If it truly wasn’t Cameron, there was no one from his family or servants that he would suspect of such a crime. Which meant it was one of their guests.
Robert, now that he’d had a little time to think, suspected Miss Hale…she seemed bored enough, and spirited enough, that she might do something like this just to see how everything unfolded.
“We?” Cameron’s anger was gone. Replaced with ice once more.
“I’m certainly not thrilled by it, either, but you, an employee of my family, were targeted, and I’m currently the head of the house. I feel it’s best if we work together.”
Cameron looked like he was going to argue.
Robert cut him off. “Perhaps I didn’t make myself clear. In light of my brother’s absence, you are, essentially, my employee. An accusation against you is an accusation against me and my family. If we have to work together to put this right, then so be it. I am not so fastidious that I can’t put aside our dislike of each other for a short time. Are you?”
Robert’s voice was strong, steady, firm, despite the racing beat of his heart. Thank God.
Cameron’s mouth opened, and then closed again. Something flitted across his expression. Something other than anger. Other than ice. There and then gone.
He finally gave one curt nod. Or something that barely passed for a nod. It was the slightest inclination of his head, as though it pained him to show too much deference to Robert.
This is surely the start of a beautiful friendship, Robert thought drily.
Chapter Five
Ian felt like his life was unraveling. He hadn’t known this deep pit of despair in a long time. Not since over a decade ago, when he’d left his parents’ home and been forced to survive alone. Even then, even desperate and hungry and pathetic, he’d never stolen. Everything he’d earned, he’d earned for himself—he hadn’t simply taken it.
Now, to be accused, to be blamed, to have someone deliberately try to ruin his good name—he wanted to smash something into pieces.
And being under Robert Townsend’s thumb was salt on the wound. He could tell the other man was enjoying every second of his discomfort.
If he weren’t at Robert Townsend’s mercy, if Townsend hadn’t reminded him he was the head of the household during Lord Arden’s absence, Ian would have told him exactly what he thought of him.
But he was at Townsend’s mercy. Currently Townsend was the only thing standing between Ian and a formal accusation of thievery.
Ian had been surprised at how quickly Townsend had rallied in light of the circumstances, at how he’d stood his ground against Ian. At how he’d even dared to provoke him—retaliation for all of the times Ian had ignored his existence, Ian assumed.
It almost…almost…made him respect the man a little.
“I told the Worthingtons that I didn’t find anything but that I’d keep looking,” Townsend said.
“Did they seem satisfied?” Georgina asked.
“For now, I suppose. I was adamant that I was taking the matter seriously. But I don’t know what will happen if we can’t discover the items.” He glanced across the table at Ian. It was late—everyone else had retired for the night—and he sat with Georgina and Townsend in the library. Townsend’s eyes were weary, but not unfocused. His hair was tousled from running his hand through it, and his cravat was partly undone.
In the half light of candle flame and fire, with his edges unlaced, he looked dangerous, somehow, like a man who might gamble a fortune simply for the thrill of it. He looked like the sort of man Ian might have thought about approaching, once upon a time.
He took a sip of whisky and met Ian’s eyes over the glass. “I think you should start spending time with us.”
Ian was startled from his thoughts. “Why?”
“I want to see how the Worthingtons and the Hales act around you. It might give us an idea of who would want to frame you for a crime.”
“I have work to do. I don’t have time to sit around speaking of nothing.”
Townsend swallowed a mouthful of whisky. “Subtle, Cameron. Regardless, postpone your work. Unless you truly don’t care about the success of our endeavors in this matter.”
Georgina glanced between them worriedly. “I think my brother has a sound idea. And they shouldn’t think anything of it, since you already ate with us once before.”
Ian nodded, more willing to agree with Georgina than her brother. “Fine.”
“I spoke to the Worthingtons about the missing objects,” Georgina continued. “The bracelet was Miss Hale’s. The gloves and handkerchief were Miss Worthington’s and the stockings belonged to Mrs. Worthington.”
“So Mr. Hale and Mr. Worthington weren’t victims of the crime,” Townsend muttered. “Though I’m not certain if that matters or not.”
Georgina covered her mouth to yawn.
“You should sleep,” Townsend said, his expression softening. “Nothing is going to be solved tonight, and wearing yourself thin won’t help.”
“Stop being a mother hen,” she said, but she said it fondly, and she leaned over to kiss him on the cheek before she rose. “All will be well. This will be set to rights before they return.”
Townsend didn’t appear convinced, but he nodded. He watched her go, looking troubled, grip tight on his whisky glass. Ian was struck by the realization that Townsend truly loved his family; he truly wanted to protect them. It shouldn’t have been startling, perhaps, but Ian hadn’t thought Townsend cared about anything as much as he cared about himself.
He must have sensed Ian studying him. He glanced toward him and then away. When he stood, Ian assumed he was leaving, but instead, he crossed over to the sideboard and poured another glass. After an instant’s hesitation, he filled a second glass and set it on the table in front of Ian.
Unfailingly polite, even now. Ian was bitterly amused. He wondered if the effort Townsend put toward being liked ever exhausted him.
As Townsend’s hand slipped away from the clear glass, Ian noticed his thumb and forefinger were stained with black ink and a callus had formed on the side of his middle finger. They were the marks of someone who wrote often. Though Ian didn’t know what he spent so much time on—letters to admirers, requests to his brother to raise his allowance?
“What?”
Ian frowned.
“You were scowling at me.”
“No, I wasna.”
Townsend’s lips quirked. “Suit yourself.”
Ian took a sip of whisky, the amber liquid burning a trail of peat and fire down his throat.
Townsend lifted his glass, almost in a toast. As if they were friends who drank together all the time, instead of two men who had nothing in common, united only by desperation. “It’s good, isn’t it? It’s from Skye.”
“It isn’t bad.”
“That, coming from you, I will count as high praise.”
“Suit yourself,” Ian said, unconsciously mimicking the other man’s words.
Townsend laughed. It was a nice laugh, quiet and unassuming and slightly husky. Ian was annoyed with himself for noticing it. More than annoyed by the way it prickled along his spine.
They drank in silence for a moment, and then, “I can’t believe this is happening,” Townsend said, breaking through the stillness.
“What?”
“Any of it. Stolen possessions, the Worthingtons threatening to go to the sheriff if I don’t find and punish the culprit. I thought—”
Ian was unwillingly interested in the end to that statement. “What did you think?”
“I thought I could do better this time, with my brother gone. Everything almost fell apart in Edinburgh…I thought this time, things would go smoothly.”
Ian wasn’t really following this conversation. And he didn’t know why he cared about it at all, except…except Townsend had never really looked like this before—uncertain and a little miserable. He was seeing a side of Townsend that he usually kept hidden, revealed by the quiet and the shadows. He felt like he was seeing something he wasn’t supposed to see, that he might never see again. He wasn’t sure why it seemed so important.