Miss Quincy lifted her chin. “This was my first chance to come and look for it.”
“Second chance,” came his butler’s bored voice. “You were here three days ago.”
“Second chance,” Miss Quincy agreed. “If you don’t mind…”
But he did mind. Rather than stalk after her as she turned toward the corridor, he loped past her to block the library entrance with his own body if necessary. The library was his private domain. The rest of the world might be random and overwhelming, but his library was the one place where every single book—
Was completely out of order?
A strangled sound burst from Adam’s throat as he forgot about Miss Quincy completely. His books! Who had touched them? Were they all still here? This was not how it was supposed to be at all! Adam had specifically ordered the contents transferred from his London residence to be presented in the same manner his father had kept them: displayed by size and color, making the library a veritable rainbow of literature no matter what the weather might be doing outside. It had been that way for generations. Adam would never have changed that. His servants would never have ruined the careful order. Miss Quincy…
He whirled to face her.
“Did you do this?” he demanded, his growl this time very real indeed.
“Youdidn’t do it?” she countered with obvious surprise.
Of course she hadn’t snuck in and rearranged his books. Swinton would have tossed her out by her ear, missing jewelry or no.
At this point, Adam didn’t give a fig about Miss Quincy and her earrings. What mattered was ensuring the dozen volumes he had planned to keep for the rest of his life were still here.
If not, heads would roll.
Chapter 3
Carole leaned into a shaft of sunlight shining over the freshly ironed billiard table and carefully missed her shot.
“That was a near miss,” said her father in surprise and admiration. “You almost made it.”
“Thank you,” she murmured in reply.
Although the le Duc family often joined the Quincys for their weekly billiards game, this afternoon Carole and her father were enjoying a rare moment together. She was taking extra care to ensure neither one of them gained too many points, in order to ensure the too-brief game lasted as long as possible. In her family, a foul shot cost two points—which erased most of her three-point lead.
“How are your sketches coming?” Father asked.
“Very well,” she prevaricated.
As far as Carole knew, her best sketchbook was making the rounds with the neighbors or bobbing at the bottom of a well. The Duke of Azureford had sent her away without giving her a chance to look for it. Her chest tightened.
Father sent her a fond smile. “You’ll have to let me see your drawings one day.”
“One day,” she agreed vaguely.
As far as Father knew, her sketchbook was full of ladylike images: still-lifes of fruit at the breakfast table, watercolors of the bright yellow rapeseed flowers in their rear garden. He considered himself progressive to allow his daughter to play billiards with a proper cue rather than a ladies’ rack. If he found out she’d sketched the elegant castle ballroom as a billiard pub for whisky-swilling ladies, he’d never let Carole near a billiard ball again.
“Corner pocket.” Father positioned his cue and sent his ivory ball flying toward hers, which knocked it into the bright red object ball. “Cannon. Watch out, daughter. Now we’re tied.”
“Twelve to twelve.”
Carole bit her lip as her father took his next shot. She longed to fill the final pages of her sketchbook. If she had it, she would not draw him eager to win, but rather a scoreboard showing fantastical numbers high in the hundreds. After all, before each match, players agreed on how many points each type of shot was worth, and how many were necessary to win. If Carole ruled the world, games wouldn’t end at twenty-one, but last for as long as the players pleased.
As she watched, her father scored two more cannons and a hazard, before losing his turn with a foul.
He grinned at her. “Seventeen to twelve. Can you catch me?”
Of course she could catch him. Carole could have won this game on her first turn.
She stalled by taking a long moment to chalk her cue’s leather tip. It wasn’t necessary. She’d already chalked it after every turn. But it gave her a few more moments with her father. This morning, she’d even let Judith smarten her up for the occasion. A French twist in her hair, a braided gold bracelet on her wrist, the fancy day gown she hated because the puffed sleeves’ lacy trim scratched.
