Dirty Aristocrat(40)

'Yes, she was.'

'She wasn't. She was a dancer.'

'Oh well, here's something you didn't know. Your mother sold her body to pay for her treatments.'

I felt angry tears flood my eyes and start dribbling down my face. 'I  don't believe you,' I shouted angrily. My mother was the one pure thing  in my life.

'Believe what you want. As if I care either way. You're not my sister. I  hate you and I've always hated you. If anything this makes me even  happier to get rid of you. How could Robert favor you over us? If we  didn't have to preserve your face, I would love to punch it in.'

'Don't even think about,' Dr. Spencer interjected. 'Keep the emotions out. Or we'll all be rotting in prison.'

I concentrated all my attention on Rosalind. 'The money was not for me. It is supposed to be used for the charity.'

She frowned. 'That ridiculous turtle nonsense?'

'Yes. It is not for me. I'm just supposed to administer it. Make sure  the foundation carries on in the way Robert wanted.' Then an idea  occurred to me. 'But I can sign it all over to you.'

She stiffened suddenly. 'Thank you, but that won't be necessary. I'll just do it the old fashioned way. Murder.'

'That's just stupid. Why take such a big risk? Don't you think the  police would find it very suspicious that I came here for no reason at  all and drowned in a shallow lake?'

'Maybe, but if there is no proof of foul play …  '

'Are you sure you covered all your tracks Rosalind. In this day and age  there are many way to trip up a murderer? How did you get here? How many  CCTV cameras caught your face, or Dorian's, or Bianca's?'

Then I saw a tiny glimpse of hope. A look crossed her face. Uncertainty.         

     



 

I pressed home my point. 'My marriage is not legal. You have the proof  sitting in my solicitor's safe. You can contest the will.'

'You must think I was born yesterday. And while I'm doing all this,  you're not going to tell anyone that we kidnapped you and brought you  here intending to kill you.'

'Who would believe me?'

She shook her head. 'Nope. I'll take my chances with murder. It's worked  for millennia. It's how all my ancestors got rid of their enemies.'

I could feel the adrenaline pumping in my blood. I could take her. Even  bound up I could whoop her ass. She was not as clever as she thought. I  stared at her fiercely. 'You don't get it. I've already transferred all  my money into the trust. None, of you can touch it without me.'

Dorian and Bianca froze.

'You're lying,' Rosalind shouted, but I could see that I had unsettled  her for the first time. For the first time I had the upper-hand. I could  do this.

'How do you know?' I challenged, my voice strong and sure.

'Because you haven't,' Ivan's voice reverberated around the room.

At the sound of his voice my body sagged. The betrayal was complete. He came into the room.

'You made a phone call yesterday to his office and you have an  appointment for tomorrow, but even so, without my say so you cannot make  any such decision. So my darling, as it stands, the Maxwell fortune is  still all in your name.'

He stood in front of me in his black leather jacket, a total stranger.  Did I dance goofily with this man in a sex club called The Dirty  Aristocrat?

'Are you all right?' he asked me, his eyes quickly and impersonally pouring over my body. Where had all the passion gone?

I wanted to spit in his face. I knew there was no point in trying to ask  him for mercy. He knew I was in love with him and he could do this to  me. I glared at him with murderous hatred, and he smiled. 'That's my  girl,' he whispered softly and turned away.

'Are we all agreed that we do this?'

Without the silence of hesitation every single person in the room spoke up and offered their agreement.'

'Right. Let's get on with it, but first there's something I've wanted to  do for a very fucking long time. Faster than I could blink, he swung  his fist out and crashed it slap bang into the middle of Dorian's face.  The thud was rather delightful. I thought I heard bone crunch.

'Fuck,' Dorian screamed in pain, clutching his nose with both his hands.  Blood rushed out between his fingers like a bubbling brook. 'What the  fuck? You broke my fucking nose.'

Ivan grinned. 'I did you a favor. Now you won't be the prettiest bitch on your prison block.'

'What?' Rosalind screeched. 'You asshole you.' She went flying towards him in a fury.

'We're done,' Ivan shouts and all of a sudden the place was crawling  with policemen and other people. I was in such a state I couldn't make  sense of the scene before me. Men were grabbing Rosalind and she was  screaming wild abuse at me and them. Bianca was sobbing and telling  everyone that she was innocent. She had been forced to cooperate, and  Dorian, with blood pouring down his face, looking stunned and stupid.





