A Lady of His Own

CHAPTER 2

HE AWOKE THE NEXT MORNING TO THE SOUND OF HOOFbeats. Not on the gravel drive circling the house, but farther away, not nearing but retreating.

He’d left the French doors to his balcony open, a very un-English act, but in Toulouse he’d grown accustomed to open windows at night.

Fortuitous. Rolling from the bed, he stretched and strolled across the room. Naked, he stood in the balcony doorway watching Penny, garbed in a gold riding habit, steadily canter away. If the doors hadn’t been open, he’d never have heard her; she’d left from the stables, a good distance from the house. Sidesaddle on a roan, she was unhurriedly heading south.

To Fowey? Or her home? Or somewhere else?

Five minutes later, he strode into the kitchen.

“My lord!” Mrs. Slattery was shocked to see him. “We’re just starting your breakfast-I had no idea-”

“My fault entirely.” He smiled charmingly. “I forgot I wanted to ride early this morning. If there’s any coffee? And perhaps a pastry or two?”

In between muttering dire warnings over what was sure to befall gentlemen who didn’t start their day by sitting down to a proper breakfast, contemptuously dismissing his proffered excuse that he’d grown accustomed to French ways-“Well, you’re a proper English earl now, so you’ll need to forget such heathenish habits”-Mrs. Slattery provided him with a mug of strong coffee and three pastries.

He demolished one pastry, gulped down the coffee, scooped up the remaining pastries, planted a quick kiss on Mrs. Slattery’s cheek, eliciting a squawk and a “Get along with you, young master-m’lord, I mean,” and was out of the back door striding toward the stables ten minutes behind Penny.

Fifteen minutes by the time he swung Domino, his gray hunter, out of the stable yard and set out in her wake.

He hadn’t had the big gray out since early March; Domino was ready to run, fighting to stretch out even before he loosened the reins. The instant they left the drive for the lush green of the paddock rising to the low escarpment, he let the gelding have his head. They thundered up, then flew.

Leaning low, he let Domino run, riding hands and knees, scanning ahead as they sped southwest. Penny, sidesaddle and believing herself unobserved, would stay on the lanes, a longer and slower route. He went across country, trusting he’d read her direction correctly, then he saw her, still some way ahead, crossing the bridge over the Fowey outside the village of Lostwithiel, a mile above where the river opened into the estuary. Smiling, he eased Domino back; he clattered across the bridge five minutes later.

Returning to the high ground, from a distance he continued to track her. Fowey, her home, or somewhere else, all were still possible. But then she passed the mouth of the lane leading west to Wallingham Hall, remaining on the wider lane that veered south, following the estuary’s west bank all the way to the town of Fowey at the estuary mouth.

But the town was still some way on; there were other places she might go. The morning was sunny and fine, perfect for riding. She kept to her steady pace; on the ridge above and behind, he matched her.

Then she slowed her roan and turned east into a narrow lane. Descending from the ridge, he followed; the lane led to Essington Manor. She rode, unconcerned and unaware, to the front steps. He drew away and circled the manor, finding a vantage point within the surrounding woods from where he could see both the forecourt and the stable yard. A groom led Penny’s horse to the stables. Charles dismounted, tethered Domino in a nearby clearing, then returned to keep watch.

Half an hour later, a groom drove a light gig from the stables to the front steps. Another groom followed, leading Penny’s horse.

Charles shifted until he could see the front steps. Penny appeared, followed by two other ladies of similar age, vaguely familiar. The Essington brothers’ wives? They climbed into the gig. Penny was assisted back into her saddle. He went to fetch Domino.

He reached the junction of the Essington lane and the Fowey road in time to confirm that the ladies were, indeed, on their way south. Presumably to Fowey, presumably shopping.

Charles sat atop Domino and debated. At this point, Penny was his surest and most immediate link to the situation he’d been sent to investigate.

