into Rich’s disappearance, she was held back by the frustrating certainty that a lady on her own would never get far with such a quest. She was too hedged about with constraints not to need a man of power on her side to forge through or round any obstacles thrown in their way.
‘Whatever your opinion of me, I’ll not rest until I know where my brother is and what has made him conceal himself so completely from those of us who love him, Lord Calvercombe. Despite all Richard has done to put his family off the notion of owning up to him, let alone loving him, we stubbornly insist on doing so,’ she told him with as much icy dignity as she could muster.
If not for the habit he had of watching her with cynical incredulity—as if he were about to have her stalked and captured to be displayed as a public curiosity—she might have turned and walked away, but as it was she didn’t trust him not to go straight to her mother and warn her that her daughter was intent on seeking out her errant eldest son, if only to get Persephone out of his way and carry on searching for Rich and his precious cousin Annabelle unopposed.
‘At least I now know I read you right in the first place,’ he muttered with a formidable frown to tell her he’d hoped he was wrong, for once in his life.
‘I’m a Seaborne—what else did you expect?’ she said scornfully.
‘Some common sense and a smidgeon of ladylike self-restraint to make you more endurable?’ he asked as if he already knew that was too much to ask.
‘That would be your mistake, my lord, not mine.’
‘So I see, but would you truly risk your unfortunate mother losing yet another of her offspring in such a reckless fashion, Miss Seaborne? I dare say she’d miss you as much as she does her eldest son, even if I can’t currently fathom any reason why she should find your absence aught but a blessing,’ he replied, as if only his talent for merciless words kept him from physically shaking her.
‘It’s because she’s our mother and a darling, something you clearly wouldn’t understand,’ she declared, informing her conscience it wasn’t a low blow if it got her out of here with her dignity intact.
She would not lose the blazing Seaborne temper she had inherited in spades from her passionate and often restless sire and make this infuriating idiot happy that he’d bested her in an argument. She didn’t need his admiration or approval, but letting him brush her off as a feminine irrelevance was not an option she could allow, either.
‘No, I wouldn’t,’ he admitted. ‘Although I do have an imagination,’ he went on, ‘even if it’s a quality you clearly lack. Being cursed with such a questionable gift, it tells me you could end up as alone and beleaguered as Rich Seaborne if you carry on pursuing this mystery. You risk losing everything you have, Miss Seaborne—your health, your safety and even your sanity—if you try to pick up their trail where I left off, and that’s a risk too far for a gently bred female.’
‘How would you know?’ she demanded, stung by the assumption he knew better than she did what was good for her.
‘You can really ask such a question of a former soldier like me? How naive are you in this ridiculous quest to outsmart your brother and the enemy he and Annabelle must be hiding from? Rape and slavery are weapons of war, Miss Seaborne. Pray that you never have to watch the sack of a conquered city or face the wrath of a triumphant enemy.’ He fell silent as appalling images flicked through his head in a kaleidoscope of horror she could only imagine.
Persephone hesitated between keeping out of whatever battles might be coming, as he wanted, and following her instincts to find her brother and help him come home at long last. At times she knew he was in trouble almost as if she were there with him, while at others his fate was obscure as a brick wall. No, even if it meant losing some elusive something she should never want and couldn’t have with this man, she still had to find Rich. She shook her head sadly and met his eyes with something she feared was very close to an apology in them.
‘Would you give up trying to find your cousin Annabelle if someone warned you it could be dangerous and tried to make you stop?’ she asked.
‘No, but I’m a man and a former soldier. If you have it in you to look beyond the end of your own nose, imagine what a bitter enemy might do to the lovely young sister of a man he’s set out to break and overcome. Rich Seaborne has enemies who would love to hold a trump card like his sister in their hands, so why not show some crumbs of common sense and stay here while I track them both down for you?’
‘You must do as you please, my lord,’ she made herself say as distantly as she could manage when he was so close that every sense seemed on edge.
Apparently he expected her to behave like some passive maiden in a story, waiting for the prince to slay her dragons and retrieve her when he wasn’t busy. She told herself this hollow feeling she was fighting wasn’t caused by the disappointment that he could misread her so radically, or want her to be so different from the real Persephone Seaborne under her fine lady gloss.
‘While you do exactly the same?’ he asked as if he’d like to shake her.
‘I must,’ she said quietly.
‘From where I stand, you absolutely must not.’
‘Ah, but you’ve got your feet firmly planted in those trusty male Hessians of yours, haven’t you, Lord Calvercombe? Standing in them, I doubt I’d see how anyone could go their own way without your interference, either.’
‘Nonsense,’ he said gruffly, with a look that told her he knew she was right, under all that temper and frustration, and it only made things worse.
Something inside her shifted, almost softened, and since that would cause all sorts of chaos if she let it, she refused to consider the notion they might do better together than they would apart. ‘How is it that men always accuse us women of speaking rubbish whenever we’re in danger of winning an argument?’ she mused, doing her best to guard her inner thoughts and fears from him with a superior smile.
‘I don’t know,’ he said after what looked like a mighty struggle. ‘Could it be because you talk such illogical claptrap we can’t help but be driven half mad? Maybe it’s because when a woman risks having to admit a man could be right, she deploys every weapon she can lay hands on to avoid doing so?’
‘What a very odd opinion you do have of my sex, my lord,’ she said sweetly, deciding that since she wasn’t going to find peace today, perhaps she ought to leave him to his instead.
‘I’ll admit I find many ladies empty-headed and silly, but that’s mostly the fault of unequal upbringing and low expectations. In your case it can only be wilful stupidity though, since your family seems to expect a great deal of both its male and female members. Your little sisters behave themselves with grace and intelligence, after all, so I can hardly blame your parents for your own lack of manners, can I?’
‘Penelope and Helen are good, dear girls, my lord. You’ll not succeed in driving a wedge between us by praising them and slighting me. You clearly never had a brother or sister you would walk to the end of the world for if you had to, so I can only feel sorry for you for that lack,’ she said, hoping he would see steady purpose in her eyes when they met his, rather than a fear they were both up against a force hellbent on making sure his family never set eyes on Rich again this side of the grave.
‘It won’t do Rich a mite of good if you sacrifice your peace of mind, personal safety and reputation and achieve nothing. Can you imagine how he would feel if he knew you were pitting your wits
