His lips twitched. It was an expression that was doomed to failure. How could he possibly think of her as a forbidding governess when the entire meal he had been plagued with the image of sweeping aside the plates and spreading her across the worn wood of the table?
An erotic fantasy easily trumped even the most prudish expression.
“I believe you know that it is not your compliments I desire to hear, sir,” she prompted.
Hawksley remained silent a long moment. He had known from the moment he made his decision to bring Miss Dawson to London he would have to reveal at least a portion of his troubles.
The only question was how much.
“Very well.” Meeting her gaze squarely, he offered the blunt truth. “I believe that Lord Doulton is responsible for my brother’s death.”
The emerald eyes darkened with swift sympathy. “Oh. I am sorry,” she breathed. “Was it a duel?”
Hawksley’s expression hardened with the bitter frustration that had haunted him for the past three months.
“No. My brother was found floating in the river with his throat slit.”
There was a stunned silence as his companion absorbed his stark words. Hardly surprising. Such violence was rare even by London standards.
“Dear heavens,” she at last managed to choke out. “And you think Lord Doulton did such an evil deed?”
“I do not think he actually put the blade to Fredrick’s throat, but I am certain he hired the villain who did so.”
“I see.” Sucking in a slow breath, Miss Dawson slowly gathered her thoughts. Hawksley could almost feel her odd mind beginning to grind over his startling confession. “Why would he do such a thing?”
A good question, he ruefully acknowledged. Unfortunately, he possessed little more than conjecture and gut instinct.
And, of course, a healthy dose of intense dislike for the weasly bastard.
“It is my belief that my brother foolishly stumbled across information that would be harmful to Lord Doulton.”
“Do you have any proof?”
“Nothing tangible,” he reluctantly conceded. He was certain Miss Logic would not consider vague instinct and prickly dislike quite the irrefutable proof that he did. “I do know my brother was very distracted just before his murder. I quizzed him upon his odd manner, but to be honest, I assumed it was a woman preying upon his mind.” His lips twisted as he recalled his brother’s habit of tumbling in love with every pretty chit who crossed his path. “He tended to be a hopeless romantic, always tossing his heart at the feet of some female or another.”
She leaned forward, folding her arms upon the table. “Now you think his distraction was due to something else?”
“Just before his death his townhouse was broken into. The thieves managed to make a mess, but there was nothing missing.”
“That is odd. Could they have been interrupted?”
Hawksley shrugged. “That was what Fredrick claimed, although after his death I am no longer so certain.”
“Why?”
“His home was broken into again a fortnight after his funeral, only on this occasion the thief took far greater care to hide his search. It was only because I noticed that the papers in the desk had been disturbed and several books my brother kept in precise order moved on the shelf that I knew anyone had been there at all.”
“What was the thief searching for?”
“I cannot say for certain, but I believe it had something to do with this.”
Reaching into his pocket, Hawksley withdrew the small journal that he had not revealed to anyone.
Strange that he would share it with this woman he barely knew. Perhaps it was because she was regarding him with intense concentration rather than that pitying expression that implied she thought his grief had driven him mad. Or perhaps it was because he had grown so desperate that he was willing to clutch at any straw, no matter if it was an innocent wench fresh from the country, he wryly acknowledged.
Whatever the reason, he found himself wanting to discover her unique opinion on the mystery surrounding his brother’s murder.
“Your brother’s diary?” she murmured, taking the journal and glancing over Fredrick’s meticulous notes.
“It was hidden beneath the floorboards of my brother’s study. It was only by accident the butler stumbled across it and brought it to me.”
“Does it reveal who your brother might have feared?”
“No, but it did include these.”
Once again reaching into his pocket, Hawksley revealed the folded scraps of paper that had been tucked within the diary. Taking them, Miss Dawson smoothed out the wrinkled notes with a frown.
“What are they?”
Hawksley was not surprised by her puzzlement. Proper young ladies were not supposed to be familiar with such things. Of course, when it came to his angel he was learning to be prepared for anything.
“Gambling vowels.”
“Ah.” She peered at them more closely. “From Lord Doulton?”
“Yes.”
She pondered a moment before lifting her head to regard him with obvious curiosity. “You think Lord Doulton killed your brother because he could not pay his debts?”
Hawksley grimaced. “That was my first thought, but no longer. Those vowels add up to a little over two hundred pounds. A paltry sum that is not worth the risk of murder.”
She nodded her head, no doubt having come to the same conclusion. Only at a much quicker pace.
“But . . . you still believe Lord Doulton was involved?”
His features hardened. “Yes.”
“Why?”
His hand reached out to point to the open journal. “In his diary my brother was painstaking in listing his appointments. A fortnight before his death he had dinner at Lord Doulton’s home and stayed to play cards.”
She glanced toward the paper in her hands. “The vowels?”
“Precisely. After that night his usual schedule has obviously been rearranged. He scratches out appointments with both the prime minster and the prince and inserts a meeting with a mysterious MC.” Hawksley caught and held her gaze. “He would never have cancelled an appointment with the prince unless it was a matter of vital urgency.”
Her expression became distracted, her brows furrowed together. Hawksley settled back in his chair, sensing that she was busily shifting and sorting in her usual method. He presumed such deep pondering could not be rushed.
Oblivious to his presence, Miss Dawson absently shifted the vowels she still held in her fingers, turning them this way and that in silence. He watched her in a rather bemused fascination.
He had never before allowed a female in his home. Partially because the cramped, barren chambers were hardly suited to entertain the fairer sex, but more importantly because he had no desire to encourage any woman to believe she might domesticate him.
Allow a woman into your home and before you knew it, she was fussing and clucking over a gentleman as if he were a mere child.
Somehow, however, he did not resent the sight of the silver-haired beauty seated so comfortably at his table.
He tried to tell himself it was because she was not the sort to bother a man. If she chose to alter the household it would be to suit her own damn pleasure, not an attempt to coax her way into his life. And as for fussing over him, well . . . he was not entirely certain she was more than passingly aware of his presence most of the time.
Highly reasonable excuses. Unfortunately, they did not explain his sense of ease as they had shared the private luncheon, or the undeniable pleasure he found in simply having her near.