veil flashed. ‘I think I’ve sprained my ankle. Isn’t that punishment enough?’
‘Oh, for pity’s sake.’ He crouched down beside her. This day was just getting better and better. ‘Are you certain that it’s sprained? Here, let me look.’
‘No!’ She tugged her ankle away as he reached for it, putting her weight on the other foot as she tried to stand up instead. ‘I can manage. Ahhh!’
‘Sit down, woman, or you’ll do even more damage.’ He reached for her waist as she tumbled downwards again, but she jerked even further away from his touch, landing with a fresh squelch in the mud.
‘I can’t sit down...’ Her voice was tinged with panic now. ‘I have to go or I’ll be late.’
‘You were eager enough to see me a few minutes ago.’
‘I was looking for somebody else, but it was a mistake. I shouldn’t have come.’
Somebody else? His frown deepened at the words. Who had she expected to find there but him? ‘Who were you looking for?’
‘I...’ She started to speak and then stopped. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
He folded his arms, not bothering to conceal a sigh of irritation. ‘You know if you tell me, there’s a fair chance I might be able to help.’
‘Yes, but... Oh, very well.’ She threw her hands up as if conceding defeat. ‘I was told that Lord Scorborough lives here.’
‘He does.’
‘He does?’
The head twisted towards him again, but it was impossible to see past the veil. Who on earth was she? It was obvious she had no idea who he was, though he supposed he couldn’t blame her for that. He didn’t look much like a gentleman these days. He kept his hair cropped short for practicality’s sake, to keep it out of his face when working, and he preferred being clean shaven to the current fashion for long moustaches and beards, but he hadn’t shaved for a couple of days either. He’d intended doing so after his bath, had been boiling water for that very purpose when he’d found her in the corridor, so that he was probably looking more than a little weatherbeaten and bristly. It was no wonder she’d been so frightened. Still, he couldn’t just abandon her there, no matter how much they might both prefer it.
‘Come on. You’re not walking anywhere on that ankle.’
‘What...?’ Her voice rose in alarm as he curled one arm beneath her knees and the other about her shoulders. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Nothing to sound so shrill about.’ He lifted her up, liberally splattering his new clean clothes with mud as he carried her back the way that they’d come. ‘I’m taking you inside so that I can bind that ankle.’
‘I can walk!’
‘No, you can’t. You could try, but you’d probably break something.’
‘I won’t...’
‘Believe me, I’m not thrilled by the prospect either, but I don’t think either of us has a choice.’ He kicked open the farmhouse door and carried her back through the hall to the kitchen, a curious-looking Meg trotting alongside as he deposited her in a tattered-looking armchair by the range and then reached up on to a shelf for some bandages. ‘There. Now, what did you want with Scorborough?’
‘It’s private.’
‘Private business with a viscount? Sounds intriguing.’
He deposited a roll of bandages on to the table with a thud. Her voice was still muffled by the veil and he had to fight the urge to tear it away. Wasn’t she ever going to remove the blasted thing, even indoors? He might not have been in polite society for a while, but surely his appearance wasn’t so shocking? At least not so much that ladies felt the need to cover their faces at the sight of him. He rubbed a hand over his stubbly chin. Just how fearsome exactly did he look?
‘It’s nothing like that!’ She sounded indignant.
‘Really?’
He folded his arms again, a new suspicion taking shape in his mind. Despite his somewhat chequered personal history, he was still a viscount and society still considered him a prize catch. He’d endured a number of probing visits from ambitious, matchmaking parents when he’d first moved into the farm, though thankfully they’d stopped when he hadn’t returned the calls. The sight of him in his farm clothes might have had something to do with it, too, he supposed, but perhaps this woman was simply more determined than the rest.
‘Really!’
She sounded so genuinely offended by the suggestion that he almost believed her. Almost. But he’d believed a woman once before and look where that had got him. He knew firsthand what good actresses women could be.
‘Yet here you are, wearing a veil over your face and visiting a gentleman’s house without any kind of chaperon? Forgive my scepticism, but to most minds that would suggest something of a personal nature.’
‘How could it be personal when I thought I had the wrong house? I haven’t even seen Arthur in six years!’
‘Arthur?’ He quirked an eyebrow in surprise. The way she said his name suggested they were already acquainted.
‘Yes.’ The veil face tipped downwards as if in embarrassment. ‘But it’s not illicit at all. I only came to deliver a message. He has no idea that I’m here.’
‘On the contrary.’ He drew up a stool and placed it in front of her, sitting down with one arm draped over his knees. ‘He’s fully aware of the fact. Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Scorborough.’
‘Arthur?’ The veiled face leaned closer towards him. ‘I didn’t recognise you.’
He shrugged. ‘If it’s been six years, then I imagine you wouldn’t, but now it seems you have the advantage. You say that we’ve met?’
‘Yes, many times.’ Her voice sounded almost excited now. Somehow that made it sound even more familiar...
‘And you have a message for me?’
‘Ye-es.’ The excitement dissipated in one word. ‘It’s from my sister. Lydia Baird.’
He stiffened, all of his muscles tensing at once. Hearing the name, so suddenly out of the blue, felt as shocking as if he’d just been hit hard in the face. He could happily have lived out the rest of his days without ever hearing it again, but apparently that was too much to hope for, even in the privacy of his own home. Lydia Webster, as she was then, the woman he’d been secretly engaged to, who he’d been prepared to sacrifice everything for, who’d said that she loved him and seemed to mean it, too, right up until the moment when she’d broken his heart and stamped her dainty feet all over it...
Not that she knew what she’d done. He doubted she had even the faintest inkling. The last time she’d seen him had been on a balmy mid-May afternoon when he’d left her parents’ house determined to stand up to his father once and for all. He hadn’t told her his intention and so she’d never known that he’d actually gone through with it, nor that he’d come back the next morning, eager to ask formal permission for her hand in marriage, only to discover just how false she truly was. That had been an occasion he would never forget and yet he’d had no one to blame for the shock but himself. He’d been warned about her often enough, not least by his brother Lance, but he’d never believed that she would betray him, not until he’d seen her walking arm in arm with another suitor, a man she’d clearly known very well, and all his hopes for the future—their future—had come tumbling down around his ears.
He hadn’t accosted them. After the morning’s argument with his father he’d felt too