“Going somewhere, Miss Stuart?”
She was forcefully turned about, and, her heart thumping hard within her, looked up into the grim handsome face of Mr. Penhallow.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded, a little breathlessly.
Gabriel, in turn, answered, “I might ask the same of you.” All at once he noticed that the hand that he’d wrapped around her upper arm felt hot, as if he’d grasped fire, and swiftly he released her.
“I needed to be outside,” she said reluctantly. “After being cooped up in that carriage all day, and then being bundled in a shawl and hustled up into my room as if I were a prisoner, with supper sent to me on a tray!”
“Your—ah—ensemble not being quite up to snuff, according to my grandmother.”
“That’s tactful of you. She told me I looked like the daughter of a rag-and-bone man.”
“Did she? Once,” he said reflectively, “when I was seventeen, she told me that my fashionable new waistcoat made me look like a circus performer. I’d been so proud of it, too.”
Her expression softened. “How crushing.”
“I must admit it seemed so at the time.”
“Your grandmother seems to me a person of strong opinions.”
“That’s one way of putting it.” He looked at her more closely. “You’re not wearing the shawl she gave you.”
“Gave me? You mean forced upon me. No, I left it in my room.”
“So you just came out for a breath of fresh air,” he said, his skepticism renewed. “Not to—oh, take a turn about charming Bradford-on-Avon?”
“In the middle of the night?” she retorted. “In a strange town? Just how stupid do you think I am?”
“You’re the one who last night ran away to be a scullery maid, so perhaps I might be forgiven if I’m a little dubious.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Have you been out here waiting for me all this time?”
There was no way he’d reveal the truth, that he’d been out here for hours, expecting exactly this scenario. He only said, blandly, “I like fresh air also.”
She took this in, then said, “I suppose you think me very impulsive.”
“Aren’t you?”
“I think you are. You’re supposed to be marrying in order to—how did your grandmother put it in her letter to Lady Glanville?—oh yes, to ensure the succession. How will you do that now, I wonder?”
He took his time responding, for he was analyzing her tone. It wasn’t one he heard often. It was—impudence. Brazen impudence. If he had hackles, he thought, they’d be rising right now. Coolly he said, “That’s my problem, isn’t it, Miss Stuart? Not yours.”
“Aren’t you afraid I’ll reveal your horrid little secret to Mrs. Penhallow?”
Gabriel shrugged. “Go ahead. What do you think she’d do then?”
She was silent, and he could almost hear the wheels in her head turning. Then, slowly, she answered.
“One way or another, she’d end the engagement.”
“And you’d be back where you started, wouldn’t you, Miss Stuart? A denizen of that delightful old abbey of yours.”
“I’ll never go back there, never!”
He was startled by her vehemence. But in that same cool voice he replied, “Then perhaps it’s in your best interest to be discreet.”
Her eyes were huge in the moonlight as she stared up at him. “Don’t you care about the succession? Your estate? Surmont Hall, isn’t that what it’s called?”
“Yes, Surmont Hall. And no, I don’t really care about it. It’s just a house and some land.”
“I don’t think your grandmother would like to hear you talking about it that way.”
“Why would it matter to her? She hasn’t been there in many years. She never talks about it. Besides, she doesn’t own me. Despite, perhaps, her beliefs to the contrary.”
“How proud you both are,” she said, wonderingly. “How you like to have your own way. As if it’s your right.”
“Isn’t it?” He smiled mockingly down at her, and she frowned.
“Apparently it is! After all, the Conqueror bowed to you Penhallows, didn’t he?”
“So it’s said.”
He watched as she crossed her arms over her chest. That rather delectable chest.
“Well,” she went on, “if you don’t care about having an heir, what do you care about?”
His smile faded. “I care about my own agency. I don’t enjoy being a pawn on someone else’s chessboard.”
“I understand that. Aren’t I a pawn on your chessboard?”