Destined to Last (14 page)

“I can’t help it. Overthinking comes naturally to me.”

“I see.” He sat back in his chair and studied her. “And have you had second thoughts about speaking with Whit, yet?”

“No.” It was a lie. She
had
reconsidered speaking with Whit, but she wasn’t yet ready to hand Hunter that victory.

Hunter’s lips twisted wryly. “And you accused me of being spiteful.”

“I’m not being spiteful,” she countered. “I’m being vengeful. It’s entirely different.”

“I can’t believe I’m going to ask this,” he muttered, “but how is it different?”

“Only the latter implies one is standing up for oneself,” she explained.

“Vengeance isn’t a virtue, Kate.”

The smile she gave him was Machiavellian. “Oh, it can be.”

He didn’t smile back. “Would it make any difference if I were to apologize for last night?”

Apologies, when genuine, always made a difference. But she wasn’t ready to hand him that either. “I suppose that would depend.”

“On?” he prompted.

“Why you were apologizing, and what you were apologizing for. If you’re going to offer a vague and sweeping sort of apology for ‘last night’ or ‘the argument’ just to make me more biddable, then I assure you it won’t help. But if you’re quite sincerely sorry about something specific—”

“I am,” he broke in. He caught her gaze and held it. “I am genuinely sorry I called your honor into question. It was wrong of me.”

“Oh, well, yes, that does make a difference.” All the difference, or quite a bit at any rate, there was still the question of whether he believed it. She looked down and plucked at her skirts. “When you say wrong, do you mean wrong because you know it isn’t true, or wrong because it isn’t something you should say even when it is true?”

“Kate, look at me.” He waited for her to stop plucking and look up. “I knew it wasn’t true, but I was willing to ignore that because I was angry with you and wanted to twist the conversation to my benefit.”

She nodded slowly. “Very well, apology accepted.”

He nodded in return. “Excellent, now—”

“Are you sorry for initiating the threat to tell Whit as well?” she asked, not because she needed for him to be, but because she was curious.

“I might have been, had you not turned it back on me so quickly.” His lips curved up. “I had no idea you were capable of such cold disdain.”

“The benefits of being Lady Thurston’s daughter are many.”

He laughed at that. “I imagine they are. Is that where you acquired your stubbornness as well?”

“Oh, no, that I developed on my own.”

“It’s not a flaw I would have attributed to you without seeing it firsthand.”

“I recall mentioning I have loads of flaws. Everyone does.” She smiled at him sweetly. “Some more than others.”

“I am aware of my flaws,” he replied dryly, “thank you.”

“Are you?”

“Certainly. Did I argue when you called me unpatriotic and selfish?”

He hadn’t, nor did he look at the moment as if he was at
all unsettled by the idea of being considered both. “It’s true that others would consider those flaws. Do you?”

There was a brief pause before he answered. “No.”

She briefly wondered if he was in earnest, before deciding he couldn’t possibly be. Everyone considered selfishness a flaw. Like as not, he was attempting to ruffle her feathers again. “What flaws are you aware of, then?”

He tapped a finger on the arm of his chair as he thought about it. “I’m overindulgent.”

“Of yourself or others?”

“Myself, mostly.”

She found that rather surprising. She’d thought him the disciplined sort. “You’re wasteful?”

His finger stopped tapping. “No. Waste implies a resource has been discarded, not used to excess.”

“Oh. Well, what do you overindulge in?”

“Whatever takes my fancy at the time. Land, art…” He gave her a wicked smile. “Sin.”

She twisted her lips. “I don’t believe that. Evie told me you’re a good man at the core.”

“Did she?” he asked, clearly intrigued.

“But that you’re nicked a bit on the edges.”

“Makes me sound like bruised fruit.”

“Yes,” she laughed, “that’s what I said.”

He didn’t laugh in return. Instead, he sat very still in his chair, studying her. “And what do you believe, Kate?”

“That…” She shifted in her seat, uncomfortable with his intense gaze. “That I was wrong to call you selfish and unpatriotic.”

“No,” he said softly, “you weren’t.”

“Of course I—”

“Do you know why I work for William?”

