He didn’t know. It chased itself around his brain for hours, days, and he still didn’t know. And like the idiot he was, he hadn’t asked her. He hadn’t stopped the carriage and demanded she clarify her statement, explain herself. Give him a chance to fix whatever the problem was. He was a bloody duke now, wasn’t he?
Instead, he’d stood there like a lump, her voice reverberating inside his skull.
And now he was on the back of a horse, cursing his fate and poor choices.
And like to have his teeth rattle clean out of his head. He’d known it was too soon to leave the paddock, but he needed the distraction. Holding on for dear life as the trees and fields whizzed by seemed the thing. It was his third morning in a row, and every time he rode away, Colin stood by the gate and shouted at him. “Don’t forget to hold on! I don’t want to be the duke, it’s entirely too much bookkeeping!”
He was improving, if nothing else. His seat was much more secure. His horse had even stopped shaking his mane and shooting him dirty looks. It was therapeutic. Painful, but therapeutic. He rode for hours, stopping at the cliff to watch the sea. There were no pirate ships, no green flash to mark the way. No Meg itching to paint the changing shifting colors of the water.
No Meg.
No, he wasn’t supposed to be thinking about her.
Or the fact that he had less than a month left in which to choose a wife. For the rest of his life. Or to have her chosen for him by a drunken prince he’d never met.
He would never miss the hunger or the hollow look to his siblings’ faces, but there were other aspects of his old life that he would miss. The ability to choose his own wife for one. The responsibility for three people, not several hundred. The fact that this new world had given him Meg, only to take her away again.
At night, he spent hours haunting the house, searching for more clues, for stars and secrets. Lady Beatrice continued her patrols, and he merely nodded a greeting when they passed each other in the small hours. Secretly, he placed footmen near the front doors, back doors and kitchen doors. Both in case of intruders, and to help her regain her feet if that bloody big spear tipped her over.
He had found countless spiders, dust, one startled mouse, three beetles, and a packet of racy love letters wedged behind a mounted frieze but no treasure.
As if he didn’t know the treasure was Meg herself.
And now, when he couldn’t rest, he locked himself in the dining room, counting stars like sheep for the sleepless, and then attacking the floorboards one by one with a crowbar by lamplight. It would take days, weeks even to rip them all up and then out them back together, but he couldn’t see to care.
Sometimes Colin stumbled in before dawn, stinking of wine and perfume and smoke, and gave him a hand. They didn’t speak much, only worked until they were covered in sweat and dust.
Still no treasure though.
One night, as they worked side by side, there was a sound at the window, just before it opened. They stood quietly, stepping back against the wall as a treasure hunter pulled himself into the room. He was graceful enough, right up until the moment that Colin leapt out of the shadows with a shout of “Oi!”. The intruder jumped, tripped over a floorboard and sprawled ignominiously in one of the many coffin-like holes in the floor.
Colin smirked down at him. “Serves you right, tosspot.”
“Cinderella, another brandy.And something sweet, eh?”
If Meg were to draw Lord Piers she would draw him with Lady Beatrice’s spear through his eye. Spiders in his mouth. And perhaps with a lobster attached to his more delicate places.
To say she loathed the man was an understatement.
He attended every one of her uncle’s parties, drank more wine than a pirate drank rum, and groped the ladies under the table. And he wasn’t the only one. Currently the ballroom had converted into a gaming hell with tables and chairs from every part of the house, and candles burning throughout the night. It was four o’clock in the morning and the guests did not appear to notice. Card games continued, increasingly dangerous bets were placed, couples meandered into the shadows (mostly) for sport. Perfume and cheroot smoke thickened the air.
Though footmen took care of the serving of drinks and delivering of food, lady’s maids were always being summoned by the women to fetch various items such as shawls and nose powder and thread for dropped hems.
And Lord Piers always took advantage.
He lay in wait like a kraken made of hands.
She did what she could to mitigate his behavior at the best of times but tonight, when her mood was sour, and gloom threatened to spill through her like spilled ink, she was abruptly done with everything. Everyone. The whole lot of them.
Especially when his smile turned a smirk as a particularly pretty lady’s maid, clearly out of her depths, arrived with her mistress’s pearl earrings, lately lost on a hand of cards. Her curls were flaxen, her cheeks pink as she tried to avoid looking at anyone or anything. Not all of the wagering was done with coins or jewels. There was a large pile of clothing in the back corner. Meg did not begrudge them their entertainment, but she did begrudge them the hours they expected the staff to remain alert or what they expected them to overlook. She’d already set the housemaids and footmen on rotating shifts so they might catch a few hours of rest.
And now Piers was reaching for the maid. Her mistress rolled her eyes. “If it will buy back my favorite pearl earrings, I’ll look the other way,” she said.
Meg stepped closer, just as his hand closed around the poor girl’s backside and then began to wander. She jumped and squeaked. The other guests at the table laughed. Meg inserted herself between them on the pretext of snuffing a candle that was gutting out and belching black smoke. She had already pulled her hat pin from the folds of her dress.
This was not the first time she had worked one of her uncle’s parties.
By God, it would be the last.