“If this is your condition, then I agree,” he said quietly, and my heart flew into my throat. I’d won. My goodness, had I just won? “But,” he continued, “you will allow me to read your notes before you give them to your father, so I can feel certain that you did the work you promised you’d do.”
“You might not like what I’ve had to say so far,” I said dryly. But what did I have to hide? I’d written with my father in mind, using a professional, factual tone with only the barest hints of gossip.
Well, perhaps there were a few notes I wasn’t proud of.
“After three years with you, Anna, I am certain I can handle it. Can we agree?”
I shrugged. Why not? One week more, and either way I had what I needed. “Very well, then. We’ve a deal.”
Graham nodded, swallowing hard. His mood was more somber than ever. “Wonderful.”
ChapterThirteen
Anna
Besides the ticking of a little clock on my desk which read five thirty-seven the next morning, Highcliffe House was without a sound, but I was awake. Alert. Unable to sit still.
Not long after Graham and I had made our deal, we walked home, Graham carrying Tabs until she was awake enough to stumble down the path and chase the wind. He hadn’t said much, but I knew his mind was at work planning out our week.
As promised, the notes I’d made in my notebook after dinner were straightforward, perhaps tinted in favor for the way the sea had relaxed me. I’d mentioned how easily I could see families picnicking there, chasing one another, perhaps tossing an unlucky member in the sea. Knowing Graham would read it later made me laugh. I ended with a final assessment: Brighton was no better than Lyme; worse, if one considered how rocky the beach was. Therefore, nothing had convinced me that its popularity might last long enough to warrant a grand investment.
Let Graham argue that point.
I’d yet to call for Mariah and decided to simply enjoy the view. As I opened my balcony doors, salty sea air andsunshine assaulted my senses. Just above the line of treetops rose the sea, blue and green and sparkling brilliantly at the start of a new day. Leaning against the cold balustrade, I untied my curling papers and watched the waves roil from far out. The sea was musical, soothing as it welcomed the morning. Five more days until Papa came for me. My future looked brighter than it had in some time. I tugged on a few crooked curls.
Then a man coughed.
I lurched backward, crouching low, not wanting anyone to see me in my nightdress. On my knees, I peeked through the pillars in the balustrade.
Graham.
Dressed in a white shirt and brown, worn breeches, he carried an armful of wooden poles hefted over his shoulder, heading downward on a trail toward a little white building partially hidden behind a copse of trees. What was he doing?
Perhaps I had seen wrong. Perhaps I was still groggy, and I’d mistaken a servant for my host, but I’d known Graham for years. I wished I could deny it, but his angles and features were frustratingly familiar.
I glanced back to my notebook and pencil resting on the writing table beside my bed. Then at my already half-tied stays and pink-and-brown-striped cotton pelisse folded in a chair. And before I knew what I was doing, I was sloppily dressed, tiptoeing down the stairs and out the front door.
Following him.
The air became more frigid the closer to the sea I traveled. I moved slowly, for the trail Graham had followed veered to the right before continuing toward a grassy area and the little building where by now he’d surely stopped. Stone barriers astall as my waist lined the path on either side as I drew closer. They veered out and connected with a wooden fence that surrounded the little stable house.
Was it a stable house?
Graham owned several horses, but I’d assumed, seeing as he lived in a sea town, he housed them elsewhere. He couldn’t possibly fit them all in that small building. The wooden poles he’d carried now leaned against the shaded side of the building. What was he doing here, so early and in such informal dress?
I took careful steps, peering around each side of the building until I’d walked its entirety. No sign of him. Not a single rustling of leaves.
He’d gone inside, then. What could he possibly be doing? Building something? Worse, hiding something? Whatever it was, Ihadto know. I’d come down all this way from my bed. I hadn’t even arranged my hair.
I lifted my chin. If not for my sake, for Papa’s. In one swift movement, I slid the door open.
And there he was. Sitting on a stool. With a pail of milk under a cow.
He looked up, his neck bare from his loose shirt, then blinked down to the cow and looked up at me again. Then he jumped up, knocking over his stool. “Anna? What are you—”
My jaw hung open, eyes racing from the cow stepping forward then back over a sloshing pail of milk to Graham’s parted lips, his eyes growing wide with alarm. “Are you ...milking a cow?” Where were his servants? I could count on my hand the ones I’d seen so far.
Graham took the bucket and swung around, setting it on a little table across from the cow’s stall. One cow. No horses.A brown-and-white tabby cat zigzagged around Graham’s boots.
