“Nine and twenty. Six years older than me. Two of the friends he was visiting are wed and new fathers. They could not go off adventuring.” Primrose sighed. “I did not even think to ask the others. They are good enough men to have thought of it after I left but it would have been too late by then. And, to be fair, I am not sure they even considered that when I said I had to find Simeon, that I actually intended to do so myself.”
Bened said nothing but decided Primrose had been surrounded by people who had had little to do with the darker, harsher realities of life. It was often a problem when dealing with the gentry, especially those who spent much of their lives in the country. He studied Primrose as she rode beside him with an admirable skill. He suspected she was na?ve but not blindingly so. It was something he was counting on because using his skill to keep her calm and unafraid could not continue indefinitely. It was good now, allowing him to gain information and some trust, but could quickly exhaust him. That would hinder his ability to hunt down her brother, something he believed was imperative.
It was growing dark by the time they reached the village where he had planned to stop for the night. Bened was relieved to find there were still two bedchambers available, side by side, which would help him keep Primrose safe during the night. After washing the travel dust off, he went down the stairs and ordered them a meal as well as a private parlor.
Taking a seat at the table in the private room, Bened sipped at his ale and thought about what he was doing. He realized he was acting just as he did with the lordlings he had watched over for the last few years. That might prove to be the wrong way to behave with a baron’s daughter. A woman who went out on her own to hunt down her brother undoubtedly had a very independent nature. Such a woman would object to him trying to lead her about.
He thought on what little she had told him and frowned. There was something she was hiding from him. Bened was certain of it. Primrose was hunting her brother for more reasons than to inform him that their father had died. That was not enough cause for a gently bred female to set out on a journey on her own. Bened was determined to find out exactly what had made her so desperate. Every instinct he depended upon was telling him that she was in trouble and he needed all the information he could get from her if he was to protect her adequately. It surprised him a little when he realized just how determined he was to do that.
Primrose finished brushing the travel dust from her gown, hung it up, and dug a clean one out of her bag. She pushed aside a pang of disappointment over the fact that she had brought only a few serviceable gowns. The strange urge to look nice for Sir Bened was unexpected. She was not even sure she could trust him. He could be the chivalrous man she had called him but she no longer so readily believed such people exist. Recent events had shown her that her judgment of people was not as sound as she had once believed.
She had certainly misjudged her aunt and uncle. When her father had generously allowed them to move into the dower house when her uncle had lost his money through bad investments, she had soon deemed them both to be foolish, rude, and somewhat mean-spirited. Having had as little as possible to do with them from then on, she had not altered her opinion of them by much. Then her father had died and her aunt and uncle had moved into the manor to, as they told anyone who would listen, care for young Primrose until her errant brother returned. She had quickly decided that her aunt was still rude and mean-spirited but that the woman’s foolishness was mostly an act. Augusta was cunning, coldhearted, and dangerous. Although she had no proof of it, Primrose was certain Augusta had killed her father.
The pain of that loss struck her hard and Primrose nearly collapsed beneath the smothering waves of grief roiling inside her. Her father had been six and fifty years of age when he had suffered his fatal heart seizure. It was not something that should should have raised any questions. Then her brother had not returned home, not even for the burial, and Primrose had begun to grow suspicious. The air of contentment, even smug victory, Aunt Augusta had assumed grew more noticeable as the woman took over more and more of the running of the manor. She had pushed aside all Primrose’s attempts to become the lady of the manor as was her right, and not always with tact or even subtlety. It was all just another good reason to find Simeon as soon as possible.