She was concerned enough to follow men about the countryside at night, concerned enough to refuse to tell him what she’d discovered, not without thinking and considering carefully first. Yet there she was, blithely going off to indulge in a morning’s shopping with such concerns unresolved, circling her head.

She might be female, but he’d grown up with four sisters; he wasn’t that gullible.

Penny stayed with Millie and Julia Essington for the first hour and a half of their prearranged foray through Fowey’s shops-two milliners, the haberdasherer’s, the old glove-maker’s, and two drapers. As they left the second draper’s establishment, she halted on the pavement. “I must pay my duty call-why don’t you two go on to the apothecary’s, then I’ll meet you at the Pelican for lunch?”

She’d warned them before they set out that morning that one of the retired servants from Wallingham had fallen gravely ill and she felt honor-bound to call.

“Right-oh!” Julia, rosy-cheeked and forever sunny-tempered, linked her arm in Millie’s.

Quieter and more sensitive, Millie fixed Penny with an inquiring gaze. “If you’re sure you don’t need support? We wouldn’t mind coming with you, truly.”

“No-there’s no need, I assure you.” She smiled. “There’s no question of them dying, not yet.” She’d managed not to mention any name; both Millie and Julia were local landowners’ daughters, had married and continued to live locally-it was perfectly possible anyone she might mention would have relatives working at Essington Manor.

“I won’t be long.” She stepped back. “I’ll join you at the Pelican.”

“Very well.”

“We’ll order for you, shall we?”

“Yes, do, if I’m not there before you.”

With an easy smile, she left the sisters and crossed the cobbled street. She followed it slowly uphill, then, hearing the distant tinkle she’d been listening for, she paused and glanced back. Millie and Julia were just stepping into the apothecary’s tiny shop.

Penny walked on, then turned right down the next lane.

She knew the streets of Fowey well. Tacking down this lane, then that, she descended to the harbor, then angled up into the tiny lanes leading to the oldest cottages perched above one arm of the wharves. Although protected from the prevailing winds, the small cottages were packed cheek by jowl as if by huddling they could better maintain their precarious grip on the cliff side. The poorest section of the town, the cottages housed the fishermen and their families, forming the principal nest of the local smuggling fraternity.

Penny entered a passageway little wider than the runnel that ran down its center. Halfway up the steep climb, she halted. Settling her habit’s train more securely on her arm, she knocked imperiously on a thick wooden door.

She waited, then knocked again. At this hour, in this neighborhood, there were few people about. She’d checked the harbor; the fleet was out. It was the perfect time to call on Mother Gibbs.

The door finally cracked open an inch or two. A bloodshot eye peered through the gap. Then Penny heard a snort, and the door was opened wide.

“Well, Miss Finery, and what can I do for you?”

Penny left Mother Gibbs’s residence half an hour later, no wiser yet, but, she hoped, one step nearer to uncovering the truth. The door closed behind her with a soft thud. She walked quickly down the steep passageway; she would have to hurry to get back to the Pelican Inn, up on the High Street in the better part of town, in reasonable time.

Reaching the end of the passage, she swung around the corner.

Straight into a wall of muscle and bone.

He caught her in one arm, steadied her against him. Not trapping her, yet…she couldn’t move.

Couldn’t even blink as she stared into his eyes, mere inches away. In daylight, they were an intense dark blue, but it was the intelligence she knew resided behind them that had her mentally reeling.

That, and the fact she’d stopped breathing. She couldn’t get her lungs to work. Not with the hard length of him against the front of her.

Had he seen? Did he know?

“Yes, I saw which house you left. Yes, I know whose house it is. Yes, I remember what goes on in there.” His gaze had grown so sharp it was a wonder she wasn’t bleeding. “Are you going to tell me what you were doing in the most notorious fishermen’s brothel in Fowey?”

Damn! She realized her hands were lying boneless against his chest. She pushed back, dragged in a breath as he let her go and she stepped back.

Having air between them was a very good thing. Her lungs expanded; her head steadied. Grabbing up her skirt, she stepped past him. “No.”

