Mad about Ivy by MARGO MAGUIRE

Author:MARGO MAGUIRE [MAGUIRE, MARGO]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2015-01-02T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SEVEN

“Well?” Somehow, Dev managed to find his voice. “Shall we begin our search?”

His hands were actually shaking. God almighty, he could not possibly want this woman. Should not want her.

But Epworth? Lightbridge?

It was unfathomable that her aunt and uncle could be thinking of giving her to Epworth, who would get her with child two or three times and then forget her. Or Lightbridge, the most starched, tight-fisted—

“All right, we’ll finish,” Miss Barnett said, her voice just above a whisper. To Dev’s gratification, it sounded none too steady. At least he wasn’t the only one affected. “The terrace?”

She pivoted on her heel and started off ahead of him. Dev took a few long strides and quickly caught up in time to open the door for her. It was fully dark, but a fire blazed in a beautiful stone-lined pit just beyond the cobbled terrace. He’d noticed it the night before, when he and Beckworth had gone outside to enjoy a brandy and a cheroot there.

“This is lovely,” Ivy said. “Evenings like these would be wonderful near this fire. Just look at the stars.”

“We are not here to look at stars, Miss Barnett,” Dev said, though he did pause beside her. He rarely missed an opportunity to enjoy the night sky when he was at Claymere Castle, but had never known a woman who took a moment to appreciate such things. Not even his mother.

“But look,” she countered, pointing to the northern sky. “It is so clear tonight we can see Ursa Major and the plough. And there is Polaris.”

“You are versed in astronomy, Miss Barrett?”

“A little,” she replied. “Sometimes on clear summer nights, my father would have us lie on the ground in the field behind our country house to watch the stars.”

Dev could not imagine lying on the ground with his father to look at the stars. He couldn’t remember merely sitting on a garden bench with him, just to talk. His father had died when Dev was thirteen, and there’d been little chance for stargazing after that. It was what happened when one had an elderly father.

“We should look for the next clue,” he said.

“Where are all the others?”

“Others?”

“Treasure hunters. Shouldn’t the rest of the players be here looking for the first clue?”

“The clues are probably in different order for everyone,” he replied. “The last two will converge, and then it will be a race at the end.”

He started walking systematically around the fire, studying each of the stones that surrounded it, while keeping one eye on Miss Barnett, who went the opposite way. She kept her head down as she searched for the clue among the stones.

When she crouched to the ground on the far side of the fire, she looked up at him and smiled shyly. “I’ve got it.”

Dev’s breath caught as he looked at her, and he felt a deep hunger for something he did not want. Not yet.

She walked toward him, reading the clue aloud. “The tropical sun is where I thrive, but there are other places where I come alive.

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