Part 10 (1/2)

”And we saw him in Tingle's Bookshop today, too,” Genevieve added, brightly. ”Over by the history tomes. Lyon Redmond.”

That's when everyone seemed to freeze mid-chew.

”In Tingle's, you say?” her father finally said, idly, reaching for more roast beef.

Olivia suddenly wasn't certain where to aim her eyes. She felt as if Lyon Redmond was imprinted on her corneas and everyone could see him.

She applied herself to her peas, which were bobbing in a little pool of sauce. They friskily eluded the tines of her fork, which gave her an occupation.

”Yes!” Genevieve continued brightly. ”And Olivia spoke with-OW!”

Genevieve scowled at Olivia and reached down to rub her kicked s.h.i.+n.

”As Genevieve was saying before a twinge overcame her-perhaps too much beef gives you indigestion, Gen?” Olivia added with pointed sweetness, ”I spoke with Mr. Tingle, who then referred me to another book and gave me a new pamphlet.”

A sort of collective, sighing groan rumbled around the table. It wasn't that they were an uncharitable lot. It was just that the word ”pamphlet” had that effect upon her family. She had waxed evangelically on the topic more than once, and they were indulgent but puzzled by what they perceived as a pa.s.sion that had sprung from nowhere, and would likely be cured, like an ague, when she married.

”Pamphlet” ought to frighten them off the topic of Lyon Redmond.

Her father drizzled gravy over his meat. ”A bit of a coincidence that Mr. Redmond would be in the bookshop at the same time as you two ladies were in it.”

He flicked a swift look at his older daughter.

Olivia went still.

She didn't dare look at her mother, because her mother could read her like a b.l.o.o.d.y book.

Her father, Jacob Eversea, was usually so merry and affectionate they often forgot he was also unnervingly astute. The Everseas were wealthy for a reason. He was the reason. His instincts for investments were uncanny and occasionally, if rumors were to be believed, unorthodox.

Olivia was fairly new to both subterfuge and guilt and found both of them uncomfortable. The latter had, in fact, rendered her mute. Genevieve was still nursing hurt feelings and a smarting s.h.i.+n and was unblinkingly inspecting her sister's face as if she suspected she was instead an impostor wearing an Olivia costume.

Genevieve, alas, was no imbecile.

So neither of them replied to her father.

And the silence was teetering on the brink of becoming d.a.m.ning.

Help came in the unlikely and oblivious form of Ian. ”The diversions in Pennyroyal Green, apart from riding and shooting, begin with the pub and end with the bookshop. Where else is Redmond to go? Church?”

”I do wish you wouldn't say 'church' quite so incredulously,” their mother said dryly. ”We do own the living, you know.”

”A pity none of us went into the clergy.”

This elicited a scatter of uneasy chuckles that rapidly dwindled. Olivia, like her mother and her sister, wouldn't have minded in the least if any of her brothers had gone into the clergy. Her brothers had all instead gone to war. Chase and Ian had been gravely wounded. Colin, with his talent for survival, had been relatively unscathed. All had served with honor and bravery. It was a miracle they had all returned.

She was freshly reminded that idly discussing anything around the dinner table with her entire family now, whether it was Lyon Redmond or church or cricket, was a luxury she would never again take for granted. These people, so rarely together all at once now, meant more to her than anything else in the world.

They were her world.

She was suddenly flooded with love and resentment for this very fact, and she was inclined to forgive them for anything, including tattling on her.

”I don't know what on earth would keep Redmond in Pennyroyal Green, anyway,” Colin added. ”I heard at the Pig & Thistle that he's meant to go to the continent on Mercury Club business. Or marry Hexford's daughter, as White's betting book has it. After all, when a man is accustomed to throwing money about and women falling all ov-”

Her father slowly turned toward Colin and shocked him into silence with a glare so arctic it was a wonder the candles weren't snuffed.

”This is a dinner table,” Jacob said mildly to his frozen family, after a moment's stunned silence to allow his point to settle in. ”Why should we ruin a fine meal with such talk?”

”Fair enough,” Colin said, after a moment, subdued but undaunted. ”What do you say we get up a cricket match tomorrow? Run down to the Pig & Thistle in a bit, recruit a few men?”

And they were off and talking cricket, and all the forks and knives were moving again.

Olivia couldn't take her eyes from her plate.

Hexford's daughter. As in the Duke of Hexford. That would be Lady Arabella. Olivia knew her. Shy girl, pretty, so very, very wealthy. On the marriage mart, Arabella was the equivalent of winning the Suss.e.x Marksmans.h.i.+p Trophy.

She was remembering the worried shadow between Lyon Redmond's eyes when he thought he'd alarmed her. The little step he took toward her to protect her. The impulse to lay her head against his chest, as if she could transfer her every worry to him through her cheek.

She'd danced perhaps four waltzes in her life and countless reels and quadrilles, but not once had she noticed so acutely the fit of her hand in another's. Not once had the heat of a touch lingered at her waist.

Such talk.

Wicked, laughing blue eyes.

His trembling hand.

A whisper of a touch that had turned her blood effervescent and hot, and ignited a craving that made her understand at once everything and nothing about the matters between men and women.

Such talk.

As if the mere idea of him or any Redmond was enough to turn the roast beef.

She had never questioned it. Children were trusting and malleable when they loved and were much loved by their parents, and Jacob and Isolde Eversea were in general bastions of kindness and wisdom and authority, in turns affectionate and strict. The Everseas had dozen of friends all over England, all of them, at least the ones she knew about, respectable. Olivia had certainly never witnessed any marked tendency toward arbitrary enmities.

So surely the objection to the Redmonds was based in some truth?

But then there was a legend, after all. The trees in the town square, the two ancient oaks entwined, said to represent the Everseas and Redmonds. Who were now so entwined they both fought for supremacy and held each other up, and could no longer live without each other.

Some called it a curse.

”May I be excused?” she said suddenly.

”Olivia, darling, are you feeling well?” Her mother was worried. Olivia usually polished her plate and then returned for more.

”She has a new pamphlet,” Genevieve explained.

”Right, right, a pamphlet, right,” everyone murmured.

She dashed up to her room. She'd given the pamphlet to Lyon. Thank G.o.d no one in her family wanted to read it.

She s.n.a.t.c.hed up the book on Spain he'd shoved into her hands, eager to touch something that he'd touched. She hadn't yet opened the book.