He exhaled through his teeth. “Penny.” He reached out and manacled her wrist.

She halted and looked down at his long tanned fingers wrapped about her slender bones. “Don’t.”

He sighed again and let her go. She started walking, then recalled the Essingtons and walked faster. He kept pace easily.

“What could you possibly want from Mother Gibbs?”

She glanced briefly at him. “Information.”

A good enough answer to appease him, for all of six strides. “What did you learn?”

“Nothing yet.”

Another few steps. “How on earth did you-Lady Penelope Selborne of Wallingham Hall-make Mother Gibbs’s acquaintance?”

She debated asking him how he-now Earl of Lostwithiel-knew of Mother Gibbs, but his response might be more than she wanted to know. “I met her through Granville.”

He stopped. “What?”

“No-I don’t mean he introduced me.” She kept walking; in two strides he was again by her side.

“You’re not, I sincerely hope, going to tell me that Granville was so mullet-brained he frequented her establishment?”

Mullet-brained? Perhaps he hadn’t met Mother Gibbs by way of her trade. “Not precisely.”

Silence for another three steps. “Educate me-how does one imprecisely frequent a brothel?”

She sighed. “He didn’t actually enter the place-he grew enamored of one of her girls and took to mooning about, following the poor girl and buying her trinkets, that sort of thing. When he started propping up the wall in the passageway, languishing-for all I know serenading-Mother Gibbs said enough. She sent word to me through our workers and the servants. We met in a field and she explained how Granville’s behavior was severely disrupting her business. The local fisherlads didn’t fancy slipping through her door with the local earl’s son looking on.”

He muttered a derogatory appellation, then more clearly said, “I can see her point. So what did you do?”

“I talked to Granville, of course.”

She felt his glance. “And he listened?”

“Regardless of what else he was, Granville wasn’t stupid.”

“You mean he understood what would happen if you mentioned his habits to his mother.”

Looking ahead, she smiled tightly. “As I said, he wasn’t stupid. He saw that point quite quickly.”

“So Mother Gibbs owes you a favor, and you’ve asked her for information in return.”

That, in a nutshell, was it-her morning’s endeavor.

“You are not, I repeat not, going back there alone.”

His voice had changed. She knew those tones. She didn’t bother arguing.

He knew her too well to imagine that meant she’d agreed.

A frustrated hiss from him confirmed that, but he let the matter slide, which made her wonder what he was planning.

Regardless, they’d reached the High Street. She turned onto the wider pavement with Charles beside her.

And came face to face with Nicholas, Viscount Arbry.

She halted.

Charles stopped beside her. He glanced at her face, noted the momentary blankness in her expression while she decided what tack to take.

He looked at the man facing them. He’d also halted. One glance was enough to identify him as a gentleman of their class. No real emotion showed in his face, yet the impression Charles received was that he hadn’t expected to meet Penny, and if given the choice, would have preferred he hadn’t.

“Good morning, cousin.” Penny nodded in cool, distinctly mild greeting; smoothly, she turned to him. “I don’t believe you’ve met. Allow me to introduce you.” She glanced at the other man. “Nicholas Selborne, Viscount Arbry-Charles St. Austell, Earl of Lostwithiel.”

Arbry bowed; Charles nodded and offered his hand. While they shook hands, Penny said, “Nicholas is a distant cousin. His father is the Marquess of Amberly, who inherited Papa’s title and estates.”

Which might explain her coolness, but not Arbry’s hesitation. How distant was the connection, Charles wondered. More than the stipulated seven degrees? There was definitely more in the “cousins’ ” interaction that required explanation.

“Lostwithiel.” Arbry was studying him. “So you’re back at…the Abbey, isn’t it? A fleeting visit, I expect.”

Charles grinned, letting his practiced facade of bonhomie bubble to his surface. “Restormel Abbey, yes, but as to the fleetingness of my visit, that remains to be seen.”

“Oh? Business?”

