“What’s that you’re doing, Miss Burke?” Vivi, suffering from no such compunction, stretched out her neck to peer across the table.
At first, Erica did not seem to hear the question. The pencil continued its rapid movements across the page. Only when its scritch-scritch fell silent did she seem to realize anyone had spoken. She glanced rapidly between the two of them, a wary blankness in her expression. “Did you—? Oh. I—” The pencil listed, nearly slipping from her fingers. “I’m dreadfully sorry. My—my thoughts have a tendency to scatter. It helps if I write down what I…” Her gaze dropped to the page, then she turned the book toward them, though with obvious reluctance. Tristan held his breath. No spy would offer up her secrets so readily.
Unless by doing so, she hoped to persuade them she had nothing to hide.
“Why, it’s a picture of Hawesdale,” Vivi exclaimed, drawing the book closer to her. “Look, Tris. However did you manage to make it so quickly?”
With every ounce of apparent indifference he could muster, he scanned the spread of pages held up to his gaze. Hastily done, yes, but unquestionably his home. Here and there, illegible squiggles suggested a system of signs he did not immediately recognize.
“Please forgive me.” Erica’s cheeks were still pale. “I suddenly realized that if I am to stay for several days, I really ought to have some notion of how to get around.”
“Oh, it’s a map! How clever. But Miss Burke—you’ve mislabeled. This is the east wing.” Vivi pointed at the right side of the drawing, and he realized the illegible marks were simply sloppily written letters intended to denote the cardinal directions. “You’d be lost in no time if you followed that. The schoolroom is just here,” she explained, tracing her fingertip across the paper as she spoke, “and your room somewhere along here, I suppose.”
As quick as that, she’d gained an insider’s knowledge of her target’s environment. Brilliant.
“Thank you, Lady Viviane.” Erica closed the journal around the pencil after making the suggested corrections. “I hope you can forgive my rudeness. I can be rather…shatterbrained, as my mama is fond of saying.”
“As can I,” Vivi confessed eagerly. “At least, according to my governess. We must think of something amusing, Tris,” she added in a whisper, leaning closer to him, her mother’s kindness gleaming in her eyes, though Viviane’s were darkest brown. “A real distraction. The library?”
The library had been his father’s preserve, the last room in the house in which he would want to be trapped. Still, the walls of bookshelves would keep Erica occupied for the better part of the day, if she did not throw up her hands and flit back to her chamber or wander off in another direction. The longer he kept her in his sight and in his company, the better chance he stood of determining who she was and what she really wanted.
“An excellent idea, Vivi—if Miss Burke is amenable, that is.” Erica gave a wary nod. “And I suspect our guest is not the only one who would welcome a diversion,” he continued, turning back toward his sister. “What would you say to a break from your regular lessons for as long as the storm lasts?”
Vivi loosed a most improper squeal. Then her shoulders sagged. “Miss Chatham will never allow it.”
“Leave me to deal with her.” He would undertake the task only too gladly. “Come,” he said, after lifting the cup of now-cold chocolate to his lips and swallowing its contents with unanticipated relish. “Finish your breakfast and I’ll take you both down myself.”
* * * *
Inside the library, Tristan’s eyes went first to the massive mahogany desk, half expecting to find it still buried beneath sliding, sloppy piles of his father’s books and papers. But the desktop was empty save for a neat stack of baize-covered volumes: account books, presumably left for his review. No doubt they contained ample proof that Hawesdale got on very well without him.
Just now, however, the thought provided little comfort. What if his mysterious adversary succeeded in exposing him and he were forced to abandon necessary work for…this? He looked around the library, at the comfortable furnishings, the artwork, the walls lined with books. A very pleasant sort of prison, but a prison, nonetheless.
Vivi snatched a volume from a nearby shelf and threw herself into an oversized, high-backed chair near the fireplace. “What suits you, Miss Burke?” he asked, turning toward his guest. “A tale of romance or adventure? Something to dispel the clouds?”
Her eyes wandered to the window and she watched the rain fall for a moment. “Will it work, do you suppose?”
Years of training and the exigencies of war had taught him how to cordon off his emotions, his fears, when necessary. He had almost forgotten the strength of their teeth and claws, their ability to drag a person down. Erica was worried. If he asked, she would likely confess to worrying for her sister. Was she in fact afraid for herself?
Afraid of being caught?
She still carried her journal, along with the pencils, the pens, and the ink she had acquired. When he held out his hand, she carefully extracted the writing implements and gave them to him one by one. Everything but the journal, which she kept clutched to her chest.
Relieved of most of her burden, she turned toward the nearest bookcase. After studying the shelves for a moment, she said, “It would appear that your father stocked his library on somewhat different principles from my own.”
“You may find little other than history books and Arthurian legends lining the shelves,” he warned. Almost certainly, unless Davies or someone else had been charged with ensuring the collection contained the essential works of the age.
“I am the last person to fault a gentleman for having a hobbyhorse.” Her eyes continued to scan the titles. “If my own father had not been somewhat single-minded, where would I be?”
Not here.
