Chapter 3

The next morning, I saw Lydia carrying a stack of receipts into the records room. I followed her. She was tossing the previous night's prescription slip and the rest of the pharmacy receipts into the fireplace.

I snatched one off the table before it could burn. It listed black cohosh, rue, and iron supplements. The buyer was Lydia's personal maid. The date was three months before the wedding.

I had helped Helena manage the charity hospital's accounts for years. I knew these herbs. Taken in certain doses, they could stop a woman's periods, cause nausea and bloating, and mimic pregnancy. On the table was also a marriage license Lydia and Adrian had filed for in advance, along with a receipt from a doctor they had bribed for a false certificate.

I held up the prescription. "You're not pregnant."

Lydia froze for a second, then smiled. There was no one else in the room. She did not even bother with tears.

"That's right." She threw the last slip into the fire. "But they all believed it."

"Why?"

"Because I wanted to watch you get driven away from that altar." She walked up to me, beaming. "If I'd said something beforehand, they would have shut the doors and talked you into giving in quietly. Where's the fun in that? I wanted you in your wedding dress, giving up your place in front of everyone."

"And Adrian? Was he just something else for you to steal?"

"What else? I wanted everything you had: the eldest daughter's room, Mother's necklace, a wedding into the Grey family, the title of Duchess of Northsea. I didn't want to leave you a single thing."

I picked up the unburned doctor's receipt from the table. "I'm taking this to the constable right now. And I'll tell Adrian the truth."

Lydia lunged for it. I dodged, and her nails raked across the back of my hand. My maid, Martha Hale, heard the commotion and came running, arriving just in time to see Lydia grab the candlestick and bring it down on my forehead.

I staggered back two steps. Blood ran down from my brow. When Lydia saw Martha, real panic crossed her face for the first time.

"Shut the door," she snapped at Martha.

Martha did not move. Instead, she ran to my side and helped me up. Lydia clenched her jaw, swept her arm across the table, and knocked the kerosene lamp to the floor. The glass shattered. Flames licked up the tablecloth and surged toward the forged documents.

"The lamp fell over." She backed toward the door, her tone as light as if she had tipped over a glass of water. "The evidence is gone."

I yanked down the heavy curtain to smother the fire, but she shoved a bookshelf over. The wooden frame crashed straight down. I twisted sideways to dodge, and the edge scraped across my shoulder, leaving it numb. Martha was pinned beneath it, her forehead striking the corner of the table. Blood poured out.

"Help me!" I dropped to my knees and tried to drag her free.

Lydia stood in the doorway, arms crossed. "Why would I help you? I can't risk letting you reach Northsea alive. What if you tell someone what happened today?"

"Martha saw everything. If you kill us both, this only gets worse."

"Then let her die with you."

She pulled a threatening letter forged in my handwriting from her pocket and tossed my lost handkerchief and the kerosene lamp's registry tag into the fire.

That was when I finally understood. She had planned everything. Whether or not I discovered the fake pregnancy, she was always going to pin this fire on me.

Lydia gripped the door handle and smiled over her shoulder. "Evelyn, haven't you always been the one to clean up my messes? Do it for me one last time."

The door closed. The deadbolt clicked shut.

Smoke pressed down from above. I wrapped my hand in my skirt, heaved the bookshelf aside, and dragged Martha's unconscious body toward the window. The curtains were already ablaze. Sparks rained from the wooden beams overhead.

The last thing I saw before I blacked out was my handkerchief on the floor, embroidered with my name.

Five days until my wedding to the Duke of Northsea.

It felt like I was going to die here.