“She’s a thief?” Jago whispered.
Henry shook his head. “Why go to all this trouble?”
“A subterfuge to scout out anything of value?” He tensed. “I showed her all the things I’ve repurchased and everything I’ve stored. She made a comment about an alarm system, and I told her I didn’t have one. Maybe tomorrow is a diversion and she has accomplices coming here to help themselves. Oh fuck. I like her.” He stared into Henry’s eyes. “I really like her.”
“So do I. We could be wrong. There could be any number of reasons to explain this. Don’t go jumping in half-cocked—ah…”
Jago glared. “No, I haven’t slept with her.”
“But you want to?”
“I don’t know what I want anymore. Don’t say anything to her. Let me think about this.”
Henry nodded over his shoulder. “Here she comes.”
Jago turned to see Ellie hurrying toward them clutching a folder. She was wearing a pale green floaty skirt, a lacy bright yellow top, and she looked like a flower. Despite all his misgivings, every inch of him was aware of her, and the way he felt scared the crap out of him.
Oh God, I want to fuck her. And I don’t want to ask her questions she can’t answer.
“Hi, you two. Check this out.” She took a sheet of paper from the folder and gave it to Henry.
Jago looked over his shoulder. She’d made a map of Sharwood, but it was far more than that. A detailed drawing with each section completed in beautiful pastel colors: the trees in the orchard, vegetables, roses, herbs, lawns, the wilderness garden, and in the middle, Sharwood itself gazing over the ornate Italian garden. She’d numbered the different elements and put an index at the bottom left-hand side. It was a work of art, and Jago’s worries slid away. Anyone who could take this much trouble wasn’t out to rob him. That kiss wasn’t the kiss of someone who wanted to cheat him. There had to be a logical explanation.
And yet, he could think of none, and he was a very logical guy. She was up to something. He’d find out what, and he suspected he wasn’t going to like it.
“You drew that weed in the wrong place,” Henry said, and she laughed. “Ellie, this is fantastic. Isn’t it, Jago?”
He couldn’t risk opening his mouth. Henry glared at him.
“I don’t think I missed anything. I had a wander round today, so I’m pretty sure I have it right, but you need to check. I don’t want to lead visitors into the alligator-infested swamp or velociraptor territory.”
“Did you find an entertainer?” Henry asked.
“A clown who makes animals out of balloons. He’s coming at twelve. He wants fifty pounds, but I figured we wouldn’t get anyone cheaper, not at this late stage. We need to buy the strawberries too.”
“Why don’t you go with Ellie tomorrow afternoon and pick them,” Henry said pointedly. “Take the Land Rover.”
Jago nodded.
“Diane’s invited me for dinner tonight, so you’ll have to fend for yourselves,” Henry said. “Jago will cook for you up at the hall. Look at your mother’s jewelry and ask Ellie what she thinks.”
For once, Jago didn’t like the way her eyes lit up.
“Will you show me the baron’s hall as well? That’s the only room I’ve not seen.”
“Seven,” he snapped, started to walk away, and then turned back. “Was it you who finished painting the blue bedroom?”
“Me and your lodgers. It’s okay, isn’t it?”
He harrumphed in response and stalked off. It was impossible for her to have finished that room on her own. Did she have an accomplice? Was she really a thief? He walked back up to the hall wondering how he was going to create a meal out of one egg, half a basket of four-day-old mushrooms, and a red pepper.
SOMETHING WAS WRONG with Jago. Ellie understood he might not want to show affection in front of Henry or anyone else come to that, but there had been a cold remoteness about him that made her uneasy.
“Is Jago okay?” she asked Henry.
“Overwhelmed and therefore grouchy. How many copies of this do you think we need?”
“Five hundred? If we don’t use them all, they’ll keep. I did this too.” She handed him another sheet from the folder.
It was a map intended for children. She’d called the main path of the Italian garden “Dragons’ Walk” and put little notes such as
find the herb with the funniest name
and
count the hollyhocks and win a prize.
“How many hollyhocks are there?” Henry asked.
“I’m not telling you. Adults have to pay to guess.”
As he laughed, Diane came to his side, and he held the sheets out to show her. “Look at these.”
“Wow, they’re fantastic, Ellie. You are clever. Look, Henry, she’s drawn you and James and Gavin.”
