Unraveled (Turner, #3)

It had been distressing. But it had passed. She wouldn’t—couldn’t—ask him to give up his honor to save herself from a few hours of dismay.

“Do you understand?” he was saying. “I had the ability to order you released at any time. Why are you still near me?”

She had always thought that she wanted someone to love her beyond all reason. Someone who would slay a regiment of knights to save her the slightest inconvenience.

She’d been wrong. That sort of fool left nothing but a swath of bloody knights in his wake.

“You will always put your duty first,” she said.

He nodded.

“So long as you put me best, I shall be satisfied.”

“I’m not the easiest man,” he replied warily.

Miranda smothered a smile. “You sound as if you fear this might come as a sad shock to me. And yet, over the course of our acquaintance, I had noticed that. Nonetheless, despite all sense and rational argument, you are my favorite.”

His lip quirked up in a smile. It lasted but briefly, before he was serious once again.

“Miranda, nothing has changed. The reasons I sent you away—”

“But everything has changed,” Miranda whispered. “I know who the Patron is. It’s my friend Jeremy Blasseur’s grandfather. They call him Old Blazer.”





Chapter Twenty-two




AFTER THEY LEFT THE Council House, Smite didn’t conduct Miranda back to her home. Instead, he led her toward the heart of town, and finally to the Royal Western Hotel. The walk there wasn’t too long, but a sleepless night spent in a cold room without supper or breakfast had robbed Miranda of most of her strength.

The building was a newly constructed spectacle of modern architecture: four stories high, with stone columns dominating the entryway. Inside, the paintings were bright and new; the cushions on the chairs seemed as if they’d never been used. A waft of some delicious, savory scent drifted through the foyer, and her empty stomach growled. But Smite didn’t conduct her into the salon for a meal. Alas. Instead, he motioned a footman over.

Miranda ran her hand along the carved wainscoting while Smite murmured something to the fellow. The man bowed to him, then turned and spoke to another man, who turned and ducked through a door. A few minutes later, the fellow returned, this time followed by a man in gray-and-maroon livery.

Neither man was carrying a tray of food, which was rather depressing. Both servants bowed to Smite—and flicked glances toward Miranda.

They no doubt took in her wrinkled traveling habit, the frightful disarray of her hair. She had no hat, no gloves, and no cloak. Her mouth felt like cotton. When Smite held out his arm for her, she clung to it. Touching him, even just his elbow, seemed the key to safe passage through these perilous halls.

If she held on too tightly, he made no mention of it. Not as they ascended the wide, polished wood of the stairs. Instead, he set his hand—his gloved hand—over hers. When they reached the next floor, he paused briefly and turned to her. “We must have a few words,” he said, motioning to the servant ahead of them. The man simply nodded, and ducked through a door.

For a moment, they were alone in the hall, with nothing but the shining crystals of the lamps to keep them company.

“Only words? That’s rather stingy of you.”

His lips twitched in a smile. “Granted,” he said smoothly. “This is the safest place I can imagine, without sending you out of town once more.” He cast her another look. “Or trying to, at any rate.”

Her fingers twitched convulsively at that.

But he made no other attempt to soothe her. Since he’d sent her away, she had touched him. Held his hand. Miranda had even embraced him—and in public, no less. He had called her his best beloved.

But he hadn’t tried to kiss her. He’d walked away from her once. He could do it again.

When she shifted close to him now, he stepped away. It was so smoothly done that it might not even have been a rejection.

“I’ve taken you to my brother, the Duke of Parford. He’s staying here.” He paused, looked at Miranda, and added, “Don’t worry. They’re all good sorts.” Without any further explanation, he opened the door the servant had entered earlier.

Here seemed oppressively foreign. The home Smite had obtained for Miranda had been impossibly luxurious; by comparison to this hotel, however, it seemed a hovel. The room before her seemed both palatial and austere at once. The ceilings seemed too high overhead. The floor was marble, and covered with carpets that positively gleamed with wealth. The room was so massive, and the illumination so bright, that for one second, she thought Smite must have opened up a passage to the outdoors.

But outdoors did not have embroidered silks hanging on the walls. Today, it was cloudy and gray, in sharp contrast to the bucolic autumn scene depicted on the nearby wall. And gentlemen wore hats and the ladies bonnets outdoors. The two men who struggled to their feet at their entrance were both hatless.