A Bride by Moonlight Read Online Free PDF Page B

You should know. You let her into your office to see your father’s files. Because of that, she asked one too many questions, and Sir Wilfred feared his house of cards was collapsing.”
    Napier could only stare at the man. A cold chill was slowly creeping over him. He had allowed Lady Anisha into his office—and for selfish reasons, too. And now it was coming horrifically clear just why he had been summoned here.
    But Lazonby was still speaking—and rather too authoritatively. “So Coldwater was stalking Sir Wilfred when he saw him strike Lady Anisha and drag her in the dairy. Coldwater tried to save her but Sir Wilfred rushed him. A struggle ensued. And Coldwater’s pocket pistol went off. Accidentally.”
    “An interesting story,” said Napier snidely. “But then you’ve always possessed quite an imagination, my lord.”
    “You have Miss Ashton as a witness,” Lazonby barked. “And then there is Anisha herself. But I shall warn you here and now I’ll not have her further involved in this mess. So you are going to tidy this up, Napier. You are.”
    “The devil!” swore Napier. “I’ll do no such thing.”
    “Oh, I very much think you ought.” Miss Ashton’s voice had stopped quavering now. “For it’s all true. Moreover, Sir Wilfred said something else, Mr. Napier, just before he died—bragged about it, really.”
    “Oh?” Napier tried not to sound callous. “And what was that?”
    The lady’s odd green-blue gaze now held his, unblinking and certain, and Napier was suddenly sure he knew her.
    And he realized, too, with his policeman’s instincts that she was about to say something he did not wish to hear.
    She dragged in a deep, almost ragged breath. “Sir Wilfred bragged that he had bribed the former assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police,” she said. “He bribed your father, Mr. Napier. To ensure Rance Welham—now Lord Lazonby—was accused and convicted of a murder he did not commit.”
    Napier could only stare at her. The shiver inside him turned to a surge of blood-chilling uncertainty, like some secret, dammed-up dread too long held back. It roared in his head, threatening to burst free of all constraint.
    “No. I . . . I do not believe you,” he finally managed.
    For what else was there to say?
    Nicholas Napier had been known far and wide as the Crown’s most resolute, most ruthless man within the Metropolitan Police. And once his officers arrested a man, the chap was as good as hanged; only Lazonby had managed to slip the Newgate knot.
    As a boy, Napier had idolized his father; had always imagined him flawless. Above reproach. And if, in later years, there had come the occasional question or inconsistency . . . well, he’d be damned before he’d admit it to the likes of a convicted killer.
    If Lazonby was, in fact, a killer . . .
    Napier dragged a hand down his face. The significance of it all sunk in on him again, forcing him to will his own breath.
    Sir Wilfred—oh, he had always been too bloody clever for anyone’s good. No one would long mourn him once the shock was past.
    And Lazonby, the arrogant bastard—he had suddenly stepped a little away—ever the gentleman!—as if to give Napier the time and space to collect himself.
    Miss Ashton merely sighed. “Mr. Napier, you do not remember me, do you?” she said. “It was nearly two years ago. In your office.”
    Napier could only stare at her. And suddenly, he knew why she was so familiar. Why he felt that strange connection that was so alluring yet so disturbing.
    “Elizabeth Colburne!” he growled. “By God, this cannot be coincidence.”
    “It actually is, rather,” she said quietly, her slender hands set almost prayerfully together.
    It was her eyes, he realized. Those incredible eyes were the clue. And the only clue, too, for her hair was somehow darker, her figure fuller and far more shapely.
    “And as to what Lord Lazonby has said,” the lady went on, her voice trembling a little, “I fear