Josette flinched at Henri’s savage words and the violence they described, so incongruous with the beauty of this corner of the gardens.

“What happened?” she asked softly.

Unashamed tears filled Henri’s eyes. “My family were slaves in Antigua. Sir Harmon took over the plantation where we worked. He does not know I lived there—he never noticed us. He worked my parents and sister until they were sick, and when they could do no more labor, they were turned out. I did what I could, but my parents and my sister were too ill, too starved. They died.”

Josette listened in horror. “Oh, lad. I’m so sorry.”

“I ran away. A Scottish family helped me. They brought me here and made certain I was freed. Papers to prove it. I worked for them—here. It was not like this.”

Henri waved his hand at the summerhouse, the gardens, the vast mansion in the distance.

“And then he came,” Henri went on. “Sir Harmon hated the Dunbars—the Scottish family—had been their enemy in the Indies. They were missionaries, and he believed they’d cause a slave revolt, and he’d lose all his land and money. When Sir Harmon returned to England, he lied to the government and said Mr. Dunbar was a Jacobite who sent money to the King over the Water. But they were not. They were innocent. They were arrested and taken away, and I’m sure they are dead. Sir Harmon seized their property and built all this. I stayed here to work. He does not know. Now I will kill him and throw myself into the sea, and they will be avenged. Why did you stop me?” He glared at Will.

“Because I need Sir Harmon to stay alive just a bit longer,” Will said. “He’s a rotten bastard, I agree. But killing him won’t solve matters, and drowning is an unpleasant death. The man’s not worth dying for.”

Henri gazed at him in disbelief. “What reason do I have to live? Anyone I ever cared for is gone. Taken away from me.”

“I know.” Will put a kind hand on the youth’s shoulder. Henri winced, but he didn’t pull away. “I can help you, lad. How would you like to bring down Sir Harmon? Possibly get him arrested and hanged, free the Dunbars, if they are still alive, and live the rest of your days on his ill-gotten gains?”

Henri remained unconvinced. “Killing him will be quicker.”

“Not necessarily. The cavalry officer who is staying in the house, Captain Ellis, would feel obligated to arrest you, no matter how much he agreed with you. He is an honorable man and follows the rules. I, on the other hand, do not.”

Henri jerked from Will’s touch. “Why should I believe you? You are one of them.”

“I’ll thank you not to insult me.” Will’s voice held a touch of humor. “I am not one of those trumped-up English brats. I’m not ready to tell you exactly who I am, but trust me, lad, I want Sir Harmon. I came here to finish him.”

“How?” Henri’s tone was suspicious, but he at least waited for Will’s answer.

“I will make him betray himself, and then the honorable Captain Ellis will have no choice but to take him into custody.”

“And his friends will get him free again,” Henri sneered.

“Not if he’s the traitor I believe he is. I sense in Sir Harmon a man who’d sell his own mother if he could make a penny. Probably has already.”

Henri listened impatiently. “How can this help me find the Dunbars?”

“I know people. Those people know people who know many things. Or at least can find them out.” Will didn’t boast or even speak with great confidence. He simply stated facts that Josette knew to be true.

Henri’s scowl returned. “Who are you really? Not Prince Charlie himself, are you?”

“Good Lord, no. My dad would skin me if I waltzed about like that overly arrogant coxcomb. I’m merely concerned with justice—and Sir Harmon might have knowledge that would help me greatly. Tell me, lad—as a servant you’ll have learned the ins and outs of this place. Is there somewhere Sir Harmon hides things he wants no one to find? From his guests, his servants, his wife?”

“Here.” Henri jerked his thumb at the pseudo Greek summerhouse. “There’s also a secret room in the wine cellar at the main house. He thinks it’s secret anyway.”

“Ah.” Will headed for the summerhouse, mounting the stone steps to its door. “An easy place to start.”

“It’s locked,” Henri said as he and Josette trailed after him. “Only Sir Harmon and the majordomo have the keys.”

“No matter.”

Will drew a pair of thin wires from his pocket, knelt before the lock, and proceeded to pick it. Josette watched with interest, Henri in skepticism. In less than a minute, the lock clicked and the door creaked open.

“Not very formidable,” Will said. “A baby could pick that. Anyone at home?” he sang out in his fop’s voice.

