Page 22 of Submitting to the Widow

He nearly chuckled at the thought of what book the odious man might possibly check out:How to Sneak into a Fancy Dress Ball Disguised as a Ruffian?The Fine Art of Thievery in Ten Lessons?

Stephen’s valet himself wore a fine jacket and trousers he’d picked up at a rag shop to employ in his frequent spy ventures in pursuit of evidence for Mr. Forsythe’s barrister practice. He’d mended and cleaned his handy disguise within an inch of its usefulness to blend in with the upper crust of society when needs must.

In that moment, the man shuffled out of the library, letting the door bang shut behind him. But no one was with him.Fawkes balls.Who the hell had he met inside? Murray cursed again beneath his breath. He’d let his worries about being spotted override the need to for himself see what the hell the bastard was up to.

On a hunch, he breezed through the double doors and approached the man at the front counter.

“How may I help you, sir?”

“I, um, need to find something for my, er, wife.”

“What are her reading interests?”

The question somehow caught him off-guard. Although to be fair, he wasn’t really paying attention to what the library clerk was saying. He was more interested in the current patrons strolling amongst the endless shelves loaded with books, and tables stacked with piles of special-interest tomes.

Since he’d been watching the houses of all the men on Captain Goodrum’s list, he was familiar with their faces. Whoever the crude brute met up with must have been someone employed by one of the men. He hadn’t counted on that eventuality.

“Flowers,” he finally blurted out. “That’s what she likes, flowers.”

The man gave him an odd look before pointing toward the botany section directly behind the counter in the center of the library.

Murray slowly made his way through the botany section, pretending to study all possible titles, picking up a few books and flipping through the first few pages. All the while, he was noting descriptions of the men in the room.

There were also a few women, whom he also committed to memory. Who knew? Maybe the man behind the attack on the baroness was using a woman to do his dirty work and deliver orders to the brute. He couldn’t imagine a woman getting involved in something so nasty and dangerous, but then he thought of Raj and the lump he still carried on the back of his head.

All that was left for him was to report back to Mr. Forsythe and then maybe, together with James, the three of them could take turns watching the houses of the four suspects to see if anyone showed up looking like the library patrons in the reading room that day.

* * *

Wednesday,April 26, 1826

Trevellyn Family Carriage

Road Between Bath and Combe Down

Stephen was once again sitting in the late baron’s lumbering, ridiculously opulent carriage. But this time, he was headed back toward Trevellyn House.

Murray had come back the day before from his afternoon of following the man they’d found who fit the description of the ruffian who’d snatched Jane away from him in the crush at the Monday night fancy dress ball. The tale he’d related was a bit hard to believe. A rendezvous in the Bath Reading Rooms? And then he’d explained that none of the men Captain Goodrum had sent them to investigate were anywhere near the circulating library. Whoever was behind the upheaval of his rooms, and grabbing Jane was being inordinately clever in hiding any trail that might lead back to them.

She sat across from him now, in a tragically different mood from when they’d originally set off on an adventure to replicate one of his asinine sexual exploits depicted in the journal pages of his unthinking youth. Her dark eyes had lost the glint of humor he’d come to crave.

She stared at him like a small, lost child. A small, lost child that he’d taken under his wing to protect and keep from harm. The anxious, wretched thoughts that spun through his mind made him grateful he didn’t have children of his own. He’d completely fall apart if any harm ever befell them. He’d kill whoever dared to hurt someone he loved.

His normally rational heart hitched a bit at his dark thoughts. He was a skillful, respected barrister. His special talent was to come at a question from all different angles. But he was damned if he could sort out the current tangle in which he found himself. Was it possible to fall in love with someone from a wholly different world…in a matter of little more than a week?

He took a cautionary look outside the carriage window. James still cantered next to them on one of the geldings from Jane’s stable, his hunting rifle slung over his shoulder. Raj rode on the other side with her trusty curved sword. Murray ranged ahead of them, looking for any possible threats on the road, or lurking in the nearby wood.

Murray was always armed, with multiple weapons. How Raj had ever gotten the better of the man the night he’d broken into the baroness’s conservatory was beyond Stephen. However, considering the way his valet behaved now around Jane’s prickly aunt, he probably had not put up much of a fight when he’d realized his attacker’s curves were in all the wrong places for a man.

They’d made the decision to return to Trevellyn House when they’d realized keeping watch on four men’s houses in and around Combe Down would be nearly impossible while based in the Bath townhouse. Raj had argued convincingly the manor would also be easier to defend.

Henry had come over earlier after he’d received Stephen’s harried message. He explained he could not become involved until someone broke a law. Without reliable witnesses from the Monday night crush, it would be difficult to charge the man with anything. And doing so might cause a scandal from which Stephen’s reputation might not survive. However, he’d offered to do what he could if they could produce evidence one of the suspects had committed a crime.

Stephen’s gaze swung back toward Jane, like a compass toward true north. Gad—he’d better get a grip before he started blubbering like a school boy and declaring undying devotion to a woman he’d known for barely two weeks.

* * *

Jane’s couragehad rallied when Raj had insisted they’d be safer at Trevellyn House. She knew the minute she walked back into her conservatory, the mere presence of her beloved plants would give her strength.