Page 88 of Married to the Earl

That was true. Committing murder, or even enlisting one of his associates to carry out the murder, would have been a shocking escalation for O’Flannagan.

But then, to Conor’s knowledge, Henry had never engaged in violence before either.

He had thought his friend was someone he knew, someone he could count on. He had trusted Henry with every detail of his life. Now he felt cruelly, monumentally betrayed.

“You couldn’t have done this,” he said. “O’Flannagan was my enemy, at least. You—you and I are friends.”

“That’s so like you,” Henry said. “You’re so eager to believe the best of people. You think everyone is like you, Conor. You think everyone is better than they appear, that we all have hidden wells of kindness and compassion. It never occurs to you that some of us areexactlyas we seem.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means you thought of me as a friend because we saw each other every day,” Henry said. “It means you needed a friend, and I was there, so you cast me in the role. You never listened to what I was actually saying to you, did you?”

“What were you saying to me?”

“I’ve been telling you for ages that I needed more from you,” Henry said. “I needed you to work harder around The Arc. I needed more money. I needed more leeway when it came to decision making. And you ignored me.”

“You killed a man because you wantedgreater creative control over the bar?” Conor was in disbelief. Surely that couldn’t be the answer. “How does killing Lord Hayward get you what you want? Or did you just do it to get my attention?”

“I know my desires are small to you,” Henry said, his tone scathing. “Everything I am is small to you, isn’t it? I’m not a member of theton. I’m a commoner. You think I’m lucky just to be included in your little enterprise. You think I couldn’t possibly want or expect anything more than what I already have.”

“That’s not what I think,” Conor protested. “My God, Henry, I was planning to give you a larger stake in the business. I was going to talk to you about it, but then…well, I got married, I got distracted—”

“I don’t want alarger stake,” Henry scoffed. “I should own this business. I do all the work, and you do nothing.”

“The Arc wouldn’t even exist if it weren’t for me,” Conor protested. “I put up the startup money. Don’t you remember that?”

“Oh, I remember. You’ve never let me forget it. You put up the money at the beginning, and ever since then the club has beenyours.”

“It’s yours too,” Conor said. “It was always yours too.”

“It shouldn’t be minetoo! I’m the one who works with all the suppliers and gets us everything we need to operate. I’m the one who spends time with all our customers. I’m the one who hires the staff and talks to them every night. I doeverything.What do you do, besides that initial outlay of money? You almost never even show up here anymore.”

“And so, you decided to kill Lord Hayward,” Conor said. “Why? Why would you do such a thing, Henry? How does that help you?”

Henry shook his head. “You’re such a fool,” he said. “This is why you shouldn’t be running a business. I thought you would know it was me far sooner than this. Who else could have gotten into The Arc—twice, now—without breaking anything or leaving any sign of forced entry?”

Conor didn’t know what to say to that.

“Lord Hayward was one of Killian O’Flannagan’s regular patrons,” Henry said. “I knew that the moment he turned up dead, people would connect him with O’Flannagan. And they might even look at O’Flannagan’s enemies to determine a suspect. But I couldn’t be sure.”

“So you committed the murder here,” Conor realized. “To frame me for the crime.”

“It was almost too easy. I knew you wouldn’t be coming in. When we had supper together the other night, when I pestered you about when you would be returning, you gave me a timeline I could use. That was helpful, by the way. I thank you.”

Conor gritted his teeth at the thought that he had in any way aided Henry in committing his crime. “You called him here?”

“After hours. I found him on the street. I told him that I had information against you that O’Flannagan might be able to use. He followed me right away. He was eager to get his hands on anything damaging.” Henry laughed unpleasantly. “People really don’t like you, Conor.”

It was deeply unsettling to see someone he had thought of as a friend acting so cold and cruel. Conor did not want to hear Henry describe the act of murder.

He wanted to get the violent man in front of him away from his wife.

The police are coming,he thought to himself. But he also knew that not nearly enough time had gone by. He had only been here at The Arc for a few minutes. DuBois wouldn’t alert the authorities until at least two a.m., as he had been ordered.

Conor was going to have to stall.

“So you killed him knowing that I would be blamed,” he said, trying to draw out their conversation as much as he could. Even though it was painful, he forced himself not to look at Astrid. He wanted Henry’s focus squarely on him until he could maneuver them to a safe distance.

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