Chapter Seventeen #2
the last two days. They’d been too caught up in each other to focus on anything else.
“This find could be an extraordinary discovery, my lord. And the historical value of these artifacts,” she said, speaking
a bit more loudly and forcefully, “may be so great that it would be a travesty to let them leave England.” She took a breath
after that impassioned declaration.
Dom wasn’t at all surprised by her vehemence. She’d made her feelings clear before they’d sank a single trowel into the ground.
“So,” he said, locking eyes with first Fenbridge and then Tess, “what should we tell Van Arsdale now, before we know exactly
what we’ll find?”
Fenbridge’s face slowly softened into a mischievous grin. “That seems a very good question indeed.”
“I’m going to make the same argument to him,” Tess told Dom, as if he might have forgotten her thoughts on the matter. “If
it’s a significant hoard, some of what we find should remain in England.”
“I know,” he told her with a smile. “We can show him what we’ve found and tell him what it could mean.” The American hoped
for the grandest treasure they could unearth, but they didn’t yet know what had already been plundered.
“Then let’s go and speak to him,” Tess said decidedly. Then she dug something out of the pocket of her skirt. A tiny box.
Dom knew instantly what it contained. “Show him this if he needs proof of what we’ve accomplished.”
Dom took the box, as small as a ring box, and closed his fingers over it. “Are you coming, Fenbridge?”
The old man waved them off as if eager to be rid of them. “To be frank, I’ve had enough of the Americans to last me a good
long while.”
Dom and Tess walked side by side, and he barely resisted reaching for her. She was all but vibrating with nervous energy.
“He’s gregarious and rather loud,” Dom told her by way of warning.
“That’s just how I imagined him.”
“Don’t let him rattle you.”
“I don’t rattle easily, Mr. Prince.” Her saucy expression heated his blood.
Dom wanted to stop her, brace her against the wall, and remind her how he could make her come apart in his arms.
Instead, he grinned and told her, “I’m well aware.”
A housemaid directed them to the dining room, though the lively conversation emanating from the room served as a kind of beacon.
The first thing Dom noticed when they stepped inside was that the table was all but bursting with dishes, far too much for
two people to consume. The second thing he noticed was that Van Arsdale’s heir was not a son but a daughter.
The young woman was garbed in an elaborate striped gown with enormous sleeves and wore jewels on every finger, around her
neck and wrists, and even in her hair. She sprang up from her seat at their entrance, oblivious to the linen napkin that fluttered
to the floor.
“Oh, I know who you are!” she said with too much enthusiasm. “The famous treasure hunter, Dominic Prince,” she breathed with
an awestruck American twang. She clapped her hands together and beamed at him, then turned her attention to Tess. “And you
look a bit like his sister, Miss Eveline Prince, but you’re not, are you?”
Tess laughed. “I am not, no.” She stepped forward confidently. “I am Tess Hawthorne.”
“Sofia Van Arsdale.” The young woman held her hand out almost as a debutante would in expectation that a gentleman might take
it and kiss it.
Tess clasped the young woman’s hand and shook it.
“Darling girl,” Van Arsdale boomed, as he dabbed a napkin at his lips and then tossed it aside as he stood, “I told you about
the lady historian we hired in place of her deceased father.”
Dom snapped his gaze to Tess at that. She maintained her pleasant expression, seemingly unfazed by the man’s bluntness.
“You weren’t expected, Van Arsdale,” Dom told the man, who he knew he should attempt a bit more deference with.
“My dear girl here forced the issue, I’m afraid.”
Miss Van Arsdale rolled her eyes dramatically. “What Papa means to say is that he forced the issue because he fancies a titled
son-in-law.” She grinned at Tess as if she might sympathize with her plight. “He’s secured invitations for me to a dozen aristocratic
soirees in London, but I refused to go until we came to meet the dashing Mr. Prince.”
A demure batting of her lashes came after that revelation and then a brazen assessment of him from head to toe that her father,
standing behind her, could not see.
Though Tess could.
Dom groaned inwardly.
He knew what was expected of him, like one knows the steps of a familiar dance performed again and again. And there had been
a time when he would have relished it—stretching up to his full height, puffing out his chest, smoothing out his voice as
he offered some brief, colorful tale of his exploits.
Now, none of it held any appeal. It felt a bit like a suit of clothes he’d long outgrown, and he took comfort in that realization,
because it was a costume he no longer wished to wear.
“Stop fussing over Prince, my girl.” Van Arsdale strode past his daughter, straight up to Dom. “Now, tell us, man, what have
you found?”
“We’ve only just begun, Mr. Van Arsdale.”
The tall, boisterous American’s face crumpled. “Two weeks. Money for more than a dozen men. You must have found something.”
Dom took a single step back, nearer to Tess.
The man seemed to relish using his booming voice and larger-than-life presence to overwhelm. Dom wasn’t intimidated by the
man, but he did value a bit of breathing room.
Except when it came to Tess Hawthorne. To her, he couldn’t seem to get close enough.
Slowly, making sure to infuse it all with a bit of drama he thought the Americans would appreciate, Dom drew the box containing
Tess’s find out of his pocket.
“We have made some discoveries. Very promising discoveries. Including this.” Dom lifted the box’s lid, tipping it forward
so that the metal and gem would catch the light.
“Ooh, Papa, let me see.” Miss Van Arsdale rushed forward, one palm pressed to her chest, the other to her belly. “It’s a gem,”
she said breathlessly. “An ancient ruby.”
