Page 29 of The Bastard's Iberian Bride
Chapter 6
Paulette surveyedthe room while an inn servant poured tea. The paneled walls gleamed with a fresh oiling, and the aged stone floor had been scrubbed to a dull finish without a speck of the road dust and mud from outside. No fire burned in the well-swept hearth, but the day had been warm.
The maid closed the door and Mabel passed her a cup. “Drink up, then, Polly,” Mabel said. “And don’t you be worrying. Mr. Gibson will see to the accounting, I’m sure.”
“I’m not worrying,” she lied.
With Cummings distracted by Mr. Gibson and his men, she’d recovered her bit of money and stowed it away in a pocket.
Cummings’ man had looked for money. She’d seen him pawing through drawers and testing the floorboards, but not the panels along the wall of the kitchen. Oh, he’d checked the shelves and lifted the lid on every jar, but he couldn’t spring a panel loose if he didn’t know the spring was there.
She had money, but it must be stretched. She needed to see the solicitor in London, and perhaps meet with her trustees if they were in town.
And if she could find the lord who’d made her first visit to Cransdall so miserable, well, she didn’t need to be a lady of fashion to take back what was hers.
She swallowed a sigh. Cransdall was not a lucky place for her, not the first time she’d been there, nor this second. There would not be a third. She’d track down Lord Agruen and recover her mother’s ring, and somehow she’d find the treasure Jock said her father had left her. Lord Shaldon—both lords, old and new—were irrelevant to her now. Neither would stand in her way.
Only one stumbling block remained, and he would be joining her soon.
Kincaid gruntedthrough Bink’s instructions about securing Miss Heardwyn’s goods, making it ever more clear to Bink the man was not an upper crust batman at all. Whatever his role for Lord Shaldon, it had been much more than washing his smalls and scraping off his beard.
Whatever grief Kincaid felt for his master’s death, he was keeping it in. Probably, if he’d been abroad with the spymaster, he’d seen enough to take dying in stride.
The older of the two grooms from Cransdall trotted up. “She’s wishing to speak to you, Mr. Gibson,” he said.
“Is she now?”
“Aye. She and her jolly maid have sat down to tea, and there’s a third cup awaiting you, sir.”
He’d delivered that information straight-faced.
“Have we met before?” Bink asked. “Johnny, is it?”
Johnny grinned. “You were a boy, and I was but a little more than one meself. I never seen the young lord smile so much as when you were there, then and now, truth to be told. He said I’m to stay with you as long as you wish.”
Bakeley had settled him with another dependent. At this rate he’d have all of Little Norwick staffed for the lady. If they were to marry.
The other groom, a freckle-faced youth, was arranging straw for his resting place to take the first watch over the wagon.
Johnny noticed his glance. “Ewan, there, is me nephew. A good fellow. He’ll serve you right also.”
Bink laughed. Bakeley was having him on. In Bink’s present state, he didn’t need a valet and two grooms. Or a wife, for that matter. Bakeley, or rather, this new incarnation of Lord Shaldon, was applying the weight of afait accompli.
And to hell with that. He’d diverted them to this inn for a good night’s rest, and tomorrow he was returning them to Cransdall.
When he entered the parlor, Paulette looked up, and then jumped up, rattling the plates at her elbow.
A crumb clung to the corner of her mouth, sending a jolt through him.
If he licked it away, he could taste her.
He managed a greeting, tore his gaze away and surveyed the room. He’d stopped here once with Lady Hackwell and the children. It was as tidy now as it had been then. “I trust you are comfortable,” he added.
“Mr. Gibson…” She swallowed.
“And the food was palatable.”
She nodded, wringing the napkin in her hands.
