Cameron leaned on his mallet, trying to stave off his headache as the tedious game commenced tediously. He’d drunk far too much last night, and while he’d felt better riding this morning, his head was still thick with his hangover.

Ainsley, on the other hand, looked fresh and bright, every gleaming hair in place. Cameron had liked her much better mussed. On his bed last night he’d wanted to spread her golden hair in his hands, drag it over her bare breasts, kiss the lips that talked back to him so saucily. He let his senses drift to the scent of her, the feel of her beneath him, the taste of her mouth when he’d pushed the key into it.

“Ah,” Mrs. Yardley said. “I see a spring lassie catching a laddie’s eyes.”

Cameron opened his eyes and frowned as the count tried to guide Ainsley’s hands on her mallet. There was no need for the count to instruct her—Ainsley had already racked up a number of points with her competent strokes.

“It’s autumn,” Cameron said. The trees at the bottom of the park blazed scarlet and gold, mixed with the deeper black green of the pines.

“But a beautiful lady always means spring in the heart.”

“I mean that it’s autumn for me.” Cameron watched Ainsley as she bent to tap her ball with precision. The sight of Ainsley’s hands firmly gripping her mallet made him dizzy.

“Nonsense. You’ve lived only half as long as I have, and it’s a long time through the next half of your life. Such a strange marriage Mrs. Douglas made. John Douglas was in his fifties, she barely eighteen. I imagine it was a family arrangement, but I can’t imagine what sort of arrangement. Douglas never had much money, and he left Ainsley almost destitute, poor thing. I tell you all this for a reason, Lord Cameron.”

Because she’d noted Cameron’s obsessive interest with Ainsley Douglas. Hell, the whole house party would see it if they weren’t busy trying to be noticed themselves.

“She’s young,” Cameron said. “She can remarry.”

“True, she is young and still quite lovely, but she’s shut away from company much of the time. Her Majesty keeps Mrs. Douglas tucked by her side—she’s become quite the favorite, and Mrs. Douglas needs the money the post with the queen brings. Ainsley’s oldest brother helps her, but he has a family of his own, and Ainsley rather feels the pinch of living in his back spare room. Ainsley’s mother had been one of the queen’s favorites before she lost that pleasure by marrying beneath her. Mr. McBride was not who the queen had in mind for poor, dear Jeanette. But all that was forgotten when the queen met Ainsley. She was enchanted with Ainsley and insisted on bringing her into the household. The post was a godsend. Ainsley’s brother is kind, but she was utterly dependent on him. Of course she took it.”

All of which explained Ainsley’s obsessive determination to retrieve the disgraceful letter from the clutches of the evil Lord Cameron before he showed it to anyone. Ainsley couldn’t afford to lose her position with the queen.

“But the poor girl is never seen out and about during the Season,” Mrs. Yardley went on. “Or any other time for that matter. The queen likes to keep her close. By the time Ainsley is allowed a holiday, she’s too exhausted for much of a social life. She stays with her brother during her meager days off—kind people, as I said, but stuffy. Family suppers and reading aloud. Playing the piano if they’re feeling truly frivolous. Patrick and his wife are a bit overprotective, have always been, but then Patrick and Rona raised Ainsley and her three other brothers when their parents died. I’m happy that Isabella plucks Ainsley out once in a while, even if only for a week.” Cameron felt Mrs. Yardley’s keen eyes on him. “Are you listening, my lord? I’m not babbling to fill the time, you know.”

Cameron couldn’t look away from Ainsley, her head bent to the count’s as they discussed their next play. “Yes, I’m listening.”

“I wasn’t born old, my lord. I recognize when a man wants a woman. And you’re not a monster, despite the reputation you try to maintain. Ainsley needs a bit of excitement in her life, poor lamb. She was a very lively young woman and then suddenly had to become a drudge.”

She didn’t seem drudging now. Ainsley was laughing, her laughter sparkling across the green. Her smile was all for the count, and something dangerous stirred inside Cameron.

“Forgive me, my lord,” Mrs. Yardley said. “I don’t have much to do these days but observe my fellow men—and women—and I do have great experience in who fits with whom. Why not make a match of it? What on earth else do you intend to do with the rest of your life?”

“Much as I do now, I imagine.” Cameron rubbed his upper lip as Ainsley patted the count’s arm in praise. “Horses take much attention, and the racing calendar fills the year.”

“So I hear. But happiness is a different thing. It’s worth a little effort.”