“In a manner of speaking. But what brings you here with the Season just commenced?” It was the question Arbry had wanted to ask him. Charles capped his inquisition with a studiously innocent, “Is your wife with you?”

“Nicholas isn’t married,” Penny said.

Charles glanced at her, then directed a look of mild inquiry at Arbry. He was a peer in line for a major title, appeared hale and whole, and looked to be about Charles’s age; if Charles should be in London getting himself a bride, so, too, should Arbry.

Arbry hesitated, then said, “I act as my father’s agent-there were aspects of the estate here that needed attention.”

“Ah, yes, there’s always something.” Charles darted a look at Penny. She’d managed the Wallingham Hall estate for years; if there was anything requiring attention, she would know, yet not a hint of anything resembling comprehension showed in her face.

Arbry was frowning. “I vaguely recall…I met your mother and sisters last time I was here. They gave me to understand you would be marrying shortly, that you intended to offer for some lady this Season.”

Charles let his smile broaden. “Very possibly, but unfortunately for all those interested in my private life, duty once again called.”

“Duty?”

The question was too sharp. Arbry definitely wanted to know why he was there. Charles glanced again at Penny, but she was watching Arbry; she wasn’t giving him any clues.

She was protecting someone. Could it be Arbry?

“Indeed.” He met Arbry’s eyes, dropped all pretense. “I’ve been asked to look into the possible traffic of military and diplomatic secrets through smuggling channels hereabouts during the late wars.”

Arbry didn’t blink. Not a single expression showed on his pale face.

Which gave him away just as surely; only someone exercising supreme control would be so unresponsive in the face of such a statement.

Still blank-faced, he said, “I hadn’t realized the…government had any real interest in pursuing the past.”

“As certain arms of the government are controlled by those who fought, or sent others to fight and die over the last decade and more, you may be assured the interest is very real.”

“And they’ve asked you to look into it? I thought you were a major in the Guards?”

“I was.” Charles smiled, deliberately cold, deliberately ruthless. “But I have other strings to my bow.”

Penny glanced around, desperate to break up the exchange of pleasantries. Nicholas might be good, but Charles could be diabolical. She didn’t want him to learn more, guess more, not yet. God only knew what he’d make of it, or how he might react.

Her gaze found Millie and Julia, both with faces alight, hurrying as fast as they decorously could to join her. And the two handsome gentlemen she’d somehow acquired. For quite the first time in her life she thoroughly approved of their blatant curiosity.

“Penelope! We were just coming to join you.” Julia beamed as the three of them turned. “We got held up in the apothecary’s.” She directed her gaze to the gentlemen; Millie did the same. “Lord Arbry, isn’t it?”

Nicholas had met them before; he bowed. “Mrs. Essington. Mrs. Essington.”

Charles turned fully to face them. He was taller than Nicholas; Millie’s and Julia’s gazes rose to his face. They both blinked, then delighted smiles lit their countenances.

“Charles!” Julia all but shrieked. “You’re back!”

“How delightful,” Millie cooed. “I had thought, from what your dear mama let fall, that you were quite fixed in London for the Season.”

Charles smiled, shook their hands, and deflected their questions. Penny heaved a sigh of relief. Now if only Nicholas would grab his chance and escape.

She was turning to nudge him along, when Julia gaily said, “You both must join us for luncheon-it’s gone one o’clock. If I know anything of gentlemen, you must be ravenous, and the Pelican has the best food in Fowey.”

“Oh, yes!” Millie’s eyes shone. “We’ve booked a private parlor-do join us.”

Charles glanced at Penny, then at Nicholas. “Indeed, why not?” His smile as he gazed at Nicholas was distinctly predatory. “What say you, Arbry? I can’t see any reason not to take advantage of such an invitation from such delightful company.”

Millie and Julia preened. They turned shining eyes on Nicholas.

Penny inwardly swore. Nicholas couldn’t do anything but agree.

