Caro swung around. ‘A little clutch purse.’ In hindsight, that had been odd. She hadn’t had any plans to go out this evening, so why bring a purse to dinner in her own house?
‘It’s in there, then.’
‘So...what now? You can’t creep into her room with her in it.’
‘It wouldn’t be ideal,’ he agreed, moving to the window and raising it. In one lithe movement he slid outside.
‘So?’
‘So now I go home and ponder for a while.’
She should have known it wouldn’t be that easy. She planted her hands on her hips. ‘Jack, you can use the front door. Everyone else is in bed. No one will see you.’
‘But you’ve made me eager to try out your cat burglar method.’
So he’d heard her conversation with Paul about that...
She leaned out to peer at him. ‘Be careful.’
He moved so quickly that she wouldn’t have been able to retreat even if the gleam in his eyes hadn’t held her captive. His lips brushed her hair, his breath tickling her ear again. She froze, heart pounding, as she waited for him to murmur some final instruction to her.
Instead his teeth grazed her ear, making her gasp and sparking her every nerve ending to life.
‘I KNEW THAT was what you were remembering earlier. And your remembering made me remember.’
Jack’s voice was so full of heat and desire it made Caro sway. ‘So...’ Her voice hitched. ‘That’s my fault too, is it?’
Jack, it seemed, considered everything to be her fault.
He ignored that to lean in closer again and inhale deeply. ‘You smell as good as you ever did, Caro.’
She loathed herself for not being able to step away.
He glanced down at her and laughed—but it wasn’t a pretty sound, full of anger and scorn as it was. She sensed, though, that the anger and scorn were directed as much at himself as they were at her.
He trailed a lazy finger along the vee of her blouse. Her skin goosepimpled and puckered, burning at his touch with a ferocity that made her knees wobble.
‘If I had a mind to,’ he murmured, ‘I think I could convince you to invite me to stay.’
And the moment she did would he laugh at her and leave?
The old Jack would never have enjoyed humiliating her. And yet that finger continued trailing a tantalising path in the small vee of bare flesh at her throat. Heat gathered under her skin to burn fiercely at the centre of her.
She made herself swallow. ‘If I had my heart set on you staying, Jack, you’d stay.’
That finger stopped. He gripped her chin, forcing her gaze to meet the cold light in his. ‘Are you sure of that?’
She stared into those eyes and spoke with an honesty that frightened her. ‘Utterly convinced.’
Air whistled between his teeth.
‘You want me as much as you ever did,’ she said. And, God help her, the knowledge made her stomach swoop and twirl.
‘And you want me.’ The words ground out of him from behind a tight jaw.
‘But that wasn’t enough the last time around,’ she forced herself to say. ‘And I see no evidence to the contrary that it’d be any different for us now either.’
She found herself abruptly released.
Jack straightened. ‘Right—Barbara. Now I’ve had time to think.’
He’d what? All this time his mind had been working? It was all she’d been able to do to remain upright!
‘If she’s keeping that trinket so close then she obviously has plans for it.’
‘Or is she looking for the first available opportunity to throw it into the Thames and get rid of incriminating evidence?’
He shook his head. ‘Barbara is a woman with an eye on the main chance.’
She found herself itching to slap him. ‘You don’t even know her. You’re wrong. She’s—’
‘I’ve come across women like her before.’
Did he class Caro as one of those women?
‘And I’m the expert here. You’ve hired me to do a job and we’ll do it my way—understand?’
She lifted her hands in surrender. ‘Right. Fine.’
‘Can you get us an invitation to this country party of Lady Sedgewick’s?’
She blinked. ‘You heard that?’
‘I thoroughly searched Barbara’s room and your father’s study, as well as checking the safe.’
She stared at him. ‘You opened the safe?’
He nodded.
‘But you don’t know the combination.’
He waved that away as if it were of no consequence. ‘And on my way to the study I eavesdropped on what might prove to be a key piece of information. By the way, it’s a nice touch to keep letting Barbara think you mean to give her half of the estate. Hopefully it’ll prevent her from feeling too desperate and doing something stupid—like trying to sell something that doesn’t belong to her.’
Caro’s fingers dug into the window frame. ‘It’s not a ploy! I fully intend to give her half.’
‘Lady Sedgewick?’
She blew out a breath and tried to rein in her temper. ‘I can certainly ensure that I get an invitation.’
‘And me?’
‘On what pretext?’ She folded her arms. ‘Oh, and by the way, Lady S, my soon-to-be ex-husband is in town—may I bring him along? That won’t fly.’
He pursed his lips, his eyes suddenly unreadable. ‘What if you told her we were attempting a reconciliation?’
A great lump of resistance rose through her.
‘Think about it, Caro. Your snuffbox goes missing and then the very next weekend Barbara—who’s apparently hardly left the house in months—makes plans to attend a country house party. Ten to one she has a prospective buyer lined up and is planning to do the deal this weekend.’
Hell, blast and damnation!
‘This is becoming so much more complicated than it was supposed to.’
‘If you don’t like that plan there are two other strategies we can fall back on.’
She leaned towards him eagerly. ‘And they are...?’
‘We storm into Barbara’s room now, seize her purse and take the snuffbox back by force.’
Her heart sank. Very slowly she shook her head. ‘If we do that she’ll hate me forever.’
‘And that’s a problem because...?’
‘I know you won’t understand, but she’s family.’
He was silent for a moment. ‘That was a low blow.’
His eyes had turned dark and his face had turned to stone. Her heart started to burn. ‘I didn’t mean that the way you’ve taken it.’
‘No?’
Jack had grown up in Australia’s foster care system. It hadn’t been a brutal childhood, but from what