Read Online A Cold Legacy by Megan Shepherd - Free Book Online

eyes would catch on a beautiful dress and images would flash in my head of potentially happier times, Montgomery wearing a suit and me wearing the gown in a chapel with all our friends and family gathered. But those images soon faded. All my family was dead. Montgomery’s only blood relation was a boy wrapped in chains.
    I closed the pattern book, sending dust into the air. Lucy looked up from the fabric samples. “What do you think of this lace?”
    The sample she held out was beautiful. A single row of scalloped edges simple enough for my taste. When I brushed my fingers over the fabric, I could practically feel it draped around me.
    I’m getting married , a voice inside me said. I was happy and yet unsettled at the same time. Would things be easier once we were married? Would our secrets matter as much? Would Montgomery forget, over time, how I’d killed those three men in cold blood?
    Would I ever forget?
    â€œIt’s perfect,” I said, trying to smile.
    Lucy drew a handful of paper bills from her purse and exchanged a few words with the dressmaker, who stumbled over promises that I’d be the most beautiful bride north of Inverness. I’d have settled for the plainest, if it meant a peaceful future for us.
    â€œI can hardly wait until the dress is ready,” Lucy said, pulling on her coat outside. “We’ll comb your hair into a chignon like that actress at the Brixton. I’m sure Elizabeth has some pins we can borrow. . . .”
    Lucy kept talking, but I only half paid attention. My eyes had fallen on a stack of old newspapers in the street outside the tavern. A GENTLEMAN’S THOUGHTS ON THE CHRISTMAS DAY MASSACRE , the headline read in bold black ink, like an accusation. My thoughts went to that bloodstained room in King’s College where my water-tank creatures had murdered three men. I took a step closer, read the byline, and nearly died of shock.
    The article was written by John Radcliffe.
    Lucy’s father .
    â€œThere’s Carlyle with the mule cart.” Lucy’s hand clamped onto mine, and I jumped. “He must be headed back to Ballentyne. I’m sure he’ll give us a ride and save our bootsthe wear. That mud was something awful.”
    I twisted away from the newspaper so she wouldn’t see her father’s name. Lucy waved Carlyle down, and the old gamekeeper steered the mule toward us, pulling it to a halt.
    â€œNot much room, but you can squeeze in there, lassies.” He jerked his head at an empty place between huge baskets of vegetables.
    I glanced back at that newspaper.
    â€œYou go,” I said, pushing Lucy toward the cart. “There’s only room for one of us to ride comfortably. I’ll walk. I’d like the time alone, anyway. Getting married, you know, so much to think about.”
    â€œAre you certain?” She climbed into the cart, looking back at me, but Carlyle whipped the mule, and the cart started with a lurch. I waved to her and she settled among the baskets, waving back, until the wagon dipped over a hill and was gone.
    Stooping down, I picked up the newspaper. The date was from a week ago—already old news, but it felt so immediate that I could practically smell the brine and damp fur of the water-tank creatures.
    It was with a heavy heart that I recently attended the funeral of three colleagues who had once been highly esteemed by society ,
    the article began.
    I pictured John Radcliffe’s pale blue eyes and shivered. As the King’s Club’s financier, Radcliffe was certainlynot innocent, though he was hardly the worst of the bunch. Money had driven him, not science. That was why he—and the rest of the lesser King’s Club members—were still alive. Not to mention that Lucy would never forgive me if I killed her father.
    Naturally I was horrified to learn of this tragedy, and even more upset that those three colleagues, whom I had once counted as friends, were