CHAPTER 35


Tawny Greystoke

As soon as our eyes locked, everyone else and everything else in the  room melted away, my mouth opened and I started howling like some  demented animal. I seemed to have no control over my actions. My whole  body was shaking uncontrollably. In an instant he was there next to me.  He wrapped his strong arms around me and held me like he had never done  since Robert gave me to him.

'You conspired with them,' I sobbed loudly. 'You made me hate you.'

He stroked my hair, his face pained. 'I know. I know, darling. I'm so sorry, but there was no other way to do it.'

I looked at him with accusing eyes. 'I was so frightened. I thought they  were going to kill me, but what hurt even more was that you betrayed  me.'

'I'm sorry, sweetheart. I really am. Please try to understand. I had no choice,' he murmured in my ear.

'You could have told me,' I whimpered.

'You are the worst actress I've ever met in my life, Tawny Greystoke.  You'd have given the game away straight away. It was too important. I  couldn't take the chance, my darling.'

'They could have hurt me, and then what would you have done,' I said.

His jaw hardened suddenly and his eyes were like chips of slate. 'You were never in any danger. Not for one tiny second.'

I sniffed pitifully, and he took an army knife from his leather jacket and started to cut through the Clingfilm.         

     



 

'I was always there, sweet Tawny. I had to do it this way. I had to  flush them out. I can't be looking over my shoulder for the rest of our  lives. That bunch of airheads would never give up, and they are stupid  enough for me to actually fear them.'

As soon as I felt my limbs become free, the dam I had been holding back  broke, I hid my face in his chest and sobbed my eyes out. He held me and  let me stay there. He knew it was just pent up emotion and it was  better out than in.

When the tears subsided and I raised my head, Dr. Spencer was standing  in front of us. The whole world was upside down. Dr. Spencer who I'd  always thought hated me was working behind the scenes to save me.

'I'm sorry I frightened you,' he said softly.

I shook my head to signify that it didn't matter. 'What about James?' I asked.

He shook his head.

'Right,' I said sadly. How blind I had been. Everyone had managed to fool me. 'Does he have a sick wife?'

'I believe he has a wife, but she is not sick.'

'Well. Never mind.'

He leaned forward and gently patted my shoulder. 'You'll be all right, Lady Greystoke.'

'Please call me Tawny.'

'Then you must call me Harry,' he said with a smile.

'I will. I always wanted to be close to you because Robert loved you so much, but you were always so cold and horrible to me.'

'I'm sorry. It was necessary.' He put his hand into his jacket and held out an envelope.

'For me?' I whispered.

He nodded.

'What is it?' I asked looking at it.

'It's from Robert.'

'Robert?' I repeated with a frown.

'Yes. He knew this day would come. He planned very carefully, Tawny. He  loved you so much. You changed him. He said until you came into his  life, he was a cold, unfeeling creature. He always thought of you as the  golden child that changed Silas Marner's life.'

I took the envelope in my hand. It had my name across the front in  Robert's scrawly handwriting. I looked up at Harry, confused and  disturbed. 'But he never left you anything in the will?'

'No, if he had then Rosalind would not have trusted me.'

'But you lost out,' I said.

He smiled. 'Everything I wanted I already received while Robert was alive.'

'No,' I decided firmly. 'I'm going to give you the inheritance you  deserve. I'm going to see that you're all right, Harry. I'm going to  make you rich.'

He smiled sadly.

'Why does that make you sad?' I asked, surprised by his reaction.

'I was just thinking of Robert. How well he knew us all.'

'What do you mean?'

'He told me that the day I gave you this envelope you would give me more  than anything he would have. He used the exact words you used. "She'll  make you rich," he said.' He sighed. 'Anyway, I should be going.'

'Goodbye Harry and thank you so much for everything you have done. You'll be hearing from my solicitor very soon.'

He smiled. 'Thank you.'

As he walked away Ivan turned to me. 'Come on,' he said. 'I'll take you somewhere you can sit and read that letter.'

There were still some policemen loitering about but almost everybody was  gone. Carefully, Ivan lifted me up and carried me as if I was a baby to  Robert's study. He took me to Robert's favorite chair and lowered me on  to the dustsheet. 'Read your letter and we'll talk when I come back.  There is so much I want to tell you,' he said.