Page 10 of Romancing the Rifleman
She lifted her chin.“Perfect.Lord Kinwood is an idiot.So, mock him.”In a swift motion, she spun him around and gave him a push toward the door.A shudder went through him at her touch against the small of his back.
He was halfway down the corridor when he heard her call, “And Harrington?”
He turned, regarding her in the candlelight.
“I will be expecting a full report.”
She turned on her heel and strode back toward the ballroom, leaving him standing alone in the shadowy corridor.
Chapter5
As he strode into the study and called a greeting to Lord Kinwood, Harrington hoped he didn’t look as ill as he felt.
The earl was about five years older than Harrington, in his mid-thirties.Their time at Eton had overlapped by a few years.Kinwood had reddish-brown hair and the stout, barrel-chested figure of a man who had been a sportsman in his youth, but now all that hard flesh was starting to go soft.
Harrington held out a hand.“Kinwood, you old canker.How’ve you been?”
He settled into the leather wingchair across from Kinwood’s, accepting his offer of a brandy but declining a cheroot as he seldom partook.Besides, he was feeling nauseous enough as it was.
Kinwood made polite chit-chat for ten minutes, mostly about a horse he’d recently purchased, before coming ’round to the point.“I was surprised to hear you’d been elected to the House of Commons.”
Harrington took a nonchalant sip of his drink, trying to create the illusion that he hadn’t been the more surprised of the two of them.“Were you?”
Kinwood laughed.“I’m not saying you’re the last man I ever thought would stand for Parliament, but you’re probably in my bottom five.”
Harrington cast him a bored look, wishing he could do that eyebrow-thing of Diana’s.“Is that so?”
Kinwood’s expression turned earnest, as if he sensed that he had mis-stepped.“Look, Astley—I didn’t mean anything by that.I’m sure you’ll do a fine job.I was actually very pleased to hear that you’d been elected, seeing as we’re old friends.”
Old friends, my arse.Harrington took a long, slow sip of his drink, letting Kinwood stew.He turned toward the side table as he set down his snifter, careful not to look at his “old friend.”“I take it there is some favor you wish to ask of me?”
Kinwood leaned forward, forearms resting against his knees and his cheroot dangling loosely from his fingers.“Not a favor, so much as an opportunity.An important bill will be coming up for a vote in a few weeks.I thought you might like the chance to sponsor it in the House of Commons.It’ll be the perfect start to your political career.You see…”
Kinwood launched into it, and just as Lady Diana had suggested, it was a bit of canal in the middle of nowhere that served no discernible purpose other than to connect Kinwood’s farm to the existing system.Harrington let him drone on, making the occasional encouraging sound.
“So,” Kinwood concluded, “what do you think?”
Harrington leaned back in his chair.“How much will this cost?”
“That’s the remarkable thing—I’ve had my man of business work up the numbers, and it should only come to around six thousand pounds.”
Harrington made a sound of surprise.“It’s only half a mile long, then?”
Kinwood laughed nervously.“Not that short.But it’s just three miles.”
“Funny.”Harrington reached for the decanter and refilled both of their glasses.“The Royal Military Canal cost closer to twelve-thousand pounds a mile.”
Kinwood chuckled again.“I think you might be misremembering the figures?—”
“234,000 pounds,” Harrington cut in.“Over a span of nineteen miles.”
Kinwood swallowed, not seeming to have a ready answer.
Harrington continued, “What industries are in that area?”
Kinwood leaned forward, warming to his topic once more.“It’s close to the Welsh border.There’s a lot of iron and slate, coal, too?—”
“In theimmediatearea,” Harrington interjected.“I’m not asking about what’s twenty miles away.I want to know what goods would actually be transported on this canal.”
