“I won’t.” Mary nodded toward the door, bonnet askew. “Would you mind?”
Emily reached for the knob, grateful that Mrs. Hunt ran a well-oiled household. “Good luck,” she whispered as Mary passed then took care to shut the door behind her.
One-one-thousand. Two-one-thousand. Mary ought to have made it to the base of the stairs by now. Three-one-thousand, four. Should have ascended at least a few treads. Five-one-thousand, six and seven-one-thousand…
Emily pressed her ear to the cool mahogany, shutting out the clip-clops and grinding wheels of a passing carriage. Eight-one-thousand, nine. She held her breath. Wait for it. Wait for—
Mary’s shriek, while a bit over the top, trilled from within. The thumpity-thumps of dropped boxes were a nice touch. The girl was starting to grow on her, though she’d never replace the spot in Emily’s heart for her former maid, Wren. Nevertheless, a smile lifted the corners of her mouth.
And a deep moan leaching through the door wiped it away.
Muffled footsteps pounded across the foyer tiles. Voices, not words, filtered through the wood, but their emotion came through clear enough. Worry. Pain. Fear? La, it sounded as if the entire household congregated just beyond the threshold. She’d never be able to sneak in undetected now.
Slowly she withdrew her ear from the door then turned and leaned against it. What had gone wrong? Ignoring the fading light and passing coaches, she bit the inside of her lower lip and mulled over her plan. All Mary need do was create a diversion by pretending to have seen a mouse. A squeal, perhaps a feigned swoon, something to get the servants—and her father—to set their mind on something other than her late arrival, and she’d slip in unnoticed.
Now that would be impossible.
A gust of wind swooped beneath her bonnet and snagged loose a piece of hair. She flattened her lips and tucked up the stray. Standing on the stoop all evening wasn’t an option, and with twilight’s growing chill, tarrying much longer wouldn’t be pleasant, either.
Emily folded her arms, calculating her next move as she might in a hand of whist. She could waltz in, pretending as if nothing had happened, that she’d not technically disobeyed her father…but that wouldn’t stop his censure. Mayhap she might play on everyone’s sympathy and develop a cough. No, that would only add further restrictions to her comings and goings. Plus she’d have to remember to cough frequently. That wouldn’t do at all. Perhaps she ought—
The door flew open. She plunged backward, mimicking Mary’s earlier shriek. Strong hands righted her before she bruised her backside and her dignity.
Regaining her balance, she drew in a breath and turned. “I swear I can explain, Father—”
A man, decades younger than her father, studied her with an intense pair of green eyes—eyes that sifted and weighed the content of her heart and soul in one glance. Desire to run and hide from his curious inspection welled in her stomach—and the reaction annoyed her.
She lifted her chin and returned the stranger’s stare. A shadow lined his jaw. He’d not taken the time to shave, yet the look favored his rugged style. Dark hair breached his collar’s edge, wild and wavy, not quite long enough to pull into a queue. A good pomade would tame it, but she suspected the man would not give in to such folderol, considering the stark cut of his dress coat and plain-colored vest beneath. He might have stepped off one of her father’s merchantmen, but he didn’t smell of the sea…more like spent gunpowder and boot blacking. She wrinkled her nose. Who was this wild man?
“I should like to hear that explanation, miss, if you please.” His arm stretched toward the sitting-room door.
She frowned. Who did this fellow think he was? Hoping to spy Mrs. Hunt or Mary—or at this point, even her father—she rose to her toes, the only way to see past his tall stature and broad shoulders. A single housemaid, Betsy, was all that remained on the stairwell, collecting the last of the hatboxes.
Lowering her heels to the floor, Emily squared her shoulders. “You presume a great deal, sir. I do not answer to you.”
“Ahh, exactly what I wish to discuss. Shall we?” He nodded at the open sitting-room doorway.
Emily sucked in a breath. The man was more pompous, and likely as dangerous, as the scoundrel of a captain who’d ruined Wren—and nearly herself—late last summer. She straightened further, posture adding confidence. “I don’t know who you think you are Mr.—”
“Brentwood.”
