Chapter Twenty

Sebastian fought for his self-control. The urge to throw himself at Curling in a mindless rage was almost overpowering. The sight of Prudence being held hostage sent a shock of wild anguish through him. He knew such ungoverned emotion would be lethal if he did not master it.

"What do you hope to accomplish, Curling?" Sebastian forced himself to use the bored tone of voice he had perfected so well.

Curling's smile was thin with menace. "You know what I intend to accomplish. Did you really think I would allow you to banish me from England and destroy my fortune?"

"Your fortune?"

"Do not pretend ignorance. You know very well what I'm talking about." Curling's arm tightened around Prudence's throat. "I'm not a fool. I know what will happen to my business affairs if I leave England. The investors will assume that madman, Bloomfield, is in charge. There will be panic. The company will go bankrupt in no time if I am not here to take command."

Sebastian shrugged. "A possibility, I suppose."

"Goddamn it to hell. You know that is exactly what you intended," Curling snarled. "Did you really think I'd let you get away with it? I had everything carefully planned and I am not about to let you ruin those plans."

Garrick stirred on the floor. "This is all my fault, isn't it?"

Curling did not bother to glance at him. He kept his gaze on Sebastian. "You can take some of the credit, if you like. I needed information on Angelstone, you see. Everyone talked about how much he hated the rest of the Fleetwoods, but I was not so certain how deep his hatred went."

"You mean you didn't know if I would use my position to protect my cousin if he were implicated in murder?" Sebastian asked.

"Precisely," Curling said. "I could never figure out why, if you hated your relatives so much, you had not already used your power to crush them."

"You did not comprehend," Prudence said in her most admonish­ing tones, "because you knew that if you had been in Angelstone's position, you would have long since crushed the family."

"Exactly." Curling's eyes were still on Sebastian. "I needed to know more about Angelstone's motives and how he would react if I proceeded to use Jeremy Fleetwood in my scheme."

"So you got me drunk and pried the information out of me," Gar-rick said in a tone of savage self-disgust.

"It was an easy enough task," Curling said. "And extremely re­warding. You assured me that Angelstone would be quite happy to see any one of his relatives rot and that he would probably find it vastly amusing to see one actually taken up for murder. Then you let slip a most fascinating tidbit."

Garrick swore in despair. "I told you about his hobby, didn't I?"

"Yes, you did." Curling smiled slowly. "You told me all about Angelstone's very interesting little hobby, including the name of his Bow Street contact."

"Damnation." Garrick glanced at Sebastian. "I don't remember any of it, Angelstone. I swear to God, I don't. I was drinking so heavily in those days. There's so much I cannot recall from that time."

"I know." Sebastian did not take his attention off Curling. "It makes no matter now."

"I altered my plans accordingly," Curling said. "I decided it would be ideal to have Angelstone actually conduct the investigation. He would be certain to recognize the evidence I intended to use to impli­cate his cousin."

"An interesting precaution," Sebastian said softly. "Bow Street might have overlooked the items found at the scenes of the crimes, or failed to properly identify them. I assume you were also the one re­sponsible for leaving the message in my carriage the night of Ox-enham's death?"

"Of course." Curling frowned. "I wanted you to be the first on the scene so that you could find the evidence against your cousin. I needed young Fleetwood rather badly, you know."

"Because you knew you could not murder your three partners and assume complete control of the company without drawing attention to yourself as a suspect," Sebastian said. "One death, perhaps even two, might have been accepted as accidents. But three deaths would have been hard to explain, especially when you so clearly profited from them. You needed to be able to produce someone else who had a motive to kill those three men."

"Your cousin was perfect," Curling said. "He had a motive which only I knew about but which he would be unable to deny in a court of law. I had planned to reveal everything about Lillian's death, you see. After all, I had nothing to hide. The stupid wench jumped out of a window while I and my friends were having a bit of sport with her."

"You would have testified that my cousin, who was in love with her, discovered the facts surrounding her death years later, blamed The Princes of Virtue, and set out for revenge," Sebastian said.

"Precisely." Curling shrugged. "It would have appeared that I was fated to be his last victim, but fortunately he was caught in time."

"And just to make certain he would look guilty, you provided evi­dence at the scenes of the murders that incriminated him," Prudence concluded, scorn dripping from her words. "Lord Curling, you were very stupid, indeed. You actually thought you could use Angelstone to help you carry out your scheme?"

"It seemed a reasonable assumption."

"Hah." Prudence gave a disdainful sniff. "You know nothing about my husband."

Curling's jaw tightened. "From what I was told and from the gossip that has always followed him, I assumed Angelstcne would be only too happy to use the evidence against his cousin."

Prudence's eyebrows came together in a fierce line above her spec­tacles. "You were much mistaken in my husband's character, weren't you?"

Sebastian saw Curling's arm tighten a little around Prudence's throat. "Uh, Prue—"

"Angelstone knew his duty to his family and he did it," Prudence continued, undaunted.

"Silence," Curling ordered. "You are beginning to annoy me, Lady Angelstone." He used his grip on her throat to give her a warning squeeze.

Sebastian winced.

"You were wrong about Angelstone," Prudence squeaked. "Every­one was wrong about Angelstone."

Sebastian started to worry that Curling would lose his temper and casually choke Prudence to death. "That's enough, Prue."

She blinked at him. Something she saw in his face made her fall silent.

Sebastian arched a brow. "I have been curious about one thing, Curling. How did you come to find out that my cousin cared for Lil­lian?"

"I have known from the beginning." Curling chuckled. "Lillian's uncle told me that the Fleetwood boy fancied himself in love with the girl. But the old man was pragmatic. He knew damn well the Fleet-woods would never allow the precious heir to marry a tavern wench, so he sold her to me instead."

"What did you do after the girl died?" Sebastian asked.

Curling shrugged. "I told her uncle that she had drowned and compensated him for his loss, of course. I gave him enough money to ensure that he would keep any questions he might have had to him­self."

Sebastian folded his arms and leaned against the iron bedpost. "You won't be able to get rid of the three of us tonight without raising a few questions."

"On the contrary," Curling said softly. "This will all work out very nicely, I think. I shall tell everyone that during the course of a small weekend house party here you discovered your new bride in the arms of your best friend."

"How dare you," Prudence gasped, outraged. "I would never be­tray Angelstone."

"I believe I understand, Curling," Sebastian said coolly.

"It's simple enough." Curling looked amused. "You will use a pis­tol on both your wife and your best friend. When I arrive, pistol in hand, to see what is happening, you come at me. I am forced to shoot you dead in order to save my own life. A suitable ending for the Fallen Angel."