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Without waiting for him to reply, she began to move towards the bar. A handful of customers lounged against it but one slouched aside as she approached, although Jacob didn’t enjoy the appraising look the man subjected her to as payment for his courtesy.

The grizzled landlord’s welcome wasn’t particularly friendly either. He frowned at Meg from beneath heavy eyebrows, casting a suspicious scowl over the top of her head to take in Jacob’s cloaked figure at her back. ‘Yes?’

‘Two ales. Make them big ones.’

Beneath the cover of his hood, Jacob blinked in surprise. The voice Meg had just used was one he’d never heard before. It was rough around the edges and lower than her usual sweet tone, and if he hadn’t witnessed it issue from her lips he wouldn’t have thought it had come from her at all.

The landlord’s eyes didn’t grow any less distrustful. ‘I haven’t seen you before. You from around here?’

‘No. Just passing through.’

‘Going where?’

‘That’s our business.’

The man snorted, but apparently her curtness satisfied his curiosity. Two tankards of ale were set down carelessly on the sticky bar, their contents slopping down the sides, and with a grunted word of thanks and a coin supplied by Jacob Meg picked them up and made for an empty table nearby.

Sitting down on the rickety bench across from hers, Jacob pulled his tankard towards him. From under the edge of his hood, he could see the other patrons had lost interest in the newcomers, the landlord’s acceptance evidently soothing their reservations. The conversations that had ebbed at their entrance began to flow again, and as he took his first mouthful of ale he wondered whether any of them would turn out to be of any help.

First things first, however…

‘What was that voice you just used? That didn’t sound like you in the slightest.’

Meg looked at him over the rim of her tankard. ‘This isn’t a reputable establishment. Any polite, decent woman coming in here would be eaten alive.’

‘Ah. You had to blend in with the rest of the rogues?’

‘Exactly. There should be a good number of them here tonight. The Duck and Drake is notorious for its unsavoury clientele.’

Jacob raised an eyebrow. ‘Small wonder you didn’t want Peter to go with me, then. You wouldn’t want him to fall in with a bad lot.’

‘That’s mostly why, yes.’

She took a sip of ale, wrinkling her nose at the taste. It suddenly struck him she was trying to avoid eye contact, a suspicion confirmed when she set her tankard back on the table and looked down into it rather than at him.

‘If I’m completely honest, though… In spite of everything that told me not to, part of me also wanted to spend time with you.’

His heart turned over. Apart from an iron-clad confession from some wretch that they had been the one to sabotage Anthony’s gig, Meg’s admission was the best thing he could have heard. It echoed his sentiments exactly, and it was all he could do not to grin.

Instead, however, he chose caution. ‘I’m glad of that.’

Slowly, allowing her plenty of time to evade it if she chose, he slid a hand towards where hers lay curled near her tankard. For a moment he thought she might pull away, but her slender fingers didn’t move, and being able to wrap them in his palm felt like a glass of water to a man dying of thirst.

‘I’ve missed you, Meg,’ he said as quietly as the chatter around them would allow. ‘There’s nothing I want more than for you to come home.’

‘I know.’

She studied their entwined fingers with an expression he would have struggled to decipher even if it hadn’t been half-concealed by her hood. ‘But nothing’s changed, has it? Isabella is still telling the world I killed Anthony, and until I can prove otherwise—’

She cut herself off as the tavern door flew open so hard it banged against the wall, making them both jump. A man lurched into the room and Jacob half-rose from his bench, ready to leap in front of Meg if circumstances demanded it, but the man seemed to have eyes only for the enormous casks behind the bar.

Conversations didn’t falter for him as they had when Jacob and Meg had entered. Perhaps he was too familiar a sight to warrant comment, the only reaction to his presence being a few ragged jeers when he stumbled drunkenly across the room. He ignored everyone and everything around him as he gestured for the landlord to hand over a drink, although it was clear to anyone who saw him that he’d already had enough.

Jacob caught the landlord’s coarse laugh. Even if he hadn’t wanted to overhear what was happening at the bar, he couldn’t have avoided it, the table Meg had chosen for them to sit at so close it was impossible not to eavesdrop.

‘Back again? You’ve been in here every night for a week. Wife making life difficult at home?’

The man slumped against the bar, almost falling over as he went. ‘If only that was it. What have you got for a man that needs to drink away his guilt?’