“No but the shadow of a tree isn’t usually trimmed in lace.”
She glanced down at her hem, making a face. “Blast.”
“Did you find anything?”
She shook her head. “I searched all of their rooms. Darrington keeps brandy bottles under the bed but nothing else. Fairweather is so tidy it makes my teeth hurt.”
“Barton?”
“Ugly coats and delusions of grandeur. Nothing out of the ordinary.” She fell into step beside him as they returned to the house. “He owes markers at three gaming hells in Town, but again, that’s hardly noteworthy.”
“He’s here,” Conall insisted. Or she is. “I can taste it.” He had that tingle in his hands, as if he had just shot a musket.
“I’ll keep searching,” Priya promised.
He didn’t like to involve her in his work, but sometimes she was insistent. And helpful. And too much time spent in her gardens was turning her into a recluse. Surely one of them ought to behave like a normal healthy member of Society. Especially considering the exaggerated rakehell he had been playing at lately. It was tiresome. But effective. “You’ve done enough.”
“Hardly,” she scoffed. “Isn’t that why I’m here instead of in my greenhouse? To poke about where I don’t belong?”
“You’re here because you’re the best judge of character I know.”
She preened. “True.” She wrinkled her nose. “Which is why I don’t like Society any more now than I did as a girl.”
He frowned. “Have they been unkind to you?”
She waved that away. “Of course not. Not while you’re here, or the duke. And not to my face. I have entirely too much money for that.”
“Not since you dumped your soup on that viscountess, you mean.” It wasn’t Priya’s beauty that flustered the Ton, it was her forthright opinions and remarkable ability to ferret out secrets. Not to mention her supernatural ability to hold a grudge.
She smiled innocently. “I spilled it. A dreadful accident. I am frightfully clumsy, you know.”
“She was very sticky.”
“Serves the old cow right. I hope she stank of lobster bisque for days.” She nudged him. “They’ll flutter at me all through dinner,” she added. “Your being here is tantamount to a declaration of war.”
“War? Hardly.”
“You know nothing about matchmaking Mamas. They truly think you truly mean to shop the Marriage Mart.”
“Better that than the truth.”
“Have you really thought this through?” Priya shuddered. “Debutantes and shifty-eyed fathers, and all that sighing.”
“Sighing?”
“Oh, Lord Northwyck, you’re so clever, you’re so handsome. The rain is like needles, the grass is too green, the wind smells like cow, save me, save me.”
He couldn’t help a laugh. “You are cracked, dear sister.”
“Yes, and it’s all because of my brief three weeks on the Marriage Mart.”
He changed the subject before she could launch into another one of her tirades. The war against Napoleon might have ended sooner if someone had put Priya in charge. “What happened to Persephone Blackwell?”
“Why?”
“They whisper behind their hands. They never used to.”
“They are idiots.”
He’d have to watch her carefully. He didn’t think it would be a hardship. She was as lovely as she ever was, in her own quiet, serious way, even with dirt smudged on her cheek. Perhaps because of it.
“There was a scandal while you were in France being heroic.”
He had to force his jaw to unclench, his shoulders to relax. Heroism was not what he’d call it. “Persephone? She doesn’t seem like the type.”
Priya snorted. “Neither did I, if you’ll recall.”
He snorted back at his little sister. “You were always the type.”