One Thing Leads to a Lover (Love and Let Spy #2) - Susanna Craig Page 0,17

disdain for wrinkles. “He wants to see you right away.”

Chapter 4

Shortly after dawn began to streak the sky, Amanda was summoned to her mother’s chamber. Despite her fatigue Amanda hurried to her bedside, uncertain what could have roused Mama at such an hour.

Mama was sitting up in bed, her breakfast tray across her lap. “Did you sleep well, my dear?”

Amanda had retired last night, just as the stranger—Magpie—had ordered. But sleep had eluded her. Instead she’d replayed their second encounter, weighed it against the first, and tried to come up with some explanation for both his midnight return and his concern over a cookbook that wasn’t really a cookbook.

Every explanation that presented itself made her fear she might be going a bit mad.

“Well enough, Mama,” she lied. “And you?”

Mama sighed, managing to sound fatigued, though she looked as fresh as she always did. “I confess, I shall rest easier when you are married again, though of course a mother never really stops worrying about her children.” She paused to stir her cocoa, then gestured with the spoon for Amanda to sit down at the foot of the bed. “I only want you to be safe. And sometimes…sometimes you do not seem to realize the dangers that surround you.”

It was an old argument, one Amanda knew she could never win. “Are there dangers lurking in my writing desk, Mama?” she dared to ask as she perched on the edge of the mattress.

Her mother bristled. “Did you think I was snooping?”

Amanda said nothing. Her silence was answer enough.

“Even after all this time, you seem to have very little sense of what might happen to a woman, even one of your position, if society disapproves of her conduct.” Mama shook her head, fixing her with a pleading gaze. “I only want you to be safe,” she said again.

Must safety always take priority over happiness? Amanda wanted to reply. But she feared her mother’s answer might be yes.

To avoid an argument—some lessons, Amanda had learned well—she rose, kissed her mother’s papery cheek, and excused herself to the schoolroom. Noon found her once more in the garden, drowsing on an uncomfortable iron bench while the boys observed the bees at work in the flowers. Mama was preparing to make morning calls. Perhaps now Amanda might sneak back into her chamber for a nap.

Or would her curiosity flare again as soon as her head hit the pillow?

A woman of good sense would have raised an alarm at the discovery of a man slipping into the garden after dark. A woman of good sense would not have been in the garden after dark to begin with.

A woman of good sense definitely would not thrill a tiny bit at the thought she might have stumbled into an intrigue with a spy.

A spy? Every time the thought occurred to her, common sense tried to dash it away. He’s a clerk in a bookshop. A nosy one who suffers from sleeplessness—just like you.

But did bookshop clerks, even insomniac ones, generally have…a codename?

Magpie… What did it signify? Surely there was a copy of Bewick’s History of British Birds in the library. Maybe she would just go inside and look for it.…

“Mama, come look at this fat little fellow,” called Philip. “He’s gathered up more pollen than he can carry.”

“He’ll manage it,” insisted Jamie, lifting a glass to his eye to study the bee. “Size isn’t the same as strength, you know.”

She rose, trying to shake off her drowsiness—and her foolishness—as she shook the wrinkles from her skirt. Before she had taken a step in the boys’ direction, however, a pebble skidded in front of her.

The very idea that a single pebble skipping across a flagstone garden path would be noteworthy seemed at first to be confirmation of her sensitized, sleep-deprived state. Evidently her mind was capable of making something from absolutely nothing.

Except that something—someone—had put the pebble into motion. Not the boys, who were closer to the house. Not she; her feet hadn’t moved and her hems did not brush the ground. It had come from behind her, from somewhere near the fence and the narrow alleyway that divided the houses of Grosvenor Square from their mews.

I’ll be in touch.

She darted a quick glance toward the tall hedge, trying to decide if she could make out a masculine figure hidden by its branches.

“Come, boys,” she said, steeling herself against her sons’ inevitable protests. “No, now, it’s nearly time for luncheon. Go in and wash up. You can resume your observations this