Page 70 of Her Beast

“A little over twelve years.”

“Twelve years! And you’ve never seen him?”

“He is extremely private,” he said again.

Julia thought it sounded like something more than that, but she let the subject drop. “Will you show me the rest of the house?”

He gave her such an agonized look she almost felt guilty. Almost. “Ican’t, Miss Harlow.”

“Oh, come, how dangerous can it be? I’m not asking you to allow me into Mr. Barton’s gunroom or his—his bedchamber, just the other rooms.”

He blushed at the wordbedchamberand she decided that he reminded her a bit of Solomon—so shy and timid and proper. He was exactly the sort of man she could bend to her will without much effort.

“He doesn’t have a gunroom,” he finally admitted.

Julia laughed. “Oh no! You’ve answered a question.”

He smiled.

“What about the tour?” she persisted.

“I would have to ask Mr. Barton.”

That was ano, then.

“When will you ask him?”

He laughed, a startled blurt of a laugh that seemed to surprise him more than it did her. “You are very good at getting what you want, aren’t you, Miss Harlow?”

She gave him a smile she knew men liked: innocent with a dash of sauce, as Nanny Potter used to say. “What can it hurt to ask?” she said in a wheedling tone. “It’s not like I’ll do anything bad—like try to escape. I’ll behave.”

“Yes, after stabbing my employer you’ve been a model captive,” he retorted.

Julia gave a gurgle of laughter and his eyes widened, as if she’d just done something shocking.

“Ah, here is Kemp,” Julia said, spying the older woman over Mr. Butkins’s shoulder.

Mr. Butkins whipped around, his expression guilty. “Oh! Mrs. Kemp. I was just telling Miss Harlow that Mr. Barton wouldn’t be able to come to dinner tonight.”

Kemp lifted her eyebrows. “That was kind of you.”

“Mr. Butkins has graciously agreed to have dinner with me, Kemp.”

Kemp’s eyebrows crept even higher.

“But not if you think it improper, Mrs. Kemp,” Butkins hastened to say.

“Of course she doesn’t think it improper,” Julia said, taking Mr. Butkins by the arm and gently moving him out of the open doorway so the maid could enter. “Do you, Kemp?”

The older woman gave Julia a stern, narrow-eyed look—as if wondering what she was up to—but finally said, “No, I don’t imagine Mr. Barton would mind.”

“There, you see?” Julia assured him. “If Kemp says it is fine, then there is nothing to worry about. Do youplay cribbage or piquet, Mr. Butkins?”

“Erm—” his eyes darted frantically between Julia and Kemp, making him resemble an animal caught in a snare.

It was Kemp who came to his rescue.

“You play whist, don’t you, Mr. Butkins?”

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