With Julia, Millie, and Charles providing most of the conversation, the five of them walked the short distance to the Pelican Inn. As the landlord, all delighted gratification, bowed them into his best parlor, Penny hoped Nicholas understood that he was walking into a lion’s den, with a lion with very sharp teeth and even sharper wits beside him.

She was nursing an incipient headache by the time lunch ended. Predictably, Millie and Julia had filled the hour with bright conversation, retelling all the repeatable local gossip for Charles’s edification. He’d encouraged them, leaving him able to direct the occasional unexpected and unpredictable query at Nicholas, not that he’d learned anything from the exercise.

Nicholas was clearly on his guard, his attention focused on Charles, his attitude to everyone as it usually was, reserved and rather standoffish. She’d clung to the cool demeanor she always adopted around him; most put it down to understandable distance over his father’s assumption of her father’s estates.

Little did they know.

As they all rose and together quit the parlor, it occurred to her that, with Charles now present to draw his attention, Nicholas might lower his guard with her. She’d never given him reason to think she suspected him of anything; he had no idea she knew of the questions he’d asked the Wallingham grooms and gardeners, or of his visits to the local smugglers. He certainly didn’t know she’d been following him.

She raised her head as they emerged into the bright sunshine. Charles appeared beside her as she went down the steps into the inn yard. An ostler was holding her mare; she was about to wave him to the mounting block when Charles touched her back.

“I’ll lift you up.”

She would have frozen, stopped dead, simply refused, but he was walking half-behind her; if she stopped, he’d walk into her.

They reached the mare’s side. Charles’s hands were already sliding around her waist as she halted and turned.

Lungs locked, she glanced into his face as he gripped and effortlessly hoisted her up. But he wasn’t even looking at her, much less noticing her embarrassing reaction; his gaze was locked on Nicholas, helping Millie and Julia into their gig.

“How long has he been here?”

Slipping her boot into the stirrup he’d caught and positioned for her, she managed to breathe enough to murmur, “He arrived yesterday.”

That brought Charles’s dark gaze to her face, but an ostler appeared with his horse, and he turned away.

Nicholas had also asked for his horse-one of Granville’s hacks-to be brought out. He, too, mounted. Without actually discussing the matter, the five of them clopped out of the inn yard together, Nicholas riding attentively beside the gig, she and Charles bringing up the rear.

She watched Nicholas’s attempts to be sociable. Millie and Julia were thrilled, their day crowned by being able to claim they’d spent time conversing with both the two most eligible, and most elusive, gentlemen of the district.

“Has he been spending much time down here?”

Charles’s tone was low, noncommittal.

If she didn’t tell him, he’d ask around and find out anyway. “It’s his fourth visit since July, when he and his father came for Granville’s funeral. The longest he’s stayed is a week in December, but that was their first formal visit as owner, so to speak. He came down alone in February for five days, then turned up yesterday.”

Charles said nothing more, but was aware she was watching her “cousin” with an assessing and cynical eye. He wasn’t surprised Nicholas had joined them on their way home; all through luncheon, he’d shot swift glances at Penny, concerned, yes, but not just in the usual way. There was definitely something between them.

They reached the Essington lane and farewelled Millie and Julia. By unspoken consent, he, Penny, and Nicholas cantered on together.

Until they came to the lane to Wallingham. Nicholas drew up, his chestnut stamping as he half wheeled to face them. Penny slowed and halted. Charles drew rein beside her.

Nicholas looked at him, then at Penny. “I, er…” His features hardened. “I had thought, or rather understood, that you believed the countess was still at the Abbey.”

Penny had an instant to decide which way to jump. Charles, being Charles, would already have guessed she’d left Wallingham for the Abbey because of Nicholas. A nobleman with four sisters, two of them married, Charles would also know there was no social reason behind her decamping; she hadn’t gone to the Abbey to avoid possible scandal. Nicholas, of course, thought she had, because she’d led him to think so.

