She raised her eyebrows. “I thought your goal in pretending to mistake him for someone else was to find a way to ingratiate yourself to him, thereby creating the opportunity to discover the truth of what happened the night of the robbery.”
“Yes,” he said slowly. “But—”
“Well, he didn’t seem to care much for you, but he was certainly showing an interest in me. I wasn’t about to let that go to waste.” She spoke as if she hadn’t just invited the man who’d threatened her entire family to come join her in their parlor for tea and conversation.
“Yes, but . . . it’s too dangerous.”And I don’t want that man anywhere near you. All he could hope was that the raging jealousy that was snaking its way through him didn’t show.
“I’m aware. Although I suspect all he wants is to learn whether Jeremy has said anything to me. Once I tell him I haven’t spoken to my brother, I imagine he’ll disappear.”
Unless he’s after something else. Stuart clamped his mouth shut. His jaw ached from the unspoken words. “I don’t like it,” he finally said as they drew closer to the Parkers’ home.
Norah paused at the bottom of the steps that led up to the front door. She looked up at him with shining eyes and a serious expression. “You don’t have to. But I’ll ensure we’re in a public place. Nothing will happen, save for me discerning whether Mr. Maddox and his associates somehow convinced Jeremy to go along with them in breaking the law and set it up so that he was the only one who paid for it.”
She was changing the subject, trying to turn his mind back to Jeremy by posing that theory. Stuart sighed. The ball of fear and jealousy that sat lodged in his stomach wouldn’t go anywhere until this was over, but it would do no good to try to persuade Norah to give up this scheme.
He’d have to trust her, plain and simple.
“Jeremy wouldn’t be as innocent as he claims if he agreed to go along with robbing a train,” Stuart said, surrendering to Norah’s gentle nudge into a new line of conversation.
“Yes, that’s true.” Her face scrunched up as she thought, and Stuart thought he’d never seen anything more adorable. Before he realized what he was doing, he’d reached out and run his fingers over her cheek and down to her jaw.
Her face instantly smoothed out as she stiffened. Stuart yanked his hand away. His face burned. What had he done?
And worse, why did she stare at him as if he’d burned her with his touch?
“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice strangled as his heart plummeted with the gravest sort of disappointment. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
Slowly, her lips turned upward. Then, before he could react at all, she’d stepped forward, rose up on the tips of her toes, and planted a kiss on his cheek.
“Good night, Stuart. Thank you for the stroll.” And then she was gone, leaving him alone at the bottom of the steps.
His hand instinctively went to his cheek, feeling for the spot on his skin that her lips had touched.
Norah Parker had kissed him.
Chapter Eleven
