Page 94 of The Duke's Cursed Bride
Uncle Joseph left the room for the kitchen. A moment later, he returned with a few leaves in his hand.
“Yes!” Madeleine said. “Those very leaves!”
“Mint,” Uncle Joseph agreed. “A fine addition to tea, but it would do nothing for nightmares.”
“Then why did you send them?”
“I told you, I didn’t. If you had mint leaves, they didn’t come from me.”
“But the herb today…” she remembered that she had put the note he’d sent her in her pocket, and she pulled it out and passed it to him.
He read it quickly. “I didn’t write this, Madeleine. Someone is impersonating me. You say it came with another herb?”
“And when we gave it to Thomas, he nearly died! I would have died too if I’d had any to drink.”
Uncle Joseph held up the note and sniffed at it. His eyes widened.
“Oleander,” he said.
“What?”
“That’s oleander. That’s a deadly poison. You put this in yourtea, Madeleine?”
Madeleine couldn’t help it—she burst into frightened tears.
“I didn’t know,” she whispered. “I didn’t know what it was.”
“Well, of course you didn’t.” He wrapped his arms around her. “You didn’t have any, did you? You’re all right?”
“I’m all right. Thomas isn’t, though. This nearly killed him.” She wiped her eyes. “I nearly killed him, Uncle Joseph.”
“I don’t know what you mean by that. Of course you didn’t. You didn’t do anything to him.”
“I gave him the oleander.”
“Because someone gave it to you. Not because you wanted him to have it. You can’t blame yourself for everything, Madeleine. Come in and sit down.”
He led her into the sitting room and wrapped a blanket around her shoulders to comfort her. She closed her eyes, trying to forget how it had felt to see Thomas lying on the floor beside the dining room table.
She didn’t think she would ever forget it.
She had just managed to rid herself of the nightmares of her youth, but these would take their place. She would dream of the moment she had looked at him and known that her curse had struck him down.
After all. In spite of everything she had tried to do to protect him.
“This isn’t your fault,” Uncle Joseph said quietly.
“It is. It’s my curse.”
“No, it isn’t. You were attacked, Madeleine. You and your husband were attacked. That isn’t a curse. You’ve been the victim of a crime.”
Madeleine covered her face with her hands, afraid to let herself believe she wasn’t to blame.
“Think about it,” Uncle Joseph urged. “What did you think all those years ago when Thomas was stabbed? When you found him out on the grounds of the estate? Did you think he was the victim of a curse?”
“I thought he was the victim of an attack.”
“That’s exactly right. He was a victim. He wasn’t cursed. He didn’t do anything to bring what happened down upon him. He didn’t deserve it, Madeleine.”