He looked terribly somber all of a sudden. A storm had gathered in his eyes, but she couldn’t tell if it was one of anger, or fear, or hurt. The man was impossible to read. “You…”

She shifted again. “Presumably for many of the same reasons Whit and Alex do.”

He shook his head slowly, then caught her gaze to hold it without blinking. As if he was daring her to judge him for what he was about to say. Or perhaps asking her not to. She dearly wished she knew which.

“I take orders from William,” he said carefully, “because my only other option is take a final set of orders from the hangman.”

“I
…Beg your pardon
?” Given how significant her reaction seemed to be to him, it might have been better to come up with a more eloquent response, but that phrase was the best she could manage after hearing the word, “hangman.”

Hunter nodded once. “My punishment for crimes committed against the crown was seven years in service to the War Department. Six months remaining.” He leaned back in his chair and stretched his legs, as if suddenly deciding the whole business made very little difference to him. She might have believed him, if not for the lingering clouds in his eyes and the way his gaze was still fixed on her face. “Generous, really. William could have just as easily sent me to trial or confiscated all I had and impressed me into the navy.”

“Seven years,” she breathed. “What in heaven’s name did you do?”

“I did nothing in the name of heaven. In the name of profit, there was very little I
didn’t
do.”

“But what was the crime that earned such a punishment? Did you…did you hurt someone?” Could he have actually been a pirate?

“No. Not the way you mean.”

She let out a long breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. If he hadn’t murdered someone, or very nearly murdered someone, then she rather thought whatever he’d done could be forgiven. It had been nearly seven years ago, after all, and he’d paid for his transgression. More, it was clear he
wasn’t proud of what he’d done. Defiant, perhaps, but that seemed more a defense against her possible censure than—

“Decided if I’m a good man or not?”

She blinked herself out of her musings to find Hunter still watching her. “I’ve no idea who or what you were seven years ago,” she answered honestly. “You’ve not told me what your crime was. Are you going to tell me?”

He shook his head.

“Pity,” she replied on a sigh. “Because if I knew you’d stolen from a rich man to feed a starving child, then I’d venture to say you were a good man, but—”

“Robin Hood again.”

“It’s a lovely story,” she informed him primly before continuing. “But if you stole food from a starving child and then sold that food for profit—”

“I didn’t steal from children.”

“Well then—”

“I didn’t spend much time stealing from the rich to feed them either.”

“I believe we can safely add persistent interrupter to your list of flaws,” she drawled, delighted to see his lips twitch and the worst of the storm in his eyes subside.

He gestured in a prompting motion. “Please continue.”

“Thank you. My point is, I don’t know what sort of man you were seven years ago. I only know the man I see before me now, and yes, I believe that man is good.” Because she wanted to see his eyes laughing rather than storming, she added, “At the core.”

His eyes didn’t clear, not entirely, but he did laugh and that was certainly an improvement. “Well, now that we’ve established that either I’m a good man or you and Evie are poor judges of character, it’s time we left before someone discovers you’re keeping company with me in a locked room.”

She pulled a face. She wasn’t ready yet to face Lord Brentworth, nor her mother. “I don’t see why anyone should think
twice about
this
locked room as
all
the rooms in this hall are locked.”

There was a weighted pause before Hunter responded. “You took a stroll about the house as well?”

“Er…” She winced. “It’s possible.”

“It’s all right, Kate. It was to be your next assignment, at any rate.”

She straightened in her chair. “Was it really?”

He nodded, then seemed to hesitate. “I, ah, I’d already searched.”

“Oh.”

“But I wanted you to look again,” he was quick to assure her. “It’s always possible I’d missed something. And it’s always best to use two sets of eyes rather than one.”

“Oh,” she said again, this time with a little more enthusiasm. “That makes sense, although I didn’t find anything more interesting than the fact I couldn’t get into most of the rooms.”

“Ah, yes. You have the dowager Lady Brentworth to thank for that. She has a tendency to walk about in her sleep, and the staff keep doors locked to limit the danger.”

“The dowager Lady Brentworth? But she’s not in residence, is she?”

“Not at the moment, no. She’s visiting her sister in Kent. The doors are locked by habit.”

“Oh. That’s something of a disappointment.” She wondered if a great deal of what an agent did was follow false leads. Probably, an
authentic
agent would have been aware of Lady Brentworth’s unusual nocturnal habits.

“Would it be less disappointing if I showed you how to pick a few of those locks?” Hunter asked.

Kate felt her eyes go round. She’d wanted to acquire that skill ever since she’d discovered Sophie, the Duchess of Rockeforte, possessed it. Unfortunately, Evie and Mirabelle had been more interested in receiving instructions in Sophie’s
other unusual talent, knife throwing, which was something Kate felt she had no business attempting. She’d considered asking Sophie to give her a separate lesson in lock picking, but the woman was a friend, not a governess.

She scooted forward in her chair. “Would you really teach me?”

“Certainly.”

She beamed at him and rose from her chair. “Now?”

“Later,” he replied gaining his feet. “The next time I’m at Haldon. Guests here might not appreciate a lady’s interest in the art of lock picking, and we’re taking enough risk with your reputation as it is.”

She brushed at her skirts, caught between disappointment and embarrassment. Most of that risk had stemmed, not from the smuggling investigation, but from the time she spent with him behind closed doors. “Yes, perhaps you’re right.”

And perhaps it was time she stopped stalling and faced the consequences of the broken vase. With a sigh, she moved to walk with him toward the door, only to have the minuet shift back into the silly child’s tune.

She caught her toe at the edge of a rug, and would have fallen yet again, if Hunter hadn’t reached out to steady her.

Frustrated beyond measure, and dearly wishing she’d paid more attention to the curses Evie was so fond of collecting, she ground her teeth and gave the rug one futile—and admittedly rather foolish—stomp with her food.

“This wouldn’t keep happening if Lord Brentworth had the decency to keep his windows open.” She refused to acknowledge that it was still raining, and therefore none of the windows could be opened.

Next to her, Hunter cleared something from his throat. “Did I just hear you correctly? You tripped on the rug because Lord Brentworth keeps his windows shut?”

“Oh, never mind,” she mumbled, embarrassed to have made the comment. “You wouldn’t understand.”

“I certainly don’t at the moment.”

“An explanation isn’t likely to help.”

“Why don’t you try anyway?”

She found it impossible to meet his gaze. “Because I don’t care to be looked at as if I’ve come unhinged.” And she’d made enough of a fool of herself for one day.

“Have I ever looked at you that way?”

No, his gaze usually said he was thinking something entirely different. Something she wasn’t going to dwell on. She had enough to occupy her mind at present. Like whether or not it was only fair that she share her secret after he’d shared one of his own, and whether doing so would help erase the vestiges of the clouds from his eyes. She wondered what it meant that those clouds should bother her so greatly, and—

“Kate?”

“I hear music,” she blurted out before she could think better of it.

He looked in the general direction of the music room and cocked his head. “I don’t hear anything.”

“No, I mean…I mean in my head. I hear music in my head.” She could scarce believe she’d said it. Those six words had felt like a cork stuck in her throat, bottling up everything she wanted to explain. And now that the cork was gone, the everything came out in one long rush. “Not all the time, but quite often. It’s
my
music, the songs I compose. Sometimes it’s a piece I’m working on, or something I’ve written in the past, but on occasion the arrangement is entirely new to me, and now and then, when the music changes abruptly, or some portion of it alters dramatically, and I’ve not been paying attention to what I’m doing—which is most always, isn’t it?—then I have a tendency to do this sort of thing—trip on rugs and knock over vases. To be honest, I’ve a tendency to do so even when the music remains consistent, but a sudden change is more likely to—”

He held up a hand to cut her off, which she had to admit
was probably for the best. Her explanation, though extensive, was sadly lacking in coherency.

“You hear music in your head?” he asked, speaking each word distinctly.

The cork began to grow again. She nodded nervously.

“Music you’ve never heard anywhere before?”

Though that wasn’t always what she heard, she thought it might be wise to nod again rather than attempt another explanation.

A line formed across Hunter’s brow. “It just…comes to you?”

She nodded once more, hoping it would be the last time. Waiting for his reaction was excruciating.