He reached behind him for his phone, promising himself to leave it charging in the kitchen more often, then pulled up a text from his wife. It contained a photo of what looked to be a fairly substantial hoard of Regency-era weaponry.
He let out a low whistle. “Very nice.”
She kept hold of her wee romance with one hand and handed him a folder with the other.
He leaned up on his elbow. “Clues?”
She looked up at him with wide, innocent eyes. “Who knows?”
“You obviously do,” he chided her. “Be a love and put me out of my misery.”
“Ach, well, if you must know, Jamie feels there’s something perhaps…offin this particular year. Something missing. Or perhaps two missing things in the same time where they shouldn’t be. You know how uneasy that makes him.”
He did indeed know that. “What’s in here, then?”
“Tidbits,” she said absently, turning back to her book. “Really, Oliver, I have to at least finish this chapter. The Duke and his gel have encountered each other in his orangery and I think there may be, well, you know.” She shot him a look. “Happenings of interest.”
He waved her on to her reading, smiling to himself as he did so because he knew she knew how much he loved trolling through details for clues. He turned on his bedside lamp, made himself more comfortable for the perusal of what she’d given him, and dove in.
He flipped through a dozen pages of photographs, property descriptions, and the bios of a pair of possible miscreants. Heconsidered, then looked at his wife to find her watching him instead of reading her book.
“When did you find all this?” he asked.
“Whilst you were having a wee nap on Cameron’s sofa a fortnight ago. Emily and I asked Mrs. Paxton for help in our investigations. She was a wealth of information.”
Oliver imagined she was. Emily was, of course, accustomed to all sorts of unusual happenings, and she had pledged her fealty to Cameron just as they all had.
Mrs. Paxton, however, whilst in the thick of all the goings on, had remained discreetly aloof from the madness. She held court as Cameron’s personal secretary, which lent an air of distinction to the place and surely impressed those coming in to gawk at the business face of the Cameron empire.
Her encyclopedic knowledge of social protocols and what he suspected was a photographic recollection—updated frequently—of the Debrett’s guide to everything peerage-related had also been very useful on many occasions. But it was her unflappability in the face of the rag-tag lot of them about their usual business of uncovering potentially unsavory but always exciting things that had been a constant in their lives and, he had to admit, felt like a bit of the glue that held them all together in proper order.
“Did Mrs. Paxton enjoy it?” he asked with a smile.
“She chortled at least twice,” Mairead said solemnly.
“A record.”
She smiled. “I thought you’d think so.” She nodded at the papers. “Does it seem like cheating to know so many details now that they couldn’t have possibly known then?”
He considered. “We could term itthorough preparationand call it good. It might be wise, though, to do a little onsite investigating.”
“A little stroll through the grounds,” she agreed. “Just to observe.”
“The current estate grounds?”
She smiled pleasantly. “Now, where would be the sport in that?”
“Well,” he said, drawing the word out until he thought he could finish without rubbing his hands together with glee, “wecouldjust go observe wherever our skipping feet take us.”
“Don’t tell Jamie.”
“He’ll know anyway,” Oliver said, with feeling.
“I’m afraid that might be true, but we’re too far away for him to grumble at us.”
“Unless we go home to your keep or to Cameron Hall or that wee house we’re building around the bay from Derrick and Sam and then he’ll absolutely know where to find us and grumble at us.”
She looked at him with her beautiful, luminous face and gorgeous eyes and smiled again. “You aren’t afraid.”
