“You might see if Mr. Bridge has it,” she added quietly.
“Of Rundell and Bridge?” Jasper clarified, realizing without her saying it directly, she’d pawned his pin.
“Rundell, Bridge,andRundell,” she amended.
Her correction irked him.
“That seems incredibly unimportant,” he snapped.
“I’m sure it is important if you are the second Mr. Rundell.”
He stared at her — a hard penetrating stare — until she shrugged daintily.
“Are you and your sister in desperate need?” he asked, unable to fathom any other reason she would take something of his and sell it.
“No,” she bit out the single word.
Apparently, Miss Sudbury had a terrible compulsion or even some sort of mania. Also, quite clearly, she felt no to need explain herself.
“Will you steal from me again?”
She raised her head, looking at him with a frown.
“How could I?” she asked, still not confirming, nor denying.
He cocked his head. “What intent to your words?”
“We are riding,” she quipped. “How could I take anything from you?”
Blasted woman!She was being purposefully evasive.
“In the future,” he asked, annunciating his words clearly, “if given the opportunity?” Because Jasper still saw a future, at least for a short while, in which they could keep company and hopefully put out the fire of longing, which hadn’t diminished one whit.
“I don’t imagine you are having another party anytime soon, are you?” she asked.
He sighed. She was still dodging, and he was ready to give up.
“Besides, sir, you are bewattled,” Julia said, looking forward out over Rotten Row, past the breath of the horses, visible in the chilly air. “You do not have the right of things, I assure you.”
Bewattled?Yes, he was most certainly confounded by her.
“Will you promise to stop?” he implored.
“I will not speak of this any further,” she said.
Jasper swore under his breath. “We’re not speaking of simply picking a gentleman’s pocket of a silk handkerchief, although even that can result in being flogged or spending time in jail. This is larceny that can end with your death.”
She swallowed. He hoped he’d frightened some sense into her. Instead without looking at him, she gave a rather glib comment.
“I believe the courts are sentencing thieves less and less to hang and more often simply transporting them.”
He wanted to scream.
“To die in the airless belly of a vessel en route to a penal colony thirteen thousand miles away? That doesn’t sound much better than a quick dance on the end of a rope.”
He wiped a hand over his eyes. “I cannot believe we are discussing this almost as matter-of-factly as bantering over the cost of a pound of coffee beans.”
“Then let’s stop. I already told you I do not wish to speak any longer about it.”
