compensation for food and fuel.”
“There’s peat to spare.” Owen set a brick of dried earth in the grate and the musky scent twined throughout the chamber. The chimney was blessedly clean. No one had inhabited this house in five years, but it had not been left entirely untended.
She peeked under a Holland cover. “The furniture is in very fine condition. And everything is so neat and tidy and well appointed. I think a woman lives here. A woman of excellent taste. I wonder where she is now? London, perhaps, where I will soon be, and though she has been my hostess I won’t even know if I pass her by on the street.”
She drew a cover off a chair and folded it, dust swirling in the air. Her nose twitched, and she passed the back of her hand across it unselfconsciously. She hadn’t the manners of a town lady; the country girl clung, unspoiled. Yet she was wise in reading others. Except him.
She had changed her clothing and wore now a simple gown of moss green that left her neck and arms bare but for the shawl about her elbows. She had creamy skin, a graceful neck and beautiful shape, and looking upon her Wyn was thirsty. He craved her. His heart beat fast, his breaths short. He wanted to touch her, to explore her satin skin with his hands and mouth, to caress her everywhere.
It was the liquor calling, making him crave.
“How long will we remain here?” She came to his side. “Overnight?”
“Perhaps a day or two.” Until young William arrived with the baron, or Kitty came from London. “We must make certain Eads is well away from the road before we turn back east.”
“Mrs. Polley was grumbling again about this detour. But she has made herself comfortable in the kitchen. She even found an unspoiled jar of oil and another of flour. It seems she enjoys baking.” She smiled, the dimples denting her pale cheeks.
Wyn went to the door. “Owen, come along to the gatehouse with me. We will see you settled in.”
The lad walked beside him along the drive. “Sir . . .” He kicked a stone with his toe.
“Owen?”
“You’re not telling her, then, about this place?”
“I am not telling her.”
“She’s a good one, sir.”
“She is indeed.”
“Mr. Guyther says he can’t hold the fold up in the hills many more weeks.”
“We shan’t be here weeks, Owen. Days only. And Mr. Guyther will do as I say. As will you, I trust.” He halted and set his hand on the boy’s shoulder. “You must not tell her. If she knows, she will leave here and put herself in danger.” But now he questioned whether she would, even if he told her the truth. She was reckless, yes, but perhaps now wiser than when she’d set out upon her quest. Perhaps, in fact, she merely possessed desires beyond her situation in life—desires she could not easily fulfill, like rescuing her mother, and being touched by a man.
“Aye.” Owen nodded, frowning. “But I don’t like it, sir.”
Wyn wanted a brandy. Whiskey. Whatever it would take. “Neither do I.”
Mrs. Polley concocted a modest dinner from the pantry that was well stocked with pickled and dried foods, and simple oatcakes she baked on the grate over the peat fire in the kitchen. Miss Lucas ate happily, and the boy filled his mouth and stared at her guiltily, while the matron ran a commentary about the house. Wyn barely attended. As the evening progressed, the prickly jitters in his blood increased to a cry then a roar that he struggled to ignore. But it was of little use. He could think of nothing but brandy and the maiden sitting across the room— both unprofitable desires.
He went to the stable and tended the horses, pulling hay and oats from the supply Owen had brought from the house of Aled Guyther, the abbey’s land steward. He walked the perimeters of the estate’s wild gardens and walls, and along the sodden, mossy irrigation canal that ran to the stream. He looked into the gatehouse again. Then he saddled Galahad and set out across the hills where no animals grazed now because his orders to Guyther, conveyed by Owen, specified that the place be emptied of people and livestock. Now he could go speak with Guyther, but instead he avoided the path to the village a mile distant and the tiny pub there, as well as the modest chapel with the cemetery and a five-year-old grave he had not yet seen, had not yet visited.
The hills grew dark beneath steady rain, and finally he returned to the house. The drawing room with its dusty bottles tucked into the sideboard cabinet beckoned. He didn’t care what was in those bottles. His very marrow wanted their contents.
She met him at the parlor door, silhouetted in firelight and Mrs. Polley’s snores.
“I heard you come in. You must be exhausted. You don’t look well.” Her eyes were tired but soft. He stepped close to her to feel her warmth and to tease himself for a moment that there could be some satisfaction had this night.
“You know precisely how to bolster a man’s confidence.”
“In fact I find you remarkably handsome, but you no doubt already know that, and anyway, fine London ladies probably tell you that all the time so it isn’t any marvelous surprise that I would too. But I don’t know how you manage to maintain it here. I am a soggy, crumpled mess. My mother will be horrified when she sees me. But you appear elegant even soaked with rain.” Her blue eyes turned up, wide now and as hungry as the need within him.
“Good night, Miss Lucas.” He turned toward the stair.
“Where are you going?
“To sleep. I suggest you find a comfortable spot and do the same.”
“Where?”
He gestured along the corridor.
Slender brows shot up. “In a bedchamber?”
“That is usually where one sleeps.” And did other things that he wanted to do to her now.
“But—”
A sneeze interrupted Mrs. Polley’s snores. She coughed then settled back into sleep.
Miss Lucas’s brow dipped. “I think she took a chill today. I suggested she make a soothing broth from the dried meat but she scoffed at that. I am an indifferent cook.” She shrugged lightly. “It is a very good thing we shan’t be here long and that Mrs. Polley likes the kitchen, or else we would certainly starve.”
He could not entirely resist her good humor. “No doubt you have other talents.”
“Oh, I can embroider up a storm and do a fine watercolor of a garden trellis. Truly useful skills under present circumstances.”
He smiled. “Eating is overrated.”
“I’ve no doubt you believe so. I, on the other hand, am still famished.” She placed a hand beneath her breasts, over her stomach. “Do you really intend for us to remain here more than a night?”
“Through tomorrow night. Longer if Mrs. Polley is ill.”
She seemed to study him, her gaze dipping to his mouth. “I have something I must say to you.”
He bowed. “As you please.”
“Earlier today, when you said I save lost souls, you seemed puzzled, as though speaking of a foreign thing. But I don’t think it is as foreign to you as you allow.” Her fingertips pressed into her ribs, her gaze steady upon him. “I think—I know—you have helped people before this.”
They had all been assignments, means to ends. Not like this woman whose touch when she’d taken his hand earlier had nearly sent him to his knees on the muddy road. She looked up at him now not with the eyes of infatuation. Infatuation he recognized; he’d seen it plenty of times. This was different. This he could not entirely fathom and did not want.
“Whether I have or have not is immaterial to our situation now.” Their situation in which he lied to her and lusted after her at once. “See to your companion’s comfort then find a place yourself to sleep and get some rest.” Taking a candle from the foyer table, he went up to the drawing room. In the dark chamber filled with furniture that looked like ghosts beneath their covers, he opened the cabinet. The bottles gleamed dully. His hand shook as he reached for the nearest.
Owen woke him in the rainy depths of the night. Inside the gatehouse, young William slumped against a wall, sleeping. Ramses bathed his narrow face with his tongue and William roused and told Wyn what he feared:
