They’d ridden some ways in silence before Kiernan spoke. “Tell me, my lord, did you know Lady Celeste’s husband well?”
“No,” Ranulf answered honestly.
“It seems a pity a woman so young and lovely should be widowed so soon.”
Ranulf kept his tone noncommittal. “I’m sure Lady Celeste will find another worthy man eager to marry her.”
“I understand she’s very wealthy and popular at court.”
Celestehadbeen singing her own praises rather loudly last night. He’d been too upset about Bea to pay much attention. “Am I to understand you wouldn’t mind making an offer for her yourself?”
Kiernan flushed and stared straight ahead.
“If that’s so, I wish you every happiness.” Ranulf recalled some of the things Celeste had said to him, and her desperate pleas. “I don’t think her life at court has been as happy as she implies.”
As a knight and a man, Ranulf felt compelled to be honest with Kiernan. “She’s far from poor, but she may not be as rich as you think in terms of landed property. She told me herself she has only movable goods, although as you saw for yourself last night, her jewels alone are quite valuable. However, as you stand to inherit your father’s estate, I should think her lack of property is not a serious impediment to your marriage if you were to seek her hand.”
“The lady herself would be the prize,” Kiernan replied a little stiffly
“Spoken like a man in love,” Ranulf remarked. “And here I’ve been assuming you wanted to marry Lady Beatrice.”
Kiernan looked horrified by the very notion. “By the saints, no!”
“Forgive me for upsetting you,” Ranulf said, trying not to be offended for Bea’s sake, and even if she didn’t want Kiernan. “Surely you can’t be surprised by my assumption. I thought your concern for her sprang from tender feelings.”
“I dolikeLady Beatrice,” Kiernan allowed, “but I’d never want to marry her. She talks far too much and her sense of propriety…” He caught Ranulf’s eye. “You must admit it’s a little lacking.”
“Then why do you care so much about her reputation?” he asked.
“Because I admire and respect Lady Constance. I don’t want anyone in the family to suffer because of Beatrice’s actions.”
“You do know Constance and Lord Merrick agreed to let her come? Beatrice didn’t simply grab a horse and ride here on her own.”
“I fear Lady Constance loves Beatrice too much to curb her.”
“You think Beatrice needs to be restrained?”
“I think, my lord, that sometimes she is heedless and unthinking and forgets to act like the lady she is.”
“Yes, sometimes she does,” Ranulf agreed. “I find that refreshing.”
“A ship, my lord!” one of the soldiers at the front of the column called out. “There, in the cove!”
Ranulf raised himself in his stirrups and saw a two-masted vessel bearing no flags or other marks at the entrance to a nearby cove. Then he spotted something else: a boat full of armed men rowing toward the shore.
Excitement and hope and determination set Ranulf’s blood aflame with a different sort of passion. These men could be up to nothing good, or they would have come into the harbor at Penterwell. By God, he’d catch them and find out exactly what they were doing here.
In spite of his resolve, however, it wasn’t Ranulf’s way to charge into a fight without a plan. As he dismounted, he called to Gareth to move his men out of sight.
Ranulf crept to the edge of the cliff overlooking the cove and lay on his belly to survey the shore below. He avoided looking atthe waves where they washed up upon the sand as he gestured for Gareth to join him. “Do you know those men?”
“No, my lord,” Gareth answered. “Never seen them before.”
“Or that ship?”
“No, my lord.”
By this time Kiernan, too, had crawled up beside Ranulf. “Smugglers,” he said, and it wasn’t a question. “That’s a French ship.”
