explained some of the urgency of the task before him. Not that Lady Jane Kelby could have inherited Kelby Hall, but at least the earl would have left something behind for posterity besides the book he was writing. A flesh and blood legacy. Reyn had never thought that far ahead as to what mark any future descendants of his would leave upon the world. When one’s life was regularly in danger, one didn’t have time to think beyond the present.
He was thinking too much. He was deliberately—with the earl’s full approval—going to try to feather the Kelby nest with a Durant cuckoo. His own long nose—hell, his bushy eyebrows—might be passed down through the ages.
And he wouldn’t be around to see it. There was something terribly wrong about it all.
He clamped the cigar between his teeth and batted a bush out of his way. It had been a while since he’d been on a night patrol, and his instincts had gone soft. But it was peacetime, and he wasn’t about to be attacked on the manicured grounds of Kelby Hall.
He passed by all the regimented clipped hedges and came to a vast expanse of empty lawn. The ground beneath his feet sloped gradually down to the lake, which was lit with a shimmering stripe of moonlight. A folly with vine-covered columns rose like a stone ghost on a tiny island in the middle of the black lake. A rowboat was tied to a matching stone pillar at the water’s edge. At one time people had rowed out to the folly on a sunny summer day and picnicked, but that seemed pointless to him. A man-made lake, a man-made ruin, all very picturesque and all very false.
Even if Reyn had not known of the tragedy that had occurred there, an aura of sadness pervaded the place. Weeping willow trees shivered all around him, anticipating the winter to come. Did the lake freeze up? He wondered if the countess skated, her long legs gliding from shore to shore. Probably not. As she kept saying, she had no time for recreation, and it would not be fun visiting the place where her friend died.
Judging from the condition of the little boat, it had been ages since someone had gone out in it. Leaves floated on water that covered its bottom from the last rainfall. Rowing might be good for his bad arm. Despite the pain of it, Reyn didn’t want to lose what mobility he had left. Exercise was important.
Bedsport could be very athletic, but Reyn anticipated he and the countess would be restrained, as proper as one could be under the circumstances. Even with the privacy of the workroom, they could be discovered and then the entire plan would fall to pieces.
He bent and booted the cigar stub into the ground. Tomorrow would arrive soon enough to test his amorous abilities. He’d made enough headway today—at least Maris Kelby had been satisfied. Even her slender white thighs had been flushed, as lovely as her cheeks had been.
Reyn turned to walk back toward the house and stopped when he saw movement between a gap in the hedges that surrounded the formal garden. Someone else was enjoying the country air and moonlight. He could make out enough to know that his fellow nature lover was a woman.
A tall woman with darkish hair and fair skin that fairly glowed under the moonbeams.
He didn’t want to alarm her, so made plenty of noise as he walked up the lawn, whistling off-key and crunching his boots down hard on the fallen leaves and twigs that had scattered on the lawn. He heard her own feet on the crushed stone path. She was trying to make a rapid retreat.
Should he let her go? It might be less embarrassing all the way around. What did they have to say to each other, after all?
Reyn found himself loping up the lawn and through a break in the bushes. “Lady Kelby!”
Maris Kelby stopped at once and turned, nervously fingering the knot in the pale fringed shawl that had first attracted his attention. She wasn’t wearing gloves, and her hands were white as the tall obelisk not two feet away from her. She must be freezing.
“Good evening, Captain. I didn’t expect to find anyone out of doors at this hour.”
The implication was that he was trespassing on her privacy, which he was, but Reyn didn’t care. “It’s a beautiful night, don’t you agree? I stepped outside to enjoy one of your husband’s