She appeared so utterly convinced of this fact that Lu had to accept it. Lu ought to feel guilty, given her own secrets, but frustration welled within her breast instead. “Then why advise me to know Aidan better? Won’t this occur naturally? We are to be married after all.”
Nan cocked her head and frowned as if Lu had said something daft. “A man and woman might live together as man and wife for the whole of their lives and never know more about each other than their Christian names.” She gave a small shrug. “’Tis no matter to me if that is how you’d like to live your life. I merely suggest that you try to know your new family better by asking the questions that must be asked.”
“I never thought not to.” Honestly, what was the woman getting at? And why did Lu want nothing more than to leave this house?
A knock sounded at the door, and a moment later, a maid came in with a tea tray.
“Consider this house as your own,” Nan said as the maid left and she headed to the door. “No door will be locked to you.” She paused. “That said, do not go to the smithy. It isn’t safe, and I’ll not have the masters at my head should you get hurt.”
Lu paused, holding the teapot in midair. “The smithy?”
“Master Eamon’s smithy. He’s often at work there and doesn’t like to be disturbed.”
“Ah, yes.” Lu poured herself some fragrant, steaming tea. “I remember now. Eamon is quite talented at metalwork.” Regret pierced her heart as she thought of the small menagerie of animals that Eamon had created and Aidan had sent to her over the years. They were now at the bottom of the sea with the rest of her possessions. Only one tiny, perfectly wrought steel lilac had survived. It lay warm and familiar against her skin, for she’d turned the piece into a pendant long ago and never took it off.
Nan raised her pointy chin a notch. “Only Master Aidan is allowed inside. Please remember it.”
A flicker of fear shone in the housekeeper’s eyes, and Lu went still.
“I do not foresee any reason why I should desire to explore the smithy,” she said carefully. Lie. She’d been desperate to watch Eamon work. In her mind, he’d always been a shadowy figure. Aidan rarely spoke of him, only to say that he’d created her gifts. But they were so beautiful and perfectly formed that she wanted to see how he created them.
“Very good. Master Eamon would be most displeased should anyone invade his privacy.” The fear returned, a bit stronger now before Nan mastered her expression. She quit the room then, leaving Lu wondering just what Aidan’s silent brother was hiding in his smithy and why the housekeeper claimed devotion to a man who so clearly frightened her.
A shuddery breath left her. What would Master Eamon do if he found out she’d been lying to his brother? Father’s words haunted her, as they had for four long years. “If ever they discover what we’ve done, it will be the prison barges for you as well as me, girl. Never think otherwise. We committed a crime, you and I. The money paid is all but gone so we can’t give it back.”
No matter how much she wished otherwise, she didn’t have enough trust in her soul to tell Aidan the truth.
Lu turned and looked at herself in the mirror that hung above the mantle. Her eyes were two wide, dark, glossy disks floating in an overly pale face. “I am Lu,” she said to herself, trying to make herself believe it. “I am Lu.” She clung to the thought like a raft at sea. It was the one thing that was hers, for Aidan had given her the ridiculous moniker because he’d seen the real girl hiding between the lines. Pray God, he’d love her still.
Chapter Four
“Keep going that way and you’ll find the garden wall.”
Lu came to a sudden halt at the sound of the deep voice. It wasn’t Aidan’s; his was a bit lighter in tone. No, this voice was warmer and tinged with more of an Irish lilt than her fiancé’s well-bred English diction.
A note of humor colored it as the man continued, “Besides, the stables are in the other direction.”
She turned and found Eamon Evernight sitting in the shadows with his back against a large rowan tree. The younger Evernight brother hadn’t spoken a word in the house. He’d simply eased away from conversation until he’d blended into the woodwork. A fine trick for one so large as he. But Lu had been aware of him, or his stare rather. She’d felt it linger across her neck when her back was turned and heat her checks when she’d faced his way.
Oddly, he never outright stared, but tracked her from under his lashes. Which made it all the more unnerving that she’d known he’d been watching her.
He watched her now as well, his gaze steady and waiting.
“How did you know I was headed for the stables?” She’d been out of her room and headed for them as soon as the weather had cleared.
