Seaton.”
“But waiting for what?” the earl mused. “For the brother to come to Town and have the legal right to reclaim his sisters, perhaps?”
“Good question,” Hazlit agreed. “Let me take the sketches with me, and maybe by tomorrow, I can have some answers for you.”
“My thanks,” the earl said, showing his guest to the front door.
Westhaven sat in the library for long moments, sipping cold tea and staring at the first sketch. When Anna came in, he slid the drawing into a drawer then rose to meet her.
“You are up late,” she observed, going into his arms. He kissed her cheek, and Anna squealed. “And your lips are cold.”
“So warm them up,” he teased, kissing her cheek again. “I’ve been swilling cold tea and whiskey and putting off having an argument with you.”
“What are we going to argue about?” Anna asked, pulling back enough to regard him warily.
“Your safety,” he said, tugging her by the wrist to the sofa. “I want to ask you, one more time, to let me help you, Anna. I have the sense if you don’t let me assist you now, it might soon be too late.”
“Why now?” she asked, searching his eyes.
“You have your character,” he pointed out. “Val told me you asked him for it, and he gave it to you, as well as one for Morgan.”
“A character is of no use to me if it isn’t in my possession.”
“Anna,” he chided, his thumb rubbing over her wrist, “you could have told me.”
“That was not our arrangement. Why can you not simply accept I must solve my own problems? Why must you take this on, too?”
He looped his arm over her shoulders and pulled her against him. “Aren’t you the one telling me I should lean on my family a little more? Let my brothers help with business matters? Set my mother and sisters some tasks?”
“Yes.” She buried her nose against his shoulder. “But I am not the heir to the Duke of Moreland. I am a simple housekeeper, and my problems are my own.”
“I’ve tried,” he said, kissing her temple. “I’ve tried and tried and tried to win your trust, Anna, but I can’t make you trust me.”
“No,” she said, “you cannot.”
“You leave me no choice. I will take steps on my own tomorrow to safeguard you and your sister, as well.”
She just nodded, leaving him to wonder what it was she didn’t say. His other alternative was to wash his hands of her, and that he could not do. “Come up to bed with me?”
“Of course,” she said and let him draw her to her feet.
He said nothing, not with words, not as they undressed each other, not as they settled into one another’s arms on his big, soft bed. But when communications were offered by touch, by sigh and kiss and caress, he told her loved her and would lay down his life to keep her safe.
She told him she loved him, that she would always treasure the memories she held of him, that she would never love another.
And she told him good-bye.
The next day started out in a familiar pattern, with the earl riding in the park with his brothers and Anna joining Cook on the weekly marketing. The women took two footmen as was their usual custom. Unbeknownst to Anna, the earl had taken both men aside and acquainted them with the need to serve as bodyguards and not just porters.
When the earl and his brothers were safely away from the mews, he wasted no time informing them of recent developments.
“So as long as this Whit is content to bilk his employers and draw out his surveillance contract,” the earl concluded, “we have some time, but it becomes more imperative than ever that Anna not be left alone.”
“Where is she now?” Dev asked, frowning at his horse’s neck.
“At market, with a footman on each arm, both ordered not to let her out of their sight.”
“Let’s ride home by way of the market,” Dev suggested. “I have an odd feeling.”
Val and the earl exchanged an ominous look. Whether it was Dev’s Irish granny, his own instincts, or mere superstition, when Dev got a hunch, it was folly to ignore it.
They trotted through the streets, the morning crowds thinned by the heat. The market was bustling, however, with all manner of produce and household sundries for sale as women, children, and the occasional man strolled from vendor to vendor.
“Split up,” the earl directed, handing his reins to a boy and flipping the child a coin. “Walk him.”
Val and Dev moved off through the crowd, even as the back of the earl’s neck began to prickle. What if Fairly’s guardian urchin was wrong, and Whit had gotten tired of watching in the heat? What if Anna had chosen today to slip out of his life? What if the fat man was a procurer, and Anna was already on her way to some foul crib on the Continent?
A disturbance in the crowd to his left had the earl pushing his way through the throng. In the center of a circle of gawking onlookers, Anna stood, her wrist in the grasp of a large, seriously overweight man. Westhaven took one step back then set his fingers to his lips to emit a shrill whistle.
“Come quietly, Anna,” the fat man crooned. “I’ll be good to you, and you won’t have to live like a menial anymore. Now don’t make me summon the beadle, my girl.”
Anna merely stood there, resistance in every line of her posture.
“We can collect little Morgan,” the man went on, happy with his plans, “and be back to York in a week’s time. You’ll enjoy seeing your granny again, won’t you?”
The mention of Morgan’s name brought a martial light into Anna’s eye, and she looked up, fire in her gaze, until she saw Westhaven. She sent him a heartrending look, one it took him an instant to decipher:
“Morgan isn’t with me,” Anna said, her tone resolute. “You get me or nothing, Stull. And I’ll come quietly if we leave this minute for York, otherwise…”
“Otherwise,” Stull sneered, jerking her arm, “nothing. You are well and truly caught, Anna James, and we’ll find your sister, too. Otherwise, indeed.”
The earl stepped out of the crowd and twisted the fat man’s hand off Anna’s wrist. “Otherwise, bugger off, sir.”
Stull rubbed his wrist, eyeing the earl truculently. “I don’t know what she’s told you, good fellow”—he tried for an avuncular tone—“or what she’s promised you, but I will thank you to take your hands off my wife and leave us to return peaceably to our home in Yorkshire.”
The earl snorted and wrapped an arm around Anna’s shoulders. “You are no more her husband than I am the King. You have accosted a woman for no reason and treated her abominably. This woman is in my employ and under my protection. You will leave her in peace.”
“Leave her in peace?!” Stull screeched. “Leave her in peace when I’ve traveled the length and breadth of this country seeking just to bring her home? And she’s dragged her poor, addled sister with her, from one sorry scheme to another, when I have a betrothal contract signed and duly witnessed. It’s no wonder I don’t have her sued for breach of promise, b’gad.”
The earl let him bellow on until Dev and Val were in position on either side of the ranting Stull, a constable frowning at Val’s elbow.
“Sir,” the earl cut in, his voice cold enough to freeze the ears off of anybody with any sense. “You have produced no such contract, and you are not family to the lady. I do not deal with intermediaries, and I do not deal with arsonists.” He nodded to Dev and Val, each of whom seized Stull by one beefy arm. “I want this man arrested for arson, Constable, and held without bond. The lady might also want to bring charges for assault, but we can sort that out when you have him in custody.”
“Along with ye, then,” the constable ordered Stull. “His lordship’s word carries
