The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes (London Highwaymen, #2)(21)

“If the shoe fits, love.”

“Medicis, one has to imagine, navigated their way out of difficulties with much more style and cunning than I managed.”

“You managed just fine,” Rob said. “It might not have turned out precisely as you hoped—”

“It certainly didn’t,” she said with feeling.

“—but when you needed to pull the trigger, you did it.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You know nothing of what happened that day.”

“I trust that you had your reasons and did what needed to be done.” Rob heard the words as they left his mouth and was deeply annoyed to discover that they were the truth. He was here only because he trusted her, much as he might like to pretend otherwise. He was an even bigger fool than he had supposed.

“Do you?” she asked, one black eyebrow arched, and he feared that she had realized exactly what he had. He suppressed the urge to look away, to hide his face.

The worst part was that she didn’t trust him in return—she had woken in the dark and suspected that he had left her. She thought he might have his own motives, some sense of self-preservation. Christ. The knowledge that she was as much of a fool as he was might at least have been some consolation.

Instead she looked at him as if she could see right through him, as if her gaze was a sharp knife that exposed everything he was. Then her eyes flickered from his face to his plate. He had saved a portion of bread and ham with the aim of wrapping it in a napkin and bringing it to the room for her to eat when she woke. Instead, he slid it across the table to her now.

She pushed it back. “That’s yours.”

“I’m giving it to you.”

“I’m not taking your charity. I have my own money, and I already owe you for what you bought at the market.”

If she thought he was in the business of giving charity to earls’ daughters, she could guess again. “I’ll look away,” he offered, turning his attention to one of the spaniels, who had come over to rest her chin on his thigh, having evidently guessed that food was being given away and presenting herself as a worthy candidate. “And you can take it. You can spirit it away. It’ll be very cunning of you.”

“I want to pay for my food, not steal it, you daft man.”

“But who’s to say this food was mine to begin with?”

“You bought it,” she said slowly, as if it was dawning on her that she was dealing with a lunatic. “I can call the innkeeper over if you’d like him to explain this to you.”

It occurred to him that perhaps he could make his point with a different example. “Forget about the food. Let’s think about something else. A pistol, let’s say.” He tapped his chin. “Now why would you take a pistol that doesn’t belong to you.”

She sighed loudly and gazed at the ceiling, as if for strength. He suppressed a smile.

“Oh, I know!” he went on, again leaning close and lowering his voice so as not to be overheard. “Perhaps you needed it to shoot your—”

She threw up her hands. “Yes, yes, if you’re trying to very cleverly point out that I’m hardly a pillar of virtue, then I already know that. Don’t be tedious. I just want to pay for my own food.”

“Did you bring your coin purse downstairs?”

She glared at him. “No.”

“In that case we return to our lesson on ethical thievery. Let’s abandon the pistol—”

“First we abandoned the bread and ham, and then we abandoned the pistol, and I’m about to abandon my patience.”

“Let’s say you stole my horse,” he went on, ignoring her, “but I bought the horse using money I stole from somebody else. Who does the horse belong to?”

“Do your friends find this as boring as I do? I wonder.”

“The horse doesn’t belong to anyone.”

“Give me that pistol I stole two examples ago so I can shoot myself and make this end.”

“It’s not loaded,” he said repressively. “You never stole any shot. You’re lucky to have me around if you don’t even understand how pistols work.”

She stared at him. “You are ridiculous. I let my life get thrown into an uproar by a ridiculous man. How lowering. Villains are supposed to be serious.”

“I, a villain?” He put his hand to his heart. “You wound me.”

“I wish I wounded you,” she grumbled.

“Eat,” he said.

With the air of a woman much put upon, she ate, and he very definitely did not grin as he watched her.





Chapter 9




The path they took the next morning ran more or less parallel to the Canterbury road. It was little more than a footpath, just barely wide enough for two horses.

“The lads in the stable said it’s the old Pilgrims’ Way to Canterbury,” Rob said. “From Winchester, I suppose.”

Marian sniffed but couldn’t help but be amused. Of course Rob believed that sort of tale. “There are footpaths everywhere, and one imagines most of them were made by drovers bringing livestock to market. It seems unnecessarily quaint to bring pilgrims into it.”

Rob sighed, and Marian felt churlish for having spoiled his fun. She nudged her horse and rode ahead.