“I made that effort once.” Too damn bloody much effort.

“Yes, dear, I knew your wife.”

A glance at Mrs. Yardley told Cameron she’d known some of the truth about Lady Elizabeth. The memory of Elizabeth’s beautiful face, her mad eyes as she came at him, ready to strike, made his body tighten. Old pain, old darkness dimmed the bright morning.

Cameron heard Ainsley’s laughter again, and he opened his eyes, the visions dissolving.

“If you knew my wife, then you’ll understand why I view marriage as a miserable existence,” Cameron said, still watching Ainsley. “I won’t enter it again.”

“It can be a miserable existence, I don’t deny that. But with the right person, it can be the best existence in the world. Trust me, I know.”

“It’s our turn,” Cameron said curtly. “Are you up for a go?”

Mrs. Yardley smiled. “I’m rather tired, my lord. You take my turn for me.”

Cameron felt the paper of the stolen letter crackle in his pocket and watched Ainsley smile at the count.

“You’re a wise woman, Mrs. Yardley.” He lowered the mallet he’d rested on his shoulder and approached their waiting ball.

“I know that, dear,” Mrs. Yardley said behind him.

Ainsley knew the precise moment Cameron stepped from the shade to take his shot, while the slow-moving Mrs. Yardley kept her seat. Ainsley had been aware of every movement Cameron made since he’d appeared even though she’d avoided looking directly at him.

She hadn’t missed how Cameron carried Mrs. Yardley’s chair and mallet for her, slowing his long stride for hers as they moved about the pitch. He was being patient, kind even, conversing with the elderly lady, who smiled back at him in appreciation.

Cameron was this patient and gentle with his horses, guiding them with care that he rarely used on people, unless they were like Mrs. Yardley. It was a side of himself no one acknowledged, and Ainsley wondered if anyone but she even noticed it.

She saw no sign of that patience, however, when Cameron looked up from his ball at Ainsley. His eyes glinted with determination, like a billiards shark ready to win the pool.

It did not help that Lord Cameron was devastating in his riding clothes: buff breeches smooth over his thighs, boots muddy, casual coat hanging open over a plain shirt. Cameron’s large masculinity rendered the slender Englishmen pale and ineffectual, as though a bear had wandered into a gathering of docile deer. He wielded his mallet with precision, which was why he and Mrs. Yardley had already racked up a number of points, and therefore guineas, because no one who came to visit the Duke of Kilmorgan didn’t gamble outrageously.

Cameron drew back his mallet and struck his ball with force. The ball leapt with a straight trajectory up the little rise and smacked into Ainsley’s with a decided click.

Her heart jumped. “Botheration,” she muttered.

Her partner, the rather feeble-brained count, called out, “Excellent roquet, my lord.”

Cameron strode to them, mallet on his shoulder. He said nothing to Ainsley as he placed his large booted foot over his ball, Ainsley’s still touching it, and drew back the mallet. His riding coat stretched across his shoulders as Cameron smacked the ball under his foot, the impact sending Ainsley’s galloping across the green. She watched in dismay as the bright yellow and white striped sphere rolled merrily to the edge of the lawn and plunged into the undergrowth of the woods.

“I believe you’re out of bounds, Mrs. Douglas,” Cameron said.

Ainsley ground her teeth. “I see that, my lord.”

The count said in careful English, “That was perhaps not, as you English say, very sporting.”

“Games are played to win,” Cameron said. “And we’re Scottish.”

The count looked into the undergrowth and then down at his well-polished shoes. “I will fetch the ball for you, signora,” he said without much enthusiasm.

Which would leave Ainsley alone with Cameron. “No, indeed, I’ll find it myself. Won’t be a tick.”

Ainsley turned and ran for the undergrowth before the count could do more than make a token protest. She hadn’t missed the relief on the count’s face that he wouldn’t have to take his pristine suit into the bushes, nor had she missed the slow smile on Cameron’s.

It was cool under the trees, the mud sticky. Ainsley walked about ten yards into the woods before she spied the painted stripe on the ball under the thickest bush. She stuck her mallet into the brush and thrashed around for it.

“Allow me.” Cameron was beside her, no apology, no explanation. His longer arm allowed his mallet to reach under the brush, and in a few seconds, he scraped Ainsley’s ball back to bare mud.

“Thank you.” She started to tap the ball back, not wanting to pick up the mud-caked thing, but Lord Cameron’s body was in her way. A screen of trees blocked them from view of the green, making them effectively alone.