“She’s asleep,” Caroline said, twitching her braid over her shoulder with an irritated gesture.“She was unwell.”
“I don’t care.”Sir Colin’s tone implied that he wished them all to the very devil.“Get her down here.At once.”
Caroline scowled, but she went.
For some reason, Gabriel found himself on his feet.His heart was pounding, his ears straining for the sound of Lucy’s soft footsteps on the stairs.
There.
Caroline opened the door and Lucy walked in.She did look a bit unsteady, in a hastily donned dress that was a bit rumpled, as though she’d been wearing her night rail and had changed quickly when her presence was required downstairs.Her hair was tied in a messy chignon that looked like it could tumble down around her shoulders at any moment.
Gabriel went to meet her, worry clutching at his heart.Was she ill?Her eyes were brilliant, like sapphires glittering in her flushed face.She took his arm gratefully and leaned on him as they walked over to where Sir Colin waiting impatiently.
“You wished to see me?”she said calmly, but Gabriel felt anything but calm.
“Enough,” he said abruptly, keeping Lucy close against his side.He glared down at Sir Colin.“We have been more than accommodating, playing out this little farce of yours.But it’s time for you to go.”
“I’m not leaving until I’ve proved that the robbery tonight was not carried out by the true Gentle Rogue.”Sir Colin’s chest heaved.
“Well,” Lucy said in reasonable tones, “I don’t really understand what’s going on here.But as you once pointed out, I am something of an expert on The Gentle Rogue.Why don’t I go through the evidence with you?”
Evidently, this was what it took to push Sir Colin to the brink of madness.He clutched at his mousy brown hair, making it stand on end.“Someonerobbed a coach on the Bath Road tonight.But it couldn’t have been The Gentle Rogue!”
“Why not?”Lucy was so nonchalant, Gabriel could almost forget this had all been her idea.“Let’s be methodical about this.Did he approach humming a tune?”
“Yes,” said Sir Colin, grinding his teeth.“The young lady, a Miss Graves, reported hearing the strains of ‘Molly Brown’ after the carriage was stopped.”
“Molly Brown.”Something tugged at Gabriel’s mind.
Lucy nodded as though ticking items off a list.“And did he steal a kiss from Miss Graves?”
“Kissed her hand,” Sir Colin spat.“While relieving the young lady of?—”
“A ring,” Lucy said, as if it was a foregone conclusion.“Of course.And was he riding a black horse?”
Gabriel tensed.Why would she ask that?He’d chosen a bay gelding for Dom to ride, as the next best thing, because no one but Gabriel could get near Dante, the stallion he apparently always rode when he went out as The Gentle Rogue.
But Sir Colin was nodding.Reluctantly, but definitely nodding.
Gabriel’s head felt as though it was floating two feet above his body.
“A large black Thoroughbred,” Sir Colin confirmed briefly.His color was starting to come down.Lucy’s calm recitation of the facts seemed to soothe him.“Same one mentioned in all the other reports.”
Dante wasn’t the only large black Thoroughbred stallion in England, Gabriel told himself, but there it was again.That sharp, jabbing sensation in his brain, like a spike through his left eye.
“I don’t know, Sir Colin,” Lucy was saying as she let go of Gabriel’s arm and walked forward to take Sir Colin’s.“It sounds very much to me as though The Gentle Rogue has struck again.But don’t despair, I’m sure you’ll catch him eventually.”
“But.But.I,” Sir Colin mumbled, seeming dazed.He didn’t put up a fight as Lucy steered him gently to the door that led to the hallway.
Lucy darted a glance over her shoulder at Gabriel, her smile flashing like lightning, and as she turned back to say a firm, “Good night, Sir Colin,” Gabriel’s eyes fell to the curve where her long, slender neck met her shoulder.
There was a smudge of dirt.Brown, like road grit.
Like the dust kicked up by a horse’s hooves, galloping along the Bath Road.
She shut the door behind Sir Colin and turned around, her bright, wide smile lighting up Gabriel’s chest, the entire house, all of England.
He strode to her as though no one else in the room existed, catching her to him as she gasped in delight.One hand held her close, the other went straight to her throat.
