Chapter 6
Six
The clock on the mantel chimed the quarter hour, its steady, dignified notes at odds with the irritation tightening Leander’s jaw. He broke the seal of the missive delivered moments ago—his operative’s handwriting neat, efficient, and, in this instance, entirely unhelpful.
Lady Sabrina rose at eight. She walked in the garden with her maid… visited her modiste… called upon Miss Sedgewick… returned home to take tea with her mother…
A muscle ticked in Leander’s cheek.
Nothing. Not a single detail pointing to what she was hiding.
No mysterious meetings. No clandestine appointments.
Nothing that justified the shift he had sensed in her—the wariness in her eyes, the guarded tilt of her smile, the way she seemed to hold something close, as though it might shatter if exposed to the light.
He set the missive down with a soft thud. “Useless,” he muttered.
The operative he had chosen was competent—better than competent—but even the most skilled man could not uncover secrets a woman was determined to bury. And Sabrina was nothing if not determined.
She always had been. He lifted the missive once more and read it over.
There was one piece of information to be had from his operative’s report.
Sabrina had paid a call on Miss Sedgewick.
That in itself wasn’t newsworthy, but it may give him something to go forward with.
Miss Sedgewick was Viscount Slothington’s sister, and it was possible that Slothy had been privy to the visit.
Perhaps the viscount could give him some insight.
It was unlikely, but at least it was something…
He exhaled slowly, trying—and failing—to ease the tension from his shoulders.
His gaze drifted toward the window, where the late afternoon sun cast long amber streaks over the polished floorboards.
The Whitmore crest glimmered faintly in the corner of his eye, embossed onto the invitation lying on his desk.
The Whitmore’s annual ball was that evening.
He had been debating whether or not he would attend.
He had wanted to. But he wasn’t sure he should go at all.
Sabrina would not appreciate his attendance at her family’s ball.
She was the reason he wanted to attend, but perhaps it was more than that.
He needed to be there. He could not stay away from her for any reason.
Even the strongest objections would be set aside because of that need to be near her.
How had he stayed away from her for so many years?
Apparently, proximity was all it took for him to forget good sense.
Leander picked up the invitation to the ball and turned it between his fingers.
He would accept it. The ball would be important for him to attend.
It was a good place for a clandestine meeting or two.
Something he would take advantage of—something he had always planned on using.
But now… now the invitation carried a different weight, an irresistible pull.
She would be there.
He cursed under his breath as the truth settled over him like an unwelcome cloak.
He could stay away from danger, from intrigue, from a thousand political storms—but he had never once managed to stay away from his Sabella.
Not as long as they were this close together.
She may have thought he had forgotten her, but he never had.
He had stayed away from her to protect her.
Because the work he did would only put her in danger, and the last thing he wanted to do was cause her any sort of harm.
He loved her. He had always loved her. He had just never told her that.
She was his everything. She had the uncanny ability to look right through him—to look at him then with those clear, assessing eyes and see all his carefully hidden secrets.
She alone could see beneath the layers he carefully hid from the world.
How had she never uncovered his biggest secret? Did she suspect what he felt for her?
He had always been drawn to her. Against reason. Against caution. Against his own better judgment and now she was hiding something… something that placed her in his thoughts far too often, in ways he could not permit. He had to discover the truth. He had to protect her.
Leander walked over to the bar on the far side of the room and filled a tumbler with two fingers of brandy.
He lifted it up to his mouth and tossed back a swallow of the amber liquid, the heat doing little to steady him.
He had a lot to consider, and no answers.
He would have it all that night. She would tell him what he needed to know whether she liked it or not.
He suspected she would fight him on every front, but he was prepared for that inevitability. His decision was made.
Very well. “Have it your way, Sabella,” he muttered to himself.
He would attend the Whitmore ball. He would speak to her again. He would watch her, closely, until her secret revealed itself—whether through a slip of her tongue, a betrayal of expression, or a truth she could no longer hold inside.
And, if he were honest with himself… he simply needed to see her.
Leander folded the missive, tucked it away in a drawer in his desk, and sighed. He straightened to his full height, resolve cooling the heat in his blood. If Sabella believed she could hide from him—
she was gravely mistaken. He would have the truth. He would do what was best for her. He could never allow anything to befall her. It would destroy him if she were ever harmed.
He strode from the desk to the window, his fingers tightening behind his back as he stared out into the dimming twilight.
The grounds of his London home stretched before him, quiet and deceptively calm—nothing like the turmoil churning inside his chest. A man such as he was not meant to feel so…
unmoored. He was a creature of logic, calculation, and strategy.
He commanded rooms, negotiations…without faltering.
But Sabrina unraveled him with a single glance. It infuriated him. It humbled him. God help him, it compelled him. He dragged a hand through his hair and released a sharp breath. He ought to leave her well enough alone. A wiser man would. But he had never claimed to be wise where she was concerned.
She was hiding something. His every instinct screamed that at him.
He saw it in the tension she carried in her shoulders, in the faint tremor in her hands when she believed no one was watching.
And he had watched—too closely, too often since he first laid eyes upon her again. She was in danger of some sort.
