“I think you honest.”
“What I feel for you is—”
“I must be no less honest with you.” Meg squirmed away from the bench, ridding herself of his bothersome touch as thoughts flitted back through her mind. The places her mind had lingered these past days. The laugh she heard in her sleep. “You speak of romantic fervor as if it were the missing link to your happiness.”
He followed her to the window. “Youare the missing link to my happiness.”
“I know so little of myself. Least of all my own heart.”
“I am many things, my dear, but naive is not among them.” He turned her around. “I know, of course, the complications of your involvement with Tom McGwen. Even a stranger, he possesses power over you.”
“That is not true.” Was it? Why else did every encounter with the infuriating man make her uncomfortable … and warm?
Too warm.
As if she were holding frigid hands too close to the flames.
“I am not blind to the realization that even in anger, he has the tantalizing ability to make you flush. To make these pretty eyes of yours …” He stroked her temples, then said in a sultry voice, “Burn like fire.”
“You wish me to end my time with him.”
“On the contrary. I wish you to see him as much as you wish.” Lord Cunningham smiled. “If I am ever to win your affections, I must first be certain it has not already been done.”
Before she could answer, the double music room doors parted. The butler stepped in with a dubious bow. “A visitor has arrived.”
“I shall come presently.”
“Very good, my lord, only …”
“Only what?”
“It is not you the man requests, my lord.” The butler turned his gaze to Meg. “It is her.”
“An odd request, Mr. McGwen, even for you.” A faint puff of smoke departed the vicar’s nostrils as he tossed his cigar into one of the scraggly church bushes. “Follow me inside if you please.”
This marked the second time Tom had entered a church without Meg next to him. He rubbed the back of his neck and almost grunted. She would have been proud.
Mr. Sprigg led the way inside the nave, where two skinny girls washed the windows and a young boy polished the box pews with a rag and tung oil. The scent of soap perfumed the air.
“Two years, you say?” The vicar found his parish registry in the shelf of his three-decker pulpit. He carried it to a stool and sat. “Here it is. The column of burials. Seven and twenty names.”
“May I see?”
Mr. Sprigg raised a cynical brow but surrendered the book. “Far be it from me to deny you anything. This is the most concern you have displayed in holy affairs for a long time.”
“ ’Tis nae spiritual matter, sir.”
“Hmmm.”
“Do ye remember the causes of death?” Tom dragged his finger along the column of names. “Enoch Rowe?”
“Consumption.”
“Jane Pearce.”
“Whooping cough.”
Tom read the list aloud. Some he remembered, like little Grace Phipp. The child had borne tiny red blisters across her face, her arms, then everywhere. Meg had been quiet weeks after the child passed of smallpox. “Elisabeth.” No surname.
