A Wicked Conceit by Anna Huber (best young adult book series txt) 📗

night her betrayal had been revealed, he seemed to have forgiven her, and I could only hope that if she was still enamored of Mr. Heron, he might give the young man a chance to prove himself worthy.

“So Mr. Lennox is Bonnie Brock Kincaid’s half brother?” Alana remarked.

I noticed Henry and Gage exchanging a glance, perhaps thinking of their own kinship. “Yes, the late Alexander Lennox of Badenoch was their father.” A fact Bonnie Brock had confirmed, however begrudgingly. Though he still wouldn’t tell me how he’d gotten hold of the Kincaid seal. “Badenoch squandered away his wealth, leaving his legitimate son with a pittance for his inheritance. As best we can work out, when Badenoch the younger realized how much wealth and influence his bastard half brother, the infamous criminal Bonnie Brock, had amassed for himself, he grew angry and jealous. He became convinced that Bonnie Brock had somehow stolen his inheritance and became determined to see him not only executed but disgraced.”

“But why include those accusations against you?”

“Partly for titillation, I imagine,” Gage replied, draping his arm over the back of the chair behind me. “And partly because his friend, Lord Kirkcowan, had vented his spleen about us. Kiera, in particular.” Because of my interference with his wife, and my role in helping her save her jewels. “But unfortunately that also opened him up to Kirkcowan’s blackmail and made the baron another loose end he had to tie up.”

“Because he knew too much? Like Rookwood?” Charlotte verified.

“Yes.”

Emma made a small sighing gurgle sound, raising her fist, and then settled back into sleep in Alana’s arms. At the sight of her contented slumbering, I relaxed back in my chair again as Gage brushed his thumb over my collarbone in reassurance. Five days following our ordeal, and none of us had yet shown symptoms of contracting the cholera morbus from our time in the squalid vaults, but I was still vigilant, alert for the signs.

It certainly didn’t help that the newspapers were filled with reports of the deadly infection’s spread elsewhere. In a little over two weeks, cholera had already claimed the lives of more than thirteen thousand people in Paris, and the numbers of victims continued to increase. Meanwhile, the outbreak in Glasgow was now expected to be far worse than Edinburgh’s. And despite the cessation of the printing of Lennox’s sequel, there were continued suspicions regarding the bodies of cholera victims, and whether the surgeons and physicians were colluding to cause more death. Only time would tell whether these rumblings grew louder or reason prevailed.

There was a rap at the door followed by Jeffers’s entry. “This just arrived for you, my lady,” he said, handing me a small box.

“Thank you,” I replied as he departed, but not before he passed a fond glance over our sleeping Emma.

“From Trevor?” Alana guessed.

“I don’t think so. Our brother sent me his best wishes two days ago.” I lifted the lid of the box and then stilled in astonishment. Inside was nestled my mother’s amethyst pendant.

Gage sat forward in equal disbelief, for I’d confided in him how McQueen’s men had taken it from me. I lifted the necklace from the box to examine it, noticing a small card underneath marked solely with the letters BB.

I supposed that answered the question whether McQueen’s men had been punished. I shied away from pondering precisely how.

Gripping the amethyst in my hand, I touched Gage’s leg in reassurance before rising to my feet. While the others conversed, I crossed the room toward the mirror near our hearth, affixing the pendant around my neck again.

“That’s Mother’s pendant,” Alana said softly, coming up behind me. I glanced over my shoulder toward the others to discover that she’d passed baby Emma to Charlotte.

“Yes. McQueen’s men took it,” I answered, forced to explain.

She nodded slowly. “And Bonnie Brock Kincaid retrieved it for you.”

“I don’t know,” I hedged, and then sighed. “But yes, probably.”

“You lead a complicated life.” She straightened the neckline of my naval blue gown. “But I suppose it’s good to have friends in high and low places.”

“I’m sure you view all of this as confirmation that you were right,” I challenged in a low voice, determined to have it out with her now if she thought Emma’s birth or our abduction had changed my mind about assisting with any investigations in the future.

“Actually, no.”

I turned to her in genuine surprise.

“Don’t mistake me. I still worry about you. I still hate the way the other ladies gossip. But I also know you don’t go chasing down every murderer or thief, willy-nilly.” She grabbed hold of my hands. “So I’ll simply have to trust your judgment on this.”

Though grateful for her change of heart, I knew this hadn’t come about on its own. “How did you . . .”

“Lady Hollingsworth called on me,” she explained, already anticipating my question.

“I see,” I replied, though I didn’t. Philip’s Aunt Jane was arrogant, controlling, and a stickler for propriety. She also disapproved of me—albeit a shade less since I’d wed Gage—and often went out of her way to find fault with Alana. She was not an easy person to converse with, even in the best of circumstances, and these were not those. I would have expected her patented blend of vitriol to make matters worse for me.

“She was asking after you and baby Emma, but what she was really after was gossip about your ordeal.”

“Naturally.”

Alana’s lips curled into a commiserating smile. “I expected her to bemoan your lack of decorum, as she always does. But . . . instead she focused all of her contempt on Mr. Lennox. Or rather, Lord Badenoch, as he should be called.”

“Does she know him?”

“Apparently, a few years ago he attempted to court her daughter, Caroline, just as she was making her debut. She even welcomed it. That is, until her eldest son, James, uncovered that Badenoch was a fortune hunter. That he’d been brought to point non plus, with only his name to recommend him.” She dipped her head closer. “But it wasn’t