She laughed. At him. As she’d never dared to do before. She’d always mirrored his temper, his mood, his mannerisms, so that she could give the same confidence and professionalism he would were he able to act as the face of the agency himself. But she would not do that here. Here she would be only Amelia and see how he liked that.
“Your turn.” She laid back in the grass. The clouds were gray above them. Rain would come again soon. She pulled her shawl closer and shivered. “Tell me something about yourself I do not know.”
He laid in the grass beside her, weaving his hands together over his flat abdomen. After a moment during which the strong outline of his profile remained still as stone, his lips broke apart.“The agency is the most important thing to me.” She blinked. Then she laughed. He turned his head to scowl at her. “That is far from funny.”
“It’s only…” she said between laughs, “that I already knew that. Everyone knows it.”
“Hm.” He returned his gaze to the gray sky above.
“Perhaps it would be better if I asked a question, and you answered it.”
He nodded and crossed his legs at his ankles, threaded his hands together behind his head, a stretch and extension of his entire body. Muscle rippled beneath his fine linen and wool. Was he not cold without a greatcoat? She was certainly chilled without her pelisse. “Very well, then. Ask,” he said.
“I know the agency is more important to you than anything else. But… why did you start it? What inspired you. I know you were a tutor before, but you do not speak of it. I know so little.”
He shoved to sitting, bent one leg, and draped an arm across his knee as he gazed out at the ocean. “It’s better that way.” He stood and held a hand out to her. “We should return to the castle. You’re chilled to the bone.”
In the space of time it had taken her to ask a harmless question, he’d closed up. Perhaps the question had not been so harmless after all. She sat, took his hand, and let him pull her to her feet. For one warm moment, they stood palm to palm, staring into one another’s eyes. Then he dropped her hand and started toward the castle. She did not move. She felt too heavy. Would this be what the next three weeks were like? A tentative dance in which they moved closer only to dart farther apart once more?
Amelia turned back to the ocean, hugging herself tight. The golden thread she used to imagine skimming across the waves, leading her to a place that was no longer home, where herparents no longer existed, had disappeared long ago. A new thread existed now.
“Amelia, step away from the edge of that cliff right now or I’ll?—”
“Coming!” She raced to catch up with him, chuckling. If all her other machinations failed, she could at least sit, legs dangling on the ledge. He’d be sure to storm out to save her. Perhaps she needed to drive him a bit wild to penetrate the walls he’d built so solidly around him.
Eleven
In the past week, Drew had proved himself foolish over and over again. And in the last two days, since he’d decided to stay and court Amelia, he’d determined to put an end to that unfortunate new habit. She wanted to get closer but getting closer required certain confessions he’d rather not make and the revisiting of old ghosts he’d rather ignore.
Clearly, spending time arm in arm with his secretary was a bad way to woo the woman. Thankfully, there were other means available to him for convincing her to remain by his side.
Work. They excelled at working well together. They were like different gears in the same mechanism, perfectly churning together to achieve a singular purpose. It had taken some clever evasions, but he’d exceeded, in a mere forty-eight hours, in constructing a scenario that would prove to her how good they were together without sacrificing his hard-earned privacy.
He took one last satisfied look around the study and nodded, then stepped into the hall and bellowed, “Mrs. Dart!”
No answer.
“Mrs. Dart!”
No answer.
Where the hell was she? He checked her personal parlor and found it empty. Then he banged on the door of her bedchamber. Empty as well.
“Bernard?” he bellowed.
“Yes, my lord?”
Drew jumped. “Damn, man, where did you come from?”
“You seemed agitated below stairs, so I ascertained it was best to keep an eye on you, should you need anything. I see I was correct.” He pulled himself up tall and smoothed his lapels, preening. “What is it you need, my lord?”
“Where is Mrs. Dart?”
“Ah. Yes. The last I saw her, she was in the long gallery on the second floor. It’s just—Where are you going, my lord?”
Drew swung around the corner and took the steps two at a time. The long gallery. That’s where he was going. He pushed through the double doors at the end of the hall and entered a room filled with natural light. Tall windows at regular intervals let the sun pour in, and on every available bit of wall—a painting. Of course. Why’d she have to behere?
But here she was, her back to him, head tilted, staring up at a larger-than-life portrait.
