How could she be immune to Vane when she’d felt an immediate attraction to Redver, one that had only grown stronger as they’d conversed?
“Please don’t mistake me,” Vane said in a more conciliatory tone. “I understand your position. Sympathize, even.”
Did he? She angled herself to better see his face. His expression was not angry or unkind, but grim. Defeated.
“My mother…” His voice trailed. He inhaled. “Or, at least, the woman I knew as my mother, had a very unhappy marriage.”
His English, she noted, had a slightly foreign lilt.
“Before she wed my father, that is. I came to England, in fact, because I had wished to find out more about the family she had before coming into our lives.”
“And have you discovered the information you sought?”
“Yes,” he hesitated. “Those discoveries were not…what I had hoped.”
“Still, you intend to stay?”
“Yes,” he said finally. “I had contemplated returning to Switzerland. I was offered a position in diplomatic service. I declined. Recently, I acquired a property. It is my intention to live the country life of a quiet, respectable, English gentleman.”
The life she had once lived. “I was raised to expect such a life.”
He glanced at her with interest. “You would not begrudge a quiet life away from London?”
“I think not.” But how could she know?
She’d hardly had the chance to experience London before she and Cassie had been caught up in scandal. But now, despite the scandal, she’d the opera to look forward to…and a private tour of the Royal Academy, too.
A private tour with Redver and his family.
Redver, who should not be intruding on her thoughts right now.
“Tell me about this manor of yours?” she suggested.
“Well-managed, or so my solicitors say. Sold a year or so ago, but the party who purchased it found the surrounding environs not to his tastes. Despite the upheaval, the tenants I met were knowledgeable and the books, in order.”
“You’ve been to visit, then?”
He nodded. “There’s a home farm. A wood stocked with fallow deer. The park is bounded by a river on the eastern side, and a stone fence with unique gates runs sixteen miles long on the west.”
She frowned.
“A lightly traveled toll road with a charming, unusual little thatched-roof gate house marks the southern border—”
“And a six-foot ha-ha to the north.” She gripped the seat. “Mr. Vane, did you agree to speak with me specifically because marriage to me would give you legitimacy in the eyes of the crofters on Willowhurst?”
The astonishment in his face would have made her laugh if she hadn’t been seized with consternation. What were the chances?
“Wainwright,” he said. “You are a Wainwright of Willowhurst?”
She nodded. “My sisters and I are the only Wainwrights of Willowhurst left.”
He blinked in an exaggerated fashion. “Happy accident?”
She frowned. “The Black Widow seems to be better informed than either of us understand.”
“I agree,” he replied finally. “I’ve often found myself surprised at what she knows…and what she’s able to accomplish.”
Eliza exhaled, forcing herself to examine the situation rationally.
