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question: why should you care?”
    Jael was a strong woman, if perhaps not so strong as Hubert, whose willowy figure was deceptive; she might have wrenched out of his grasp. Instead, she moved closer into his embrace. “It’s naught to me who or what caused the death of Sir Wesley Halliday,” she murmured, against his warm neck. “As to what the Baroness may think, I neither know nor care.”
    Hubert was distracted. Jael could when she wished stir him mightily, despite the familiarity attendant on an association that had endured so many years. Nevertheless, he was no pigeon for her plucking. Even as he kissed his inamorata, Hubert contemplated the sweet smell of opium that clung to her clothing, and the leaves his sensitive fingers found entangled in her hair.

 
Chapter Nine
     
    Livvy woke early on the following morn, weary and heavy-lidded. The Baroness’s impromptu gathering had not been a notable success. Though Lady Halliday chattered gaily all through the meal, her stepson had been a great deal less sociable. Ned’s account of the hostilities at Talavera (the battle lasted two days and a night, during which a running flame caught the grass on the Medellion, scorching the wounded and roasting the dead), Connor condemned as unfit accompaniment to hot-house fruit and Indian preserves and comfitures; Hubert’s ironic essay into the popular sport of lampooning royalty, he declared unsuitable for delicate ears, a comment that caused Mr. Humboldt to take such umbrage that he left the room with the ladies and did not reappear.
    Nor did the gentlemen linger long over their port. Livvy, weary of watching her husband eye Amanda as if she were a tasty morsel and he a starving man, was relieved when Connor Halliday and his step-mama at last took their leave.
    After their departure, Dickon didn’t speak two words to Livvy for the remainder of the evening. She had lain awake long hours, pondering her situation, trying to decide what she was to do.
    Now she must endure another day’s amusements, chief among them a tour of the Castle grounds, with particular emphasis on the keep, last refuge when the outer defenses had fallen, within its walls a well. One might think the Baroness meant to exhaust her houseguests so they had no inclination for any pursuits not planned by herself.
    Livvy slid slowly out of bed, careful not to disturb her slumbering spouse. Even open-mouthed and snoring, the wretch remained a heartbreakingly handsome man.
    Whereas she was becoming more pregnant and unlovely by the moment. No wonder Dickon found Amanda attractive. She wouldn’t disgorge her dinner all over his exquisitely polished boots.
    Shrugging her dressing gown around her shoulders, Livvy slipped out of the room. An air of suppressed excitement hung over the Castle. She hoped it had to do with the approaching festivities, and feared it did not. When Dulcie was on the scent of a mystery — and when was Dulcie not on the scent of a mystery? — everyone in her vicinity, from maidservant to maharajah, found themselves pressed into service on her behalf.
    Livvy padded down the cold corridor, and tapped on her hostess’s bedchamber door. “Come in!” Dulcie called.
    The Baroness sat propped up amidst her pillows. Strewn across the counterpane were several sheets of notepaper. Around her head was wrapped a towel from beneath which escaped several damp lilac curls.
    “Blue didn’t suit you?” Livvy asked. The means by which those thick curls so rapidly changed hue was a secret jealously guarded by the Baroness and her abigail.
    “It suited me quite nicely,” said Dulcie. “But it put Casanova’s nose out of joint.”
    Livvy eyed the large ball of orange fur snuggled up against Dulcie’s feet. “Shoot the cat,” suggested Bluebeard, from the headboard where he perched.
    The room was large, with deeply recessed windows. A tallboy chest of drawers veneered with finely figured dark mahogany stood against one wall, across from it a