“Brentwood.” She spit out the name as if it were an olive pit. “This is my home. I am no servant to be ordered about within these walls, nor anywhere else for that matter. I owe you no accounting of my personal activities. Furthermore, you may collect your hat and coat, and see yourself out the way you came in.”
“Miss Payne”—the man leaned close, his voice intimate and low—“do you really want to have this conversation in the foyer?”
Her eyes followed the slight tip of his head. Gathered atop the stairway landing, Fanny, a lower housemaid with an armful of linens, had joined Betsy, each trying hard not to appear as if they weren’t devouring her every word. Had she truly been talking that loud?
She swallowed, her scratchy throat testifying against her. She’d have to concede, or her business would be all the talk of belowstairs. Still, the smug tilt of Brentwood’s jaw was not to be borne. What to do?
Straightening her skirt, she matched his arrogant stance. “Very well, Mr. Brentwood. I shall inquire of you in the sitting room.”
Amusement flashed in his eyes. Or was that irritation? Not that she cared, and it piqued her that she’d noticed in the first place. She whirled and strode into the room, the last of day’s light blending colors into a monotone. Why had Mrs. Hunt not yet lit the lamps? Where was the woman?
Behind her, boot heels thumped against wood then muted in timbre once Brentwood’s feet met the rug. Emily refused to turn. Instead, she peeled off one glove then the other, and laid them on the settee’s arm. Tugging loose the bow beneath her chin, she slowly lifted her bonnet and set that aside as well. Behind her, a sigh competed with the ticking of the floor clock, and her mouth curved into a smile. Good. The man, whoever he was, could wait upon her.
“Are you quite finished?”
She cast him a glance over her shoulder. “Momentarily.”
“While I’ve no pressing engagement requiring my attendance,” his voice rumbled from behind, “I should not like to spend the entire evening in the sitting room, staring at your back. In short, Miss Payne, your stalling tactics do not amuse.”
She spun, the swoosh of her skirts matching the rush of blood through her ears. “How dare you—”
He held up a hand. “I understand your apprehension. It is not so much daring on my part as it is obligation, for currently I am under your father’s employ. Had you obeyed the man in the first place, as a dutiful daughter should, this scene would have been avoided.”
The sitting-room’s shadows suited her mood, dark and growing blacker. “You, sir, are quick to judge. Moreover—”
“Allow me to finish.” Challenge thickened his tone, and his words smacked of authority.
When he took a step toward her, she shrank, fear more than compliance dissolving the rebuttal in her throat.
He widened his stance, planting himself but three paces from her. “Your father has recently sailed for business and made you my ward in his absence. You will find me to be fair but firm, and with little patience for antics. Speaking of which, I will have that explanation now for your absence and the subsequent spraining of your abigail’s ankle.”
Emotions riffled through her faster than she could identify. Her father gone, without so much as a by-your-leave? Not that it surprised her, but did he honestly care that little? Leaving her as the charge of the big man in front of her, a complete stranger? Questions rose like weeds after a spring rain, but only one surfaced. “Mary’s hurt?”
He folded his arms. “Is it any wonder? You sent the poor girl up a flight of stairs carrying more boxes than
a pack mule.”
A slow burn rose from her stomach to her heart. She didn’t often own up to remorse—and now she knew why.
She didn’t like it.
His green gaze pinned her in place. “Where you went today concerns me less than why. Why would you directly defy your father’s wishes?”
“I had an appointment.” Her voice sounded small, even in her own ears.
He frowned. “You also had specific instruction from your father to stay home.”
“Only for the morning.” The petulant quiver in her voice shamed her, and she drew in a breath to mask it.
Twilight’s shadows darkened the man’s—Brentwood’s—face. Or was it her imagination?
“Do you deny you left the house before noon?” His voice boomed.
She threw out her hands, hating the way he exposed her, and worse…the sudden desire ripping through her to hide beneath the settee. “How do you know all this?”
A rogue grin flashed on his face. “Part of my job.”
