She opted for a bit of both. ‘Does the earl know what you do in your spare time?’ She was having difficulty reconciling this rogue of a man with a gentleman who’d have the ear of an earl. She was starting to think Dartmoor must have owed him an extraordinary favour to make this recommendation. Although, dressed as he was tonight, Captain Sherard might be mistaken for a lord, too.
He was studying her, hot blue eyes raking the length of her evening gown. He crooked his arm. ‘Miss Rutherford, perhaps you would accompany me out to the veranda for some fresh air?’ There was going to be a price. Bryn saw the subtle negotiation immediately. He wasn’t going to talk in here where they could be overheard, but he would be pleased to trade information for the privacy of the veranda and whatever might evolve out there.
Say yes, the adventurer in her coaxed without hesitation. If his impromptu kisses were that good on a balcony, what might they be like on a veranda with moonlight and a little premeditation behind them? The lady in her knew better and tonight the lady held sway. But only for tonight, her naughty side prompted. She wouldn’t always have to be the lady. She’d promised herself that, too, among other things.
Bryn decided to challenge him. ‘Why? So I can risk a dagger in the back from the lovely Caroline Bryant for stealing your attentions or so that you can manoeuvre your way into my father’s good graces through me? It’ll take more than a kiss and a trellis to wring a recommendation from me, Captain.’
The women had been trying to lobby her all night. As much as a starlit veranda stroll with Kitt Sherard appealed to the adventurer in her, she wasn’t naive enough to think romance was the captain’s sole motivation. Rutherford girls were taught early to detect an opportunist at fifty paces. With dowries like theirs, it was a necessity for surviving London ballrooms crawling with genteel fortune hunters.
Bryn let her eyes lock with his over her tea cup as she raised it to her lips. ‘I never mix business with pleasure. It would be best if we said goodnight, Captain, before one of us makes any faulty assumptions about the other.’ Goodness knew what he must think of her after the balcony. If it was anything akin to what she thought of him, there’d been plenty of assumptions made already. Hardly the first impression either of them would have chosen to make.
His eyes glittered with humour, giving her the impression that while she had got the last word, he still had the upper hand. He gave her a small bow like the one he’d given her on the balcony, elegant and exaggerated in a subtly mocking manner. ‘I have a meeting with your father in the afternoon. Afterwards, we could walk in the garden. You can decide then if it’s business or pleasure.’
A meeting with her father? She knew what he thought. It would be a meeting where she was relegated to some far part of the house while men did business. Who was she to correct his assumptions? Bryn smiled, hoping the wideness of her grin didn’t give her away. ‘Until tomorrow, then, Captain Sherard.’ The arrogant man might think he had the upper hand and the last word, but she had a few surprises of her own.
Damn and double damn! Of all the balconies in Bridgetown, he’d climbed up Bryn Rutherford’s, the daughter of the man who’d come to induct the crown’s currency into the Caribbean and the man on whom Kitt’s future business interests depended. Kitt couldn’t believe his luck. What he couldn’t decide was if that luck was good or bad. He was still debating the issue the next afternoon when he set out for his meeting with her father.
A certain male part of him had concluded it was very good luck indeed. Bryn Rutherford was a spitfire of a goddess. She had the lips to prove it, and the tongue, and the body, and everything else, including an insightful amount of intelligence. She’d immediately seen the ramifications of going out on the veranda with him.
Her refusal made her something of a cynic, too. For all the spirit she’d shown on the balcony, she was wary of consequences or maybe it was the other way around: consequences had made her wary. Perhaps it simply made her a lady, a woman of discernment and responsible caution. Not everyone had a past chequered with regrets just because he did. Then again, this was the Caribbean, a far-flung, remote outpost of the British empire. In his experience, which was extensive, ladies didn’t sail halfway around the world without good reason. Did Bryn Rutherford have something to hide, after all?
It was an intriguing thought, one that had Kitt thinking past the interview with her father and to the walk in the garden that would follow. How did a girl with a well-bred, and very likely a sheltered, upbringing end up with the ability to kiss like seduction itself?
No, not a girl, a woman. There was no girlishness about Bryn Rutherford. She was past the first blush of debutante innocence. The green silk she’d worn last night communicated that message with clarity, even if he hadn’t already seen her in that sinfully clingy satin dressing robe, felt her uncorseted curves, or tasted her unabridged tongue in his mouth giving as good as it got. Thoughts like that had him thinking he was a very lucky man. Thoughts like that also had kept him up half the night.
The other half of the night belonged to another set of less pleasant thoughts—who wanted him dead this time? The candidates for that dubious honour were usually different, but the motives were always the same. Was this latest attacker simply one of his less savoury business associates who felt cheated or was it more complicated than that? Had someone from his past found him at last and bothered to cross the Atlantic for revenge? He’d been so careful in that regard. Discovery risked not only him, but his family. He’d cast aside all he owned including his name to keep them safe. Of course, discovery was always possible, although not probable. But he was alive today because he planned for the former. It wasn’t enough to just play the odds. Not when the people he loved and who loved him were on the line.
His mind had been a veritable hive of activity last night. He supposed he should feel fortunate he’d got any sleep, all things considered. There’d been critical business thoughts claiming his attention, too: would Bryn Rutherford hold the balcony interlude against him? If she did, how would that skew the business opportunities a bank in Barbados would provide? Those questions were still plaguing him when he knocked on the Rutherfords’ front door.
He was taken down a long hall by a stately butler who must have come with them from England. The butler, Sneed, fit the surroundings perfectly with his air of formality. In the short time they’d been in residence, the Rutherfords had already left their aristocratic mark on the house. They’d come loaded with luxuries; carpets and paintings adorned the floors and walls in testimony to the Rutherfords’ prestige to say nothing of the butler.
Kitt always made it a habit to study his surroundings. How a man lived offered all nature of insight. This house, the décor and its accessories were all designed to communicate one message: power and authority. Kitt approved of the intent. It was precisely the message a man charged with the crown’s banking interests in the new world should convey. But, did the message match the man? That remained to be seen.
The door to the study was open, revealing the same luxury and wealth that dominated the hall. The butler announced him to the room in general and Kitt was surprised to see that Rutherford was not alone. James Selby, an aspiring local importer, was already present. The weasel. He must have come early. Well, Selby’s limitations would speak for themselves sooner or later. Hopefully sooner.
The surprise didn’t end there. Selby wasn’t the only other person present. By a set of open French doors that let in the light and the breeze, her head demurely bent over an embroidery hoop, sat Bryn Rutherford. She looked up for the briefest of moments, long enough to let a coy smile slip over her lips when