“So she has.” He laughed. “We’re dragon hunters?”
“That’s to encourage the kids not to walk where they’re not supposed to and not pick the flowers.”
“Do you want me to copy them?” Diane asked. “The WI has a good printer, and I just so happen to have it in my house.” She nudged Henry. “You can do the copying while I cook.”
Ellie smiled as they walked away together. She hadn’t thought communities like this really existed, that they were the figment of a TV writer’s imagination, except not those villages where there was at least one murder a week. She’d lived in London all her life, and everyone seemed to keep to themselves. But then maybe that was because her parents made little effort to mix. In believing they didn’t fit in, they made their children believe it too. Though it didn’t help that they moved on a regular basis because they aged slower than humans.
Ellie felt more human than faerie.
Most of the time.
She wandered over to the summerhouse and sat inside. Leaning back against the wood, she closed her eyes and tried to run through everything that needed to happen to make Saturday a success. The only thing she couldn’t control was the weather, despite her assurance to Henry that it wouldn’t rain. But the forecast looked good, and the marquee would give shelter. Though when the gardens opened for normal visits, there’d be nowhere for people to get a cup of tea. How easy was it to set up a little café? The stable block seemed the perfect place. Maybe Diane would be interested in helping.
Ellie smoothed down her skirt, and when she felt the outline of the ring in her pocket, she swallowed hard.
Best not forget why I’m here.
* * * *
Jago raided the garden for three different types of lettuce and picked a bowl of tayberries, a sort of long raspberry. Back in the kitchen, he washed the lettuce and finely chopped the pepper and mushrooms to make a salad. Half a pack of dried cranberries lurked at the back of his cupboard, and he threw those in too. After he’d boiled and chopped up the egg and added that, the salad looked great, but he really did need something to go with it.
Rachel and Baxter came in with bags of groceries, and Jago swallowed his groan of jealousy.
“That looks good.” Rachel nodded toward the salad bowl. “All for you?”
“I’m feeding Ellie.”
“What are you having with it?” Baxter asked.
“Tin of tuna.” Except he didn’t have a tin of tuna, but he’d seen one on Baxter’s shelf.
He tried not to look at the things they were unloading onto the table: cheese, steak, pizza, bread, beer, and wine.
“Would you like these?” Rachel offered him a pack of two salmon fillets topped with herb butter. “It was buy one get one free.”
“Really? Thank you.”
“Have half of this baguette as well. I won’t be able to eat all of it, and it doesn’t keep.”
Baxter sighed and put a bottle of white wine in front of him. “We should have been helping out more. Sorry. I don’t think any of us realized what a mammoth job this is. We received Denzel’s invitation. You’re going to have your work cut out getting this place ready.”
He didn’t need reminding.
Rachel picked up the bottle and put it in the fridge. “Needs to be chilled. Where are you going to eat?”
“I hadn’t thought about it.”
She looked out of the window. “It’s a lovely evening. Why don’t you sit outside? If you wipe down the chairs and the table on the little patio, it’ll be romantic.”
Did he want it to be romantic?
Yes
, yelled his cock. Ellie had told him to keep an open mind. He had no proof she was up to no good. Everything she’d done so far had been little short of miraculous.
Give her the benefit of the doubt.
He went outside with a wet cloth and cleaned the chairs and table. He set it with matching plates and cutlery. Baxter lent him two wineglasses, and Jago found several tea lights in a drawer. That weird feeling in his belly had to be excitement. For the first time in a long while, he had something to look forward to.
* * * *
Jago was hacking at his hair with scissors when he heard the knock.
Ellie stood there clutching a tiny purse. Her hair was down and flowed over her shoulders like spun gold. She wore a little black dress, and Jago’s cock began to inflate.
“Are you cutting your hair?” she asked.
Jago glanced at the scissors in his hand. “Trying to.”
“Can I do it?”
“
Can
you? Though I doubt you could make any worse job of it than me.”
“Bring a comb and the scissors, and I’ll do it outside. There’ll be less mess.”
“Want to take your dress off in case you get hair all over you?” he asked.
Ellie rolled her eyes. “Nice try.”
They went downstairs and out of the front door.
“Maybe you better take off your shirt,” she said.
