“I figured since I am in your black books, you’d rather I not wander into familiarity.”
She pulled her wool shawl tighter about herself and raised her chin as if inspecting the rising sun. “If you’d come begging forgiveness for your neglect, perhaps you wouldn’t still be there.”
“What if Ihavecome to beg?” He clasped his hands behind his back.
“You don’t look very penitent.”
“Would it help if I knelt on the ground and clasped my hands in supplication?”
She smirked. “Yes. I believe that will do.”
His laughter rang off the trees, then he sobered. “How I have missed your wit.”
“Just my wit? Well, then next time you go away, I shall pack it in a box for you so you can take it along. Heavens knows I have no use for it since it goes absent when you’re not around to sharpen it on.”
A robin chirped in the tree, and a cow lowed in the distance. Algenon stepped closer to the wall, a broad smile on his face, but Javenia did not move. Her admission was as close as she’d ever get to telling him how miserable she was when he was gone.
“How about you keep your wit, Javenia? That way, I always have something to look forward to when I return home.”
She bit the inside of her lip as she pushed down the surge of longing that threatened to overtake her good sense.
“How was your time in Ipswich?”
Algenon followed her change in subject without question. “Long and dismal. I would have been home before now, but I had to find a replacement for the steward there. It seems the previous man had a way of making money disappear into the pockets of his kin.”
“How crooked. Did you arrest him for stealing?”
Algenon leaned on the edge of the wall, his arms crossed. “No, because, in truth, he stole nothing. He simply hired his family to come in and do work, which they did poorly or hardly at all, and then paid them far more than their labor was worth. It was a mess. I had to have the brickwork of an entire wall redone because his cousin used mud instead of mortar.”
Javenia clucked her tongue while shaking her head. “No wonder you were gone so long. And was everything resolved by the time you left, or will you have to return?”
“I hope not. The new man comes highly recommended for his honesty. With Parliament about to begin, I need to be inLondon. Not that I can vote in my father’s place, but I’d like to be present to hear what is being discussed, since he rarely attends.”
She nodded in agreement. Algenon was a man of honor. He took his position as a future baron seriously, knowing that his wealth and privilege could bless the lives of those less fortunate if he pressed for the right reforms.
Reforms his father found ludicrous.
She pursed her lips, trying not to utter the bitter words she’d only allowed herself to voice a handful of times over the years. Lord Roberts was a nuisance, but he was still Algenon’s father and, for some reason, Algenon still respected his authority… even if he complained about it now and then.
He crossed his feet to match his arms. “How have things been here in Kent?”
Dreadful was the word that came to her mind, but she’d not give him the satisfaction of knowing he’d been so desperately missed. Instead, she launched into an update on their friends’ health and happiness.
“John has begun a new painting.” She broke off the end of a reed near the bank of the stream and inspected its hollow middle.
Algenon pushed away from the wall. “Another one of his wife?”
She smiled to herself. Susannah was John’s usual muse, but this one was different. “No. Of the Kendalls. It’s a wedding gift like the one he painted for Nate and Melior.”
Algenon followed her lead and picked his own reed. “How are Eddie and his lady love?”
“Sickeningly happy. I see little of them outside my weekly visits, but if you had told me that Livy was capable of looking awestruck at anyone, I’d have thought you half mad.”
He met her pronouncement with a chuckle. “It is strange, but everyone needs someone who balances them out.”
“Indeed. Mr. Kendall’s happy, gentle nature has done wonders at lightening Livy’s heavy spirits. Not that she is any less fierce than she has always been, but she seems more relaxed in her own home.”
Algenon broke his reed into two, his gaze pensive. She could only imagine what he was pondering. For herself, the reminder that everyone needed an opposite, someone who complemented their own flaws, was a palpable reminder that she and Algenon were far too similar for a healthy relationship to even be attempted… even if they were free to pursue such an endeavor.
