Sins of a Ruthless Rogue

“He said he would think on it.” Which was far more than she’d ever gotten before.

Mrs. Wilkerson was one of two women in the town who’d lost a son to the British penal system, so she followed Olivia’s reform

activities closely. Work Olivia had started to rectify the horrific injustice she thought she’d caused.

“Them fancy friends of yours coming to the festival?”

Olivia would hardly call the Society for the Humane Treatment of Child Criminals fancy. They were little more than an odd collection

of two barristers, a Quaker, a retired vicar, and a handful of concerned women. But she would call them friends. And recently they’d

begun to make progress on their reforms. “I let them know they’re invited.”

A few might come. They saw the mill’s restoration as a grand experiment to see if they could keep young lads from the country from

falling into the stews of London.

Mrs. Wilkerson handed mugs to two men who’d stopped to get some cider. Both worked at the mill. Olivia had arranged for the men

to have the half day off months ago. So she’d been able to shut down the machines at the mill early without any questions. One thing

in her favor today.

Colin came over to the table, one of his little sisters perched on his shoulder. The little girl pointed a chubby finger at the cups.

“More?”

He put the girl down. “Do you mind watching her for a minute, Aunt Lucy? The competition’s about to start.”

“Competition?” Olivia asked.

Colin adjusted his glasses. “Cheese rolling.”

Olivia blinked. She couldn’t have heard that right.

Mrs. Wilkerson ladled a dribble of the drink into a cup and handed it to her whimpering niece. “You had to have seen it as a girl.”

Olivia had never attended the festival as a girl. But she didn’t remind them of that. She liked that they’d forgotten she’d once

declared that only poor mongrels bothered with the town.

She’d been seven. Her father had laughed and patted her on the head.

Another man and his wife came to buy some cider.

Mrs. Wilkerson shook her head at Colin. “I don’t think I can watch your sister. Where’s your mum?”

Colin glanced over his shoulder. “Still helping get the children arranged for their songs.”

“I can watch her,” Olivia volunteered.

They both stared at her. “Aren’t you busy with the festival?”

But things looked like they were running smoothly now. “Not for the moment.” She set down her cup and picked the little girl up. “We’

ll be fine. Go.”

Colin hesitated, then ran across the square to where some men were gathering atop a hill.

“Yellow.” The little girl pointed to the fallen leaves swirling after him.

“Yes. Yellow and orange and red.” Olivia pointed out the other colors and moved toward the tables that had been pulled outside the

tavern. She rested her cheek for a moment on the girl’s soft curls. “We are not going to let the big, mean man take this all away from

us, are we?”

“Mean,” the little girl agreed.

Handsome, though. But oh so cold.

Clayton’s reappearance should have soothed her conscience. But she’d managed to think of her guilt as something in the past.

Now it had been thrust in front of her face. Glaring. Ugly. Fresh. When she thought him dead ten years ago, she’d prayed to discover

that it was all a mistake and that Clayton was alive and unharmed. She longed for the crushing weight of her guilt to be lifted.

Now he truly was alive, and her remorse remained as heavy as ever.

But while she might owe him a debt she could never repay, that didn’t mean she would allow him to do as he wished. She’d

changed since he knew her last. She hadn’t backed away from a struggle since the day she’d been too cowed to follow her father to

the courthouse. Since the day Clayton had died.

A new schoolhouse stood proud and straight. The smell of fresh paint still lingered in the air. The inside still needed a little more

work, but she’d managed to arrange for the exterior to be finished in time for the festival.

“It’s a fine thing you’ve done. You’ve set things right.” The vicar’s gnarled face beamed down at her. “This is all thanks to you.” He

lifted the little girl into his arms.

They were the words she’d been waiting to hear for three years. Ever since he’d come to her in London and told her how bad things

had become at the mill. And in the town.

But now they meant nothing.

She’d been striving to make amends for the death of a man who wasn’t dead.

“You were the one who made me see my responsibility to the town.” It had been the second time he’d saved her.

The vicar patted the little girl on her back, swaying as the schoolchildren began their song. She longed to tell the vicar about Clayton,

but how could she when he was glowing with so much happiness?

She studied the faces around her. The Johansen family, with seven blond boys whose names she couldn’t keep straight. Mr. Grupp,

who finally had bought a new sign for his tavern to replace the one that been lost in the storms five years ago. There were even a few

new faces, people who’d come to spend their money at the festival and the families of the new hires at the mill.

The vicar left her side to return the child to her mother.

A man stopped in front of her and doffed his hat, revealing greased black hair. “Sorry to bother you, miss. But a man visited you at

the mill today. I think he might be a friend of mine.” He had an accent she couldn’t quite place. “But I wasn’t sure if it was him.”

“Clayton Campbell?” she asked, suddenly eager for someone to share in her shock. In her joy.

The man nodded, but there was no astonishment. “It was him. Did he come to look for work at the mill?”

“No.”

The man’s gaze seemed far too intent, his eyes almost predatory. Olivia stepped back. “How did you say you knew him?” she

asked.

But the men were finished with their competition and they swarmed past cheering, pounding each other on the back, and shouting

congratulations.

“I came in second!” Colin shouted to her.

She smiled at him, but when she looked back the strange visitor was gone. She stood on her tiptoes, trying to find where he’d gone

in the crowd, but she couldn’t locate him.

The men gathered around the cider table. The children had finished their song so they threaded their way through the group until

they found their families.

She refused to let Clayton destroy all this. The boy she once loved wouldn’t have been able to hurt all these innocent people. She

would just have to do a better job of showing him exactly who’d be hurt by his actions.

A shiver of something dark coursed through her. Part of it was fear, but part of it was anticipation.

To spend time with him again—

But she didn’t delude herself that she could change his feeling about her. What she did hope was to change his mind about the mill.