“Aye, ye do.” Connor draped an arm around the groom and rotated him toward the path to the dairy. The same one he’d watched Piper ride up before. He pointed in that direction with a confidential clap to the lad’s shoulder. “Mrs. Milbourne. I ken ye keep an eye out for her. I aim to do the same.”
“M-mrs. M-milbourne, m’lord?” Bram swallowed so hard Connor could hear the effort. “Never heard of her.”
Aye, he’d said as much before. They all had, though Connor knew differently now. “Ochlad,” he snapped then lowered his tone to a kinder, gentler level once more. “Mrs. Milbourne told me all about it.”
His eyes widened. “She did? I…er, I mean…”
His verbal gaff sent the lad bolting for the main stable with all the speed of Aylesbury’s finest Thoroughbred out of the gate. With a sigh, Connor followed, unwilling to let the progress he’d made slip away. The lad was young and green. And as he’d already determined, an oaf when it came to lying. That made him Connor’s best bet in finding Piper.
He meant to persist until he got what he wanted this time. Granted, he should have gotten it the previous night. God knew, he’d had plenty of opportunity. Hours of conversation and not one about where he could call on her. True, he could have offered to escort her home, but he’d already been tempted to the brink and hadn’t trusted himself to think only of her safety.
Connor ran a hand through his hair. It wasn’t basic protective inclination that drove him. He wanted to see her. Talk to her without waiting days or months to do it, making her location compulsory to that primal need. Was that so wrong?
“Bugger it, lad!” Connor swore, impatience edging his voice as he entered the dim stable. He scowled at Bram, who stood poised like a statue at the end of the aisle with a row of stalls on either side. He visibly vacillated between running left or right before scaling a ladder to the loft like a seasoned sailor climbed a mast. Damn. “I’ll have an answer!”
“Go away, m’lord! I’ve nothing to say.”
“I’ll go away the moment ye tell me where Piper lives, lad. No’ before.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” the lad protested, his voice carrying from directly above Connor and fading as the force of his footfalls shook hay down through the loft’s floorboards.
Connor dusted off his sleeves. “Enough of yer hemming and hawing.”
“Pardon, m’lord, what did ye say?”
Connor pivoted on his heel to find Albert exiting one of the stalls nearest the door. A rosy-cheeked maid followed him out, eyes downcast as she tucked a few stray locks of hair back into her cap. Clearly, the groom had been snogging the lass when he ought to be working.
A fact that Connor was willing to ignore if it got him the answers he needed. Not that he expected the groom to suddenly be more forthcoming. The man had refused to meet his eye since he’d loosened Connor’s cinch and watched him fall on his arse. “I said I’m trying to find Mrs. Milbourne.”
Albert shook his head, his gaze watchful. “Nay, you didn’t.”
“Aye.” Connor rolled his eyes. The men of Buckinghamshire were a difficult lot. “I did. I said if he tells me where…”
No, he hadn’t said Mrs. Milbourne. He eyed Albert, who returned his scrutiny in equal measure. Waiting. Bram’s head appeared over the edge of the loft, eyes wide.
“I said Piper.”
The groom nodded and the lass at his side blinked at him with a wide, owl-like expression. “You said Piper. She’s told you, then?”
“Aye.” Connor offered no more than that. Presumably her name was the key to unlock some hidden door. Best to not give away what level of information he’d been given until he knew what it took to get a foot through it. “Will ye tell me where she lives now?”
Albert rocked his head from side to side, considering the request. His jaw likewise shifted from one side to the other, then set into a disappointing grimace. “If she didn’t tell you herself where she resides, I’ll not be the one to do it. I’ll not be the one to betray her confidence.”
Eyes again to the heavens, Connor pinched the bridge of his nose. Aye, a blasted difficult lot. Seeing his frown, Bram scurried out of sight.
“I will tell you where she is, though,” Albert conceded. “And leave the rest up to her.”
Connor gaped at him, torn between astonishment and relief. Relief that this evasive nonsense was over. “They are two different things? Where she lives and where she is?”
Lips compressed, the groom offered a thoughtful nod. “Often enough and at the moment, at any rate.”
As he was in no mood to wax philosophical, Connor got to the point. “And where would she be? At the moment, that is?”
“She’s gone to the village, m’lord.”
For the first time, the titular courtesy didn’t raise a brow. The admission did. From what he’d seen, Piper had embraced the secrecy of her residence with a vengeance. Disguising her identity. Enshrouding her location so thoroughly even someone who been hunting for her for months hadn’t been able to unearth her.
“Surely she wouldn’t be that reckless.” Especially if she truly believed Connor wasn’t the only one seeking her out.