Silence met them. Josette doubted any of the house party were here—they’d have had to venture outdoors.

The interior of the summerhouse had been simply furnished, without the grandeur of the main house. A table and chairs, a bookcase with a smattering of tomes, a chair and a desk, empty of papers. It was cool here, no fire in the small fireplace.

A search turned up nothing. Will was thorough, and he’d taught Josette to be. Henri watched them before joining in.

The floor was solid, no trapdoors leading to tunnels. “Too new,” Will said in derision. “No escape route, priest’s hole, or smuggler’s tunnel. No self-respecting Scot of the old days would build a place like this.”

“Sir Harmon had it put up,” Henri confirmed. “Was finished six months ago.”

“He would. Well.” Will wiped his brow with the back of his hand and continued his search.

They turned up no caskets full of French gold, either in coins or bars, and no papers or maps that would lead them to such a find. The room seemed to be Sir Harmon’s hideaway, with books on horses and fishing and not much else.

Will rubbed his palms, looking more animated.

“All right, then,” he said. “On to the wine cellar.”

Neither Sir Harmon nor Lady Bentley nor the majordomo questioned them or tried to stop Henri from leading them to the cellar of the main house, which Will took to be a sign they’d find nothing.

A man skilled at concealment would not show concern about a person approaching his hiding place—betraying nervousness only gave a hiding place away. Sir Harmon did not seem skilled, however; therefore, his lack of worry told Will he had hidden nothing in his cellar. But Will would never forgive himself if he didn’t search anyway.

Sir Harmon did have many casks of wine and brandy. Again Will thought of the whisky Malcolm had labored on every day of the year, how he’d hover over the mash like a mother hen, and wander among the kegs of aging brew, touching them, talking to them. Will imagined the British army’s joy when they chanced upon the distillery and all the barrels in the aging room, and his deep anger simmered.

He tried to press Kilmorgan out of his thoughts, shut out the intense pain of the memories. Ironic that Will had been avid to leave home as a lad, weary of living with a horde of irascible men. Now he’d give anything to bring those days back.

A small door behind a stack of barrels intrigued him, as well as the fact that the racks of barrels were on tracks and could easily be moved. Henri helped Will slide the racks aside, and another picked lock later, the three of them peered into a small chamber—empty.

“Well, that is disappointing,” Will said with a sigh. “But worth remembering.”

He closed the door, locked it with his picks, and he and Henri shoved the barrels in front of it again.

“Are you playing a game?” came the voice of Lady Bentley.

Will quickly motioned for Henri to duck into the shadows as Lady Bentley swept toward them, the feathers in her bag-like cap swaying. “You hide, and I find you?”

Josette, bless her, let out a high-pitched laugh. “How delightful. No, my husband was curious about your husband’s brandy. So much of it.” She spread her hands and looked about at the racks of kegs.

She played the insipid Anna so well, Will thought with an inward grin. He wanted to kiss her. Again.

“Sir Harmon likes his drink.” Lady Bentley’s tone turned irritated. “He has friends bring it to him—never more delighted than when another shipment arrives. He won’t be able to drink it all in his lifetime.”

“He is kind to share it with guests,” Will said. “I look forward to more at supper.”

“There won’t be supper,” Lady Bentley announced. “That is, it will be served, but we won’t sit down to it. I’ve ordered a feast to be spread in the dining room while we dance in the ballroom. But you look surprised, Lady Jacobs—I forgot, you ran out to walk with your husband before we decided.” She clasped her hands like an excited girl. “We’re having a masked ball. Hurry upstairs now, or you’ll have no time to get your costumes sorted.”

“Of all the daft ideas …” Josette trailed off as Will laced her into the blue and pink gown covered with silk roses she had chosen from Lady Bentley’s wide-ranging wardrobe.

Will, having spent a few years coming and going in European courts, had grown used to impromptu parties dreamed up by a bored queen or official mistress. Spontaneity counted as entertainment in their cushioned worlds.

“More time to learn things, my dear,” Will said into Josette’s ear.

He pressed a kiss to her neck. The smile she flashed him made Will want to consign the Bentleys to hell and take Josette to bed for the rest of the night.

Will finished lacing Josette’s gown and helped tie on her mask, a lace affair with a spray of silk flowers on one side.

