When a Rogue Meets His Match - Elizabeth Hoyt Page 0,152

could smooth away the sorrow and weariness that had settled across her features. But to touch her now would be folly because he wouldn’t just offer her a token of comfort. He would take her in his arms and kiss away her sadness and tell her that everything would be all right. And that was absurd because inane platitudes never made anything all right, and they both knew it.

“I’m tired,” she said. “Tired of fighting alone,” she clarified, looking up at him. “Of not belonging to anywhere or anyone. Of not having that one person who will put severed heads in baskets so that you don’t have to.”

You could belong to me as I fear I already belong to you. He swallowed the words before he could make a fool out of himself.

“You need a partner, then,” he said instead, trying to sound objective.

“Are you volunteering to be that partner?”

A peculiar ache settled like a vise around his chest. For one terrifying second, he wanted to say yes. He shook his head hard because there was no point in entertaining an idea that would never come to pass. “I must decline,” he said with all the cavalier wit he could muster. “As much as I might enjoy transporting severed heads, I hear the hours are wretched.”

She tried to smile but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Then perhaps it’s just time for a change.”

“The château.”

“It was always my father’s dream that he could one day reclaim it. Make the vineyards productive again.”

“And is that your dream too?”

“Maybe. I’d like the chance to find out.”

“And what does a goddess of retribution know about wine making?” he asked.

“Almost nothing,” she admitted. “But in Italy and Spain I loved watching the men and women in the vineyards we saw. Entire generations of families that had the ability to coax something from the earth, to grow and care for it and make it into something wonderful…” She trailed off. “I envied that. I feel like maybe Falaise d’Argent is a place where I could find the remnants of my own familial roots and grow them there. Finally find the place I belong.”

“And what happens to Adrestia?”

She smiled faintly. “She’ll always be there. Just in case.”

“You will have your home in France.” King spoke quietly, not remembering making the decision to tell her this. “Along with the man heading to Spain, I sent a man to Lille this morning. He’ll take care of the paperwork and payment for Falaise d’Argent to be yours.”

Adeline looked up at him, her eyes wide. “But I haven’t found justice for you yet.”

“You will. We will.”

“But I—”

“You’re here right now, and that’s enough.” But she wouldn’t be here forever. She would leave, and he would be alone—

He rubbed his face with his hands. Jesus, he sounded positively maudlin.

“The man who was with you in the churchyard. Was he your duke?”

He stilled. “My duke?”

“The one you spoke of—the one who was imprisoned with you?”

“What makes you think that?”

“You didn’t guard your emotion with him.”

King didn’t answer right away. He had known that she would be there watching for the baron. He hadn’t considered how carefully she might have been watching him. “Yes.”

“Does he know what the baron did?”

“Enough.” But not all. No one knew it all.

“Was he there to talk you out of murder?”

“Yes. He’s a good man. Noble and honorable.”

“And he really thought you might kill a baron in a churchyard full of witnesses?” she asked. She was making a clear effort to keep her voice light, but it sounded forced.

“The thought had crossed his mind.”

“Where was he today?” she asked. “Marstowe?”

“I don’t know.”

Adeline uncrossed her foot from her knee, her boot thumping softly to the rug. “I tried the Marstowe house in Hanover Square, but he wasn’t there.”

“Perhaps he simply refused to answer the door.”

“I didn’t knock, exactly,” Adeline told him. “The house was deserted, as were the stables in the mews around back. It was clear he does not yet have a staff, probably because servants and horses cost money. A groom further down did tell me that he’s seen Marstowe use Rotham’s carriage from time to time.”

King frowned faintly.

“There are reasonable explanations for his failure to meet you this afternoon, of course. Perhaps he was too drunk to remember the conversation last night. Or he was too much of a coward to meet you and is on another packet back to Virginia as we speak.” Very carefully she set her knife on the surface of the desk and