The corners of his eyes crinkled just a touch. “I recall hearing you had an affinity for horses.” His lids lowered, a slow perusal that had her skin prickling. “Seems inevitable that you’d suss them out as soon as you could.”
The way he spoke to her, as if to tease; she did not know why, but it roused her. Why hadn’t Aidan taunted her in this manner? She’d expected it of him, even hoped for such an exchange.
“Oh?” she said lightly. “And what if I was merely going for a walk?”
“Well, your muttering ‘where the bloody hell are the stables’ might have provided me with further clues.”
She laughed. “I must say, Mr. Evernight, your powers of observation are keen. Though it wasn’t very nice of you to repeat a lady’s indiscretion to her.” Good Lord, she had been swearing like a stable hand, hadn’t she? Ladies did not do such things. She’d have to repeat that fact until she remembered. Damn it.
A deep, slow chuckle drifted over to her. Strangely, she thought that Eamon Evernight did not laugh often. Which was a shame because it was a very nice sound.
“I won’t think any less of you, I promise,” he said. “Especially when I have uttered a few of those words a few times myself today.”
Shaking her head slightly, Lu stepped closer, bringing herself under the shade of the tree, and Eamon came into better focus.
My, but he was large. His shoulders were twice the width of hers. His arms beefy with muscle, now on display behind the thin, improper lawn shirt he wore. Massive, scarred, and callused hands hung limply upon his bent knees. She looked away from them and into his face.
His coloring was unfortunate. One could not shy away from it. Vibrant, angry red hair swirled in a thick wave from his crown, giving the impression of a flame. On this towering brute of a man, the color was excessive. And not at all fashionable. Indeed most people in England looked upon red hair as a defect. Ridiculous notion, but one that did not abate. Regardless, her preference was for golden hair and light blue eyes.
“I merely wanted to brush down the horses, perhaps have a chat with them,” she said to him. “I am quite accustomed to caring for them, you know.”
The corners of his mouth curled in a hint of a smile. “It’s the grooms, you see. They do not yet know you. If you wander in, they won’t know what to do with themselves.”
The quiet way in which he spoke was firm but not reproachful. Even so, her shoulders slumped. No servant wanted an unfamiliar woman drifting into their territory. Especially in the stables. How long had it taken her to win over the hands at her father’s stables? “Well, I suppose I shall make do with roaming the garden.”
She must have made a face, for he smiled then, and his face was transformed to something almost boyish, with little dimples appearing on each side of his wide mouth. Strong, white teeth flashed in the shadows.
“Ah, now, don’t go fretting. You simply need an able escort. I can take you to the stables, if you’d like—” He stopped, his high cheeks coloring in that strong, ginger way that he must abhor. “That is, Aidan can escort you, of course.” His gaze settled on his hands.
Yes, Aidan could take her. Only the thought made the horrid lump within her chest grow. She did not want to face the man who called himself Aidan yet treated her as if she were a stranger.
“I’ll go fetch him, shall I?” He moved to get up, and Lu put out her hand.
“Oh, no. Don’t bother. Truly, it’s all right.”
An uncomfortable silence descended.
“May I sit with you, Mr. Evernight?” Lu did not know what had prompted her to ask. And when he looked up at her with his dark brows raised in surprise, she wished she could take back the request. But only a little.
There was something oddly comforting about Eamon Evernight. She fancied that whatever she said or did, he would not sit in judgment.
“Call me Eamon,” he said, shifting over so that she could sit with her back supported by the tree. “Mr. Evernight makes me think of my father.”
Lu arranged herself, and her skirts, at the base of the tree. There was not much room, Eamon being as large as he was, and their shoulders were close enough to feel his body heat. “So then you did not get along with your father either?”
“Either?” Eamon frowned.
“I merely meant that Aidan told me he did not have a close relationship with your father, and it sounded like you did not either.”
Eamon cleared his throat. “Right, of course. Well, ours was not the best of accords.” With a distracted air, he scratched the back of his head, and the curve of his biceps bulged against the tight stretch of his sleeve.
