Page 4 of The Spinster's Secret Scoundrel
Clever.
Insincere.
A gentleman. Not in the sense of having a shred of respectability to his suspiciously common name, but in the sense that beinga gentlemanmeant you were involved in the trade. Most of Cavalier Cove’s residents participated in smuggling. That’s why she’d been sent here. To spy.
For three years, she’d existed on the edge of society in this charming seaside town, praying her uncle never succeeded in arresting any of the villagers, lest they burn down her rented house.
Adeline was rather fond of her little cottage. She had fallen in love with it the moment she glimpsed the sea glinting down the hill from her garden, on the day she arrived to take up residence here.
Of course, if Uncle Patrick ever found out she had personally captured Le Fantôme andnotturned him in, he might well turn her out of the cottage himself. He was, after all, the one who paid her rent, and had ever since her disgrace.
Decisions, decisions.
It would be a pity to hang a man who kissed like that—
Ada groaned and flung a handful of grain with extra force and without looking first, accidentally pelting a goose. It raised its wings menacingly.
“Morning, Miss Naughton,” waved to her nearest neighbor, Betsey Briars. Betsey lived across the pond, on a small plot of land, with her elderly father. Though they were close in age, they weren’t entirely what you’d call friends.
Ada didn’t have friends, much as she wanted them. Everyone in town knew who her uncle was. They kept their distance.
“Good morning,” she called back, waving with feigned cheer she. Immediately, she wondered if it made her look guilty of harboring a fugitive from the law.
Then, she spotted it. A nest. Six new eggs, an overnight gift from some poor goose who was about to have her brood snatched. Right on the boundary between their properties, on the bank of the tiny pond that straddled it.
Mine, Ada thought, mentally rubbing her hands and calculating the money could earn if she claimed those pristine shells.
But not if her neighbor spied them first.
“You look well this morning,” Betsey called out.
“I am!”Go away. Don’t look at the nest. Don’t look at my house, or the man tied to a chair, visible through the window.Ada edged away from the dilapidated outbuilding where she had cornered Thierry, that lying thief, and winced to think what might have happened if she’d caught him a few minutes later. “You look well, as well!”
Ada’s face froze in horror. This was why she kept to herself. She was terrible at social interactions. Her pretty face had been almost enough to win her a husband once, until she’d made a foolish decision to anticipate her wedding vows with him.
Hardly an uncommon occurrence—but for the youngest daughter of a strict rector, she was expected to uphold certain standards. Her actions brought shame upon the entire family.
Her minor rebellion could have been papered over and forgotten if her betrothed hadn’t promptly abandoned her.
I cannot tie myself to a woman so lacking in character,he said in a letter to her father.I expected better from a clergyman’s daughter.
Ada couldn’t stand the way people looked in her home village looked at her after that. Pityingly. Scornfully. As someone who’d always struggled to make friends, who’d been overlooked by her parents and siblings her whole life, there was no coming back from the disaster of her abortive nuptials.
Ada would have signed a deal with the Devil himself to get away.
Uncle Patrick had offered her a far better bargain than Lucifer would have.Move to Cavalier Cove, help me bring down a ring of smugglers, and I will rent you a house of your own.
He’d worked his way up the ranks of the Excise Officers to lead a team of Riding Officers coordinating with the Preventive Waterguard, formed six years before to patrol the Chanel and stop illicit trade. Everyone benefited—except the law-breaking residents of Cavalier Cove, of course.
And yet… Ada couldn’t bring herself to betray neighbors like Betsey, who brought her fresh bread when she first arrived, even if they regarded her as strange and gossiped about her when they didn’t think she could overhear.
Ada was very good at going unnoticed, particularly in groups. She made a good spy. She knew about the underground caves leading to the Cock and Bull. She knew Viscount Prescott’s housekeeper, Mrs. Gosling, wasn’t above receiving the occasional bottle of fine cognac for her master’s cellars.
The villagers didn’t seem like criminals. Most of the people here were resilient and cheerful. She liked them. In her heart of hearts, she yearned to buy her rented cottage and remain in Cavalier Cove forever.
Her secret dream would be forever ruined if she told her uncle about their clandestine activities.
But sheowedUncle Patrick. He’d saved her from a life of shame and ruin.
