“Yes?”
“I need to speak to Master Noble.” This time my voice was strong, calm.
“Lady Winters, I presume?”
I blinked. “Yes.”
“I’m sorry, Lady Winters, but Master Noble is out for the evening.” He looked behind me. “I’ll have the carriage see you home.”
Disappointment, sharp and deep, hit. “I see. Thank you.”
A different carriage from any I had ridden in previously escorted me back to my rented town house. Out with another somewhere in the city—escorting a new client perhaps?
I swallowed.
I entered and greeted our new butler. Penny, the only servant we had rehired, passed me in the hall, her eyes unfocused and dreamy. I shook my head. A good worker but still a mite daft.
The door to my room was shut. I opened it and slipped inside, heading for my dressing table. Penny had been prompt in lighting the lamps. I peeled off my gloves and reached to my nape to unclasp the necklace there. Movement in the looking glass caused me to go motionless as I examined the image reflected.
It explained Penny’s behavior and the lamps.
I let the necklace fall to the table and walked back to the door, closing it softly and sealing us inside. I leaned against the door, my hands splayed on the wood behind me.
Gabriel was sitting on my bed, papers spread in a terrible mess around him, leaning back against a pile of my pillows, looking wonderful, even with the dark creases under his eyes.
“Marietta.”
“Gabriel. This is my bedroom, you did know.”
“I confess I’ve been here before.”
A tingle shot through me, very different from the last time he was in my room, the night our partnership had begun.
“How did you get in?”
“I bribed your servants.”
“Well, that will hardly do. And here I thought you had hired us some respectable ones.”
He unfolded from his position and rose slowly, hitching his hip and shoulder against one of the bed poster poles and crossing his arms. “I bribed them doubly, so they would say nothing to your brothers or anyone else, should I stay for five minutes or five hours.” Emotion flashed, and I caught the vulnerability he tried so desperately to hide. “I suppose they are only as respectable as the man hiring them. Perhaps you should have checked his references.”
He looked delicious. Hair falling into his ever watchful eyes.
“Perhaps I still should. A full,thoroughsearch.”
He smiled. A full stretch of sensual lips—palpable relief combined with a predatory upward curl.
“That would be best. Tea?” He pointed to a service on my side table. He had obviously made himself right at home.
“No.” I walked toward him, picking the pins out of my hair as I went. “I’ve had plenty of tea.”
“You were supposed to be at the Smithertons’ for at least another hour.”
I arched a brow back. “You are keeping track of my appointments?”
“Of course.”
“You say it as if it’s obvious. Why would you keep track of such a thing?”