But now here she was, staying at the Abbey apparently alone with Charles, to whom she was in no way related.

She had three options. One, take advantage of Nicholas’s misconstruction and seek refuge at Essington Manor, free of both Charles and Nicholas. Unfortunately, Lady Essington, Millie and Julia’s mama-in-law, was a dragon and would expect her to remain with Millie and Julia during the days, and even more during the evenings and nights. She’d never find out what was going on, and what she needed to do to protect Elaine and her half sisters.

Alternatively, she could return to Wallingham Hall on the grounds that residing under the same roof as Nicholas was scandalwise preferable to sharing a roof with Charles; no one could argue that. However, she’d then be using the same stables as Nicholas, the same house, and she’d much rather he remained ignorant of her comings and goings while following him.

Living at Wallingham might be useful if Nicholas lowered his guard while distracted by Charles, but she’d seen enough of Nicholas to be sure that if Charles wasn’t physically present, being distracting, then Nicholas would have defenses aplenty deployed against her.

All in all, her last option seemed preferable.

She smiled reassuringly. “The countess’s elderly cousin Emily is at the Abbey, so there’s no reason I can’t remain there, at least while you’re at Wallingham.”

She glanced at Charles; his expression deceptively open, he was watching Nicholas. His horse didn’t shift. Not by a flicker of a lash did he betray her.

“Ah…I see.” It was Nicholas’s horse that shifted. After a fractional pause, during which she sensed he searched for some other reason to have her return to Wallingham, he conceded. “I’ll bid you farewell, then.” He nodded to Charles. “Lostwithiel. No doubt we’ll meet again.”

“No doubt.” Charles returned the nod, but his tone made the comment anything but comforting.

Enough. With a gracious nod of her own, she set her mare trotting, then urged her into a canter.

Charles’s gray ranged alongside. He waited until they’d rounded the next bend to murmur, “Where did Cousin Emily come from?”

“If she’s your mother’s elderly cousin, then presumably she came from France.”

“Presumably. And what happens when dear Nicholas asks around, innocently or otherwise?”

She kept her gaze forward. “Until recently, Cousin Emily has been staying with other relatives-she only arrived two days ago to spend some time here, in warmer climes-”

“Warmer climes being recommended for her stiff joints, I suppose?”

“Precisely. However, Cousin Emily still prefers to converse in French, and considers herself too old to socialize, so she’s something of a curmudgeonly recluse, and not at home to callers.”

“How convenient.”

“Indeed. Your Cousin Emily is the perfect chaperone.”

She felt his gaze, scimitar-sharp on her face.

“What is it about Arbry that sent you to the Abbey?”

She exhaled, but knew he’d simply wait her out. “I don’t trust him.”

“On a personal level?”

His tone was uninflected, perfectly even; latent menace shimmered beneath. “No,” she hurried to say, “it’s not personal. Not at all.”

They rode on; sure of what his next question would be, she strove to find words to explain her suspicions without revealing their cause.

“Is Arbry the person you’re protecting, or the person you were following, or both?”

She glanced at him, eyes widening. How had he seen, deduced, known all that?

He met her gaze, his own steady. And waited.

Lips setting, she looked ahead as they slowed for the bridge over the river. She knew him; correspondingly, he knew her. The noise as they clattered over the wooden bridge gave her a minute to think. As they set out again along the well-beaten lane, she replied, “He’s not who I’m protecting. He is who I was following.”

That said, she urged Gilly, her mare, into a gallop. Charles’s gray surged alongside, but Charles took the hint; as they rode on through the fine afternoon, he asked no further questions.

She escaped him in the stables, leaving him holding both their horses. He cast her a dark look, but let her go. She reached the house, glanced back, but he hadn’t made haste to follow her.

Just as well. Last night, after leaving him in the kitchen, she’d gone to bed, but memories had swamped her, claimed her; she hadn’t slept well, but neither had she analyzed. She desperately needed to think, to put together the information she’d gathered and decide what it might reveal, especially to someone used to dealing with such matters, like Charles. Telling him…she accepted she would ultimately have to, but if there was a way to present the facts in a more favorable light, she needed to find it first.

