stiffened and she winced at her forthrightness, yet couldn’t quite bring herself to apologise for her outburst. It was unneighbourly. Effie had never been particularly good at remembering either her place or her sex. She blamed that failing on her excessively large brain and growing up with a father who had always actively encouraged her to use it. Nor had she ever had much patience for wilful ignorance or downright unfairness. She had been perfectly polite to him up until now, but that forced politeness only stretched so far. ‘Have you no respect for history sir? For your legacy or for knowledge? You do not strike me as stupid. Or anywhere close to being an idiot.’ That, she was prepared to concede, was undoubtedly a step too far. Slowly, he turned and beneath the cloak of his hair she saw his mouth was partially open at her insolence. ‘So I fail to understand how you can wilfully stand in the way of progress!’
‘I am the stupid one? I asked you to leave, madam.’ This time his voice was icy calm and, frankly, quite terrifying as he slowly stalked towards her. ‘As I am well within my rights as the owner of this property to do. What part of that instruction are you struggling with?’
‘I am not easily intimidated, Lord Rivenhall.’ It was a lie, she was exceedingly intimidated now that he was stood less than a foot away, but she felt her delivery of the lie had been reasonably convincing thanks to her legendary stubborn streak and unhelpful lack of diplomacy in trying to convince him to see sense. She had never had much patience for blind ignorance.
Honey, not vinegar.
‘I should like us to have a rational discussion about the future of the dig like mature and polite adults.’ The stubborn streak made her lift her chin defiantly and fold her arms like a petulant, sulky child—although, to be fair, she was only mirroring his stance.
‘Then you give me no other choice, madam. If you continue to outstay your welcome, I shall have to remove you forcibly from my premises.’ He leaned until their eyes were level, scant inches apart, intent on intimidating her. Intent on letting her know in no uncertain terms he meant business and was heartily unimpressed with both her and her arguments to sway him to the contrary. ‘I think I would enjoy that.’
‘Am I supposed to be terrified now, Lord Rivenhall?’
Despite all the bluster and noise, all the overtly hostile evidence to the contrary, she somehow knew that this man would not lay a finger on her. Knew that in her bones. How odd, because she wasn’t usually one for nonsense like feeling things in her bones. Yet she was so certain he was harmless, her eyes locked on his brazenly as he continued to stare and remained so when he gripped the arms of her chair to lean closer, making no effort this time to conceal the scars marring his cheek. Almost as if he expected her to recoil disgusted at the merest sight of them.
‘If you are expecting me to burst into tears and scurry away, then I must tell you that you are doomed to be disappointed.’
He blinked, looked away and hastily stepped back. She smiled again because she could see he was confused by her reaction and perhaps a little uncomfortable with his own attempts to intimidate her, if his sudden inability to look her in the eye was a gauge. He was clearly all bluster. Just as she’d suspected. A lion with a thorn in his paw.
‘I need to excavate that pot and will not be deterred from that goal.’
‘And I need to be left alone, madam.’ His arms were crossed again and he stood far too tall and much too close for comfort. ‘Do I need to build a wall encasing my land to keep you off it?’
‘You have a lot of land, my lord. If you start building it today, it might be finished in three years and by then, I can assure you, the pot will be long out of the ground.’
However, the rest of the Abbey’s secrets would still be buried there—taunting her. Effie tried to ignore the way he overwhelmed her and pretended to look nonplussed while her clever mind ran every possible scenario through to the end in the hope of finding a way to make him see reason and concluded, with her customary rapidity, she had to face facts.
Thanks to her poor efforts at diplomacy, he wasn’t going to budge today—in reality, if she continued to push he would only dig his heels in deeper. Something she had quite the knack for making people do even when she tried not to.
He might not budge at all come to that, but the scant remains of the former optimist she had once been and the strategist in her refused to believe she couldn’t get him to ever see sense once he listened to her superior and irrefutable arguments. In truth, he really didn’t strike her as an idiot. Surely between the pair of them they could come to some agreement—when he had calmed down, of course, and was more agreeable. And there was more than one way to skin a cat or excavate a pot for that matter. The pot was her most pressing priority now that it was exposed to the elements and nature and clumsy horses’ hooves. For now, though, it was probably best she retreat and allow the dust to settle, then approach him again when he wasn’t feeling so belligerent.
‘I can see I have inadvertently called upon you at a bad time, putting you in another bad mood with my irritating over-enthusiasm for the quest I hold dear. Something which was never my intention. Nor was insulting you with my forthrightness. Occasionally, I forget myself and I apologise.’ It took a great deal of strength to get those insincere words out without sounding as disgusted by them as she felt. But she managed another magnanimous smile regardless for the sake of the pot. ‘When would be a more convenient time for our discussion?’
‘Never.’
She found herself smiling ironically. He might well be obnoxiously rude, but at least he was predictable. She could work with that. Or around it. He might not be an idiot, but he was unlikely to be cleverer than her.
According to Papa, nobody was.
Her curse and the root cause of all her problems and isolation—but occasionally it came in handy. ‘Enjoy the cake, Lord Rivenhall. And the brandy. I can see myself out.’
Four hundred and twelve crystals...
Max knew that already because he had counted every damn droplet on the chandelier above his bed twice this week when sleep evaded him. For once, he had someone else to blame for his restlessness. The tart-mouthed, not easily intimidated new bane of his life: Miss Euphemia Nithercott.
He would lay good money she was out there. Since laying siege to his study and frightening the life out of him two days ago, he knew full well she was still digging despite his expressly forbidding her to do so. Annoyed, he threw the covers back and padded to the window, staring sightlessly at the darkness, impatiently willing dawn to break an hour earlier than usual.
He knew she was out there because he had become unhealthily obsessed with checking up on her. Each morning since, as soon as the sun came up, he rode to her haphazard cluster of holes in his ground and each time he had seen as clear as the sparkling crystals on his bedchamber chandelier her dratted hole was getting bigger. Although she was taking her own sweet time about it as only a few inches of dirt had been neatly scraped away from her stupid pot. Why she hadn’t taken a shovel to the earth to get the damn thing out once and for all was beyond him. That she hadn’t strangely intrigued him.
So much so, the chit had apparently taken root in his thoughts since—although Miss Nithercott was hardly a chit. She was, he estimated, probably nearer thirty than twenty and undeniably all woman. And a damned attractive one at that. The entire time he had been forced
