“No, it would becomeours.It would be a fitting end to the whole matter, don’t you think? No family wins, and no family loses. Your grandmother claimed to want peace.”
“I think you saw a way to turn the tables on her. On my father. I think you enjoyed the idea of besting them at their own game.”
“Since it undermined his careful plan to ensure that land would forever remain out of my family’s hands, I definitely enjoyed knowing that.”
“What do you mean, careful plans?”
“Why in hell do you think he bequeathed you that property, Clara? There had to be other lands not entailed that would have suited you just as well. He believed you would never marry. He counted on it. Theo might sell it, maybe even to me, if he ever found himself caught in financial trouble. You never would because it would be your source of independence.”
She wanted to disagree. He saw that in her scathing glare and tight posture. Adam counted on her being too smart to miss how very neat that plan had been.
She looked down on the desk and its papers. “Were you in here making your own plans on how to ruin his good name the way he did your father’s?” She still sounded angry, but at least she no longer looked ready to shoot him.
“My last letter discussed decorating at Drewsbarrow, if you want the honest answer.”
The worst of her fury left her like a dark specter flying out of her body. “Tell the steward not to use blue too much. So many people use blue.” Looking weary now, she walked to the door. “I will go now. My carriage is waiting.”
He strode over and pressed his hand against that door so she could not open it. “You are here now. I cannot let you go on the chance you will return tomorrow.”
She stood there, her hand on the latch, her back a mere inch from his body. He drank in her scent and closeness like a man deprived for years.
“I cannot let you go, Clara, because I fear if I do I will never see you alone again.”
She turned. “You are braver than I am, if you force this conversation now.”
“Not so brave.” Not brave at all. Desperate. “I will send your carriage away. Do not move. Do not leave.”
He sent word to her coachman. When he stepped back in the study, she was sitting on a bench in front of the garden window. She had removed her black bonnet, and the afternoon sun found those subtle strands of copper in her dark hair. She did not appear eager to see him again.
“Do you have any sherry here?”
“I can send for some, or I have brandy on hand.”
“I suppose brandy will do.”
He opened the cupboard that housed it and poured two glasses. She tasted tentatively, thought about it, then shrugged. “It will do.”
“You were making calls today,” he said.
“What makes you think so?”
“The black.”
She looked down at her dress. “I visited my solicitor. That is how I learned about the land. As I think about what you said, about my father’s plan, I think you give him more credit for nefarious plotting than is fair. My grandmother changed her mind, you see. When she concluded you preferred me to Emilia, she decided that would do as well.”
He set down his glass, and went over to her, and knelt on one knee in front of her. He wanted to say he was wrong and swear that he never thought about land or fathers or anything at all where she was concerned except heartfelt emotions.I saw you and decided to marry you.It was not the entire truth.
“Your grandmother decided that because that old argument and that land was the least of it. She knew I had more recent causes to want an accounting with your family. More serious reasons. I will not lie and say my interest in you was always separate from that, Clara. I desired you from the start for the woman you are, but I also saw at once how knowing you might benefit me as I sought to learn the truth.”
“And did it benefit you?”
“In small ways at first. And then, soon, I no longer cared if it did.”
She searched his face, his eyes, looking for the signs of lying, he assumed. He counted on her knowing him very well, as she claimed.
He ventured a touch on her hand. When she did not resist, he took that hand in his. “At Drewsbarrow you asked if I could let it go. If I could ever be finished with it. For you I can, and I will.”
Her hand turned palm up, so she held his. “I said you must tell me everything. I do not think you want to.”
