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Irritating, that.
She’d noticed him that afternoon. Spoken to him. Sparred with him. Stolen from him.
Kissed him.
And... to add insult to injury, she had his puzzle box.
He was going to have to get it back from her. Hell, he’d be searching for her right now if he weren’t here, in the foyer of Havistock House... summoned.
But the notice had been clear.
Clayborn—
We must discuss your brother.
I shall see you at seven o’clock.
Olivia, Lady Havistock
Clayborn had been expecting this particular summons for several months, as Jack had fallen, as he described it,utterly and irrevocably in love with the Lady Helene. As though he were in a Shakespearean comedy and been shot with an arrow by a man with a donkey head.
Clayborn tilted his head.
It was something like that; he’d always been better at maths.
The point was, Jack was in love, and Lady Helene seemed somehow willing to suffer his wide-eyed affection. As Clayborn hadn’t seen Jack drink or gamble or even smoke in the last several months, he was inclined to support a marriage between the two.
Though thirty-six years of receiving summonses made him think that the Marchioness of Havistock might have a different opinion on the situation.
He followed a liveried servant through the halls of the manor house to a richly appointed sitting room, complete with a small, elaborately carved desk that had clearly been chosen for appearance rather than purpose. Nevertheless, the Marchioness of Havistock sat behind it, as though holding court—an affect that was underscored by her impressive beauty. Despite what could not have been aneasy marriage to a vile husband, or the production of six children with the same, the marchioness had somehow avoided the weathering that came for others’ pale skin, her face devoid of all but the most graceful signs of age.
“Clayborn,” she said as he entered the room, the name clipped, as though she was in a terrible rush and he was putting her out. “Good of you to come.”
Wishing he could be anywhere but there, Clayborn knew the part he was to play, crossing the room and giving a short bow over the marchioness’s hand. A better gentleman would have told her he’d been happy to receive her summons, but the bow was as much as Clayborn could muster.
“I read about your...displayin Lords last week,” she said, disdain dripping from every word as she referenced his losing his temper before the assembly as he attempted to move them to compassion for literally anyone but themselves. “What a good Samaritan you are, speaking on... what was it? Labor of some kind?”
“Child labor,” he replied, cold as ice. The kind of labor her husband used without hesitation or conscience. The kind of labor that made the marquess enough money that he’d hired a gang of thieves to destroy Clayborn’s future on the floor of Parliament.
Of course, now, the stolen item, and the information within, was in the hands of another, far more interesting, thief—one with whom he’d much prefer negotiating.
“Ah, yes,” the marchioness went on, waving a hand as though the entire topic was beyond her grasp. “You know Havistock never speaks to me about the things youmendebate.”
“Child labor should not be a thing onlymendebate.”
Clayborn turned at the words, and that’s when he noticed that a woman sat nearby in lush, cascading skirts of black silk, wrist-length gloves, pristinely polished boots, a small hat and a half veil.
He froze in all too familiar shock, his gaze tracingover her, registering her straight spine, the trim tuck of her waist beneath her corset, the freckled skin of her breast above the gown, the long column of her neck, her angled jaw and full lips—lips he knew intimately as of that afternoon.
Lips belonging to Adelaide Frampton. Lips attached to the rest of Adelaide Frampton’s body.
If he were another man, his brows might have risen in surprise. But he was the Duke of Clayborn, and surprise was never for public revelation.
What in hell was she doing here?
She didn’t move, and he couldn’t read her enormous, brown eyes hidden behind her short veil. He would have done anything to see those expressive eyes. It was a clever disguise—one that shielded the spectacles that would so easily reveal her identity. Still, he had the wild instinct to rip the silly black hat from her head and loose the hair that she usually kept tightly moored. The fiery, red hair he’d discovered that afternoon.
It was a decidedly un-Clayborn-like instinct.
