Moon Love by Joan Smith Page A

approval. If your own common sense doesn’t convince you, then I must apply to the head of your house to restrain you.”
    “And would that be Lord Ashworth, or the clever one of the family, Cousin Felix?” she asked with a sneer.
    His scowl wasas goodas an admission of defeat. “I expect that is half the problem. There has been no one to restrain you.”
    “Restrain me? You make me sound like a raving lunatic.”
    “You’re acting like one,” he charged.
    Her chin rose, and her eyes flashed. From the mouth of the creature who looked like a street urchin came accents of withering contempt. “I do not request or require your approval, tacit or spoken, milord. Nor do I care for the good opinion of anyone foolish enough to despise me for doing my duty as an Englishwoman. It is my lunacy that alerted Sir George to what is afoot here on the coast. It was my lunacy that discovered Bransom was murdered, and it will be my lunacy that finds his murderer. I doubt very much you will succeed without my help. What is required is familiarity with the local people and their ways.”
    He studied her a moment through narrowed eyes. “You have not made clear just how you did learn of Bransom’s murder, Miss Bratty.”
    “No, I haven’t. I wouldn’t want to shock you. I shan’t burden your conscience or your reputation by informing you fully how I discovered it.”
    “No need,” he said with a dismissive wave of his shapely fingers. “I know Bransom was working with the Gentlemen. Your George is obviously one of them. He told you. I expect you have instructed him not to assist me without your approval. I have already made my own connection in that quarter. Cocker seems an agreeable fellow. Why work with inferiors when you can work with the chief?”
    Amy read a sly reference to herself in that ‘inferiors.’ As he was being intransigent, she was not of a mind to enlighten him as to her own involvement with the Gentlemen.
    “That is your affair,” she said.
    “I suggest you go home, Miss Bratty. I trust that not even your love of adventure stretches to bathing a naked male corpse. I shall send a telegraph to Sir George this very night. By tomorrow he will send his instructions. Meanwhile, Glover and Spinks can take turns here.”
    “Disposing of Bransom’s corpse, while necessary, is not the matter of paramount importance, milord,” she said coldly. “Finding the man who is disseminating the forged banknotes is what you should be concentrating on. But you refuse my help, so I shall say no more. You are quite right that I have no desire to bathe a naked male corpse. I have more important things to do.”
    She rose and strode from the room, her grand exit hampered by her too large boots, that dragged along the floor.
    Ravencroft watched her go with grave misgivings. In his heart, he agreed with much of what she had said. He even admired her pluck. But he knew, better than she, the consequences of her behaviour if it should become known. He merely scoffed at her warning that he could not solve the case without her help. He had solved more complicated ones. The difficulty would be keeping her out of mischief.
    Amy was in a fury as she rode home on the dispirited nag. It was just as she feared. Ravencroft planned to cut her out entirely. She was only a lady, so obviously she was a fool. Well, she would show him. She had a few ideas about who was working with Alphonse, and tomorrow she would begin to investigate them.
    As she prepared for bed, she heard again in her mind every word Ravencroft had said, and knew it was only what any gentleman would say. It wasn’t really his fault. She remembered she had not bathed and bandaged his wound, and worried that it would not be done properly. She felt a softening of her fury when she remembered his tenderness when he held her in his arms after she fainted. But that, of course, was just pity. She didn’t want his pity. She didn’t want anything from him. But it had been exciting