Honoria drew in a deep breath. She looked at the portion he held out, the bone wrapped neatly in a napkin-then reached out, took it, and sank her teeth into it.
To her relief, he made no effort to converse. She shot a glance his way. He lay stretched on the rug, propped on one elbow as he worked steadily through the basket. Honoria took a long draft of champagne-and focused on distracting them both.
"Why," she asked, "did Tolly come by way of St. Ives rather than Cambridge? If he wanted to see you, why didn't he come by the faster route?"
Devil shrugged. "All of us travel via St. Ives."
"For obvious reasons?"
He grinned. "We do, of course, feel a certain link with the town." He caught Honoria's eye. "One of my ancestors built the bridge-chapel, after all."
The chapel she had entirely forgotten to demand a glimpse of. Honoria humphed. "As a penance, no doubt."
"Presumably." Devil sipped his champagne.
Honoria returned to her cogitations. "When did Charles arrive at the Place?"
"I don't know-Vane said he was there when he arrived, late that evening, just before the worst of the storm."
Honoria frowned. "If Charles followed Tolly from town, why didn't he come upon us in the lane?"
"Charles wouldn't come that way."
"I thought all Cynsters travel via St. Ives?"
"All except Charles." Sitting up, Devil started to repack the basket. He glanced at Honoria, then reached for her glass. He drained it in one gulp. "Charles, in case you hadn't noticed, is not really one of the pack."
Pack-a good word to describe them, the Cynster pack of wolves. "He does seem…" leaning on one arm, Honoria gestured, "in something of a different mold."
Devil shrugged. "He takes after his mother in looks and in disposition. Barely a Cynster trait to be discerned."
"Hmm." Honoria settled more comfortably, a warm glow spreading through her. "When did his mother die?"
"Twenty or so years ago."
"So your uncle remarried almost immediately?"
The basket repacked, Devil stretched out, crossed his arms behind his head, closed his eyes-and watched Honoria through his lashes. "Uncle Arthur's first marriage was little short of a disaster. Almira Butterworth did what no other has in the history of the family-she trapped a Cynster into marriage, much good did it do her. After twelve years of marital discord, she died of consumption-Arthur married Louise a bare year later."
"So how would Charles, not being a dyed-in-the-wool Cynster, have come to the Place? Did he drive?"
"He doesn't drive-don't ask me why. He always comes via Cambridge, hires a horse, then comes riding up the main drive. He once said something about a master always coming to the front door, rather than the back."
Charles, Honoria decided, sounded as insufferable as she'd thought him. "So it's unlikely he saw anything?"
"He said he didn't see anyone about."
Honoria tried to think, but could find no focus for further questions. It was pleasant in the sunshine. Her parasol lay furled in the grass beside her; she should open it, but could not summon the strength. A deliciously warm, relaxed sense of peace pervaded her-she was loath to break the spell.
Glancing at Devil, she noted his closed eyes, black lashes feathering his high cheekbones. Briefly, she let her gaze skim his long frame, conscious, as always, of the deep tug she'd never previously experienced, never felt for any other man. A frisson of pure excitement, it heightened every sense, sensitized every nerve, and set her pulse racing. Simultaneously, at some fundamental level, it drew her like a magnet, a potent attraction all too hard to deny. Every instinct she possessed screamed he was dangerous-specifically dangerous to her. Perversely, those selfsame instincts insisted that with him, she was safe. Was it any wonder she felt giddy?
Yet the last was as true as the first. Not even Michael eased her mind to the same degree nor conveyed the same certainty of inviolable protection. The devil might be a tyrant, an autocrat supreme, yet he was also to be relied on, predictable in many ways, rigid in his honor.
Her eyes once more on his face, Honoria drew in a slow breath. He was dangerous indeed, but the basket sat, large and cumbersome between them. Lips gently curving, she looked away, into the soft haze of the early afternoon to the green fields of his domain.
No field came close to the pale, clear green of his eyes.
She'd reached that conclusion when the horizon abruptly fell, leaving her flat on her back, gazing up at the cloudless sky. An instant later, half the sky vanished, replaced by a black mane, hard, angular features and a pair of eyes that saw far too much. And a pair of long, mobile lips, their contours reflecting the same laughing triumph she could see in his green eyes.