Free Night Fire by Catherine Coulter Page B

lord.”
    Burke stood there a moment longer, undecided. He didn’t want to leave. He didn’t want to give in to this nonsense. He knew she wasn’t ill. He knew, deep down, that she simply didn’t want to see him. The question was, why? Did he repulse her? For some reason was she afraid of him? Was she still grieving for that miserable excuse for a husband?
    He walked thoughtfully toward the Rendel stables, where he’d left Ashes and Joshua. Joshua had asked if he could accompany him and he’d agreed, not really paying much heed to his batman. No, he corrected himself silently, no longer a batman. Joshua was now his valet. When he reached the slate-roofed stables, he saw Joshua in conversation with an older man whose wiry, lean body didn’t fool Burke for a minute. The man was as strong as he was, perhaps stronger.
    â€œMy lord,” Joshua said. “I’d like you to meet Geordie. He’s Lady Rendel’s groom and the head stable lad.”
    Now this was odd, Burke was thinking, but he nodded politely and said, “Geordie.”
    â€œMe lord,” said Geordie, and Burke was aware of being studied and assessed and weighed. He felt at once amused and annoyed.
    â€œWe will return tomorrow, Joshua,” he said finally, ignoring Geordie.
    â€œAye,” said Geordie. “Tomorrow, me lord. Joshua.”
    â€œWhat the devil was that all about?” Burke asked as they rode down the narrow drive away from Rendel Hall.
    Joshua leaned forward and scratched his horse’s ear. “Well, Major Lord, I came because I wanted to know what happened to that sweet, mouthy little girl I’d met three years ago. And Geordie, he wanted to know all about you and what you intended toward Lady Rendel.”
    Burke turned in the saddle, his hand fisting on the reins. “Joshua, have you any idea how very—” Burke stalled. He chewed on his lower lip, searching for words to convey his indignation without insulting his longtime batman and friend.
    â€œYes, Major Lord. Forward, that I’d call it myself.”
    â€œBut you don’t like women.”
    â€œThat’s true enough, but this little one—well, I never thought of her as exactly a female, if you know what I mean.”
    â€œNo, I haven’t the foggiest notion of what you mean. Arielle—that is, Lady Rendel—not a female?”
    â€œAs I said before, Major Lord, a mouthy little thing she was, but not a mean splinter in her body. And open for all to see.”
    â€œAs in honest, I presume?”
    â€œYes. Flat out leveled me, me disliking the fairer sex the way I do. Now Geordie, he’d kill for the lass—that’s what he calls her. Told me, he did, that she booted out all the servants right after her husband died. They’d been loyal to him, you see. He heard one of them carrying on about her and what a slut she was, and, well, he said it made him furious as spit. Lady Rendel hired him on and he protects her, you might say.”
    â€œYou learned all this in the few minutes I was being told by a thoroughly reprehensible butler that I wouldn’t be admitted?”
    â€œYes. Now, Philfer, that’s the butler, Geordie said Lady Rendel didn’t get rid of him, miserable old fool that he is, because she’s too kind.”
    â€œFine. She should pension him off. He’s obnoxious, dishonest, and hasn’t an honorable or loyal thought in his damned brain.”
    Joshua merely nodded, falling into silence, his report completed. Burke chewed over what he’d been told. Why did she need Geordie to protect her?
    Â 
    Arielle let the lace curtain gently fall back into place. He was gone. He hadn’t made a scene. She turned stiffly away from the window, willing the images from the nightmare to leave her. When Philfer told her an hour later that Lord Ravensworth would return on the morrow, she said nothing, merely nodded.
    It was that evening that her