The Ideal Bride

prompted, “Caro?”

She looked up, blinked. “I was just thinking… the count and countess’s standing might be at risk, but I would have heard something from someone…” She met Michael’s gaze. “Even from the count or countess themselves.”

“Not if it was something horrendously damaging,” Edward pointed out.

“True. However, it’s just occurred to me that the count and countess are not the head of the family—and that position means a lot.”

“The duke and duchess?” Michael asked.

She nodded. “Ferdinand certainly gave me that impression, and the countess, too. I’d never met the duke and duchess before, not until this last Season in town, and that only briefly, but”—she looked at Edward, then at Michael—“I should have met them, sometime, at some function in Lisbon. But I didn’t, I’m quite sure of that.”

Edward blinked owlishly. “I can’t even recall them being mentioned.”

“Nor can I,” Caro said. “Yet if they’re the head of a house, and that house is close to the throne… well, something’s wrong. Could it be they’ve been quietly banished?”

A pregnant silence fell as they all considered the prospect, all wordlessly accepted it as a possibility.

Michael glanced at Caro, then Edward. “Which begs the question, if so, for what—and could that ‘what’ be in some way connected with Ferdinand’s obsession with Camden’s papers?”

“The latter isn’t hard to imagine,” Edward said.

“Indeed not,” Caro agreed. “Camden was in touch with virtually everyone. However, Camden would have placed anything pertaining to any sensitive subject in the official files, and they’re with either the Foreign Office or the new ambassador.”

“But Ferdinand wouldn’t know that,” Michael said.

“Possibly not. So that, potentially, explains his searching.”

Edward frowned. “It doesn’t, however, throw any light on why he might be trying to harm you.”

She blinked. “You didn’t seriously think… ?” Her gaze swept to Michael, then returned to Edward. “Even if these recent incidents are attempts to harm me, I can’t see how they could have any diplomatic connection. Especially not with Ferdinand’s family secret—that, whatever it is, most likely predates my time as Camden’s wife.”

Michael’s steady, rather stern regard didn’t waver. After a moment, he said, quietly but firmly, “That’s because you don’t know, never knew, or can’t remember—for whatever reason are not aware of knowing— whatever it is these people think you know.”

After an instant, Edward nodded decisively. “Yes—that could be it. In lieu of retrieving whatever it is from Camden’s papers, someone— presumably the duke if our theorizing is correct—has decided you might know his secret, and must therefore be silenced.” He paused as if turning his words over in his mind, then nodded again. “That makes sense.”

“Not to me,” she declared, equally decisively.

“Caro—” Michael said.

“No!” She held up a hand. “Just hear me out.” She paused, listening to the distant music. “And we’ll have to be quick because Elizabeth’s almost at the end of that study, and she’ll be along as soon as she’s finished.” She looked at Michael. “So don’t argue.”

He set his lips.

“You’ve decided these three incidents have been attempts to harm me—but have they? Couldn’t they just as easily have been accidents? Only the first and third actually involved me—it’s pure conjecture that the second was targeted at me. The men attacked Miss Trice, not me. If they’d been sent to kidnap me, why did they seize her?”

Michael bit his tongue; furnished with a sketchy description, in the deceptive twilight making such a mistake would be easy. He exchanged a long glance with Edward.

“As for the third incident,” Caro rattled on, “an arrow shot from the forest too close to the edge of a crowd. Doing such a thing and successfully hitting a particular person—the archer would need to be a better marksman than Robin Hood. It was pure luck I happened to be there at that moment, that’s all. The arrow had nothing to do with me specifically.”

He and Edward kept silent. This was one argument Caro wasn’t going to let them win; there was no point pursuing it even though they were convinced they were right. They’d simply watch her anyway.

“And even you and Hardacre thought the first incident with the pellets was just boys being stupid.” Caro spread her hands. “So we have two likely accidents, and one attack. And while I grant the attack on Miss Trice wasn’t an accident, there’s no evidence it was me those men were after. Indeed, there’s no reason to think that anyone wishes me, specifically me, ill.”

She concluded on a definite note. She glanced at them, first one, then the other. They met her gaze and said nothing.

Caro frowned. She opened her lips—then had to swallow her “Well, what do you think?” as Elizabeth entered.

Michael rose; he and Elizabeth shook hands.

Bright-eyed, Elizabeth looked around. “Have you been discussing the fete—or business?”

“Both,” Caro replied, and rose, too. She didn’t want Michael and Edward worrying Elizabeth with speculations. “But we’ve exhausted both topics, and now Edward is free. I’m going for a stroll in the gardens.”

Michael reached across and appropriated her hand. “An excellent idea. After all those hours amid the crowds, you’re no doubt longing for silence and solitude.” He drew her hand through his arm. “Come, I’ll walk with you.”

He turned to the door. She narrowed her eyes at him; he’d taken the words out of her mouth and turned them to his own advantage.

“Very well,” she assented as he guided her through the doorway. “But”—she lowered her voice—“I’m not going anywhere near the summerhouse.”

The way he smiled in response, his expression shadowed in the dimmer corrider, did nothing for her equanimity.

But as they strolled across the lawns, then along the walks lushly bordered by beds burgeoning with the summer’s verdant growth, the peace of their surroundings closed in, cocooning them from the world, and her serenity returned, bringing with it a degree of ease, of acceptance.

She glanced at him; he was looking about them. “I really can’t believe anyone is seeking to harm me.”

He looked down at her. “I know.” He studied her eyes, then said, “However, Edward and I do.”

She grimaced and looked ahead.

After a moment, he lowered his arm, took her hand in his, and said, his voice even, but low, “We both care for you, Caro—consider… if we were ultimately proved right, but hadn’t taken any precautions, hadn’t done what we could have and you were hurt, or killed…”

She frowned; they walked on.

“We’ll keep watch over you—you won’t even be aware of it.”

Much he knew; she’d know every instant, would feel his gaze on her… would that be bad?

She inwardly frowned, thankful when he said no more but gave her time to wrestle with what for her was a novel situation. No one before had “watched over her” for the reasons he’d given. Camden had been protective, but only because she’d been one of his most treasured possessions, and she used the word “possessions” advisedly, that was what she’d been to him.

Edward was attached to her; they shared a common bond through their years with Camden and their respect for him and his memory. Edward and she were friends as well as associates; she wasn’t surprised he was concerned for her safety.

But Michael… his quiet tone veiled yet, she suspected quite deliberately, didn’t conceal a wealth of deeper emotions, and a need—a reason—to watch over her, to guard and protect her, which stemmed from a different source. It was a form of possessiveness, true, but one that arose not from an appreciation for and a need of her skills, her talents, but from an appreciation for and need of her, herself, the woman she was.

“Yes. All right.” Her agreement was on her lips before she’d thought further, already distracted by a wish—a