Page 26 of One Thing Leads to a Lover

Her chin jerked up and her pulse began to knock as she peered into the shadows beyond the gate.

She wasn’t alone.

Chapter 7

What had Amanda been thinking of as she stood inside, looking out over the little garden?

Whatever it was, Langley had fully expected her to turn around and disappear into the depths of the house again. The night air was damp, all lay in darkness, and the hour was late. She certainly ought to be safely in bed.

When instead she pushed open the doors, making a surprisingly dramatic exit—or entrance?—he did not know what to feel.

On the one hand, this sudden enthusiasm for going out would cause no end of trouble. She would be more difficult to guard, to protect. If the men who had got hold of Hopkins managed to get hold of Lady Kingston, they would not hesitate to do whatever was necessary to pry information from her. They would not be put off by her protests that she knew nothing at all about the contents of the codebook or its present whereabouts. Though she was a countess, they would not be chivalrous.

On the other hand, he had spent the whole evening watching her from afar, straining to bring her into sharper focus.

He could see her now.

Not with perfect clarity, no. But well enough.

She had shed her cloak, and in the deep darkness of the garden, the silvery stuff of her gown shone like moonlight, paler even than the skin of her throat and her arms. She moved with an easy, graceful stride among the flowerbeds. Above her brown hair—no hint of its golden warmth visible now, as it had been earlier beneath the lights of the theater—swayed a pair of creamy plumes, held in place by a circlet of diamonds that gleamed in what faint light they could find.

He slipped a hand inside his coat, reaching for the stubby jeweled handle of the damned quizzing glass he’d been toying with all evening. Billy had suggested the disguise, a dandy whose clothes and manner would draw all the notice, leaving him quite overlooked.

At first, Langley had protested the costume, until Fanny had said, with icy humor, “I thought magpies liked all the shiny bits and bobs,” and the need to clamp his jaw against a string of epithets had left him unable to tell Billy no.

But as it had turned out, the glass had been good for more than deflecting any theater-goer’s untoward curiosity about his identity. Still missing his spectacles, he’d found this little substitute unexpectedly useful for keeping an eye on…things.

He slid the quizzing glass from his waistcoat, the garment so fashionably tight-fighting that he swore he heard a little pop when he tugged the round glass free of the slit pocket. Slowly, he raised it to his eye to bring Lady Kingston into sharper focus, then stopped.

What the hell was he doing?

Standing guard, yes, of course—he’d relieved another soldier of his duty for the privilege of lurking all night in this stinking alleyway, wearing a kit even less comfortable than the footman’s had been, to make sure Lady Kingston and her family did not come to harm.

But what exactly was it he wanted to see?

The glass tumbled from his suddenly nerveless fingers, falling, falling, until it reached the end of the silk ribbon by which it was tethered to a button of his waistcoat, jerked in surprise at its arrested momentum, sprang back, and clanged against a wrought-iron fence post.

Amanda froze mid-stride and searched the darkness beyond the gate.

She’s not foolish enough to investigate a noise in the alley after midnight.

She took a step closer. Two steps.

She’ll never know it’s you if you don’t move.

“Magpie?”

Stiffly, he moved into the gap between the hedges, where the narrow gate stood.

“Lady Kingston.”

Her face, which had been creased with worry, eased into a smile. “I hoped it was you.”

She had?

“Better a spy than a thief, I should think,” she explained through upturned lips.

He ought to waste no time in correcting her assumptions about spies. About himself in particular. Ought to tell her right now of the dangers she faced, the knowledge of which would surely wipe away her pleased expression. He even opened his mouth to form the words.