Such an outcome would have been infinitely preferable to the current state of affairs, of course. Still, he found himself oddly glad that some Irishman had chosen to pass down his peculiarities to his daughter and inspired her interest in the flora of the British Isles. Unless it was her brothers’ radical politics that had brought her here, instead…
He allowed himself a moment to watch her. Her gaze traveled without apparent rhyme or reason from one shelf to another, and he wondered whether it was her mind or the bookcase that was haphazardly organized. For a spy, she was remarkably open about her foibles. The only thing she seemed to guard was that damn journal.
Or was her behavior a ruse, an attempt to exploit his sympathies, to lure him into a trap and steal his secrets? But surely if that were the case, she would have been given information about him, his preferences, his…weaknesses. Even the best agents had them. Who, knowing his love of order and precision, his reputation for cool detachment, would have sent this fire-haired woman into his life and given her orders to make messes, speak wildly, act erratically?
Except…it had worked, hadn’t it? She had caught his notice, all right, just as Guin had said. Even now, in his memory, he could see the spark of determination and defiance in her eyes. He could also see her dressing gown slip from her shoulder and the temptations it had revealed. He crossed to the window and leaned his forehead against the pane under the pretense of surveying the park, hoping the chill of the glass would drive away his fever. Never before in his career had he let desire cloud his judgment. If it had been just physical desire, he could have managed to ease it. But this was something deeper. Something more. Everything she said or did was unexpected. Unpredictable.
And for the first time in years, he found himself drawn to the element of surprise.
Behind him, he heard the unmistakable sound of a book being pulled from the shelf. He turned back and saw Erica carrying a heavy volume toward the sofa near where Vivi sat. Telling himself this was just the sort of opportunity he had sought, he followed her there.
“Have you found something to your liking, M
iss Burke?”
For answer, she showed him the cover of the book, where Introduction to Botany was stamped in fading, leaf-twined letters, the gilt long since worn away. “It’s an older text. From 1760 or so. Still, it suggests someone at Hawesdale must have had an interest in plants.”
He held his breath until he could be certain it would be under his control when at last he released it. “My mother loved a garden.”
And a gardener.
That damning voice inside his head spoke in the broad Yorkshire accent of Hawesdale’s late cook. Good God, he had no proof that the accusation was even true, yet he’d been repeating it to himself for twenty years.
Or was the diffidence and insolence with which the servants of Hawesdale treated him now a kind of proof?
“Botany?” Vivi’s face appeared around the wing of her chair, glowing with curiosity. “Miss Chatham says that’s not a proper subject for young ladies.”
“Viv,” he said warningly. “Miss Burke is a botanist.”
“Oh.” Vivi considered this revelation. “Will you teach me?” Her governess’ disapproval was evidently a greater lure than a ringing endorsement would have been.
“But your brother promised you a reprieve from your lessons, Lady Viviane.” Erica rose, book in hand, clearly poised to put an end to the discussion.
Tristan stood too. Vivi had provided the perfect excuse for him to get even closer to Erica. “I did. But Viviane has always been an eager learner. And I had not considered the unique opportunity of which I might be depriving her.”
Vivi weighed her choices. “I should like to finish my book. Miss Chatham disapproves of novel reading too, you see. But…” She closed her book, keeping one finger between the pages to mark her place. “I should also be very glad to understand something of the sciences.”
For the first time that morning, Erica smiled, albeit in the manner of one accustomed to humoring children. But the gentle expression was quickly erased by a flicker of worry. She glanced over her shoulder at the bookcase where her journal had been laid aside, shifting Introduction to Botany in her arms like a burden she was eager to return to the shelf. “If I might have a word in private, Your Grace?”
Vivi’s dark brows shot up her forehead as she looked at her brother. With the slightest lift of his shoulders and a wave of his hand, he motioned her back into her hiding place. She slid obligingly out of sight, back into the depths of the chair. He nodded toward Erica and the bookcase, indicating she should step to the other side of the room. He followed. Neither of them spoke, however, until they heard the reassuring flick of pages from Vivi’s corner of the room.
“I am perfectly willing to teach your sister the rudiments of botany if both you and she wish it, Your Grace,” Erica said, her voice low. She was still holding Introduction to Botany in one arm, her journal now stacked on top of it, and as she spoke, she laid one palm on both books in the posture of one taking an oath. “But I would not wish to proceed without making sure you understand that there are many who agree with your sister’s governess. There is vigorous debate over the appropriateness of the subject for ladies.”
By her expression he could guess his face revealed his bafflement. “Who could see harm in a lady’s careful study of flowers?”
Her lips quirked with something that was not quite humor. “Anyone, forgive me, who knows much about plants.” Carefully, she opened her journal to a pencil sketch of a flower, exquisitely done, every suggestive curve and hollow labeled in Latin terms that needed no translation. “There are those who believe that botany can never be suitable for ladies, because the fair sex must be thoroughly protected from knowledge of, well…” She had been watching his face study the picture; now her gaze flickered away and back. “Sex.”
Suddenly, the library felt much too warm. But the source of the heat was internal, a bright flame burning at his core, casting its glow into every dark corner of his being, and making him weigh the necessity of taking refuge behind the desk to hide his arousal.
