Gallant Waif by Anne Gracie (the alpha prince and his bride full story free .txt) 📗

Jack could restrain himself no longer. Already he’d had to wait until he and Francis had changed and refreshments served to Mr Phillips.

The elderly lawyer looked momentarily shocked at his bluntness, but after a moment seemed to come to a decision. He allowed a discreet smile to transform his face.

“Yes, sir, you have guessed correctly, although I must say no more until I have informed Miss Farleigh of the whole. But it is wonderful news indeed.”

Jack turned to Francis. “According to my grandmother, Kate’s Delacombe grandparents were extremely wealthy. Undoubtedly they have left her a legacy,” he said, feeling unaccountably low.

“That should please Kate. Girl deserves a bit of good fortune,” Francis said.

“Wait a minute…” said Jack slowly. “I thought all the money went to that cousin of hers.”

“That’s right,” said Francis, sitting up.

“What cousin is that?” said Mr Phillips, frowning. “I investigated the matter very thoroughly, and to the best of my knowledge there is no living cousin.”

“Fellow called Cole.”

“Cole!” snorted Phillips rudely. “He is no cousin of hers. I’ve sent Bow Street Runners after him!”

“What?” Both men leaned forward, riveted.

“Well, if it is the same man—Jeremiah Cole, big fellow with sandy hair?” They nodded. “He’s the rascally solicitor that I caught with his hands in the honeypot, so to speak. He slipped out of my hands a few weeks ago and disappeared.”

“Good God!”

“Fellow has been discreetly helping himself to funds from the Delacombe estate for some time since his father, the previous trustee, died.”

“Good God!” exclaimed Francis again.

“Do you mean to say that swine was embezzling Kate’s money? And that he’s no relation at all to her?”

Phillips nodded. “Yes, indeed. But how do you know of him?”

Jack exchanged a long look with Francis. The motive for Cole’s abduction of Kate was perfectly clear now. Had he forced Kate to marry him, her entire inheritance would have legally belonged to him. But there was no need to let Phillips know of the abduction attempt.

“He was here,” said Jack grimly. “Posing as Miss Far-leigh’s cousin and attempting to get her to marry him.”

Mr Phillips gasped in amazement. Jack glanced at Francis. “You should have let me kill him, you know,” he murmured.

“The Runners will get him, old man. He’ll hang, or be transported at the very least.”

“If they catch him.”

“Oh, they’ll catch him, no fear of that,” said Mr Phillips confidently. “I have no doubt at all. None at all.”

“They’d better,” growled Jack.

“I don’t suppose he got his greasy paws on too much of Miss Farleigh’s inheritance?” asked Francis diffidently.

Jack shot a look at him. Francis had no need of a rich wife.

“No, no. Fortunately the great majority of her inheritance is tied up so he could not touch it, and the whole is of such a size that it makes Cole’s depredations almost negligible, a fact I expect he was counting on, should the heirs ever have been discovered,” said Mr Phillips, rendered indiscreet by the generous quantity of brandy his host had pressed upon him.

Jack’s heart sank. She was rich, immensely so, from what Phillips had inadvertently revealed. She would not stay here long, in that case. With a fortune she would have need of nothing, nobody.

“I gather there’s some significance to your arrival in my grandmother’s carriage,” he said heavily.

“Yes, so very kind of her ladyship,” agreed Mr Phillips. “I am to convey Miss Farleigh to London as soon as may be convenient. Lady Cahill has great plans for her, I believe, great plans.”

“I’ll wager she has,” muttered Jack sourly.

“Perhaps Miss Farleigh will have her own ideas about that,” suggested Francis. “She may not wish to leave here.”

“Not wish to leave here!” Mr Phillips was astonished. He glanced around the shabby room. “Not wish to live in a fine London house, to go to balls and routs? Why would she not?”

“Why not, indeed?” murmured Jack. “If you will excuse me, I must go upstairs and have my man see to this curst leg.”

He stumped wearily upstairs, almost relishing the distraction of the pain of his leg. He stopped at the door to Kate’s room and stood there for several minutes. There was something to be said for purely physical pain, after all. An hour or so of massage, a half-bottle of brandy and it was cured.

Neither of those remedies would help the other sort of pain. In fact, they only served to intensify it; massage invariably conjured up the memory of the time when Kate first laid her small, strong hands on his leg, kneading, stroking, caressing… And as for brandy—there was neither pleasure nor forgetfulness for him in getting drunk now, for the very scent of alcohol recalled that night when she had stormed into his sanctuary like a small avenging angel, smashing all his decanters and bottles. He would never forget the look on her face that night… nor what occurred afterwards… the pleasure, the madness, the bitterness.

He had to let her go. She had no future with him. Not now. Not since she had become a rich woman. She might have agreed to take him on in exchange for a home, shabby as it was, for security, for his protection for the rest of her life. He hadn’t dared to speak of love. That would have remained his secret. But a home—that might have been enough for a girl who had lost everything. That and the promise of a family. To an orphan, the promise of a family might have been appealing.

None of those things held any significance now. She didn’t need to marry now—she could choose. She would go up to London and choose. He would never ask her now—he would not have her think him a fortune hunter. He cursed the De-lacombe inheritance. He cursed Mr Phillips. Had the man not arrived when he did, Jack might have had her agreement to wed him already. And he would have wasted no time, would have had her to the village church the very next day.

He glanced up and down the corridor, then leaned