‘Who was that?’ Guin demanded, looking back over her shoulder. The stranger walked away rapidly without turning, silken skirts swaying.
‘The entrance is just here.’ Jared, tight-lipped, was holding a door for her.
Guin shot him one hard glance then swept in, up to the man who came out of a side door to greet them. ‘A private parlour, if you please. And luncheon.’
‘Of course, ma’am. Just step this way.’ He led them to a small antechamber, then opened a door onto a pleasant room overlooking the street.
‘Thank you, my maid will order. Please wait in the anteroom for a few minutes, Faith.’ She closed the door almost on their faces and whirled on Jared. ‘Who was that and what the devil is going on?’
‘My sister-in-law and nothing is going on.’
‘No? When you are as cold as one of Gunter’s ices? When you won’t talk to me other than to my lady me? When you are told in the street that your brother has died and you walk on as though nothing has happened?’
‘I am not cold, I am concentrating on doing my job and keeping you alive.’
‘Yesterday you were in my bed.’
‘And I should not have been. You want me to be warm? You want me to flirt with you? You want my focus off whatever is attacking you?’
‘And you cannot be a n
ormal, feeling human being and concentrate?’
‘Do you think I want to take the risk?’ He was not cold now, she thought with a shiver of something that was not quite alarm. ‘Yesterday I left my damned weapons in the study and that door was unlocked and the staircase unguarded. And my mind, what little I appear to have left of it, was entirely focused on what we were doing on that bed. I do not know what is wrong, but somehow you have turned my brain to mush.’
‘So it is my fault is it?’ Guin demanded.
‘No,’ he snarled back. ‘It is mine.’
There was such bleak despair in the amber eyes that Guin caught her breath. He has just heard that his brother is dead and I am railing at him like a Billingsgate fishwife. ‘Of course you are right.’ She kept her voice low. ‘We were careless, both of us. We will not be so again. But, Jared – your brother. I am so sorry.’
He had his composure again, the long-fingered hands were steady. But his eyes still betrayed him. ‘I had not spoken to him in eleven years.’
‘And it was he who lied about you, hurt you.’ He half-shrugged one shoulder. ‘She is beautiful, your sister-in-law.’
‘Bella. Yes.’
‘And very well dressed.’ And there had been both a liveried footman and a smart maid following her, Guin realised. ‘Wealthy. Just who are you, Jared Hunt?’
‘The man I have made myself,’ he said and opened the door. ‘Faith, wait in here with your mistress and lock the door behind me. I am not leaving the building. Open only to me.’
‘Jared, come – ’ The door closed leaving Faith, bewildered, on the inside. ‘– back. Oh damn. Lock the door, Faith.’
Jared strode into the main taproom. Several tables were occupied, a bar maid was serving and the landlord was at one end of the bar polishing glasses and keeping an eye on what was going on. He put down the cloth as Jared approached him.
‘I hear Ravenlaw is dead. When did that happen?’
‘A month past, near enough. A fall from his horse – herd of bullocks spooked it, he fell, got trampled. Nasty business.’
Nasty business. Jared slammed a brake on his imagination. William. My brother. He waited a beat until he was certain his voice would be under control. ‘And his father?’
‘Bearing up, they say. He’s taken it hard though, that’s for certain.’
‘Ravenlaw will have a son to inherit. The old man will have to take him in hand.’ He had never once yielded to the temptation to open that thick red tome, look at the list of names that would, surely, be growing beneath the entry for William and Bella, under the heading Huntingford.
‘No.’ The man picked up the cloth and began polishing again.
‘What do you mean, no?’