Entering the house through the garden hall, she halted, wondering where to hide to gain the greatest time alone. She might wish to have the rest of the evening to assemble the facts and cudgel her brains, but of that she held little hope. Charles had never been renowned for patience.

Persistence, yes; patience, no.

“The orchard.” Grabbing up her habit’s train, she whirled, reopened the door, and peered out. Charles hadn’t left the stables; he was probably brushing down her mount. Slipping outside, she ran for the shrubbery, then used the cover of the high hedges to make her way to the orchard, currently a mass of pink and white blossom effectively screening her from the house.

An old swing hung from the gnarled branch of an ancient apple tree. She sank onto the seat with a sigh and turned her mind to her troubles. To all she’d learned over the last months, to all she now suspected.

And to all that in turn suggested.

Charles found her half an hour later. The house was huge, but it hadn’t taken him long to check in her room and discover neither she nor her riding habit was there. So he’d returned to the gardens; there were only so many places she could hide.

She was facing away from the house, apparently looking out over his fields. She was slowly swinging, absentmindedly pushing away from the ground with one booted toe; she was thinking, and didn’t yet know he was there.

He considered going near enough to push the swing higher, but he didn’t think he could get so close without her knowing. Not that she’d hear or see him, but she’d sense him the instant he got nearer than two yards.

That had been the case for as long as he could remember. He could effectively silence enemy pickets, but sneaking up on Penny had never worked. He’d only succeeded the previous night because, unsure of her identity, he’d kept his distance until the last.

Now, however, there were things she had to tell him. He needed to make clear that, no matter what she thought, she had no choice; telling him, and soon, was her only option. After meeting Arbry, he wasn’t prepared to allow her to keep her secrets to herself for even one more day; he needed her to tell him so he could effectively step between her and all he’d been sent to investigate, including, it now seemed, her “cousin” Arbry.

If he could separate her from the investigation, he would, but he couldn’t see any way of managing that yet.

One step at a time. He needed to learn all she knew about this business. Had she been any other woman, he’d already have started plucking nerves of various sorts, but with Penny such tactics weren’t an option, at least not for him. His plucking her nerves was too painful for them both. Just lifting her to her saddle that afternoon had been bad enough, and he hadn’t even been trying. He’d distracted her by asking after Arbry, and she’d recovered quickly, but…not that way. All he could do was be water dripping on stone.

He strolled toward her, deliberately making noise. “Tell me-why did you choose to come to the Abbey?”

Penny glanced at him. Slowly swinging, she watched as he leaned against a nearby tree trunk; hands in his breeches’ pockets, he fixed his dark gaze on her.

They’d been lovers once. Just once.

Once had been enough for her to realize that continuing to be lovers would not be wise, not for her. He’d been twenty, she sixteen; for him, the encounter had been purely physical, for her…something so much more. Yet their physical connection continued; even now, after thirteen years and her best efforts to subdue her susceptibility, it still sprang to quivering life the instant he got close. Close enough for her to sense, to be able to touch-to want. Even now, looking at him leaning with casual grace against the tree, the breeze stirring his black hair, his eyes dark and brooding fixed on her, her heart simply stopped. Ached.

Her susceptibility irritated, annoyed, sometimes even disgusted her, yet she’d been forced to accept that regardless of him having no reciprocal feelings for her, she would always love him; she didn’t seem able to stop. That, however, was something he didn’t know, and she had no intention of letting him guess.

Forcing her eyes from him, she looked ahead and continued to swing. “Nicholas is no fool. If I was following him out of the Wallingham Hall stables, he’d notice.”

“How often have you followed him?”