Though she had kept her voice low, the last word seemed to reverberate around the room. He shot a glance over his shoulder, but Vivi remained fully absorbed in her book. “I—I see,” he muttered as he turned back to face her, thunderstruck by the direction the conversation had taken and once more craving the cooling touch of the glass. “And your father did not object?”
“He did not. He is fond of saying that those who truly value a woman’s innocence would do better not to promote her ignorance.”
“A sound judgment.” And a comfortable way to rationalize allowing Vivi to get closer to Erica. Never before had he used a child to gain an informant’s trust. Would he be putting his sister in danger—of either the moral or the mortal variety—to do so now? “But my sister is not yet thirteen…”
“And possessed of an admirably curious mind. She will find ways to learn what she wishes to know, Your Grace, both about botany and…other matters.” A pause. “Servants’ gossip can be a dangerous teacher.”
The words struck him like barbs, though of course she could have no way of knowing how pointed they were. “Indeed.”
As if suddenly aware of his discomfort, she closed her journal and her voice took on a curiously formal, distant tone. “You may rest assured that Mr. Lee’s work does not contain anything too scandalous. He does an admirable job of translating Linnaeus’s ideas into more familiar language. Metaphors, if you will. Courtship, marriage, and the like.” As she spoke, she returned the heavy volume to its place on the shelf, sliding it between two similarly dusty tomes. “Of course, the truth of the matter is that many plant, er, relationships are neither especially modest nor monogamous. Those showy blooms are not for naught, you see—not unlike how a lady’s gown, if well fashioned, may catch the eyes of several different gentlemen at a ball.”
Would he ever look at a lady’s dress—at Erica—the same way? Or would he forever imagine her skirts as the curved petals of a flower hiding something extraordinary at their center? He swallowed hard. “Is there no other way to explain—?”
Disappointment flickered in the depths of her amber eyes. He could see she was mentally classing him with Miss Chatham. “I can think of one botanist who instead organizes the plant world into armies engaging in battles. Perhaps, as a soldier, you find that metaphor more suitable?”
From what he had overheard in the schoolroom, he could guess how Vivi would react to further talk of war. He shook his head and folded his arms over his chest. “Between combat and coquetry, regrettably, there is not much to choose.”
Erica mirrored his posture and he was struck, not for the first time, by the notion that she would have made a formidable ally—or adversary—on the battlefield, for all that she was a head shorter than he. “Take heart, Your Grace. I have a theory that the study of botany is in fact the finest means of preparation for a young woman’s entry into the marriage mart. One day, in the not too distant future, Lady Viviane will be paraded about in the finest gowns to catch the eye of the fattest purse with the loftiest title—in short”—her eyes flashed—“like every other delicate blossom, she’ll be engaged in a battle for survival and wary every moment of being crushed.”
Her words made him recall, as he would rather not, his dilemma with Caroline and her family’s expectations, and he responded to Erica’s unanticipated rancor with sharp words of his own. Words that he did not trouble to whisper. Words he regretted as soon as they passed his lips.
“And I suppose your own engagement was a love match?”
As soon as he spoke, he knew he had damaged his hopes of earning her trust, and with it, his plan to gain easy access to her journal. Worse, he was dangerously close to having to admit to himself that her journal was no longer his primary point of interest. Worst of all, he could offer no rational explanation for his callous words—for surely the flicker of jealousy he felt whenever he imagined her dearly departed paramour could not
be called rational.
He waited for her to blush with either embarrassment or, more likely, fury. Instead she grew pale—so pale, he feared she might faint. With trembling hands, she snatched up her journal and tucked it against her breast, then swept from the room without speaking a word, without even indulging in the cold comfort of slamming the door behind her. Silence reigned over the room, except for the occasional rustle of paper as Vivi turned a page in her book.
After perhaps two minutes had passed, two minutes that felt like an hour, she closed her volume and unfolded herself from the chair. “Miss Burke has spirit,” she declared. “I like her.”
Tristan nodded. In spite of Erica’s occasional outrageousness, in spite of Whitby’s words of warning—hell, in spite of himself—he liked her too. And what a fine job he had done of showing her how much.
“If you are thinking of a way to apologize, you might offer to show her the conservatory,” Vivi said, stepping closer, and he was struck afresh by the realization his sister was no longer a little girl. She had a knowing looking in her eye, and he suspected she had overheard every bit of his and Erica’s conversation, even the parts that had gone unspoken. “It would be an excellent place for a botany lesson.”
With a grateful smile, he settled an arm around Vivi’s shoulders and gave them a squeeze. “It would,” he said, and led her from the room.
Chapter 9
Erica set off with only the vaguest sense of her intended destination. Not because she was lost, but because she needed to walk, to work off the energy that coursed through her blood and animated her limbs. If she had not left the library, she would have spoken—or worse, acted—most unwisely. Something about the Duke of Raynham not knowing a love match if one slapped him across the face…followed by actions suited to her words.
All her life, she’d been impulsive. But rarely had she been so intemperate, so angry. Since the spring, however, her emotions had lingered close to the surface. Everything about Henry, including his proposal, was a reminder of what she’d never have. Because Tristan was right, the insufferable prig. It had not been a love match.
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