By Saint Joan, she shouldn’t be looking at the man’s muscles, or noting the way they moved. She bit her lip in annoyance and tried to focus on his face. But that did no good. For she realized, with a bit of a start, that he was quite handsome when one looked past that flaming red hair. Classically so.
His nose was strong and straight, his jaw squared and graceful.
She was staring now. She knew it, yet Lu could not help but keep looking. To find such masculine beauty here was like discovering a secret treasure.
With such bright red hair, one would expect him to have freckles and pale eyes, but his skin was mellow ivory, and beneath sweeping brows of auburn, his eyes were deep, saturated cobalt blue, such as found in Chinese porcelain.
Looking into them, she felt a strange sort of hitch in her chest, as if someone had stolen her breath for a moment.
Perhaps she made a sound or something showed in her expression, for his brows drew together and a small half-smile pulled at his lips. “What is it?” His voice was soft and searching, as if he worried he’d offended her.
“You’re…” She trailed off in a mad blush.
“I’m what?” he prompted gently, yet looking a bit apprehensive.
Lovely. Rare. Unexpected.
“You’re Eamon,” she said instead. Lord, what was wrong with her? Had she gone mad?
Again came that smile, a slow stretch of his mouth. And it was as though someone had lit a tinder within him. “So we’ve established, Bit.”
“Bit?” Surely she had heard him incorrectly. “What does that mean?”
His smile vanished with a wince. “I apologize,” he said after a moment, “that was rude of me. Now you have an idea why the family refrains from taking me anywhere. Or why I refrain from going,” he said under his breath.
How well she understood that feeling of awkwardness. She’d never said or done the proper thing in her life. Much to everyone’s despair.
“I don’t mind the familiarity,” she said, feeling too warm. “After all, we are to be brother and sister.”
He scowled at this, as if unconvinced.
“What does bit mean?” she prompted once again.
“Nothing. It was a foolish slip of my tongue. Forget I said a thing.”
“Oh-ho no,” she said with a light laugh. “You cannot tell a person to forget what they’ve heard. It only tweaks the curiosity more.” She narrowed her eyes at him, and he went an endearing shade of pink that clashed with his flaming hair. “Tell me.”
Eamon cleared his throat. “Well, you’re a little bit of a thing, now aren’t you?”
“Little?” she scoffed. She was a quite respectable five foot three inches. “Compared to some, I suppose.”
He laughed, a rasping sound, and then ducked his head. “You’ve the right of it. I’m a big brute, to be sure.”
“I did not mean it as an insult, Mr.—Eamon.”
Still smiling, he squinted up at her from under his lashes. “Then I shall not take it as such, Lady Luella.”
“Lu,” she corrected, ignoring the small pinch in her heart. “You may call me Lu, if you’d like.” Even as she spoke the words, her skin heated. Lu? Was she mad? It was Aidan’s name for her. Perhaps it was a bit of revenge for Aidan’s current frostiness toward her, for her embarrassment faded and defiance surged forth. Anyone might call her Lu. And why not?
As for Eamon, he went utterly still, his expression unreadable. And she wondered again if she had overstepped. Lu opened her mouth to recant her offer when he cleared his throat.
“All right then, Lu.” He swallowed audibly, and his gaze rested on her. It was strange, she thought in a daze, that looking into his steady, too-blue eyes felt familiar, safe, and at the same time, extremely dangerous. A bit like standing on a cliff that overlooked the sea. One could study that view forever, know it would always be there, and at the same moment, one could leap into danger.
Thankfully, Eamon tilted his head back to look up at the green leaves swaying above their heads. “I wanted to say how sorry I was to hear of your loss.”
Those softly uttered words fell heavy upon her breast. “Thank you. My father’s death was…” Hell. Lu struggled to find a word that didn’t have her sounding heartless, yet didn’t make her any more of a liar than she already was. “Distressful,” she settled on. “He had lived a full life, thus it was not unexpected in the way of the others.” Everyone she’d ever loved or cared for, gone within days. “Such as when I lost my sister.” For a moment, Lu could not speak. A chasm of pain opened up within her. Why had she told him?