He felt strangely uncertain.
The fading light of late afternoon had left his study shrouded in half-darkness. Leaving the lamps untouched, Wrexford poured himself a brandy and took a seat by the unlit hearth. A cold-fingered chill seemed to creep out from the black coals and wrap itself around his boots.
His was not a tender heart—not since the days of his callow youth, when the razor-sharp cut of feminine wiles had left it irreparably scarred. These days, women rarely upset his peace of mind. And yet, Isobel Ashton seemed to have gotten under his skin.
The brandy filled his mouth with a sudden heat, and burned a trail down the back of his throat.
Though he didn’t want to, he found her attractive. Alluring. Intriguing. In the beau monde world, it was de rigueur for females to be colorless pasteboard cutouts. Mere silhouettes swathed in silks and satins. No wonder the widow’s aura of self-assured individuality stood out like a blaze of fire.
Wrexford spun the glass between his palms, feeling the prickle of cold cut crystal facets. He had never met anyone quite like her. Beautiful, but with an unusual strength and intelligence giving far deeper meaning to the superficial surface.
There was Charlotte, of course. But she was different.
He frowned as he tried to find words to describe how.
Irritating?No, that was unfair. She provoked him, she challenged him.
And what man liked that?
More than that, she forced him, by the sheer strength of her own unwavering passions, to care more deeply than he wished to about such notions as right and wrong.
Another swallow of brandy. Cynicism was much more comfortable.
Forcing his thoughts away from Charlotte, the earl made himself confront the specter of Isobel Ashton—and the fact that she might be involved in her husband’s murder.
No question in his mind that she was clever enough. She had fire, but it was tempered by ice.
And that, he slowly realized, was the elemental difference between her and Charlotte. The widow, he sensed, would be capable of murder. While Charlotte’s elemental warmth would never—never—allow for such a cold-hearted act.
That he might have misjudged Isobel’s character so badly stung. After the painful lesson of his youthful folly, he thought his brain had become a less primitive organ than other parts of his anatomy. But perhaps he was mistaken.
Brooding, however, was the coward’s way out. Whatever thespell that had drawn him to Isobel, it was broken by the fact that he could think her capable of cold-blooded murder.
Wrexford rose and went to his desk. A spark of flint and steel lit a single candle, and after quickly penning a note, he sealed it with a circle of molten wax.
“Weasel,” he called, as he returned to his workroom.
Tyler held up a warning finger. “A moment, milord. Let us finish.”
“Finish what?” Curious, Wrexford approached the counter where Raven was sitting, shoulders hunched, head bent low. The sound of pencils scratching over paper rose above the faint hiss of the oil-fueled Argand lamp.
The valet gestured to an open ledger book sitting amidst a bunch of other books. “The bantling saw the open ledger when I was showing him our work. He thinks he’s spotted an error in my addition of the monthly expenditures. We are both in the process of rechecking the final tally.”
“By all means, carry on.” Another minute or two of delay would make no difference.
Scratch, scratch.
And then Tyler let out a low whistle through his teeth. “Bloody hell. My apologies, lad. You’re right.”
Raven made a last calculation before setting down his pencil with an owlish blink. “Yeah, looks that way.”
Wrexford moved closer and surveyed the page. “You first found the error by adding this all up in your head?”
The boy nodded. “Are ye angry at me fer pointing it out?”
“Not in the least,” replied the earl. “You appear to have a knack for numbers. It’s an excellent skill to have.”
“Ye think so?” Raven slowly met his gaze, a hint of a question lurking in his eyes. “Dunno what’s so special about it. But Mr. Linsley says a great many interesting things can be explained by numbers.”
