“Sir Humphrey Carling.”
“And your brother?”
A frown started to grow in her eyes. “Jeremy Carling.”
His smile remained, all reassurance. “And have you lived here long? Is it as peaceful a neighborhood as it seems at first glance?”
Her narrowing eyes told him she hadn’t been deceived; she answered only his second question. “Entirely peaceful.”
Until recently. Leonora held his disturbingly sharp gaze, and added, as repressively as she could, “One hopes it will remain so.”
She saw his lips twitch before he glanced down.
“Indeed.” With a wave, he invited her to walk with him the few steps back to the gate.
She turned, only then realized her acquiescence was a tacit acknowledgment that she’d come racing out purely to meet him. She glanced up, caught his gaze—knew he’d seen the action for the admission it was. Bad enough. The glint she glimpsed in his hazel eyes, a flash that made her senses seize, her breath catch, was infinitely more disturbing.
But then his lashes veiled his eyes, and he smiled, as charmingly as before. She felt increasingly sure the expression was a mask.
He halted before the gate and held out his hand.
Courtesy forced her to surrender her fingers once more to his grasp.
His hand closed; his sharp, too-farseeing eyes trapped her gaze. “I’ll look forward to extending our acquaintance, Miss Carling. Pray convey my greetings to your uncle; I will call to pay my respects shortly.”
She inclined her head, consciously clinging to graciousness while she longed to pull her fingers free. It was an effort to keep them from fluttering in his; his touch, cool, firm, a fraction too strong, affected her equilibrium in a most peculiar way. “Good afternoon, Lord Trentham.”
He released her and bowed elegantly.
She turned, went through the gate, then swung it shut. Her eyes touched his briefly before she faced the house.
That fleeting connection was enough to steal her breath once again.
Walking up the path, she tried to force her lungs to work, but could feel his gaze still on her. Then she heard the scrape of boots as he turned, the sound of firm footsteps as he headed down the pavement. She finally breathed in, then exhaled in relief. What was it about Trentham that so set her on edge?
And on the edge of what?
The feel of his hard fingers and faintly callused palm about her hand lingered, a sensual memory imprinted on her mind. Recollection niggled, but as before proved elusive. She’d never met him before, of that she was sure, yet something about him was faintly familiar.
Inwardly shaking her head, she climbed the porch steps and determinedly forced her mind to the duties she’d left waiting.
Tristan strolled down Motcomb Street toward the huddle of shops midway along that housed the office of Earnest Stolemore, House and Land Agent. His discussion with Leonora Carling had sharpened his senses, stirring instincts that, until recently, had been a critical element in his daily life. Until recently his life had depended on those instincts, in reading their messages accurately, and reacting correctly.
He wasn’t sure what he made of Miss Carling—Leonora as he thought of her, only reasonable given he’d been silently watching her for three weeks. She’d been physically more attractive than he’d deduced from afar, her hair a rich mahogany in which veins of garnet glowed, those unusual blue eyes large and almond-shaped beneath finely drawn dark brows. Her nose was straight, her face finely boned, cheekbones high, her skin pale and flawless. But it was her lips that set the tone of her appearance; full, generously curved, a dusky rose, they tempted a man to take, to taste.
His instantaneous reaction, and hers, had not escaped him. Her response, however, intrigued him; it was almost as if she hadn’t recognized that flash of sensual heat for what it was.
Which raised certain fascinating questions he might well be tempted to pursue, later. At present, however, it was the pragmatic facts she’d revealed that exercised his mind.
Her fears about the attempted burglaries might be simply a figment of an overactive feminine imagination aroused by what he assumed had been Stolemore’s intimidatory tactics in trying to gain the sale of the house.
She might even have imagined the incidents entirely.
His instincts whispered otherwise.
In his previous occupation, reading people, assessing them, had been crucial; he’d long ago mastered the knack. Leonora Carling was, he would swear, a strong-willed, practical female with a healthy vein of common sense. Definitely not the sort to start at shadows, let alone imagine burglaries.
If her supposition was correct, and the burglaries were connected with Stolemore’s client’s wish to buy her uncle’s house…