Blowing out a long breath, she considered an entirely new ploy. Truth. “If you must know, Mr. Brentwood, my father sometimes makes unreasonable requests. I’d scheduled the milliner’s appointment long ago—at a most exclusive shop I might add—and I wasn’t about to miss it for one of his whims.”
“His whim, as you put it, Miss Payne, was to be able to say good-bye to his only daughter. He’ll be gone nigh on a month, perhaps longer. Was that too much to ask?”
She turned from him, glad now that no lamps had been lit, for he’d surely see the tears burning in her eyes. Her father had wanted to say good-bye to her, after all, and she’d missed it. Oh God, forgive me.
“And your abigail, Mary…Why did you hide yourself outside the front door and send the girl in to meet with injury?”
His question stabbed a hole in her repentance. She whirled back. “I did no such thing!”
The flinty set of his jaw, the steel in his posture left no room for argument. His gaze heaped coals upon her head.
Once more, he was right. She hadn’t felt so afflicted since the mumps. “I didn’t mean for her to be hurt. Truly. I merely…Wait a minute.”
Indignation doused the fire in her belly, and she lifted her face to his. “How would you know I waited outside the front door?”
Instead of answering, he stepped toward her. She sucked in a breath as he neared then slowly let it out when he strode past. Her eyes followed his broad back as he crossed the room and halted at the front window. With a tip of his head, he raised both brows at her.
Narrowing her eyes, she followed his lead and peered out the glass—then swallowed. Why had she never noticed this window gave such a clear view to the front stoop?
She drew back, and when he turned to face her, the air suddenly charged.
“I believe you sent the girl in, instructing her to create a diversion as you waited. In the aftermath, you planned to slip in unnoticed. Am I correct?”
She pressed her lips tight, hiding their trembling, and took sudden interest in the baseboards. Better that than face the all-knowing man scowling at her.
But that didn’t stop his lecture. “Servant or not, you owe the girl an apology. Furthermore, while you are in my charge, you will refrain from such devilry. Your father may overlook your schemes, but I assure you, I will not. I am a lawman, Miss Payne. I’ll as soon shackle your wrists or lock you up, if that’s the way you want to play the game.”
She jerked her face up to his. Such arrogance was not to be borne. “We’ll just see about that, Mr. Brentwood.”
“That we shall, Miss Payne.” He angled his jaw. “And so the game begins.”
Chapter 3
Sunlight slanted through the sheer window coverings in the dining room, high enough in the sky to reveal that the morning was well spent. Retrieving his pocket watch, Nicholas flipped open the lid, more to rub his thumb over the sketched miniature inside than to confirm the time. Oh, Adelina. His gut tensed. His shoulders. His soul. The old familiar ache, one usually stored in a cellar of his heart, rose like a specter—
Until he snapped the lid shut and shoved the watch back into his pocket, banishing memories as if they were lepers. He glanced one more time at the open door. If Miss Emily Payne hadn’t shown for breakfast by now, she likely wasn’t coming. Not that it surprised him. After yesterday’s threat of locking her up, she’d dived into her chamber and never resurfaced. He drained the rest of his coffee, now cold as death, and reset the cup to saucer, then stood—
Just as the woman glided into the room. “Good morning, Mr. Brentwood.”
His breathing hitched for the briefest of moments, increasing his frustration. Such a base reaction, however, was not to be helped. Entire battles had been waged and won for lesser beauties than this woman. For truly, Emily Payne was a beauty. Her blond hair was caught up into a pearl coronet, curls thick enough that once loosened would likely fall to her waist. A heart-shaped face framed eyes brown as drinking chocolate, set above lips that would no doubt taste as sweet. Her white day dress, high-waisted and trimmed in pale blue ribbons, clung to the curves that had stolen his breath in the first place. The woman was deadly—on more levels than he’d care to descend.
Donning a face that had won him many a round of faro, Nicholas pulled out a chair for her. “Good morning, Miss Payne, but barely so. Should you have dallied any longer, a good afternoon would be in order, I think.”
