“The town is close.” Her voice came to him softly. “To the right and straight ahead.”
He raised his gaze to her. Her rich, dark eyes had grown warmer on him. It made him want to smile warmly—or turn away again. He wasn’t about to risk losing what was left of his heart to love.
He motioned for her to hop on the horse in front of his captive. She refused. He took the reins and walked beside her.
“You seemed to be remembering something a little while ago,” she said in her dulcet voice. “Something that…perhaps broke your heart. Would you like someone to talk to about it?”
Someone like her? Why was she offering him her ear?
“I have been told I’m a good listener,” she said, her gracious smile intact.
He’d gone to a therapist from work. He’d helped others, but not Michael. Talking about stuff didn’t help. It only opened closed wounds and made him feel worse. “No. I’m fine.”
“Are you wed?”
He cut his glance to her. “I said I was fine.”
“Of course. I was just trying to start a conversation.” She kept her eyes on the distance and didn’t speak again.
“And no. I’m not wed in my century.”
“Pardon?” she stopped walking and waited for him to stop as well. “Why did you sayin my century?”
Did he? He was so used to thinking of things in the future ashis centurythat he automatically said it. “I meant city, in my city.” He laughed, but it was as disingenuous as hers.
“Then you likely would have said city, if that is what you meant,” she challenged.
“Just a misstep of the tongue, Miss Whimsey,” he said stiffly.
“Of course.”
They reached the village. It wasn’t as large as the city of Beddington, where they’d met yesterday morning. Most people here knew the duke’s daughter and bid her good day. Michael was surprised that she got along so well with the commoners. He thought the duke’s daughter would be stuffier with them.
He took a quick look around at the small cottages with thatched rooves. They were quaint, but small for the most part. There was a church, a mill, a few shops and some larger manor house-looking buildings.
He stopped thinking it was a movie set and started thinking Green and his friend knocked him out and brought him to this place…in England? There were mountain ranges he didn’t recognize from America. How was it all possible? When he thought about it too much, it made him feel ill.
He felt eyes on him and noticed most of the villagers staring at him or the unconscious man hanging over his saddle. Some of them smiled. He didn’t smile back.
He heard her sigh beside him and dipped his chin in her direction. “What?”
“Are you always so solemn?” She wasted no time asking him. “Does it pain you to smile?”
He turned his head to stare at her more fully. “I don’t think about it.”
“You have to think about smiling?”
He shrugged and picked up his steps once again. Her hand on his arm stopped him. He didn’t know what to tell her. Should he lie? He preferred not to, but he didn’t want to share his life. “I’ll make more of an effort to smile in the future.” He turned and kept walking.
When he reached the center of the village, he stepped up onto a wood gazebo of sorts, with a raised wooden floor.It was all real. It was all real.
“Can I have everyone’s attention?” he shouted. His voice boomed, loud and strong. People on their way to the mill, or to the baker or the butcher stopped and did as he asked.
“My name is Investigator Michael Pendridge. I have been sworn to duty as a law keeper here in Croydon by Judge Whimsey, Duke of Croydon.”
“Where do you come from?’ someone called out.
“Never saw you before today!”