He could not prove it. He did not yet know from what source it came. But he felt it—like a storm building on the horizon, its distant rumble warning of a coming downpour. Sabrina was at the center of it, and she believed she had to weather it alone.
Foolish woman.
His jaw flexed. He tossed back the rest of his brandy and placed the glass down more forcefully than necessary.
If she would not confide in him willingly, then he would extract the truth by other means—gentle ones, if possible; ruthless ones, if required.
He would not stand idle while shadows gathered around her.
He had lost too much already. He would not lose her.
At the Whitmore Hall, he would have answers. And Sabella… she would no longer evade him with pretty smiles and graceful retreat. He would corner her if needed. He would force her to look at him and—just once—see that she was not the only one carrying secrets.
Because if he was not careful, the truth inside him would spill free. That he loved her. That he always had. That every step she took away from him felt like an ache beneath his ribs. That he would burn down kingdoms before he allowed harm to come to her.
Leander turned from the window, resolve settling over him like armor. Yes, he would go to the Whitmore ball. He would uncover the danger she feared and he would protect her—whether she wanted him to or not.
For if Sabella believed she could keep her secrets…she had underestimated the one man in England who would give his very soul to untangle them.
He had to keep her safe. Whatever the cost.
The preparations for the ball were enough to drive any sensible woman to distraction, yet Sabrina found her thoughts wandering far from the placement of flowers or the proper polishing of the ballroom chandeliers.
Footmen swept past in hurried strides, maids carried armfuls of linens, and all around her, the house shook itself into the glittering spectacle expected of the Earl of Whitmore’s daughter.
But none of it mattered at the moment. She stood at the center of the grand ballroom, surveying the space with a critical eye, though her attention fluttered restlessly.
The chandeliers sparkled like captured stars, and the marble floor gleamed in anticipation of hundreds of dancing slippers. Everything was perfect.
Everything had to be perfect.
For somewhere amid the guests soon to fill this room would be the villain bold enough to blackmail her brother.
Tonight, the truth would be laid bare or so she prayed…
She had to discover what her brother had done that would ruin them all.
Time was running out, and she feared what would happen if anyone discovered what Basil had done.
She tightened her hands into fists at her side.
It ends tonight. She would know the hand behind the scheme—the shadow who held her family in its grip.
Basil had grown ever more withdrawn, his temper unpredictable.
Guilt had hallowed his eyes or perhaps it was fear or some dreadful combination of the two.
He would never to confide in her. He didn’t even know she knew something of the truth.
Her brother was in danger of ruin unless she stopped it herself.
The fool clearly was not capable of doing it himself.
She would stop it. She must. If only her thoughts did not insist on straying to him—Leander.
The very name unsettled her composure.
Leander Ashby, the Duke of Lionston—soldier, scoundrel, childhood friend, and now an inconvenient determined presence in her life. She had hoped—truly, fervently hoped—that he would not attend the ball.
She was not meant to be that fortunate.
He would come—the acceptance of his invitation had been received.
He always did whenever fate—or some devilish mischief—placed an obstacle in her path.
And he would watch her with those fathomless green eyes, as though he could see past every mask she wore.
As though he still had the right. Sabrina drew a sharp breath and moved toward a footman arranging candles along the wall.
“Those must be placed evenly,” she instructed. “A crooked taper invites disaster.”
The footman bowed and hurried to obey.
Disaster. Yes, she was well acquainted with that. Leander’s presence alone would be enough to unravel her tonight, of all nights. For he had a way—a maddening, skillful way—of catching her off guard—of reading the thoughts she guarded most fiercely. And when he called her Sabella…
Her heart did something traitorous and soft within her chest.
No. She would not allow that. She would not allow him.
Her life would be infinitely simpler if he had stayed away—as he had for years, fighting in the war, far removed from her heart, her home, her troubles. What cruel twist of fate had brought him back into her orbit now, when she could least afford distraction?
He suspects.
She felt it. In the way he looked at her. In the quiet, piercing questions he dared to ask. Leander was no fool. A man did not survive the battlefield by ignoring danger. And somehow, he sensed it clinging to her, no matter how carefully she tried to shield him from it.
“Lady Sabrina?” A maid curtsied before her, worry tugging her mouth.
“Shall we begin arranging the musicians’ platform?
” Sabrina nodded, though her mind was elsewhere—pulled in two directions at once.
Duty and danger in one hand… and in the other, the man she could not seem to banish from her thoughts.
The man determined, for reasons she could not fathom, to force his way back into her life. Why, Leander? Why now, when she had no strength to spare for old wounds? For old memories? For the tender, impossible ache he stirred in her heart?
She straightened her shoulders with renewed resolve.
Tonight she would uncover the truth. She would protect her brother.
She would not—could not—allow the Duke of Lionston to derail her.
No matter how gently he spoke her name. No matter how fiercely her heart remembered.
No matter how dangerous it felt to want him near.
She had one goal to see to its end, and Leander had no place in those plans. Sabrina would do her very best to pretend he did not exist. Her future, her brother’s life, and her family’s reputation depended upon it…