What Happened at Midnight(5)

But this was undoubtedly a rich man’s country hideaway. There was no kitchen garden to speak of. Still, it was not the plantings that he cared about; it was the scene on the back terrace. The terrace itself was a golden limestone, ringed by a guardrail in the same pattern as the gate. A table was set up in the shade cast by a rowan tree. It was forty yards away—he could make out a white cloth hanging listlessly over the edges of the table and a folding screen set up as a shield against the hot morning sun as best as possible.

Sitting at table were a large man with a graying handlebar mustache and a small, dark-haired woman. No doubt Sir Walter and his wife. Down from them, and farther away, sat a younger woman. Her hair was a burnished gold. She sat, her head held in book-balancing precision. He couldn’t make out her features. He didn’t need to. God, he even remembered the curve of her spine. A little spark traveled through him.

He’d found her.

The only question, now, was what to do with her. It was a bittersweet triumph. On the one hand, he’d tracked down an unrepentant thief. But seeing the woman he’d planned to spend the rest of his days with struck a peculiar ache in his gut. Matters might have been so different between them. He couldn’t think of her without feeling the quiet what-if that lay between them still.

Lady Patsworth turned to the younger woman; a few seconds later, Mary stood. Without turning to look at the horsemen coming up the lane, she slipped into the house.

John tamped down his frustration. She’d not get far, not on foot, and it was unlikely that she was expecting him. Still, he felt a bit dazed at the reality. She was here—close enough for him to run her down and ask all the questions that had gnawed at him over these long months.

Why did you lie to me? If you intended to steal the money outright, why did you send back the account book? Is your father dead, or is that another lie?

Was it all just lies between us, or did you ever feel anything?

No, not that last question. No point in even thinking about that.

They arrived at the house and handed their horses off to a groom. A silent, surly maid led them around the side to the back terrace. Mary was still not present. Beauregard made the introductions; John managed to get through them as silently as possible. Soon, the other two men were discussing the technicalities of drainage—badly and wrongly.

“And so the upper fields drain now,” Beauregard was saying, “but as Mason here explains it, the water flows from them into the lower field, leaving me with a fine quantity of mud in the spring. We must reroute—”

The door to the house opened, and Mary stepped out, burdened with a paper fan and a parasol. She stopped dead in her tracks at the sight of John.

He couldn’t move, either. It was electrifying to see her this close. It had been that way ever since he first laid eyes on her. She had all the features of classic English beauty—a creamy complexion, rose-pink lips perfectly formed in an expression of surprise, and clear blue eyes. But calling her beauty classic didn’t capture the essence of her.

She was like a cream-cake with an added hint of lemon. Familiar and comforting in aroma…and yet when one got close enough, one realized that all that sweetness was balanced by something deliciously tart. She had even used to smell of sugared lemon—a clean, fresh scent that made him think of unsullied purity.

It had also made him want to lick her. Everywhere.

She’d seemed so innocent on the surface, but when he peered into her eyes, he’d seen a spark there, a hint of mischief that drew him in. She’d looked on the verge of laughter, and her merriment had spilled out of her all too easily. She’d had an air to her—one that had made him think that she didn’t know anything about passion…but that she wanted to learn.

Mary was disarmingly attractive, and he’d wanted her. Badly.

If only he’d known that there was more mischief and less innocence in her. Still, even now, even knowing that everything about her was a sham—that she was a thief and a liar—it made no difference. He still wanted her.

“Dear Lady Patsworth,” Mary said into the awkward silence. “I’ve brought your fan.”

“Thank you.” Lady Patsworth did not move to take Mary’s burdens.

“Miss Chartley. You know Mr. Beauregard from church,” Sir Walter said. “This is his friend, Mr. John Mason. But…it looks as if you might already be acquainted.”

Mary’s face was schooled to careful blankness. She glanced warily at John, and dropped a polite curtsey in his general direction.

“No,” John heard himself say. “I’ve never known her. Not at all.”

She didn’t grimace at that disavowal. Her expression remained china-doll smooth.

“Mary, dear, if you could move the Japanese partition…” That from Lady Patsworth.

Mary set the fan and parasol on the table and brushed past John. He caught a hint of something like sweet citrus as she passed, and those same old urges welled up in him—to lick her, despite everything. Then she crossed to the other side of the terrace and fiddled with a folding screen constructed from cherrywood and delicate paper. The so-called Japanese screen, John supposed; the paintings on its side were no doubt intended to recall the Far East to men and women who had never traveled farther than Birmingham.

She adjusted the screen to allow a few more inches of shade to fall on Lady Patsworth’s side of the table.