“Beckman?”

North’s use of his given name had Beck studying the clouds too.

“Hmm?”

“I don’t mean to be so contrary, at least not all the time.” North rose very carefully.

“So who is telling the meek and selfless steward on your estates what to do now?” Beck asked.

North braced his hands on the small of his back and arched slowly. “The rightful heir, of course. Now let’s be about planting your magic trees.” North’s reply was airy and unconcerned. When he quickened his step, Beck let him move on ahead alone, for that seemed to be how the man functioned most comfortably.

* * *

“Tremaine is Reynard’s brother,” Sara pointed out for the dozenth time. “There is no giving him the benefit of the doubt. Even Reynard didn’t trust him.”

“He never struck me as cut from the same cloth as Reynard,” Polly argued. “And he kept his hands to himself.”

Sara spoke more quietly, when she wanted to scream. “You were a girl, Polly. At the risk of opening old wounds, your judgment of a man’s character was not necessarily your best feature.”

“My judgment of some men’s characters was miserable, I admit it. But Tremaine wasn’t one of those men, and I credit him for that. And when we did run across Tremaine, Reynard received him with every evidence of affection.”

“Reynard would have received the devil with every evidence of affection if Old Scratch’s pockets were full, but I did not receive Tremaine with every evidence of affection, and neither should you.”

Polly folded her arms and braced herself against the shelves of the small pantry housing their altercation. “At least write back to him, Sara. Tell him his niece is provided for. Tell him to stay in perishing France, impersonating a comte or whatever he’s doing.”

“He’s not in France,” Sara said miserably. “He rents out the chateau—Vive le roi!—and he’s bought a place not far from Oxford.”

“Near St. Albans?” Polly verbally cringed.

Sara stopped pretending to arrange the rack of spices Beckman had brought with him. “Quite the coincidence, don’t you think?”

“You have to warn Mama and Papa,” Polly pleaded. “He’ll call upon them, and there will be no end of fuss.”

“I doubt it. We haven’t made a secret of where we are, not to Mama and Papa, Polly. If they wanted to fuss, we would have heard from them.”

“I have left the decision of how to deal with them to you, Sara.” Polly’s tone became thoughtful. “If you’re tiring of that responsibility, I can change my position.”

Sara regarded Polly narrowly, but when she saw Polly’s offer was genuine, her shoulders dropped.

“You miss Mama and Papa.” Sara missed them too, and Allie didn’t even know them, her only maternal relatives.

“I miss them, and I can’t help but think Allie has the right to know them. She can’t know her father’s parents, but Mama and Papa are decent people, Sara. Stubborn, true, and misguided and provincial, but they’d love her.”

They would. They would love the child regardless of her origins. “You’d want to tell Mama and Papa all the sordid, sorry details, Polly. They aren’t that forgiving.”

“That is not the decision before us,” Polly countered gently, uncrossing her arms. “The decision before us is if, given that Tremaine is making overtures, we can continue to cling to the fiction that we’ll be safe standing alone and ignoring him.”

“We do stand alone.” Sara was never more miserably sure of anything. “It isn’t a fiction, and Tremaine isn’t making overtures, he’s making threats, saying he has been remiss not to play a role in Allie’s upbringing, and so forth.”

Polly planted her fists on her hips. “I thought he was apologizing for his absence.”

“He’s French,” Sara shot back. “That was a threat, couched as an apology. They excel at it. ‘So sorry, your head, he got in the way of my guillotine. Quel domage! Zut alors! And such the mess!’”

Polly’s lips quirked at Sara’s parody. “Half French, and the other half of Tremaine’s heritage is Scottish. They don’t apologize for anything.”

Sara managed a weak smile. “Our poor Allie.”

“Go to Portsmouth and put this from your mind. You can always write back to Tremaine later, but I think you’d be best advised to make some reply, lest you give him a reason to jaunt down here and see for himself that Allie thrives. Then too, Sara, you have another alternative—we have, rather.”

“What is that?”

Polly ran a finger over the nearest shelf, as if dust might have had the temerity to gather in her pantry. “You can put this situation in Beckman Haddonfield’s capable hands. He’s big enough to intimidate anyone, well connected, wealthy, a gentleman, and enamored of you. He’d take any threat to Allie very seriously.”

