Page 124 of Laird of Flint
“Then how…?”
Hew said, “Someone else has regular access to this room.”
Their eyes widened simultaneously as they recognized the significance of that fact. With prudent haste, they began throwing on their clothes.
“Do ye think ’tis Peris?” she said, shimmying into her leine.
“That would be my guess.” He pulled on his braies. “He could have easily snatched the key from your father.”
“True.” She slid her stockings up over her knees. “Da wouldn’t even notice it missin’. I don’t think he’s come here since that day.”
Hew stuck his leg through his trews. “The physician’s accomplice. He said they planned to move the goods, right?”
“Aye.” She tossed her arisaid over her shoulder, trying in vain to find the brooch to pin it together. “Before Lent, he said.”
“So they mean to transport them from here within…” he said, tying a sloppy knot in his trews as he calculated the days. “A month.”
“Which means we need to catch them in the act. But how? Post a guard at the door?” She shook her head. “My father would ask too many questions.” She found the brooch.
“Nay.” Hew shook his leine out and hauled it over his head. “I’m taking it.”
“Takin’ what?”
“The treasure.”
She winced as she poked her finger with the brooch. “Ye can’t do that. What if ye’re caught with it?”
“’Twas stolen long before I arrived.” he said, buckling his belt. “The abbot will vouch for that.”
That made sense. Then a twisted thought coiled around her brain. “What if Peris’s accompliceisthe abbot?”
“I don’t think so.” But she could see there was a sliver of doubt in his mind. “The abbot wouldn’t have put me on the task in the first place if he had something to hide.”
“So what are we goin’ to do with the treasure?”
“Weare doing nothing,” he said, arching an overprotective brow.“Ihave a plan.”
“And what’s that?”
He furrowed his brows. He obviously didn’t want to divulge his plan.
“Damn ye, Rivenloch,” she bit out, startling him with her oath. She startled herself almost as much. “I brought ye here.” She pointed to the bed. “We just lay on that pallet together in nothin’ but the skin we were born in. I shared my body with ye in the most intimate act a man and woman can perform. God’s eyes, I gave my maidenhood to ye. Are ye goin’ to tell me ye’re unwillin’ to share your plan with me?”
She could see he was taken aback by her fury. To be honest, so was she. But she had to admit she rather liked this new person she was becoming. Someone who wasn’t afraid to speak her mind. To disagree. To get angry. To have opinions and ideas and dreams of her own.
He apparently liked her too. His lip curved up in a half-smile of approval.
“Fine,” he said, telling her his plan as he gathered up the treasures in the linen square, tying a knot in the top.
She didn’t like the plan. It was too risky. There were too many opportunities for mistakes.
But she knew it would do no good to tell him so. His mind was set. He was confident it would work.
The best thing she could do was make her own plan for when his failed.
Hew carefully poured the contents of the linen bundle onto the table of the chapter house. The gold gleamed in the candlelight, and the jewels winked up at the three witnesses.
“Ye found it!” the abbot exclaimed in stunned awe.