She swung a little more, considering how much, if anything, to reveal. “I first realized he was visiting places no nonlocal gentleman such as he should know of in February. I don’t think he’d started before then-none of the grooms were aware of it if he had-but in February he spent all five days he was down here riding out. I’d done the same then as I did this time, coming here to the Abbey when he arrived, so I didn’t realize he was also riding out by night until it was too late.”

His silence made it clear there was a lot in that he didn’t like. Eyes on the corn rising green in his fields, she said nothing more, just waited.

“Where did he go? Smugglers’ haunts, I assume, but which?”

She hid a resigned smile; he hadn’t missed the point of her seeing Mother Gibbs. “All the major gathering places in Polruan, Bodinnick, Lostwithiel, and Fowey.”

“No farther afield?”

“Not as far as I know, but I missed his nighttime excursions.”

“Did you ask Mother Gibbs what he’d been doing in those places?”

“Yes.”

When she didn’t elaborate, he prompted, his voice carrying a wealth of compulsion-no, intimidation. “And?”

She set her jaw. “I can’t tell you-not yet.”

A moment passed, then he said, “You have to tell me. I need to know-this isn’t a game.”

She looked at him, met his eyes. “Believe me, I know it’s not a game.”

She paused, holding his gaze, then went on, “I need to think things through, to work out how much I actually know and what it might mean before I tell you. As you’ve already realized, what I know concerns someone else, someone whose name I can’t lightly give to the authorities. And regardless of all else, you, in this, are ‘the authorities.’ ”

His gaze sharpened. For a long moment, he studied her, then quietly said, “I may represent the authorities in this, but I’m still…much the same man I was before, one you know very well.”

She inclined her head. “My point exactly. Much the same, perhaps, but you’re not the same man you were thirteen years ago.”

That was the matter in a teacup. Until she knew how and in what ways he’d changed, he remained, not a stranger but something even more confusing, an amalgam of the familiar and the unknown. Until she understood the here-and-now him better, she wouldn’t feel comfortable trusting him with what she knew.

What she thought she knew.

Recalling her intention in coming to the orchard, she rubbed a finger across her forehead, then looked at him. “I haven’t yet had a chance to work out what the snippets I’ve learned amount to-I need time to think.” She stopped the swing and stood.

He straightened away from the tree.

“No.” She frowned at him. “I do not need your help to think.”

That made him smile, which helped her thought processes even less.

She narrowed her eyes. “If you want me to tell you all, soon, then you’ll allow me a little peace so I can get my thoughts in order. I’m going to my room-I’ll tell you when I’m prepared to divulge what I’ve learned.”

Head rising, she stepped out, intending to sweep past him. The trailing skirt of her habit trapped her ankle.

“Oh!” She tripped, fell.

He swooped, caught her to him, drew her upright. Steadied her within his arms.

Her lungs seized. She looked up, met his eyes.

Felt, as she had years ago, as she always did when in his arms, fragile, vulnerable…intensely feminine.

Felt again, after so many years, the unmistakable flare of attraction, of heat, of flagrant desire.

Her gaze dropped to his lips; her own throbbed, then ached. Whatever else the years had changed, this-their private madness-remained.

Her heart raced, pounded. She hadn’t anticipated that he would still want her. Lifting her eyes to his, she confirmed he did. She’d seen desire burn in his eyes before; she knew how it affected him.

He wasn’t trying to hide what he felt. She watched the shades shift in those glorious dark eyes, watched him fight the urge to kiss her. Breath bated, helpless to assist, she waited, tense and tensing, eyes locked with his, for one crazed instant not sure what she wanted…

He won the battle. Sanity returned, and she breathed shallowly again as his hold on her gradually, very gradually, eased.

Setting her on her feet, he stepped back. His eyes, dark and still burning, locked with hers. “Don’t leave it too long.”

A breeze ruffled the trees, sent a shower of petals swirling down around them. She searched his eyes. His tone had been harsh. She wished she had the courage to ask what he was referring to-divulging her secrets, or…

Deciding that in this case discretion was indeed the better part of valor, she gathered her skirts and walked back to the house.