Abruptly, the tidy little pantry with its interesting scents of exotic cooking and clean aprons felt stifling.

“Tell Beck…? And what would he think of us, Polly Hunt, did he know how far we fell from his polite, titled world? He knows I performed, but he never saw my bare feet on the stage. He doesn’t know about the private performances. He doesn’t know the leverage Tremaine possesses should he seek to make our lives miserable.”

And of course, Polly had an answer for that: “Tremaine likely doesn’t know the leverage he possesses. We have to hope that’s the case.”

Sara did not hear hope in Polly’s voice; she heard thinly veiled, old despair. “And how long will you punish yourself for that?”

“I don’t punish myself for it, but it’s always there, Sara.”

“I know.” Sara slipped an arm around her younger sister and hugged her. “There are some decisions we make it seems we never stop paying for. I still don’t think I should go to Portsmouth.”

“You’re going,” Polly assured her, hugging her back and stroking a hand over Sara’s blazing hair. “You need to loosen your grip on Allie and let Beckman spoil you, as a woman needs to be spoiled.”

Sara slipped away. “Will you let North spoil you?”

“It’s as much a matter of letting me spoil him, though we’re working on it. Seriously, Sara, use this little trip to put your troubles aside, enjoy some time with Beck, and come back here refreshed and restored.”

“You will not let Allie out of your sight, Polonaise. I mean it.”

“I will let her paint, with your permission,” Polly countered. “She’s dying to do another canvas, Sara, and trying not to pester you for it.”

“You’re right. Beck points out, and he’s right too, she’ll just sneak and dodge her way around my permission if I don’t allow her reasonable access to her paints. You corner her on the subject matter of this one before she starts, though.”

For the first time in their exchange, Polly smiled. “I can do that. I ought to make her do a study of Hildegard and challenge her to make the pig beautiful.”

“She could do it,” Sara said. “She really could.”

Polly tucked Sara’s braid over her shoulder. “If she sees beauty in a wallowing pig, Sister mine, it’s because you showed her where to look.”

* * *

The trip to Portsmouth took the entire day, much of which Sara spent reading Mansfield Park to Beck on the wagon’s seat, while wishing she’d chosen a less judgmental tale.

As the day had progressed, she’d droned on with her book, not knowing how to manage a real topic of conversation. Her mind in the past week had been too divided, too busy—too worried. Now she had three nights with Beckman ahead of her, three days with him as well, and she wasn’t ready.

Judging from his increasingly silent mood, maybe he wasn’t either.

The inn was lovely, and Sara was made keenly aware Beckman—the male half of “Squire and Mrs. Sylvanus”—knew exactly how to manage himself there. He greeted the innkeeper with the perfect blend of cordiality and condescension to guarantee attentive service, and the suite of rooms they were shown to was comfortable, spotless, and possessed of an enormous bed. Tea and scones with jam and butter appeared within minutes of their baggage being brought up.

Sara glanced around the room, noting a fresh bouquet of roses on the sideboard and lace curtains on each window. “This is every bit as nice as Three Springs itself.”

“I would tolerate no lesser accommodation for you.” Beck eyed her across the little sitting room, and Sara understood clearly: The Subject Had Changed. “There’s something I’ve been wanting to do, Sarabande Adagio. Will you allow me some privileges while we’re away from Three Springs?”

Her expression must have given her thoughts away, for Beck smiled.

“Not that,” he said. “Well, yes, that, soon and in all its glorious permutations, but we’ll settle in here first, bathe, have our meal, and enjoy some anticipation, if that’s acceptable to you.”

He was sophisticated enough to enjoy anticipation, while Sara experienced worry.

“That’s acceptable.” She swallowed, because five syllables had left her mouth dry. Beck sidled over to her, his walk predatory and just plain… erotic.

“Let me be your lady’s maid, Sarabande.” He leaned in and ran his nose along her jaw. “I want to take your hair down, and I don’t mean simply take the pins out to free your braid. I want to see it completely unbound, your hair in all its glory. The frustration of never having seen you thus, the anticipation of seeing you thus, has kept me up nights.”

The husky, intimate note in his voice made her insides flutter, but she didn’t move, didn’t glide over to their luggage, find her hairbrush, and set it into his waiting hand.

She’d never glided in her life.

“Beckman, I don’t know…” Beck’s fingers brushed along her nape.