He heard her laugh-that wicked, sensual chuckle in his head-and the sound winded him. He felt her body under his hands, as if in some sensuously vivid dream. He could smell the delicate, lavender-scented freshness of her skin. The burnished copper head, the great, golden-brown eyes, shimmered in his internal vision. But it wasn't just that, was it? It was Judith herself. Judith with her tempestuous spirit, her needle wit, her acerbic tongue, her delicious sense of humor. Judith of the lynx pride and ferocious independence. It was the woman who carried a pistol, who didn't buckle under adversity, who didn't think twice about slaving amid the gory detritus of a battlefield, who took responsibility for herself.

It was the woman he had thought he needed to lash into submission. The foolishness of such a misguided intention now brought a sardonic curve to his mouth. Whatever she was, whatever she had been, she belonged to him. And for some perverse reason, despite the scheming and the deceit, she seemed to be what he wanted. And if that was the case, then he'd have to try to modify the bad with rather more subtlety than he'd shown so far, and what he couldn't change he'd have to accept.

But first he had to retrieve her. The initial step was obvious. If it failed, the next was less obvious.

Gregson announced that his lordship's curricle was at the door. "Thank you. Lady Carrington has gone into the country to visit a sick aunt."

"Yes, my lord, so I understand from Chevdey. Do we know when her ladyship will return?"

"When the sick aunt is recovered, I assume," Marcus snapped, thrusting his arms into the many-caped driving coat held by Gregson.

He drove to Albemarle Street. It was eleven o'clock, hopefully too early for Sebastian to have left his lodgings. He was right, to a certain extent, in that his quarry was seated at breakfast, having returned to his lodgings after an early-morning journey to Kensington.

"Good morning, Marcus." Sebastian rose from the table as his servant announced his brother-in-law. "Breakfast?" He gestured to the laden table.

"No, I've already breakfasted. Where is she, Sebastian?"

"I thought that was probably the purpose of your call." Sebastian resumed his seat. "You don't mind if I continue…?"

Marcus slapped at his Hessians with his driving whip. "I haven't got all day, Sebastian. Where is she?"

"Well, there's the difficulty," his host murmured, taking up a tankard of ale. "I can't say, you see."

"She came to you, of course?"

"Of course." He took a draft of ale.

Marcus glanced around the room. If Judith was anywhere in the vicinity, he would know it, would feel it in his bones and through his skin. She had that effect on him, and it was getting stronger the longer he lived with her. He knew she was no longer in her brother's lodgings.

"If you don't mind my saying so, you seem to have been rather unsubtle," Sebastian observed, spearing a deviled kidney.

"I'm willing to concede that," Marcus said. "But the provocation was overpowering."

Sebastian frowned. He'd been thinking things through for many hours now, ever since his sister had fallen asleep. He hadn't said anything to her, but he had come to tie conclusion that a degree of interference might be in her best interests. Of course, putting Judith's marriage together again would be in his best interests also. He couldn't destroy Gracemere without her help, and until Gracemere was dealt with, he couldn't make a formal offer for Harriet. He'd had to wrestle with the issues for a long time before he satisfied himself that what he was going to do would be certainly as much for Judith as it 'would be for himself.

"If you hadn't jumped to conclusions in the first place, there'd have been no need for Ju to offer you provocation," he said deliberately.

"Perhaps you'd like to explain." Marcus sat down, flicking at his boot with his whip, his eyes resting on his brother-in-law with an arrested expression.

"Ju had no idea who was in the taproom at that inn, after you and she had…" Sebastian waved a hand in lieu of completing the sentence.

Marcus was suddenly very still. "But she said she did."

"Did she? You sure about that?" Sebastian buttered a piece of toast without looking at his visitor.

Marcus thought. He'd asked her in that little loft on the morning of Waterloo, and she'd said… but no, she hadn't said anything at all. He'd asked her and she hadn't denied it.

"If it wasn't true, why wouldn't she deny it?"

"Well, you'd have to understand Ju and her eccentric principles rather better than you do to see that," her brother declared. "She'd be so insulted that you could have suspected her of such an underhand trick that she wouldn't see any point defending herself."

"Are you telling me that all these months, she could have put my mind at rest with a single word and she deliberately chose not to?"

Sebastian nodded. It was a little more complicated than that, but he couldn't explain to Marcus that Judith had seen little difference between the accusation of manipulation and the truth of opportunism. The difference, however, struck her brother as crucial in the present turmoil. "You shouldn't have suspected such a thing of her," he said simply.

Marcus closed his eyes on a surge of exasperation that for the moment prevented his unhampered joy as he laid down the burden of mistrust. "It was not an unnatural suspicion, knowing how you and your sister were living," he pointed out after a minute.

"Oh, I beg to differ," Sebastian said. "You made a false deduction from the premise. You hardly knew her." He glanced across at Marcus. "The other matter, too," he said. "Rather delicate, but you had no grounds for-"

"All right," Marcus interrupted, a spot of color burning on his cheek. "There's no need to expand. I know what you're referring to. If your sister hadn't been ruled by that damnable lynx pride of hers, all of this could have been avoided." He slashed at his boot. "I'm not prepared to assume total responsibility for this, Sebastian."

"No," Sebastian agreed, taking up his tankard again. He drank deeply. "So what are you going to do when you find her?"

"Wring her neck and throw her body in the Serpentine," Marcus said promptly.

Sebastian chuckled and shook his head. "That might defeat the object of reconciliation."

Marcus stood up abruptly. "Damn it, Sebastian, where is she?"

Sebastian shook his head. "I'm afraid I can't help you, Marcus."

"You know where she is, though?" Sebastian nodded. "But I'm sworn to secrecy." Marcus regarded him through narrowed eyes, tapping the silver knob of his whip against the palm of one hand. "I daresay you'll be seeing her at some point today."

"Yes." There was cool comprehension in Sebastian's eyes.

Marcus inclined his head in acknowledgment and walked to the door. "Thank you, Sebastian."

The door closed on his visitor. Sebastian pushed his chair back from the table and stretched out his long legs. Judith would probably be annoyed at his interference, but he felt as if he'd just done some good work. He was fairly certain his sister's feelings for Marcus Devlin went deeper than she had so far been prepared to acknowledge. And Marcus, for all his autocratic temperament, felt a great deal more for Judith than he might have demonstrated.

Maybe it took a man in love to recognize the signs in others, Sebastian reflected complacently. He'd give Marcus time to set his spy in place before he went himself to see Judith.

Marcus drove his curricle round to the mews. "Where's Tom, Timkins?"

The head groom took the reins as they were tossed to him. "In the tack room, m'lord. Shall I fetch him?"

"Please."

A minute later a lad of about fourteen came hurrying across the cobbles, wiping his palms against his leather apron. "You wanted me, m'lord."