“More likely a garnet,” Tess said factually. “But I believe the metal may be gold.”
“Thunderation,” Van Arsdale said, followed by a whistle. Though once he peered around his daughter’s wide sleeves, his forehead
puckered. “It’s broken and very small.”
“It’s likely a piece of a buckle, or perhaps a brooch,” Tess offered.
“Why is it broken?”
“My theory would be grave robbers,” Dom told the man. “Perhaps within the last hundred years, or even contemporary to the
burial.”
“If we could find the matching piece, and there was another ruby, imagine what lovely earbobs they’d make,” Miss Van Arsdale
mused, peeking a glance at her father.
Tess sucked in an audible breath. Dom’s stomach tightened with unease.
“We’ll find you something much finer than a broken buckle, Sofie girl.”
Dom glanced at Tess, who shot him a horrified look.
“They aren’t truly thinking of wearing what we find, are they?” she whispered to him.
Dom hardly thought it the time to point out that his own family had earned their wealth and fame from the trade in antiquities—from frescos to wall hangings to gems and art.
Though his father had finally refused the practice, there were even dealers who sold entire mummies to private collectors for the entertainment of party guests.
But he understood Tess’s dismay.
“These items are to be secured in your museum, are they not?” Dom asked Van Arsdale, fully aware the man needed no reminder.
“They’ll be featured for their historical value.”
“Of course.” Van Arsdale glared at him, as if he’d caught the tightness in Dom’s tone.
Van Arsdale cast a look Tess’s way, and Dom immediately felt protective.
“You can tell us more of the history, yes?” the American said to her with a bit of a bark that set Dom’s teeth on edge.
“I can.”
Van Arsdale squared in on Dom again. “Take us out to the dig site. Sofia and I want to see what you’ve done.” He gestured
dismissively at the box. “I hope the next finds are better than this and preferably not broken.”
“Whatever we find will be centuries old and likely greatly weathered if not broken,” Tess told him, her tone surprisingly
light.
And she was right. If the man thought this would be like pulling Egyptian relics out of an undisturbed tomb, he was greatly
mistaken.
Miss Van Arsdale seemed to sense her father’s growing ire and moved past him to draw next to Tess. “Whatever you find, I want
to hear all the stories of the people who made it.”
Tess nodded and offered the young woman a smile. “I can tell you about our theories of whose burial this may be, of course.”
“Excellent.” Miss Van Arsdale beamed, revealing dimples. “And can you make them colorful theories, Miss Hawthorne? Our guests will love that most of all.”
“Guests?” Dom prompted.
“Oh yes, Mr. Prince, we’ve invited some of our friends in London to Norfolk for dinner tomorrow evening.” She pointed a look
her father’s way. “Papa wants to let them all know of the glorious museum he’s establishing in New York.”
“Your dinner is to be hosted by Lord Fenbridge?” Tess sounded dubious.
Dom couldn’t imagine it either.
“I’m hosting,” Van Arsdale clarified, “with Fenbridge generously loaning us his dining room.”
“You’ll both come, of course,” Miss Van Arsdale insisted. “And your brother, Miss Hawthorne. Papa says he’s employed at the
dig too.”
“He is, and I’ll be sure to invite him.” Tess sounded as resigned as Dom felt about this impromptu social event.
“Now.” Van Arsdale clapped his hands. “Give us a few minutes to prepare and take us to the dig site. We want to see what we’re
paying for.”
Dom took the crass dismissal as an opportunity to lead Tess out of the dining room and into the hall’s foyer.
She clenched her hands into fists and spun toward him with flushed cheeks and thunder in her eyes. “She wants to make earbobs
out of a centuries-old relic,” she hissed quietly.
“I’ll speak to him privately.”
“Why privately?”
Dom shrugged. “From the little I know of him, he seems a man who might be less prideful without an audience.”
Tess scoffed and pitched her brow.
Though she’d hate for him to say it when she was so full of righteous fury, she looked beautiful when she was fierce.
“I could be wrong,” Dom admitted in a soft tone.
He took a step toward her and his pulse jumped when she matched the movement, until they were within whispering distance.
“Promise me,” she said in a hushed tone. “We’ll make them understand the value of all we find amounts to more than gold and
gems.”
He understood why she was disturbed by the Van Arsdales and their attitude toward the antiquities they hoped to unearth.
Dom reached for her hand without thinking, needing the anchor of her touch. Tess let him, her fingers tightening around his,
though her gaze remained stormy.
“I promise you,” he murmured, his thumb grazing her knuckles. “We’ll make them understand.”
Her shoulders relaxed just slightly, but something flickered in her eyes. Fragile trust, maybe, or the hope that he would
be the sort of man who wouldn’t let her down. The weight of it settled in his chest, heavier than any artifact they might
pull from the earth.
Before he could say more, the dining room door swung open behind them.
“Well then. Shall we?” Van Arsdale’s booming voice shattered the quiet moment between them.
Tess pulled her hand from Dom’s and turned, her expression composed once more. But Dom felt the loss of her touch like a frayed
thread in a tapestry, unraveling something he wasn’t sure he could stitch back together.
With every step toward the excavation site, he wondered which would change everything first, the artifacts buried beneath the earth, or the feelings unfolding between them.
Last night hadn’t just been about becoming lovers.
She’d offered him her trust. Yet her walk this morning—her hesitance when he met her in the field—made him wonder about her doubts.