It had the intended effect. The steward looked suddenly uncertain.
“Sir,” Winnie said, “you’ve misunderstood entirely. There will be no men after me because I am already married.”
“You… are?” The steward gazed at her doubtfully. Winnie amplified the smile. “Are you a widow then?”
“Certainly not.” That would not do. A young widow? She’d be inundated by gentleman callers on the morrow. Winnie searched her imagination.
“My husband and I are estranged,” she decided. “He has chosen to remain in London, while I have elected to live independently here in Llanreithan.”
“And he does not mind, your husband?”
Winnie waved a hand airily. “He is a modern man.” Inspiration struck, and she made her face stiffen a bit, as though she were hiding a wound. “He has… found other companionship. It is of no consequence to me, of course.”
She allowed her voice to crack on the final word. DearGod,she was her mother’s daughter, for all that she did not want to be.
The elderly steward leaned forward. He had softened toward her. She could feel it.
“And you so young!” he said. “A sin, that’s what I say. Is that why you introduced yourself as Miss Jellicoe when you entered?”
Ohblast,she had. Hell. She had chosen her pseudonym on the mail coach as she’d ridden from London to Llanreithan. She’d plucked the name from the address on an envelope that she’d watched slip from a satchel of letters and fall onto the street. The wind had caught it; the envelope had fluttered into the air and then wheeled merrily up, up, into the sky and away.
“Ah,” she said. She pinched her own thigh through her skirts until her eyes started to fill with tears. “Yes. You’ve found me out. I should not have tried to deceive you, only it has been so difficult to come to terms with my separation from my husband.”
She made her voice grow rather tragic. The steward leaned forward, utterly enthralled. “In fact, I am Mrs. Spencer—”
Ohhell,why had she said Spencer? It had just popped out, familiar on the tongue—the very pseudonym her mother had used in London, and thus utterly unsuitable.
“Er,” she tried again, “Mrs. Spencer…”
Think, Win, think! A town, a name—the place you were born—say something!
“Halifax,” she said. “I am Mrs. Spencer Halifax.”
Chapter 1
Ten years later
Spencer Halifax, Earl of Warren, looked at the jailer. The man was built like a bull—ashortbull—and appeared to be missing at least three fairly important teeth.
“You are certain?” Spencer asked. He tried to peer again into the dimness of the tiny ring of cells, but it was no use. It was too dark, and the building was too windowless, and the cells were entirely too fetid. “You’re certain she’s in there?”
“Oh, aye, she’s in there.” The jailer spat directly on the floor. “A hellish vixen, she is. She’s been here eighteen hours, and the only moment of peace I’ve had is when I went to piss. Screeching and caterwauling to wake the dead and—”
The jailer paused and looked up at Spencer. It was several inches up, and his loutish form seemed to quail a bit, deflating under Spencer’s gaze. He did not, perhaps, often encounter men who could outmatch him in a fight without breaking a sweat.
“Who did you say she was to you?” the jailer asked.
“I didn’t.”
Spencer thought again of the letter he’d received from his solicitor. Of the hours he’d spent on the coach staring in consternation at the fair copy of the ten-year-old marriage record.
Winifred Halifax.
Mrs. Spencer Halifax.
“I believe,” he said, “that the woman you have incarcerated in this hellhole is my wife.”
The jailer choked. “Ah—begging your pardon, sir, but surely—surely—”
