And there was something remarkable about a night sky after a week of rain, as if the very air had been scrubbed clean. Each star shined down from its place in the cosmos, a pinprick to him here. And yet a sun to its own planets.
“Any particular reason you’re laughing at the stars, my lord?”
He spun with a frown, his eyes taking a long moment to pick Ainsley out from the shadows in which he sat. There—he was on the bench tucked into the flowers, leaning forward with his forearms braced on his legs and his hands clasped between his knees. Relaxed in a way that he only ever was when Sheridan came upon him in the middle of the night out of doors.
Which, given the many excavations on which he’d dragged along his poor valet, was more times than one might think.
Sheridan repositioned one of the chairs to more or less face him and settled into it, tipping his head back to keep those far-off suns in view. “Not at the stars. At their claim that they could clear my mind of Beth enough to then read more.”
Ainsley’s puff of breath might have been a laugh. Or it might just as easily have been exasperation at having his midnight garden invaded. Well, if he wanted solitude to finish his prayers, he’d just say that Sheridan had better get to bed. It was his code for “Leave me alone, you oblivious dolt. Can’t you see I’m trying to escape from you for a few minutes?”
Diplomatic even in his dismissals, that was Ainsley.
But instead of sending him away, Ainsley sucked in a long breath. “It’s a lovely spot, isn’t it? At night, with the village sleeping, you can hear the surf on the shores even from up here.”
“Mm.” Sheridan linked his hands behind his head. “One of the loveliest we’ve seen. We’ll visit often, I expect. With Telly, to see Libby. And if I convince Beth to propose to me, for her sake too.”
Definitely a laugh, that second puff. “You’re incorrigible.”
He grinned up at the sky. “Seriously, though. I’m glad you like it here. I do feel bad, dragging you around to places you have no desire to see. I’ll never forget the look in your eyes after a week in Egypt.”
“If God meant me to live in the desert, He wouldn’t have made me an Englishman.” A smile laced his voice at the memory. “I’m not sorry you didn’t discover that your true passion lies in Egyptology. Druid cairns I can handle. Especially if there’s an inn near them.”
A sound of fabric on stone had Sheridan briefly tilting his head forward, just long enough to see that Ainsley had stretched himself out along the bench so he, too, was staring up at the stars.
The silence was summer-warm, rain-fresh, and comfortable. Though Sheridan could practically hear Ainsley thinking, so he wasn’t surprised when he said, “I won’t mind visiting here. Though Miss Dawe might mind my coming, if she doesn’t find another position elsewhere.”
Sheridan pressed his lips together. He’d known that Ainsley and Collins were spending most of their time with the Dawes. And he’d thought he’d caught his valet looking a bit longer than necessary at Senara—understandably. She was a pretty woman, and she knew her mother’s crumpet recipe. So quite a catch.
But now that he mentioned her, she hadn’t been among the group of family and neighbors today, which was odd indeed. She ought to have been one of the first to embrace Mabena Moon and congratulate her.
Was Ainsley saying it was his fault, somehow, that she’d been avoiding them today? Unthinkable. Unless . . . “Did you preach too loudly?”
“I didn’t preach.”
“Not even with your eyes?”
Another snort of laughter. “No. But—do you remember my cousin? Rory Smithfield?”
Sheridan made a face, though Ainsley wouldn’t be able to see it. “Hard to forget that one. Not my favorite of your relatives, I confess.”
“Yes, well, Miss Dawe knows him. Quite well, apparently. He showed up here the other night, thinking to lure her away to marry him.”
“I beg your pardon?” Sheridan nearly wished he’d been tilting his chair back so that he could slam it down on all fours again. As it was, he had to settle for tipping his head to its normal angle. “She said no, clearly. Having some sense.”
“She did. Though she hasn’t said a word to me since, no doubt because I witnessed a scene between them that would have been embarrassing.” Ainsley sighed. “And it gets worse. I’ve been debating how best to bring it up.”
“Oh dear.” It must be bad indeed, whatever it was, if Ainsley had to debate how to talk to him about it. Sheridan leaned forward. “What is it? Has Smithfield tried to sell all our secrets to Scofield or something?”
Ainsley propped himself up on his elbows. And frowned at him.
Sheridan blinked. “Well, I can’t have guessed it. That would be absurd. He doesn’t know any of our secrets.”
With a snort—a dignified one, somehow—Ainsley lowered back down to the bench. “That apparently doesn’t stop my cousin from making things up. He’s convinced the Scofields that he’s my confidant—that they can get at me, and hence you, through him. Now he wants to draw Miss Dawe into it, too, and have her provide him with actual information in exchange for his affection and a marriage proposal.”
“As if that would be a prize.” Sheridan would have muttered a few other choice words, had he not known that his valet would lecture him on it. “Well, I’m not concerned that she’ll turn on the Tremaynes—they’re family. But your cousin himself is a different story. What’s he told them?”
“He wouldn’t say. Except to point out that I ought to thank him for blathering on, since it meant they weren’t pressing my mother or aunt for information instead.”
Worry wove through Ainsley’s words, and for good reason. They made Sheridan’s chest tighten too. He hadn’t been exactly surprised when Ainsley had told him back in May that the Scofields had tried to get information out of him. They were, after all, good businessmen. Just trying to know as much about their buyer as they could. It had been little more than amusing at the time.
It felt far more sinister now. Knowing what he did of them, he wouldn’t put them past extortion. “Well, that won’t do. We can’t have your family in any sort of danger just because you work for me. Did you check with your mother? Is she all right?”
“I wired her first thing this morning and had a reply this afternoon. She said some strange men have been around, here and there. One tried once, months ago, to get her to talk about you, but you know Mother—she isn’t one to ever have loose lips.”
Chuckling at the memories of the times he’d met Mrs. Ainsley—and their very opposite personalities—Sheridan let his head tilt back again. “Nothing for it, though. We have to keep your family safe. Maybe—what do you think? Move them to the castle until this all blows over?” They’d had a smashing good time at Christmas. Mrs. Ainsley had even said so.
“Generous of you, my lord, but what good would that do? Especially given that we’re here.”
“You have a point. If the Scofields are looking for people to pressure into spilling our secrets, the castle would be the first place they’d try. So then. Paris it is.”