The Duke's Masked Wife

410 Family secrets (3)

“Poison?” Mark asked, looking at Katrina who didn’t react to Clark’s accusation. She was doing a better job at controlling her facial expressions now than she did at first.

Mark considered the Barretts to be a mess but poisoning someone was new. The bad blood between Katrina and Clark was worse than he was aware of. Katrina was quite bold if she did in fact try poisoning Clark. “What proof do you have she was poisoning you? That is a big accusation to make.”

“I stayed with her after my brother’s death and slowly I started to get weak. Like there was a burning pain in my chest the more I ate and once I stopped eating food from there, I got better. I confronted her and told my mother about it but the end result was I got sent out of town. Isn’t that right, mother?” Clark smiled, enjoying the way her wrinkles became more prominent with her anger.

The least she could do was defend her son even if he wasn’t her favorite. Clark was quickly reminded today how much he hated his mother.

“Did you find poison in Katrina’s home, have a servant as a witness, or at least visit a doctor?” Mask inquired further since he couldn’t do much without any proof. He couldn’t take anyone’s word as the truth and if he did, Clark wasn’t a person he would believe told the truth. Clark was just looking to get back at his mother and sister-in-law. It didn’t help that Clark looked perfectly fine.

“No, and no but I did visit a doctor. Whatever I consume doesn’t show any effects on the outside. I might have just dropped dead one day. I’m just throwing this out so if one day someone around Katrina drops dead, you know the first suspect. We don’t know much about her background so we have no idea what she is capable of. Doesn’t that make her quite dangerous?” Clark asked, throwing suspicion on Katrina’s past which he was curious about.

Katrina wished she had Clark in her home a bit longer for the poison to work. Aside from Desmond, Clark was the one person she regretted not succeeding in the killing. His mouth never knew when to close and though he called her dangerous, he underestimated how much she could have his body in a hole with dirt covering it by nightfall.

Mark did plan to make a note of it. They made no new discoveries about Katrina’s past which concerned him every time he thought about it. Katrina was certainly not her real name but when was Katrina created? Who helped her?

It would work in the court’s favor to have Clark nearby. They needed him to keep speaking about what he knew about Katrina. This meant they couldn’t let Clark out of their sight or he would be discovered dead one day.

.....

Katrina didn’t respond to Clark as she would not give him the satisfaction of thinking she was so bothered or panicking as if her life was about to fall about. Only one person would suffer from speaking too much today. Well, two. Katrina side-eyed Greta who was about to make a fool of herself again.

“Talk about her mother. Her mother stole from my son when she ran away!” Greta went back to Melanie after Clark’s claims were ignored. She had forgotten all about his belief that Katrina tried to poison him. There was nothing she could do about it now. After what he did today, she shouldn’t have stopped Katrina.

“My daughter had no reason to steal from your son. Stop spewing lies and accept that your son was not as innocent as you thought,” Wilma spoke up, refusing to let the likes of Greta speak negatively of her daughter.

“People,” Mark sighed. Why couldn’t these meetings ever go in a civil manner?

“Some daughter you raised. Leaves her husband and daughter in the middle of the night. I bet she did it to be with a lover. Why else would she run away from her marriage?” Greta retorted. Why else would a woman leave all that she knew behind? Some man must have fed her lies of how he loved her.

“To get away from your son!” Wilma exclaimed as she would also have left to be far away from Desmond too. “The only thing she did wrong was leave her daughter behind. Still, Alessandra should have been fine in her father’s care and if he did not want that responsibility, he should have sent her to live with me. I can at least acknowledge where my daughter made mistakes but you seem to think Desmond is the victim in all of this.”

A man who kept his mother-in-law away and kept his daughter in her room was not a victim. “Your son faked letters-”

“Do you think it was easy for him to raise a child alone when your daughter ran away? He had other important things to take care of but was left to look after Alessandra too. That was Melanie’s responsibility. I am telling you, her daughter is nothing but a thief,” Greta said, wanting Mark to investigate it and bring the woman in from whatever hole she was hiding in.

Alessandra was over the back and forth about two people she wasn’t fond of. She glanced to her side to see if Edgar was just as irritated as she was and it was no surprise he was enjoying every moment of this. If he had a tail, it would certainly be wagging right now.

Nevertheless, she preferred Edgar silently enjoying all the questions and accusations being thrown around instead of him being the one under fire. She could see how people got themselves in trouble as the men of the court had not asked about any of this but Greta had started this conversation.

“Your son deserves everything that is coming to him even in death. I will one day get to the bottom of what happened between him and Melanie. I had no issue with you before today but if you continue to let my daughter’s name pass through those dry lips, I will not sit still,” Wima said.

So far, all they knew was that Melanie had run away from her marriage. It was nothing to point fingers at to take the attention off of Desmond. This was Desmond’s time and whenever Melanie returned, she would be scolded. Not right now. Not by Greta who could not acknowledge her son’s actions.

“You!” Greta abruptly stood up and leaned forward with her hand in the air ready to strike Wilma.

Wilma looked forward to Greta trying to hit her. Greta exposed what a classless woman she was and just as Wilma anticipated, the man Zachery grabbed Greta. Still, Wilma wanted Greta to try hitting her so she had a good reason to hit Greta back.

“Let go of me! I am not a simple person for you to touch as you please,” Greta argued, pushing to get out of his hold so she could get to Wilma. “I won’t let any of you ruin my son’s name.”

The sound of small scribbles turned Greta’s attention from Wilma to Katrina who took the chance to sign away her divorce. Katrina placed the pen down when her name was signed and was ready to get everything owed to her in her name.

“You trifling whore!” Greta slapped Katrina and before she could do it again, Zachary pulled her away from the table.

“Mrs. Barrett, you are out of line to lay your hands on someone in this room-”

“I’ve been hit. The person who assaulted me should be thrown into a cell even if it is only for one hour,” Katrina calmly said, not holding her cheek or wincing from the pain. This was not enough to hurt her when she endured much more than this. Despite her cheek turning red, her main focus was seeing Greta be dragged out.

“Then shouldn’t you rot in a cell for the times you have hit or mistreated me?” Alessandra asked, not to help Greta not be taken away but she couldn’t resist asking after hearing Katrina’s hypocrisy.

“I never hit or mistreated you, Alessandra. Why wouldn’t your father have punished me if I did? I took care of you the best that I could,” Katrina replied, forcing herself to cry to appear as a pitiful stepmother who always took the blame.

“Do not cry mother,” Kate said whilst looking around for something to wipe her mother’s eyes with.

“You dramatic whore!” Greta spat, disgusted with Katrina’s poor performance.

“Take her out into one of the vacant rooms for her to cool down,” Mark ordered Zachary as he could no longer put up with Greta. This meeting was dragged out far more than he would have liked. Luckily, he had experience dealing with families lashing out at each other or his patience would have snapped by now.

“Take your filthy hands off of me. Clark!” Greta called Clark to help her be released.

“Consider me dead as you wished,” Clark responded, remaining in his seat.