Jago pulled it over his head and threw it over Denzel’s griffin. Ellie stood behind him on a higher step and stroked his hair. His cock swelled even more.
Can’t you bloody wait?
Don’t blame me. It’s your brain sending blood south.
Jago closed his eyes as she started to cut. The feel of her fingers threading through his hair soothed him, as did the
snip snap
of the scissors, as if all his troubles were being cut away.
“I only do one style. I used to cut my brothers’ hair. You did want a Mohawk?”
“Ha-ha.”
“Just a trim, right? You have lovely hair. It’s so soft and silky and dark. No gray at all.”
He could feel the locks falling onto his shoulders and chest, and resisted looking at how much she was cutting off. He held still when she combed his hair down over his forehead and trimmed above his eyes, but he could feel her breathing on his face. So could his cock.
“How many brothers do you have?” he asked.
“Two and one sister. I’m the oldest.”
“Are your parents still living?”
“Yes. My brothers have their own places. Pixie and I live at home.”
“Pixie?”
“Priscilla, but she hates that. I’m Eleanor, but I’ve always been Ellie. I don’t mind if I’m called Eleanor, but if anyone calls my sister Priscilla…” She made a shuddering sound.
“Where did you grow up?”
“London. Near Kew Gardens.”
When Ellie started to brush the hair from his shoulders, he allowed a low groan to escape, and suddenly her hand was gone.
“All done,” she said, and he opened his eyes.
He flicked away the hairs from his chest and shook them from his head. When he turned, Ellie’s face was flushed. Jago reached for his shirt, and while his back was toward her, he grinned. He wasn’t the only one whose body hummed with desire.
“Check all the hair’s off my back; otherwise, I’ll be itching through dinner.”
Touch me.
She stepped forward and blew on him. “All gone.”
Jago laughed and tugged his shirt down. “Come on. Sing for your supper. While I cook the fish, you can look at my mother’s jewelry.”
Ellie pushed open the door, and Jago followed.
“Go to the kitchen and I’ll get the pieces,” he said.
His heart lightened as he went upstairs two at a time. If she’d been up to no good, wouldn’t she have wanted to know where he kept the jewels?
The answer was in a floor safe in the bedroom his parents had used. He dropped off the scissors and comb in his room, pulled on a clean shirt, and smiled at the rather good haircut Ellie had given him before he slipped down the corridor to the grand bedroom. There was a technique for lifting the section of the floor in front of the fireplace. Jago pried it up to expose the safe, twisted the dial to the correct numbers, and levered up the door.
The bag of jewels was the only thing in there. All the important documents relating to the house were held by a lawyer. Jago put everything back as he’d found it and took the green velvet bag downstairs.
Ellie was sitting at the table when he went in. It looked as though she was doing sums.
“What are you up to?” Jago asked.
“Trying to work out the quantity of strawberries needed.”
Jago put the bag in front of her. “My mother’s jewels. Don’t get too excited. I already know they’re not worth a fortune.”
He didn’t miss Ellie’s fingers trembling as she pulled open the drawstring, and his heart sank.
He kept an eye on her as he took the wine and the salmon from the fridge. Why did she look disappointed? Not as valuable as she expected? He poured two glasses of wine and cooked the fish.
“This ring’s nice if you’re into bling,” Ellie said. “Marquise-shape diamond, three carats. E color. Little rubies around the edge. Ten thousand pounds.”
His mother’s engagement ring. The one he’d given Marianne. Fortunately she’d given it back.
Ellie rattled through the other pieces, and Jago wasn’t sure whether to be pleased or not that she appeared to know what she was talking about. The prices she quoted were in line with the insurance assessment.
When he turned, she’d put everything back in the bag.
Shit
. Now he had to manufacture a reason to check it was all there.
Jago tipped up the bag. “What should I sell?”
“There’s nothing here that’s worth appreciably more than any other piece. Go for the one you dislike the most.”
“I don’t
like
any of it.”
She shrugged. “Then sell it all. You’re not going to wear it. Whoever you mar— Well, I’d sell it all. I’ve got contacts in Hatton Garden. My friend Bernie would love to sell this for you.”
Christ. Am I going to read something into everything she says?
Jago scooped it all into the bag. “I’ll put this back in my room. Keep an eye on the fish.”