and Emma exchanged glances laced with challenge. Emma’s voice conveyed a quiet anger when she spoke. ‘It’s obeah magic. This is a bad-luck charm.’ She shot an accusing glare at Gridley.
Gridley blew out a breath, sounding genuinely aggrieved. ‘I’m sorry, Emma. It’s the last thing you need.’ He stepped forward to put a consoling hand on Emma’s arm. This time Ren didn’t imagine her response. She moved out of reach, stepping on the toes of his boots as she backed up. Gridley’s eyes narrowed, but he said nothing, opting instead to pretend he didn’t notice the slight.
‘This doll didn’t start the fire,’ Ren put in, drawing them away from whatever private war waged between them. He fingered the doll. Something wasn’t right, but his mind couldn’t grasp it.
Gridley gave a harsh laugh. ‘I’m not sure it matters what started the fire. I’m not even sure it matters only a chicken coop burnt down. It’s not the fire that’s damaging.’ He nodded to the huddle of people forming behind the big African. ‘Emma’s likely not to have any workers in the morning. Obeah magic is powerful and they believe in it.’
The tension between Emma and Gridley ratcheted up a notch. Gridley shifted on his feet and Ren flicked a covert glance over his person, noting the telltale beginnings of tightening trousers. Gridley tugged at his coat front in the age-old effort to disguise a growing arousal. For all of Gridley’s bonhomie, Ren would wager his last guinea Emma didn’t care for her neighbour as much as the neighbour cared for her, if caring was the right word. He wasn’t convinced yet that it was. There were other less flattering, less worthy words that recommended themselves.
The big African approached tentatively. ‘Miss Emma, no one wants to go back to work today. The healers need time to purify the farmyard, to make it safe again.’
Gridley spat on the ground and prepared to respond. ‘Now you listen here, you’re making a working wage—’
Emma interrupted firmly, her anger directed openly at Gridley. ‘This is my place. I will handle any business that needs handling.’ Ren had to give Emma Ward credit. Even in a tattered gown, she commanded authority. She’d acquitted herself well today in the face of a crisis.
Emma stepped forward towards the foreman, distancing herself from him and Gridley. ‘Peter, tell everyone they can have the rest of the day off. They may do whatever they need to do. But make it clear, they are to be back at work tomorrow. If the harvest fails, we all fail and failure doesn’t pay the bills.’
‘You are too generous with them,’ Gridley warned in low tones. The man was treading on dangerous ground. Couldn’t he see Emma was spoiling for a fight? Maybe a fight was what he wanted. Perhaps it was the presence of conflict that fuelled his desire. Some men were like that.
Emma’s chin went up in defiance and Ren didn’t think much of Gridley’s chances. ‘It is my mistake to make then. The last time I checked, it was my name on the deed, not yours. If you’ll excuse me, I’d like to go home and clean up.’
Ren laughed to himself as he gave Emma a leg up on the horse. She’d neatly dismissed Sir Arthur Gridley and Gridley had been furious over it. Perhaps he’d been expecting an invitation to tea? Or perhaps not, given Emma’s overt dislike of him. There probably hadn’t been invitations to tea for quite a while. Such dislike didn’t grow up overnight or without cause.
Ren wasn’t laughing when she did the same thing to him back at the house, the sun starting to set in the sky. She wanted a bath and would it be all right, given the excitement of the day, if she took dinner in her rooms? She didn’t think she was up for company.
He’d granted her request. He had little choice otherwise. She’d prettily made her excuses, playing the delicate maiden to the hilt, which had been entertaining to watch but hardly believable. He’d seen her in action today. Anyone who handled herself the way Emma had wasn’t going to be put off by company for dinner. Still, he played the gentleman and gave her the reprieve. He allowed himself to be handed over to her house servants and hustled off to his quarters.
Ren stepped inside his rooms and immediately understood what she’d done. The minx had not only dismissed him, she’d relegated him to the care of servants and tucked him into the far reaches of the house. Even worse, Ren could find little to complain about. It wasn’t as if she’d put him in the attics or that the house was so large it needed a map to navigate. It was the principle of the matter and what it signified.
The garçonnière was a novel idea borrowed from the French, a large spacious set of rooms put aside for a family’s bachelor sons. On the surface, the rooms were the practical answer for housing a male guest. It was what lay beneath that surface Ren took issue with. He could indeed come and go as he pleased through a separate entrance without tramping through the main house. In fact, he need not even interact with anyone in the main house if he chose or vice versa; the main house need not interact with him, which he suspected was more the case.
The footman, Michael, offered to stay and unpack, but Ren excused him. He wanted time to think and sort through what had happened that day. Ren pulled off his cravat and undid his waistcoat. There was no sense in standing on ceremony for oneself. He was alone.
The impact of it hit him hard as he stacked his linen and filled the drawers. For the first time in his life, he was entirely alone without his family, his friends and without his title; it meant nothing here at the moment. Even the institutions that had filled the backdrop of his life to date were absent. What he wouldn’t give for a quiet evening at his club, laughing over brandy with Benedict. Ren set out the personal effects he’d brought; his game board, his writing kit. He would need to pen a letter to his family and let them know he had arrived safely. He even rearranged a few pieces of furniture to better suit himself. He’d put his stamp on this place yet whether Emma Ward liked it or not, starting with these rooms.
The welcome he had received today was not what he’d expected. The element of surprise had served him well. Emma had not been able to hide behind the pomp and ceremony of a planned reception. She’d been forced into an impromptu situation which had left her exposed. Surprise worked both ways, though, and there’d been surprise for him as well. He’d not expected a single shareholder. He’d been prepared for a consortium of businessmen. He’d expected people would be glad, even relieved to see him. The burden of running a plantation would be lifted from their shoulders. The reality had proven a bit different. Emma Ward was clearly not eager to be relieved of her duties or to share them.
It did make him wonder what Emma Ward had to hide. Ren set out his shaving gear, a plan of attack starting to form. With another woman, he would have chosen a strategy of overwhelming kindness and politeness. He knew already that gambit would have disastrous outcomes with Emma Ward.
Emma would need to be handled directly and firmly. He’d seen how she’d treated Arthur Gridley, with unabridged disdain. She’d eat a ‘nice’ man alive, the sort of man who made the mistake of thinking she was a delicate flower. Ren chuckled at the thought, another image taking shape in his mind. If she was a flower, she would be the sort that lured their prey with their beauty and then shut their petals tight until there was no escape for the poor unsuspecting soul.
She would learn soon enough he was no fool to be played with. It would take more than bad manners to deter him. If Emma Ward thought a cold welcome would send him packing, she was in for another surprise. Of course, she had no idea of what he had faced in England—not even Kitt knew. Emma’s bad-mannered welcome couldn’t begin to compete against the consequences of genteel poverty awaiting him if he failed
