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The moment Thea saw the immense stone mansion on the grounds of—what Redcliffe liked to call—his pleasure gardens, she wondered

why Jasper had become a highwayman if his uncle was this wealthy.

All this time, she’d thought he’d been forced by circumstance to play the fool for the ton in order to conceal his nocturnal raids against despicable men. Especially since she'd learned that St. James had an aunt

and cousins on his father's side who depended upon him. Therefore, wouldn't Redcliffe understand those responsibilities and

make allowances?

It was all a great puzzle.

“Can you imagine, Miss Hartley,” Lady Abernathy said, her eyes wide and bright with wonder as they approached the house, “the

woman who might become mistress to such an awe-inspiring demesne?”

Thea gaped at the ostentation of peacocks sashaying over a grassy knoll. “Nay, my lady. For this is almost too grand, even

for one’s imagination.”

Not even Nell Hunnicutt could compete with this sort of wealth.

“I shall take that as a compliment, Miss Hartley,” Redcliffe chuckled. “One day, I hope to have an heir worthy of inheriting

all that I have amassed.”

Thea would have thought the statement a rather abrupt change of topic. Although, since she’d been wondering for nearly an hour how to insert St. James into the conversation, she didn’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

“Your nephew would inherit. Would he not?”

Redcliffe visibly stiffened, his jaw tight as if she’d insulted him.

“Regrettably, you are correct. The Fates have been unkind to me,” he said without a trace of irony as his gaze traveled over

his expansive grounds, including stables that were practically larger than the entire village of Addlewick. “To take not one,

but two wives, then leave me without issue. Then my beloved sister was also taken, saddling me with a simpleton to raise.”

“He isn’t a simpleton,” she interrupted. However, knowing she couldn’t reveal too much or else it could expose him, she softened

her tone. “I’ve spoken with St. James on a few occasions and he has proven himself to be as intelligent as any man.”

Far above any man, she wanted to say. But to know one’s audience was something her father had always taught her. She probably should have remembered that before she’d interrupted.

“I did hire the best tutors for my nephew,” Redcliffe offered magnanimously, as if any accomplishment of St. James’s were

his own doing. “I sent him to school. And when he was dismissed from one, I sent him to another. I have done all that I could

for my sister’s child. More than most. I also tried to make a man out of him and purchased a commission, but all for naught.”

He shrugged. “Even his father’s younger brother saw that the boy was unfit to manage what was left of the estate and entrusted

it to me. I, and I alone, look after his tenants and his land because he is utterly incapable of doing so.”

She didn’t understand how any of that could be true. “Surely, he should be in charge of his own estate. He has reached his

majority.”

“And when he did, the courts ruled him mentally incompetent, Miss Hartley.” His resolute tone brooked no further argument.

Thea felt her brow knit. She knew Jasper. He wasn’t a man who would lie to her about who he really was. He wasn’t like Kellum

who’d wear one face for the public while in private he...

Her thoughts stalled. Wasn’t that precisely what Jasper was doing, showing the ton one face and her the other?

The truth of the matter was, Jasper hadn’t trusted her enough to tell her his reasons for what he did. In that sense, she

didn’t know him. Not really. And hadn’t she already traveled that road before?

How much more of herself was she willing to risk losing?

The carriage stopped at the mouth of a yawning doorway, flanked by three liveried footmen on either side, all standing at

attention.

Before climbing out, Redcliffe turned to her, a frown bracketing his mouth. “You seem to take a great interest in my nephew.”

“She merely has a soft and forgiving heart, my lord,” Lady Abernathy interjected. “Surely those are accomplishments as much

as beauty and grace.”

“They are indeed,” he conceded, then extended his palm to hand Thea down. “A man could ask for no more in a wife.”

Distracted by her thoughts, she placed her hand in his before he’d finished that sentence. Too late, she saw the hungry gleam

in his eyes. It churned uneasily in her stomach.

The sensation only intensified when, upon crossing the threshold to the vaulted marble foyer, the housekeeper made it known

that tea was waiting on the terrace. Clearly, this entire supposedly impromptu outing had been arranged.

So why the conspiracy? The secrecy? If he wanted to change the agreement from a tour of Hyde Park to his own pleasure gardens, why not simply invite them?

Honestly, she was exhausted by lies.

Furthermore, as someone who’d been reared on plays her entire life, she usually found that it was the villain who consorted

and conspired. And she wondered if she was the oblivious character being led into a trap.

“ Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind ,” the chorus quoted.

Uneasy, she lingered at the railing and gazed out at a maze with a serpentine path between the hedgerows on the far side of

the back garden. Seeing it from above, she thought that the pattern was simple. Even she could navigate it to the domed Grecian

folly in the center.

“It’s deceptively simple,” Redcliffe said as if reading her mind as he sidled up to her, his hand resting so close to hers

on the railing that she could feel the heat of it through her glove.

Retreating a half step, she pursed her lips and studied the maze once more. “It is hardly a challenge. All one must do is

memorize the turns from up here.”

His arm extended in a sweeping gesture. “You are welcome to try. I will remain with Lady Abernathy. Then, if you have not

returned in, say, half an hour, I will come to your rescue.”

“Gallantly said, Redcliffe,” Lady Abernathy offered from the ease of an upholstered chair, her knobby fingers pinched around

the handle of a teacup. And when Thea looked at her for permission, she jerked her chin in a nod. “Off with you, Miss Hartley.

Redcliffe and I have much to discuss.”

As she curtsied and took her leave, she silently hoped that they weren’t fools enough to think they had anything to discuss

regarding her.

Striding away, she couldn’t wait to distance herself from the pair. Lady Abernathy seemed to forget that her opinion had no bearing on Thea’s future. And as far as she was concerned, she’d rather lose herself in the maze until nightfall than spend one more minute in the company of Redcliffe.

As she walked toward the pebbled path between the tall boxwood spires, she felt a taut, gnawing sensation on the nape of her

neck as if she were being watched.

She shrugged it off and continued her trek, keeping track of every turn she’d memorized.

It wouldn’t take long before she reached the middle. Then, with any luck, Lady Abernathy would be ready to depart. The sooner

this entire outing ended, the better.

“What a waste of an afternoon,” she muttered to herself after a few minutes. “I learned nothing of what I intended, and am

only left to feel more hopeless than—”

She stopped, surrounded by three boxwood walls. A dead end. Drat!

Redcliffe was likely looking down and chuckling to himself.

She cast a surreptitious glance over her shoulder. “Was that left, right, right? Or right, left, left?”

Unfortunately in retracing her steps, she soon discovered that there was an identical dead end in another part of the maze.

Unless... of course, she’d circled back to the first one.

She sighed. Lady Broadbent was right. She truly did have the directionality of dandelion fluff. Even so, at least a downy

seed would have the ability to fly over the top of these hedges.

Perhaps, she should start again. Unfortunately, finding the two spires wasn’t as simple as it seemed. And when she looked

down, she definitely saw footprints in the gravel that looked suspiciously similar to her own.

The sun must have been caught behind a cloud because she shivered for no apparent reason.

Then she heard a footfall on the gravel.

“Oh, Miss Hartley?” Redcliffe called. “I’ve come to rescue you.”

She swallowed and for some reason, she didn’t want to respond.

After a minute, he chuckled. “I do enjoy a game of cat and mouse.”

Her throat tightened, the pulse beating in a harried rhythm beneath her skin. She had played blindman’s bluff with officers

at a garden party. Hide-and-seek in Addlewick with Percival, Peter and Carlton Culpepper. But never before had she felt the

utter certainty that what she was playing was definitely not a game.

All at once, Thea didn’t want to be in the maze. And most assuredly, she didn’t want Redcliffe to find her.

Her steps quickened on the path.

“Ah, there you are,” he said, his voice an indeterminate distance away. And then his steps were faster, too.

She hated this cornered feeling. There were debutantes who’d shared stories about the men who took liberties. Men who’d held

them too tightly. And men who’d done much worse.

But this was the Earl of Redcliffe. Surely, she needn’t worry about impropriety with Lady Abernathy watching on. Then again,

the dowager viscountess might simply turn her head, believing herself to be a matchmaker.

Biting down on her panic, Thea dashed around the curve of a long, winding path and stopped short at another wall in front

of her.

“I believe you’ve reached the serpent’s tail. That’s what I like to call this path,” he said, the crunch of his steps slowing.

They slowed, she realized, because there was no exit for her from this vantage. If she ran back the way she came, she’d only

meet up with him sooner.

Her gaze darted around at all the possibilities... just before she heard the crackle of branches behind her and a hand

clamped over her mouth.