Unbuttoning Miss Hardwick. Deb Marlowe

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СКАЧАТЬ how do you know of it?’ she asked carefully. His attention still hadn’t wavered from his task, so she eased her spectacles off and allowed her gaze to roam over him.

      Though he sat still and focused, the marquess loomed large in the enclosed space. From corner to corner, the air pulsed with the energy of leashed strength, of capable male. He had, as usual, lost his coat some time earlier in the day. Beneath the linen of his shirt, muscles bunched and flexed as he worked. The old, scuffed cavalry boots, his favourite and hers, were planted wide on either side of his chair as he worked. His hair—good heavens, the fantasies that she’d built around that hair—had begun to pull loose from his queue. One long strand hung before his eyes as he leaned in close to his work.

      He sat back suddenly and grinned at her. She whipped her gaze back to her desk and pushed her spectacles back onto her nose.

      ‘Whispers,’ he answered. ‘The Spear of Skanda has been but a myth, a legend spoke of in whispers trickled down through the ages.’ His eyes flashed in the candlelit room, nearly as dark as the elaborate black embroidery on his waistcoat. ‘Lately the trickle has become a river. People are talking about it once more. I’ve heard more than one report saying that the Spear has been brought to England by an unknowing nabob.’

      She looked up again, and cocked her head at him. ‘What doesn’t he know?’

      ‘The extreme value of what he holds, it is to be hoped,’ he answered sardonically. ‘And if he’s unaware of just what he has, then it’s unlikely he’s aware of the curse.’

      Chloe groaned. ‘It’s cursed, too?’ Heart thumping, she returned his grin. ‘Bad enough you charge me with finding a will-o’-the-wisp weapon that may or may not exist, but must it be cursed as well?’

      The marquess’s expression grew suddenly stern and unexpectedly intent. ‘I want that spear, Hardwick.’ He slapped down the oiled cloth he’d been using with a muffled thump. ‘If it has indeed surfaced, then I must have it. No other weapon could be a more perfect centrepiece for my collection.’

      Mesmerised, Chloe stared. Since the day he’d agreed to let her stay on, Lord Marland’s manner had been cool, unflappable and frustratingly distant. As passionate as she knew him to be about his weapons collection and the elaborate wing they were constructing to showcase it, she’d seen evidence of it only in his unending dedication to the project. He’d never given her so much as a glimpse of what lay behind his obsession or how he truly felt about it and she had learned not to ask. This sudden flash of emotion set her to blinking. She felt as if she’d caught wind of something far more rare than Skanda’s alleged spear.

      ‘You’ve amassed a network of sources that puts even your father’s to shame. Use it. Track it down,’ he ordered, retreating into bland politeness once more. He gestured towards the papers on her desk. ‘I know you’ll find it. You’ve never failed me yet.’

      He turned back to his weapon, running slow fingers over the length of the curved blade. A shiver of longing skittered up Chloe’s spine, tightening her nipples and setting her insides to sizzling. She suffered a vision of those big hands touching her with such precision.

      Abruptly the marquess flourished the sword he’d been working on, slashing bites out of the air with practised ease. ‘This is interesting,’ he said, caressing the pommel. ‘A hodge-podge of a piece, with the lion’s head and the fancy basket guard. A cavalry sword, I’d guess, but the blade …’ He ran careful fingers along the curved edge. ‘It is unmistakably from an earlier weapon. Repaired after battle, perhaps?’ He stared at the thing, musing. ‘Scots made, in all likelihood. Not fit for display, but excellent for practice.’ A slow smile spread across his face. ‘It puts me in mind of the first old blade that I ever found.’

      Chloe’s heart leapt, though she was careful to keep her expression neutral and her gaze fixed on her next book selection. She had no idea what might have brought on this unusually candid mood, but she had no wish to inadvertently put an end to it. ‘Is that how you began your collection?’ she asked casually.

      ‘Have I never told you the tale?’ A wry grin put a lie to the innocent question.

      ‘Not that I recall,’ she replied, turning a page and keeping her tone absent. All of her insides were aflutter at the idea of Lord Marland sharing such an important piece of his past.

      ‘Ah.’ For several long moments he said no more. The workroom filled with a companionable silence, broken only by the distant clatter of workmen and the rasp of the polishing stone over his tarnished blade.

      ‘I was young—perhaps twelve years at most,’ he said eventually. ‘I was exploring the eastern boundaries of my father’s land. Near the shore there are long stretches of rocky ledges that eventually expand into cliffs.’

      Chloe glanced up. ‘Yes, I’m familiar with the area.’

      The marquess looked surprised. ‘Are you?’

      She shrugged. ‘I enjoy the seaside.’

      He stared at her a moment.

      Inexplicably, his startled expression began to irritate her. ‘It may come as a shock, my lord, but I do continue to exist once I step out of this workroom and beyond the new wing.’

      ‘Yes, of course.’

      She raised her chin. ‘I find the sea to be soothing. Ever changing and yet constant at the same time—it comforts me. I go whenever I can, especially in the months since my father passed.’

      Lord Marland blinked.

      What was she doing? She was breaking their code, the unwritten rules that had allowed them to exist in harmony these many months. But there truly was something different about her today. Her inner landscape was shifting and the words would not stop bubbling out. ‘Some day I hope to have a home of my own, near the sea.’

      A flash of bleakness darkened his expression, just for an instant. Chloe winced. She’d gone too far.

      Charged silence stretched between them. Breathless, she waited.

      He’d turned back to his work. ‘I found a cache, built of stone,’ he continued as if she hadn’t spoken, but he’d lost the open, contemplative tone that he’d started with. ‘It contained a musty old sporran, a disintegrating bit of plaid and a heavy, gorgeous broadsword, corroded by the sea air.’ A sigh escaped him. ‘I could barely lift the thing, but I thought it the most marvellous thing I had ever beheld.’

      Out of the corner of her eye, Chloe caught a small flutter of movement. Silently cursing the ill-timed interruption, she turned her head towards the door. She expected to find yet another workman with a question or problem—but to her surprise, she discovered a strange woman standing there.

      Chloe stiffened. In an automatically defensive gesture, she reached to tug her coat straight.

      The woman caught her eye and smiled. ‘You would have thought it was a sultan’s treasure that he had found—’ she spoke as if she had been included in the conversation all along ‘—instead of a pile of mouldy discards.’

      The sword clattered to the table and Lord Marland was up and bounding to the door before Chloe could blink an eye.

      ‘Mairead, you minx!’ He lifted the woman off her feet in an exuberant embrace. ‘I was expecting you this morning.’

      ‘The СКАЧАТЬ