Page 152 of Immortal Rose

“No thank you,” I told him. “I’m still hoping to keep sleep as an option for my evening. You might consider doing the same.”

The hint of darkness beneath his eyes concurred.

Hugh waved a dismissive hand, swallowing another fortifying gulp. “I’ll rest when I’m in hell.”

I shook my head, but his words tweaked my heart. “What makes you believe you’re bound for hell?”

He arched an ironic brow. “What, in the entirety of our acquaintance, has made you believe I’m not?”

I began a leisurely perusal of the study’s many bookshelves, only partly absorbing the titles that passed. “I think you’re far kinder than you’d have others believe.”

He made a noise of offense. “Take that back, madam.”

“And,” I added, “contrary to what you believe, I think your conscience rules you more than your logic.”

Hugh scoffed. “Tell that to the Earl of Wincaster.”

I glanced over my shoulder. “Another schoolmate?”

“No,” he said, resuming his work on the structure. “Just an enemy I’ve enjoyed cultivating.”

I remembered all at once. “He wrote that rather mean-spirited letter to the editor about Eleanor not being fit for the throne a year ago.”

“He did indeed.” One side of his mouth curled in a telling smirk. “He should have ensured that he owned all of the land surrounding his estate before he wrote a word of it.”

“You purchased it?” I surmised.

“And sold it,” Hugh said. “As it would happen, his estate in Broadshire sits near the intended path of the new Hilton railway line that will begin construction in a few years. They were all too eager to take that land off my hands to lay their track there instead. Fleet House was likewise interested in the land between the coast and his seaside estate for the purpose of a new lighthouse, which will be just large enough to ruin his much-vaunted view of the Narrow Sea.”

“That is utterly fiendish,” I said. “But you still did it to avenge the good name of a friend.”

“Did I?” he challenged. “Or do I just despise the way the air wheezes from his nose when he breathes in my presence?” Hugh carefully placed his next toothpick. “The difference between you and me is that you feel sympathy for someone’s plight, but I see only opportunity.”

He certainly wanted to believe that about himself, but the evidence did not bear out.

“Is that why you found Arabella and ensured she was given safe work?” I asked.

A rare uncertainty settled over his fine features—as though he hadn’t ever expected to find himself caught there, in the glare of exposure. He rarely was, if I had to guess. And now, as he set his tweezers down once more, he seemed to brace for my reaction at what he’d done.

What he’d done for me.

“You needn’t make more of it than it is,” he said carefully, after he’d no doubt rehearsed it in his mind. “I was simply . . . attempting to remove a distraction, so you could focus solely on Immortal Rose.”

A rather weak effort from him, that.

I gave him an ironic look of my own. “Yes, and you simply forgot to tell me, I’m sure. That is obviously why you decided to help all the other women with her.” He opened his mouth, but I held up a finger. “Your diabolical plan to assist women in need didn’t account for her bringing a delivery to the house this evening.”

Hugh scowled, coming around the desk to sit on the edge of it, as he had done the other night. He assumed a posture of nonchalance, keeping his voice to that haughty, aristocratic tone he used when he wished to diminish something’s importance. “You seemed to regard her so highly,” he said at last, “I found I simply had to meet her.”

Not a lie, but not the complete truth. I wasn’t entirely sure what I would have done if he’d voiced the words banging in my heart. For you. He did it for you.

“How in the world did you find her?” I asked, amazed. “I never even told you her name.”

That now familiar smirk, mysterious and smug, curled his lips.

Nearly the entire room was between us, and yet I could make out every detail of his exposed legs, from his muscled, hair-dusted calves to his bare feet. I swallowed thickly as he began to roll the soft silk sleeves of his banyan, revealing, inch by tantalizing inch, hard forearms. Warmth pooled in my belly, my thoughts softening at that small, homey intimacy.

A large scar marred his left wrist, no doubt marking another fascinating story. He’d have more, of course. Just then, all I wanted was to find them all. To chart them on the empty map of his life and follow them to their secrets.