Home Before Sundown

Chapter 10-2

Banan had been the youngest, not-too-bright son of an earl who was rich as Croesus, or so he’d said. And the old man had one foot in the grave to boot.

She’d hoped for one of the older sons, but they were either already married or courting. Not that she would have let that stop her, but she wanted to be a wife, not a mistress. Banan was the best she could do—by marrying him, she obtained an honorable before her name—but she’d had plans to get rid of his brothers and whoever else might stand between what should have rightly been hers. She planned to make sure Banan inherited the old man’s wealth as well as his title. She’d be Lady Deirdre…

Only all her dreams had come crashing down like a house of cards when Banan, who was horse-mad, got himself kicked in the head by one of his damned hunters. He’d wound up a drooling i***t, confined to his bed, babbling nonsense like an infant.

Of course, there were men who appreciated a woman with a…complaisant husband, but if she’d been willing to walk that path, she never would have tied herself to a man with no more brains than a flea.

The least he could have done was have the courtesy to die.

She looked good in black—she was one of the few women in her family who could carry off the stark color—and no one realized she’d covered that buffoon’s face with his pillow. He hadn’t even struggled.

No one except Aislinn, the oldest brother’s witch of a wife. She had suspected something and started poking around. The brothers had been fond of Banan, and if they’d learned she was behind his death, they would have killed her.

Deirdre had had no choice but to flee the country, using the excuse she’d been widowed by the Great Famine and had nothing left as the reason behind her leaving.

So she changed her name, caught a steamship leaving for America, and wound up in Hoboken. She’d met an old man with money who was more than willing to marry her. She’d thought he wanted her on his arm as an ornament—he was not only old, but he also had a heart ailment, for which he took laudanum. Who’d have thought he had it in him to make love? It was a miscalculation on her part, one she had no intention of accepting. Increasing his dosage hadn’t been difficult, and it took care of the situation.

After all, once you’d put one husband out of his misery, it wasn’t so very difficult to do the same for the next one.

He’d left all his money to her, his loving wife, and it hadn’t taken her long to make her way to New York City. She’d changed her name once again, and in an even shorter span of time, she’d found the boarding house in the East Village. She’d hoped to rent rooms to gentlemen, one of whom might be interested in a wife, but for some reason she only seemed able to attract widows.

Until Tom Pettigrew came looking for a room for himself and his son. At first she hadn’t seen him as a candidate for husband number three. After all, the man was a mere hansom driver, and Deirdre intended to continue going up in the world, thank you very much. If she couldn’t have a title and wealth, she’d have wealth. She’d gone into his room to clean; that was what she intended to tell anyone who might find her there, because she wasn’t a thief. But then she’d found that ruby brooch at the bottom of the saddlebag at the back of the wardrobe. The size of the ruby alone…she knew it was worth a fortune. There was also a title to land—a vast amount of land—in the Dakota Territory. What she didn’t know was if Tom Pettigrew was that wealthy, why was he slumming in the East Village? She’d turned over the brooch and decided that if he brought it along with him, she didn’t care….

* * * *

The door burst open, returning her to the present, and she flinched from the high-pitched wails.

“Deirdre!” Eilís Keogh cried. “Oh, my dear! Are you all right?”

“Of course I’m not all right.” Deirdre frowned at the woman who’d come rushing in.

“Did that man do something to my precious girl?” Eilis took a handkerchief from a pocket and patted her cheeks dry.

“Tom Pettigrew has left. He’ll no longer be residing with us.” After what had gone on tonight, Deirdre found she enjoyed the attention.

“I saw him as he was about to walk out the door. Oh, Deirdre, what have you done?”

“What makes you think I did anything?” Deirdre glared at her. Eilís had changed her tune quick enough, she thought sourly. What happened to her precious girl? “Why does everyone always blame me for whatever happens?”

“You forget I’ve known you since you opened this boarding house.”

“Well, I didn’t do anything. I simply tried to warn him that St. Claire trollop would never be safely delivered of the child she’s carrying.”

“You said that to a man who lost his beloved wife in childbirth? Oh, Deirdre, how could you?”

“It’s the truth,” she said sulkily.

“Just a second…Miss St. Claire is in an interesting condition?”

Deirdre rolled her eyes. “Didn’t you suspect anything when she spent the mornings puking her guts up?”

“Well…er…no. Is Mr. Pettigrew the father? Such a shame. He seemed like a very nice man.”

“Fool,” Deirdre muttered under her breath. “No man is nice.” She dismissed the other woman’s presence. Deirdre wanted Tom Pettigrew—it didn’t matter whether or not she’d been taken by his blond hair and blue eyes from the first moment she’d seen him—and she was going to have him.

“The girls are waiting to serve dinner.” Eilís stood there wringing her hands.

“Tell them to go ahead.” She rose to her feet and shook out her skirts. “I have some thinking to do.”

“But—”

She walked out of the dining room without responding.

It had been a simple matter to dispose of two husbands of her own. It should be equally simple to dispose of someone’s wife.