The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes (London Highwaymen, #2)(54)

That was something they had in common—they were neither of them, perhaps, especially good, at least not by any standard Marian had ever heard of. But they would do what it took to protect the people who were theirs. They would do what needed to be done, maybe because nobody else would do it.

“Would you mind going around the side of the church with me?” He hadn’t let go of her hand, so she led him beneath the tall windows, where they could still hear the singing. “There,” she announced. “That’s nice.”

Rob coughed out a laugh, his breath fogging the air between them. “I don’t know why I’m surprised that your idea of a good time is lurking in a boneyard on a cold and moonless night.”

“It’s not quite moonless,” she said, because she really couldn’t take issue with the rest of it. The sun had set while they were in the church and darkness descended as abruptly as it always did in midwinter.

“It’s been a long time since I set foot in a church.”

She squeezed his hand and it had the effect that she had hoped gripping the pew would: some of the doubt and confusion that had been chasing her seemed to recede into the background. She wasn’t any less confused or doubtful, but she felt like she could live with it as long as she had something to hold on to.

“My mother—not my adoptive mother, but the woman you know about in London—was very young when I was born, so she arranged for me to be fostered by a childless couple. The head gardener at Cheveril Castle and his wife, in fact.”

Marian raised an eyebrow. “You were raised by the duke’s gardener?”

Rob nodded. “She wrote to me a few times a year and paid for my schooling, but I never met her until after my adoptive parents died and Kit and I went to London. By that point, we had been living rough for the better part of a year, and Kit had come down with a cough that I didn’t like the sound of, so I swallowed my pride. It wasn’t easy to go for help to the mother who had given me away, you understand?”

“I can imagine,” Marian said, trying not to think of Eliza, who she had left some fifty miles away.

“To be clear, I didn’t want to ask anyone for help, but especially not someone to whom my existence was . . . complicated. But it turned out that it wasn’t complicated at all. She was glad that my mum and dad looked after me, and later she was pleased that she could afford to educate me.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because my mother wasn’t whatever we mean when we think of good mothers. But she was a good parent. There are plenty of fathers who never bother to see that their children are looked after, let alone loved and educated. When I went to her for help, she gave it to me.” He was silent for a moment. “I saw you looking at the altarpiece. Madonna and child, and so forth. There will come a time when you haven’t recently killed on your daughter’s behalf or nearly died bringing her into the world, and you’ll likely settle into something a good deal less complicated than whatever it is you’re feeling now.”

Marian swallowed. She hadn’t realized that her thoughts were so transparent, nor had she realized exactly how much Rob knew about her history. “I know that I didn’t abandon Eliza,” she finally said. “It’s not that. It’s more that I know I don’t feel whatever a mother is meant to feel for her child.” She knew there were reasons for that, but none of them were good enough. “And I didn’t shoot the duke for her. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I don’t know the details, but I suspect the duke found out that you knew about his bigamy and threatened Eliza so you’d keep quiet.”

Marian felt hot despite the chill in the graveyard. “If he had threatened Eliza, he would have been dead much sooner. And I wouldn’t have been satisfied with a single shot. I’d have unloaded every pistol I could get my hands on.”

Beside her, he went silent for a moment. “Holland, then.”

“The duke found—he found out that I knew about his bigamy the morning of the highway robbery. The truth is that he had always hated Percy and made no secret of it, and I think he was rather looking forward to being rid of him. And, sure enough, he recognized Percy during the hold up and shot him. So I shot the duke, because even though he had aimed badly that day, he wouldn’t the next time.” That wasn’t the whole truth, but it was enough, and it felt good to say it aloud, in all its bleakness, and to know that Rob understood.

Rob nodded, as if this all made perfect sense, which Marian was fairly certain it did not.

“It wouldn’t only have been Mr. Webb’s cough,” Marian said, mainly because she didn’t want to think about that charnel house of a carriage or the duke’s labored breathing. Instead she recalled her realization when they had left the church. “I don’t think you would have gone to your mother just for your friend’s health.” It was a shot in the dark, but Rob opened his eyes wide for a moment, so she knew she was close to the truth.

He shifted his body so there was suddenly space between them, and until the cold air reached her, she hadn’t realized how close they had been. “We got into some trouble with a smuggling gang in Rye,” Rob said. “I needed to take care of that in a way Kit wouldn’t approve of, so I left him with my mother for a few weeks.”

“Did Kit know?”