Page 33 of Give Him a Chance

Bernard took the letter from the platter and hoped his face gave nothing away as he said quietly, “Ah, yes. Thank you.”

He used his butter knife to open it up before remembering that etiquette demanded something very different. But it was done now, and the folds of paper were unfurling in his hands, and—

And it was as he had thought. Hovell.

How the devil had the man tracked him down?

Dixon,

Well, what a clever mess you have managed to find yourself in. I wouldn’t have believed it except I heard from Judge Bonner myself, and the idiot appears to believe he has done you a favor.

Stuck as you are with the toffs, I’d ask you to stay a little while—it will look too suspicious if you depart now, and this Lady Lucy Chance appears to have destroyed all hopes of getting the intelligence from you. You can’t write, the letter could be intercepted—you must know that, as you haven’t written.

Give it another three days, then I’ll write again. I have another little project for you that I think you’ll find most interesting.

Hovell

Anger burned through Bernard’s lungs as he reread the letter for a second time.

“This Lady Lucy Chance appears to have destroyed all hopes of getting the intelligence from you.”

It was hardly her fault! The woman had thought she’d been saving a man from a fate worse than death—she wasn’t to know that the man she had ‘saved’ would never have found himself on a transport ship. And besides, the exact method of ‘saving’ hadn’t beenheridea.

And what was all this about another little project?

Bernard bit his lip. The man had promised him that this mission, the one he’d been on in Brighton prison, would be the last. That he could retire and disappear from Hovell’s memory. That had been the agreement.

So what was this about a new assignment?

And the very idea of leaving Lady Lucy… No. That could not be borne.

Bernard was not exactly sure when it had happened, but at some point, his interest in Lady Lucy had changed from amused wonder to heartfelt curiosity. He liked her, liked her far more than he perhaps wanted to admit.

The idea of leaving her now, of just disappearing from her side…

“Bad news?”

Bernard jumped. Lady Lucy had been watching him, clearly, for there was sympathy on her face and concern in her eyes.

“News,” he said briefly. “Of a sort.”

He could not exactly explain why, but lying to Lady Lucy was like lying to oneself. There was no point in it, and it diminished one as a person, somehow, to know that such a thing was being attempted.

Her expression burned with curiosity, but Bernard was swift to fold up the letter and place it in his pocket.

The last thing he needed was that sort of thing lying around.

“A letter from your brother,” the countess said vaguely, putting a pause on any conversation about his own as she perused a letter of her own—refusing to wear the spectacles, Bernard noted, that she so clearly loathed. “He wants to see you.”

“Excellent,” said the earl brightly. “I haven’t seen Cothrom or Aylesbury in ages. When will they—”

“It’s from Pernrith, dear,” came the quiet reply.

Bernard did not need to be watching the earl to feel the sudden change in the air of the room. The very atmosphere changed, the knives and forks halting, the way that Lady Lucy looked up at her father with instant curiosity.

Pernrith? Another brother, presumably, but then why all the fuss?

“Oh,” said the earl much less brightly. “I see.”