She tipped her head, studying him, yet took the offered seat, the sweet scent of lily of the valley traveling in her wake. As he settled her chair nearer the table, she glanced up over her shoulder. “Are you always this growly, Mr. Brentwood?”
“No.” He sank into the seat adjacent hers. “Your fair presence tends to magnify my starker qualities.”
She removed the linen napkin near her plate and shook it out, the snap of the fabric harsh to the ear. A frown shadowed her lips. “Is that a compliment, sir, or a threat?”
Rubbing the back of his neck, he sighed. “Admittedly, Miss Payne, we’ve gotten off on the wrong foot. I am not the cad you perceive me, and I doubt my first impressions of you are correct, either. I suggest we call a truce and start over.”
A slow smile spread, erasing her frown. Dimples appeared on each side of her mouth, indents he’d not noticed in the spare light of last evening. “Very well…Good morning, Mr. Brentwood. I am pleased to make your acquaintance.”
“Good morning, Miss Payne.” He winked. “The pleasure is mine.”
Her dimples deepened. “Apparently your charm is every bit as intense as your—”
Claws scrambling across wooden flooring, accompanied by wheezy grunts, echoed in the hallway then burst into the dining room. A fat pug strained at one end of a studded leash, a red-cheeked maid at the other.
“S–sorry, miss! Excuse me, s–sir!”
The maid stuttered—a small flaw but one Nicholas habitually tucked away in his memory for future reference.
The dog yanked the woman to the table, and she bobbed her head at Emily. “Your Alf here will have none of m–me. I d–didn’t know what to—”
“You did the right thing, Betsy.” Emily bent and unhooked the pup’s leash then scooped him up to her lap. “I’ll see to my boy.”
As Emily nuzzled her chin to the top of the pug’s head, Nicholas would swear in front of a grand jury that the dog smirked at the maid.
“Thank you, miss.” Betsy dipped a curtsy before retreating.
The dog craned his smug little muzzle toward him, wearing a mien as haughty as his owner’s. Nicholas slid his gaze from the pug to Emily. “May I assume the bundle of fur belongs to you?”
“You may.” She held the fat pup aloft. “This is Little Lord Alfred the Terror, commonly known as Alf, or Alfie if you feel so inclined.”
Her face softened as she rubbed her cheek against the pug’s chubby side. Free of guile and without defense flashing in her eyes, Miss Emily Payne quite stole his breath. No wonder her father had reservations about
leaving her unattended.
“Pleased to meet you.” He spoke to the dog without pulling his gaze from her face.
His voice rang husky in his own ear, nor did she miss the tone, for her eyes widened as she lowered the pug.
Clearing his throat, he gave himself a mental flogging. The woman was entirely too treacherous. “How is your abigail’s ankle this morning?”
She settled the dog in her lap, white teeth nibbling her lower lip—and remained silent.
Which was more indicting than a thousand excuses. He’d witnessed the same discomfited silence time and again from the most hardened of criminals. Nicholas cocked his head, knowing the effect to be hawkish. “So, I gather you were remiss on the apology and have not even checked on her as of yet. I suggest this be your first order of business for the day. Other than that, what are your plans? Any pressing appointments of which I should be aware?”
Her nose edged higher in the air as she bypassed the cold toast rack and reached for a biscuit. “None today, but tomorrow I should like to wear one of my new hats when I call upon Lady Westby. She’s asked a select few to her home to view her fan collection.”
Lest Alf land on the floor, Nicholas passed the jam dish to within Emily’s reach. “Well, then, I shall be happy to escort you.”
Her biscuit hovered midair, the crystal jam bowl ignored. “Oh no, I really don’t think—”
“Your father is paying me very well to attend you, and I never shirk a duty.” He leaned back in his seat and folded his arms, enjoying the way her lower lip shot out. “Not to worry, though. I have a way of blending in with the woodwork.”
Without a bite, Emily set down her biscuit and met his gaze dead-on. “Am I to understand, sir, that you intend to be stuck to me like a growth?”
Nicholas smiled. He’d been called many things in his day, but this was new. “An amusing way of putting it, but yes.”
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