His provocative question about Everwell played in her mind. The place was not immune to change. Students came and went. As the city’s circumstances changed, and not for the better, as the number of people knocking on their doors looking for help grew. Foster, Lady Em’s beloved butler, had passed away several years ago. And in the past year, both Elouise and Gemma had found husbands and no longer resided under Everwell’s roof. She would love Everwell and be devoted to it until her dying day. But there was something magical about The Grove. Just like there was something about Beau.
The sky, which had been brilliant blue with a few blousy clouds, darkened as they approached the house. As if amplifying Maddy’s internal turmoil, the wind picked up, moving through the grass, and tossing the leaves in nearby trees, showing the silvery backs of the maples.
“I think it’s going to rain,” she said, peering up into the sky. “I think we got back just in time.”
“Making love under a summer rain seems like a wonderful idea,” he said, coming back to that playful part of himself. “Don’t you think?”
“Perhaps,” she said, trying hard to suppress a smile. She was completely out of her depths. The idea of Beau making love to her in a summer rain sounded as equally appealing as him making love to her by the fire on a cool fall evening—like a dream. A dream she was terrified to have.
“You are hard on a man’s ego,” he said. “But lucky for me, mine is strong enough to bear it.”
A few drops of rain started to fall, and they quickened their pace. As they got to the house, Beau let out a curse.
“Shit,” he said, gesturing to a handful of tools that had been left aside. “I was supposed to take these to the tool shed. I guess I was too distracted by the thought that I might find a beautiful woman bathing herself in the river like a forest nymph.”
Maddy blinked. He kept saying these things, these words that should have been lovely and wonderful but, even after everything, felt like an illusion—some sleight-of-hand trick.
“I’m going to get these out of the rain before they rust,” he continued, seemingly unaware of her unease. He picked up the tools and ran down the path toward the tool shed.
Maddy watched him go, partially because that’s what she was here to do, and partially because she seemed unable to help herself. But after all that had happened this afternoon—as wonderful and thrilling as it was, she felt a compulsion to turn away… as if she needed to detach herself from him.
She continued toward the house, the raindrops falling here and there, as if the clouds themselves were uncertain of their intent. Maddy paused at the pergola, taking a moment to appreciate the work Beau and the Chandlers had done. Soon, however, the rain started to fall in earnest. She ran inside the back door, surprised by the contentment that settled on her like a warm embrace as she entered the house. She brushed it off as nothing more than the relief one might feel from getting to shelter in the middle of a rain. After all, the only place she could truly be at home was Everwell. Everwell was where she belonged. This was only a job. A job she’d only taken to keep Veronica Turnbull and her NWL cronies from exposing the truth about The Everwell Society.
Who here was the selfish one?
After returning from her room to refresh herself and change her clothes, Maddy was about to start supper when the sound of carriage wheels caught her attention. At first, she assumed that the Chandlers had returned, perhaps to take back a large piece of lumber, but as she peeked out her window, which looked onto the back of the house, there were no horses. Frowning, she walked to the front parlour window, where a small but well-equipped gig sat in the same path where she and Beau had upon their arrival. Her body tensed, and she immediately felt for the small knife she’d tucked in her sleeve when she realized she hadn’t strapped it on. It was too late to retrieve it when a knock at front door stopped her in her tracks.
On impulse, she grabbed her apron, hanging on a peg near the front door, and tied it around her waist. Smoothing her skirts and schooling her expression, she fell into the mode she had time after time at Everwell.
She pulled the door open and her stomach dropped.
Nelson Taylor stood on the front step. He looked up at her, regarding her with an expression that moved from disinterest to discontent.
It took every ounce of Maddy’s strength to keep herself fixed where she stood.
“Good afternoon,” she said, keeping her voice polite and firm, and not giving a tinker’s damn he was standing in the weather. “Can I help you?”
“Is Mr. da Silva about?” he asked. “And do not tell me he isn’t at home. I know he is in the area.”
Maddy stifled a groan. Nelson Taylor was many things, but stupid was not one of them.
“He is not,” she said, which was a lie and yet somehow perfectly true. Convenient, that. “Is there a message I can give him?”
“He can’t be far,” he said, rather insistent. “I can wait and speak with him, or I can bring the authorities. Your choice.”
Maddy pressed her lips together, carefully trying to decide her next move. She was here to play Beau’s housekeeper as well as his bodyguard, and she didn’t want to overreact—yet. It would have been so easy to send Nelson to the ground and make him regret ever coming to this door. But that would send him straight to the authorities, and further prejudice them against Beau. Elouise Charming, Everwell’s talented actress whose ability to use disguise was second to none, often reminded her fellow Scandalous Spinsters that people generally see what they expect to see. Nelson Taylor shouldn’t expect to see Madeline Murray, the naive girl that had been at the centre of that cruel game he, Malcolm, and a few others had concocted. He expected to see an aged, humourless spinster who was housekeeper to Beau da Silva, the man from whom he wanted to buy this property.
She led him into the parlour and silently congratulated herself that she remembered to offer him refreshments. She was tempted to lace it with something from the big recipe book, but had not yet come to the remedies on laxatives. She decided, however, that if she was ever to try forcing mustard seeds in fresh horse dung, she knew exactly who she’d feed those greens to.
Beau returned as she prepared the tea. Despite the fact his clothes were rumpled and wet from the rain, he was still as handsome as ever.
“I saw some horses,” he said, coming into the kitchen and wiping his face with a linen towel, his expression far more guarded.
“Nelson Taylor is here,” she said. At the mention of him, Beau stilled, took her hand, and gave it a gentle squeeze. “I was going to send him away, but he knows you are here.”
“You don’t have to go back there.”
“He didn’t recognize me,” she said, gently pulling her hand away. She had to be sharp now. “At least, I don’t think so.”
