He’d shaved. His jaw was smooth and strong, the sharp angles of his face no longer obscured by days of travel and weather. His dark hair was brushed back from his forehead, and he wore a coat that fit him the way only a London tailor’s work fitted a man, dark blue superfine across shoulders that genuinely had no right to exist. He looked exactly like who he was: a wealthy, powerful, impossibly attractive English lord, utterly at home in his castle, utterly in command of every inch of the world he moved through.
Megan set her teacup down very carefully, so she didn’t spill it.
He saw her the moment he walked in and something in his expression shifted—not surprise exactly, more the particular quality of attention a person gives to something they’ve been thinking about. His eyes moved over her once, quickly, and she watched him file the information away in that methodical way he had, the way he catalogued everything around him without appearing to.
“You look well,” he said. “The dress suits you.”
“It belongs to your cousin. Annie was very proud of herself.”
“It shows.” He crossed to the sideboard, lifted the coffee pot, and poured himself a cup with the ease of a man who had done this over ten thousand times in this room. “Did you sleep?”
“I did.” She hesitated. Then, because she had never been a coward even when she’d wanted to be: “I woke up in the bed.”
Oliver looked at her over the rim of his cup.
“I fell asleep in the chair,” she continued. “I’m fairly certain chairs don’t carry people to beds on their own initiative.”
“They don’t,” he agreed, and returned his attention to his coffee.
“You should have woken me.”
“You were dead to the world. It seemed wasteful.”
There was nothing in his voice that required anything from her. No expectation, no significance attached. He’d simply seensomething that needed doing and he’d done it; in the same way he’d pulled her from a frozen river and shared the larger portion of every meal and stood guard in the cold while she slept. As if caring for her were simply something that fell under his natural purview.
“Thank you,” Megan said. “For that, and for all of it. The last week. All of it.”
Oliver looked up at her then, and for a moment there was something in his expression that she couldn’t quite name. Something that moved behind the calm, controlled surface of him like a current under ice.
“Don’t thank me yet,” he said. “We still have a great deal to do.”
He pulled out the chair across from her and sat, and she was grateful for the table between them. It helped. Marginally.
“The guards?” she asked.
“Posted. I’ve been out since before dawn reviewing the positions. There are six men covering the main approaches to the castle and two stationed outside the east wing, where your room is. Harold has been instructed that no unfamiliar staff are to be admitted to the house without my prior approval.” He took a sip of his coffee. “You are safe here, Megan. I give you my word on that.”
She believed him. She believed him absolutely, which was still slightly bewildering, given that a few weeks ago she had not believed any man capable of anything.
“What happens next?” she asked.
Oliver set down his cup. “I go to London.”
The words landed in the room like stones into still water.
“When?”
“Tomorrow, if the roads are passable. The day after at the latest. I need to move quickly before Penharrow has time to consolidate his position.” He looked at her steadily. “I have contacts in the Home Office. Men who served with me, men Itrust, who have the access and the authority to begin an official inquiry if I bring them the right evidence. I also need to consult a lawyer, someone with experience in criminal proceedings at the highest level, someone who understands exactly what a case against a peer of the realm requires before it goes anywhere near a courtroom.”
“And what does it require?”
“More than your testimony alone, though yours is the foundation everything else rests on. I also have Jame’s letter. We need documentation. Records of his financial dealings, the properties he controls, any formal complaints that were made and buried. I need to find witnesses, and I know where to start looking. There are people in London who owe me considerably, and I intend to call in every debt at once.” Something hardened in his expression. “Penharrow has been untouchable because he’s been invisible. I intend to make him very visible indeed.”
Megan turned her teacup in its saucer. Once. Twice.
“And while you’re in London,” she said, “I stay here.”
“Yes.”
