“I thought it time I should call upon you,” Her Ladyship said as she sat in the most prominent chair in the room.
“We are humbled, ma’am,” Aunt Felicity repeated dutifully. Freya’s aunt turned to where Freya waited patiently. “With your permission, my lady, I would give you the acquaintance of my niece, Lady Freya Cunningham.”
“Cunningham?” Lady Rayland repeated in a tone of surprise. “I was not aware you were related to the Cunninghams, Mrs. Turner. You do mean the Scottish Cunninghams, not the English family?”
“Yes, my lady. My elder sister is married to Lord Iain Cunningham. Are you familiar with the family?”
“Somewhat,” was all Lady Rayland said, though Freya thought there was something odd that passed across HerLadyship’s features. Something Freya could not name. Whether Her Ladyship approved or disapproved of Freya’s family, Freya did not know with any confidence.
“Did not the younger Lord Graham explain our very awkward introduction?” Freya asked, meaning to bring about an understanding without all the underlying insults.
“My son simply said he had encountered you in a tree and later escorted you here,” Lady Rayland said with a lift of her brows in a challenge.
“I climbed the tree because a bull meant to charge me,” Freya said without adding the sigh of boredom with which she viewed this conversation. “I was preparing to climb down when the elder Lord Graham arrived. I was not expecting either your son or his brother, as I am confident Lord Aaran Graham explained when he called upon you. That was His Lordship’s intention, as I understood it.”
“I have not spoken to Aaran,” Lady Rayland claimed.
Freya’s first thought was that His Lordship had injured himself while saving her and had hidden his pain by sending her off with his brother, but she instinctively knew, though such could not have been put past him, Aaran Graham knew duty as few did. He would place his pain aside and search for the shooter, no matter what it cost him. “Perhaps His Lordship thought himself too unkempt to make a call upon you,” she said in excuse, but Freya was now officially worried. “We were twice knocked to the ground.”
Aaran rode intothe circle before Thom Manor and quickly dismounted. “I plan to go out again as quickly as I can freshen my clothes and speak to Lord Duncan. Tend my horseaccordingly,” he instructed the stable boy who had hurried forward to catch the horse’s reins.
“Aye, my lord,”
“I will ask your master to send word if others require their mounts,” he said before he rushed up the steps to where Mr. Boone held the door open for him. “Where are my brothers and Lord Duncan?” he asked as he shoved his hat and gloves into the butler’s open hands.
“The front sitting room, my lord.”
Aaran nodded his thanks. “Ask Mr. Dideon to lay out a new riding coat and, perhaps, breeches. I must change before I go out again.”
“I will see to it, my lord,” Mr. Boone replied.
Aaran nodded his acceptance a second time and hurried across the foyer to where he could hear his brothers’ voices. He paused inside the door and waited for their attention.
Beaufort spoke first. “Are you well, Aaran?” His Lordship rose as if to assist him, but Aaran ignored the gesture of his brother’s steady hand.
Aaran’s gaze was on Duncan when he said, “The man all in black is in Kent. He took a shot at me, Boyde, and Lady Freya.”
For what felt like forever, the room remained perfectly still, and no one moved. However, as if God had snapped his fingers, they all spoke over each other.
“Permit me to assist you.”
“Where? Where did the shooting occur?”
“Was anyone harmed?”
“Did you see his features?”
“I had hoped we were done with this business.”
The last was from Duncan. While his brothers were looking around in obvious agitation, Beaufort shoved Aaran into a nearby chair, and Orson placed a glass holding a splash ofbrandy into Aaran’s hand. Finally, Duncan signaled for silence, and Aaran’s brothers returned to their seats.
“Explain what occurred,” Duncan instructed.
Aaran gulped the brandy down to settle both his thinking and the fear crawling up his spine. “As I said this morning, I decided to make adutycall on my stepmother and assure myself that Boyde had left his antics in London behind. I encountered Boyde shortly after entering Rayland’s land, somewhere in close proximity to the vicarage, though I did not see Mr. Turner’s house. The two of us then encountered Lady Freya who was exploring some of the sites that her aunt had suggested that were found on Rayland’s land. I made the introductions, as Boyde initially thought Lady Freya should not have been on Rayland’s property.”
He paused briefly to guard his words. Aaran did not want anyone to disparage the woman, so he avoided the tale of the bull, at least for now.
“While we were conversing, someone shot at us where we stood on a prominent rise, supporting a large oak tree. The person was below us, so the bullet hit the side of a bench, which is situated under the tree, lodging itself in the oak. I sent Lady Freya back to the vicarage with Boyde as her escort and trailed the shooter back to Rayland’s manor house.”
