Or was it simply the aftereffects of lying with him, giving her body to him? There was a reason they called it “making love.” It created the illusion of love, and she knew enough now to be wary of ascribing emotions to the purely physical sensations he engendered in her.
Mostly, she thought, her desire to know him better was rooted in simple compassion for the neglected and lonely little boy of the housekeeper’s stories, the child who’d been sent off to school at the age of seven and had never, it seemed, been welcomed back. Was there still some remnant of that small boy in the brusque, decisive, self-contained man she’d married? She suspected there was.
There was kindness in him, even though he tried so hard to hide it. It was probably why he found it so hard to manage his difficult sisters—he couldn’t bring himself to be harsh with them.
And there was kindness, just now, in his telling her to go back to sleep. Because he’d woken her several times in the night to make love to her.
She hadn’t minded being woken at all. The whole physical side of marriage had taken her utterly by surprise. She hadn’t expected to find such... such pleasure in it.
Pleasurebeing a wholly inadequate word. Two nights she’d been married. Two nights he’d... amazed her. Shocked her a little too, but taken her to... ecstasy.
She stretched, her body tingling with lazy sensual awareness as remembrance washed over her in slow, pleasurable waves.
Perhaps she was just being impatient. She had a whole new, privileged life before her. There would be plenty of time to go riding.
She had duties to perform, a homecoming to prepare. The girls would be here this afternoon. She was determined to make this big old mausoleum into a place of welcome. A home.
***
Cal hadn’t intended to ride out so soon in search of the next man on his list, but this one lived close, just a few hours away. He didn’t like the thought of someone who might turn out to be the Scorpion living on his doorstep, not with Emmaline and the girls so close. Best he check and be sure.
He’d dealt with the most pressing of the estate needs. The manager was a good man, and though Henry had caused problems by ignoring all the manager’s correspondence, a year’s neglect was not so much to repair. When Cal returned to Europe he could leave the place with a clear conscience.
He reached a crossroads, consulted the sign and turned left. After this fellow, there were only two brothers living locally, though some distance away—a good day’s ride thereand back. The rest of his portion of the list lived in more distant places and would involve overnight stays.
He came to the village and was at first treated with some slight suspicion—clearly gentlemen didn’t often venture there in search of ordinary folks. But on production of a silver coin, he was soon directed to a shabby little cottage on the outskirts of the village. It backed onto the forest.
The man’s wife answered the door—pregnant, if he wasn’t mistaken—and her immediate reaction alerted his suspicions. She blanched at the sight of him and clung to the door with white-knuckled hands, peering past him to see if anyone had come with him. When he asked after Saul Whitmore, she pretended not to know who he meant. But she was a poor liar.
All Cal’s instincts prickled to life. It might have been better to have brought someone with him, but Cal was armed with two loaded pistols and a knife in his boot. He could see at a glance that the mean little one-room cottage concealed nobody, so he decided to investigate further afield. The woman followed him, wringing her hands and saying variously, “Melord, there ain’t nobody called Saul Whitmore livin’ around here. He left long ago, he did. He ain’t here, I promise you.”
Cal ignored her. He was heading toward a tumbledown outbuilding when he caught a glimpse of movement from the corner of his eye. A man emerged from the forest, carrying a load of wood. Two dead hares dangled from his waist.
“Run, Saul, run!” the woman screamed. She jumped on Cal, nearly knocking him over. He staggered and tried to shake her off, but she clung fiercely to his arm, dragging him down with her weight, determined to hold him back. Cal could have knocked her out in an instant, but he’d never hit a woman in his life, let alone a pregnant one.
The man dropped his load of wood and took to his heels. Observing the manner of his retreat, Cal instantly stopped struggling.
The man ran with a pronounced, ungainly limp. He disappeared into the trees.
“What’s the matter with his foot?” Cal asked the woman,who still clung to him with all her might. Unless the injury to the fellow’s foot was recent, he couldn’t possibly be the assassin whom Cal had last seen escaping fleet-footed and nimble over Portuguese rooftops.
She took a moment to understand his question.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, let go of me, woman,” he told her irritably. “I’m not going to chase after your husband. He probably knows that forest like the back of his hand. Just tell me, what’s wrong with his foot?”
She eyed him suspiciously, then loosened her frenetic grip slightly. “Got ’is foot shot off in the war,” she said eventually. “Makes it hard for ’im to get work, ’specially in winter.”
“Then he’s not the man I’m looking for,” Cal told her.
“He’s not?” Cal felt the tension drain out of her. “You’re not after ’im for... for...” She broke off, biting her lip. “It’s just a couple of hares.”
And suddenly Cal realized what he’d seen: a crippled former soldier, carrying illegally gathered wood and poached game—providing winter warmth and food for himself and his pregnant wife.
Hanging offenses in some places. Transportation to the other side of the world at the very least.
No wonder she was so frightened.
“I have no interest in you or your husband,” he told her gently. “It was another man I was looking for. This was a mistake.”
