Читать книгу Heart of Fire - Kat Martin - Страница 6

London, England

January, 1844

An icy drizzle hung over the churchyard. The gravestones stood dark and unreadable in the shadows of the high rock walls of St. Michael’s Church.

Gowned in layers of heavy black crepe, her face hidden beneath the veil of a wide-brimmed black bonnet, Coralee Whitmore stood next to her father and mother, the Viscount and Viscountess of Selkirk, listening to the drone of the bishop’s words but not really hearing them.

In the casket beside a mound of damp earth, her sister’s body lay cold and pale, retrieved only days ago from the chilly waters of the Avon River, the victim of a suicide, the authorities claimed. Laurel, they said, had jumped into the river to hide her shame.

“You’re shivering.” A stiff wind ruffled the viscount’s copper hair, the same fiery shade as Coralee’s. He was a man of average height and build whose imposing presence made him seem much larger. “The bishop has finished. It is time we went home.”

Corrie stared at the casket, then down at the long-stemmed white rose she carried in a black-gloved hand. Tears blurred her vision as she moved forward, her legs stiff and numb beneath her heavy black skirt, the veil on her hat fluttering in the cold February breeze. She laid the rose on top of the rosewood casket.

“I don’t believe it,” she whispered to the sister she would never see again. “Not for a single moment.” Corrie swallowed against the painful, choking knot in her throat. “Farewell, sweet sister. I shall miss you ever so much.” Turning, she walked toward her parents, the father both sisters shared and the mother who was Corrie’s alone.

Laurel’s mother had died in childbirth. The viscount had remarried, and Corrie had been born soon after. The girls were half sisters, raised together, always close, at least until the past few years. Then Corrie’s job as society editor for Heart to Heart, a London ladies’ gazette, had begun to absorb more and more of her time.

Laurel, who had always preferred the quiet life of the country, had moved in with her aunt Agnes at Selkirk Hall, the family estate in Wiltshire. The girls kept in touch through letters, but in the last year even those had grown sparse.

If only I could turn back time, Corrie thought, the lump in her throat swelling, becoming even more painful. If only I could have been there when you needed me.

But she had been too busy with her own life, too busy attending the balls and soirées she wrote about in her column. She’d been too self-absorbed to realize Laurel was in trouble.

And now her sister was dead.

“Are you all right, Coralee?”

Standing in the Blue Salon of the Whitmores’ Grosvenor Square mansion, Corrie turned at the sound of her best friend’s voice. Krista Hart Draugr walked toward her across the drawing room, where the pale blue damask curtains had been draped with black crepe, as had the brocade sofa and Hepplewhite chairs.

Corrie reached beneath her heavy black veil to brush a tear from her cheek. “I’ll be all right. But I miss her already and I feel so…responsible.”

Most of the mourners, few in number because of the circumstances of Laurel’s death, were in the Cinnamon Room, a lavish salon done in gold and umber, with huge, sienna marble fireplaces at each end. An extravagant buffet had been set out for the guests, but Corrie had no heart for food.

“It wasn’t your fault, Coralee. You had no idea your sister was in trouble.” Krista was blond, fair and tall; taller, in fact, than most men, except for her husband, Leif, a blond giant of a man who towered over his wife and actually made her look small.

One of the handsomest men Corrie had ever seen, he stood across the drawing room in conversation with his brother, Thor, who was dark instead of fair, nearly equal in size and, in a fiercer way, even more handsome.

“I should have grown suspicious when her letters dwindled to nearly nothing,” Corrie said. “I should have known something was wrong.”

“She was twenty-three, Coralee. That is two years older than you, and she was very independent. And she wrote you from Norfolk, as I recall.”

Last summer, Laurel had traveled to East Dereham in Norfolk to live with her other aunt, Gladys. Along with Allison, a cousin about Corrie’s age, they were the only relatives on her mother’s side that Laurel had. Laurel had never gotten along with Corrie’s mother, but her aunts, both spinsters, loved her like a daughter, and Laurel had loved them.

“She wrote to me from Norfolk, yes, but only on rare occasions. We had just resumed a serious correspondence last month, after her return to Selkirk Hall.”

According to the Wiltshire County constable, when Laurel was in residence at Selkirk, she had gotten herself with child. Agnes had kept Laurel’s secret until her pregnancy began to show, then sent her north to live with Gladys until the baby was born.

Corrie looked up at Krista, who stood a good six inches taller than she, a buxom young woman with lovely blue eyes, while Corrie was small-boned, with eyes a vivid shade of green. Krista was a mother now, but she still ran the gazette, a magazine for ladies that was well known for its views on social reform.

“The police believe she committed suicide,” Corrie said. “They say she took the child she had carried in her womb for nine long months and jumped into the river because she couldn’t bear the shame. I don’t believe it. Not for a moment. My sister would never harm anyone, much less her own baby.”

Krista’s gaze held a trace of pity. “I know you loved her, Corrie, but even if you are right, there is nothing you can do.”

Corrie ignored the feeling those words stirred. “Perhaps not.”

But she wasn’t completely convinced.

She had been thinking about the circumstances of her sister’s death since news of the tragedy had arrived—her sister drowned, remnants of an infant’s blue knit sweater clutched in her hand.

Corrie had been devastated. She loved her older sister. She couldn’t imagine a world without her in it.

Dreadful things were being said about Laurel but Corrie refused to believe them. Laurel’s death could not possibly have been suicide.

In time, surely the truth would be unearthed.