A Spear of Summer Grass - By Deanna Raybourn Page 0,119

to keep my strength up.

He watched me and after a moment took one of the sandwiches himself, wolfing it down in a single bite.

“You’ll give yourself indigestion.”

He grimaced. “I have that already, largely thanks to you.”

“You flatter me.”

He sighed. “Miss Drummond—”

“Delilah, please. I suspect we’re going to be spending quite a bit of time together.”

“Delilah.” He dropped his voice to something altogether softer than I had heard from him before. “I need your help. I don’t believe you killed Kit Parrymore.”

“Odd, then, that you should take me in so quickly.”

He flushed again. “I let you goad me into that and I shouldn’t have. I ought to have known right off that you were bluffing.”

“Who says I was?”

He smiled, and to my surprise it was a genuine thing. “Where was he? In the kitchen? The storeroom?”

“The barn,” I admitted. “But it wouldn’t have done you any good to arrest an innocent man. I was doing you a favour.”

“By confessing to a crime you didn’t commit,” he finished.

“Who says I didn’t? I confessed. If you neglect that confession, I suspect the governor would be mightily put out. He’s going to be under quite a bit of pressure to make sure this is solved quickly and discreetly. And I imagine if the governor is under pressure, so are you. I hear the Duke of York is planning an official visit next year. Just think what the king would say if you get this wrong! Why, I imagine, he might refuse permission for the duke to come at all. Such a perfect opportunity to showcase to Whitehall how much Kenya deserves self-governance, wasted! Yes, you are under pressure indeed, Inspector.”

“You would not believe how much if I told you,” he admitted. “But this absurd confession of yours—”

“It’s not my fault if you don’t believe it.”

“Then help me to believe it. I must have facts, a motive.”

“Oh, surely you can draw the inferences yourself. You’re a clever man,” I said, putting out my hand for another sandwich.

His hand clamped about my wrist. “Do you think I got this job by playing the fool? I will admit I swallowed your little bait like a good little fish, but I’m done with that. I’ve snapped the line and I will go my own way now. You no longer whistle the tune, Miss Drummond.”

“You’ve rather mixed your metaphors there. And we agreed it was to be Delilah.”

I slipped my arm from his grasp. He sat back, rubbing a hand over his temple.

“Headache? I always take a spoonful of bitters and lie down in a cool room with a compress. You might try it.”

He gave a short laugh. “They warned me about you. They told me you would twist me forty different ways. I could not imagine how, and yet here you are.”

He forgot to be a policeman then. The cool efficiency dropped away and he sat, his hands clasped loosely in his lap, his expression resigned. He looked like a man who had just had his dearest illusions stripped away, and there was nothing left but need. It was a look I had seen before and not one I ever cared to be responsible for.

“Inspector,” I said gently. “You ought to be asking me questions.”

“I know. I just wish we could be honest with one another. The rest of it is exhausting. But if we could just have the truth...” He trailed off and leaned forward again, his eyes warm and coaxing.

I felt myself leaning nearer. “Inspector,” I began, my voice a little tremulous.

He moved closer still, his lips parting expectantly. “Yes?”

I heard the frisson of expectation and I knew my instincts were correct.

I moved closer again. “I feel as though I could tell you anything. Anything at all.”

“Go on,” he urged, his eyes never leaving mine.

Closer still. I put a hand out to steady myself and felt the curve of his knee under my palm. “I will give you whatever you want,” I said, tightening my grip. His leg flexed under my hand and his mouth curved slightly into a thin smile of triumph.

“Yes?”

“As soon as you get my lawyer. Until then, you can go hang yourself.”

I sat back and laughed as he went brick-red and sat back as quickly as if I’d slapped him again.

“This isn’t a game, Delilah.”

“Of course it is. And you lost. Take it like a man. You thought you’d wheedle something out of me because I’m just a woman. Poor Gilchrist! I learned to turn men like you inside out before I