Will had fashioned his costume from a banner he’d found hanging in the gallery, taken with permission from Stelton, the majordomo. It had been easy for him to sew seams at the shoulders and tack the banner—a gold cross—to the front to make a surcoat.

“You are handy with a needle,” Josette commented.

“Forced to be. Grew to manhood without a mum and not enough servants willing to sew clothes for six lads. We learned to shift for ourselves. A handy skill to have, stitching.”

He finished and pulled the surcoat over his regular clothes.

“A knight of old,” he said, studying himself in the mirror. “Sir William of … Who knows where?”

“Unfair,” Josette said. She wore flowers in the wig she’d donned over her knot of hair. “You only have to throw that off when the evening is over. I’ll have to struggle out of all this fussiness.”

“I don’t mind helping you struggle.” Will laced his arms around her waist from behind and pressed a kiss to her exposed shoulder.

Josette touched his hair, and Will’s blood pumped hot. He was already thoroughly sick of Sir Harmon and his wife and their equally unpleasant guests.

At the moment, he wanted to bury himself in Josette and forget his pain. Damn men like Bentley and idiots like the zealous Highlanders who’d thought it would be easy to throw King Geordie’s armies out of Scotland. If not for them, he could be curled up around Josette without a care, the two of them wrapped in a warm plaid.

Josette’s touch brought Will back from his vast well of regret. “Are you all right?”

Will shook his head. “No. But I’ll weather it. I always do.”

Josette watched him, her beautiful eyes troubled. Will raised her hand to his lips, kissed it, and clasped it to the cross on his chest.

“Shall we go down, my lady?”

“Of course, my knight.”

Lady Bentley must have sent word to other Englishmen in the area, because the ballroom had filled with about a dozen couples. None were Scots—a quick scan told Will that—and all were masked. They spoke and laughed in the bright way of people determined to enjoy themselves, no matter that they were in the middle of a hostile wilderness.

Captain Ellis’s only nod to a costume was a black mask and a tricorn pulled over his dark hair. He looked Will up and down. “Knight of what order? I don’t recognize it.”

“I’m sure no one does,” Will answered. “One can buy banners of obsolete orders for decorating one’s house. My many times great-grandfather was a famous knight, so why not?”

Old Dan Mackenzie had been a savage man who’d fought every enemy of his clan with a ferocity that even now flowed through Mackenzie veins. He’d been given a dukedom for being unstoppable—or perhaps the Scots king had simply tried to tame him with it. Hadn’t worked, from what Will had been told.

Captain Ellis frowned. The man liked caution, and he believed Will was never cautious. Not that Captain Ellis hadn’t charged out of smoke, alone, against a handful of Scottish soldiers, in an attempt to take back captured artillery. Mal had fought him down, but only with great difficulty.

“Speak to me later,” Will said to Ellis under the cover of musicians beginning to play. Couples formed into squares for a minuet.

Will led Josette out, bowing to the other two in their square. He and Josette were skilled at the minuet—they seemed to end up dancing it whenever they came together.

Josette was graceful, her feet moving daintily, her skirts swaying enticingly as they went through the many steps. Her face was flushed, her eyes sparkling, and the smile she flashed at Will as they met and clasped hands held genuine pleasure.

Will was sorry when the minuet wound to an end. He and the second gentleman bowed to Josette and the other lady in the square, and the ladies curtsied prettily.

Josette took Will’s arm, and they strolled the room to catch their breaths as another dance formed.

Something caught Will’s eye, a flash of familiarity that broke through his disguise and struck the heart of the true Will. It was a jolt of incongruity, past rushing forward to meet present like a hazy phantom.

“A moment.” Will made an abrupt turn to a window alcove, which contained a settee with delicate, curved legs. “I think that’s one of mine. Yes, I’d swear it.”

The settee was a graceful thing of gilded wood, upholstered with a petit-point scene of lords and ladies that had been expertly rendered.

Josette peered at it, bewildered. “One of yours? What do you mean?”

“I had it shipped from France to Kilmorgan. It sat in the front drawing room.” Will bent to it, finger going unerringly to a hole in the upholstery above its front left leg. “Yes, here’s the tear where Dad threw a whisky tumbler at Duncan. I tried to deflect it, but it caught the edge.”

His breath came faster as the phantom rose to blot out his vision. Will had made himself stay away from his burned home—he’d only once returned to the ruins and then never gone again. But to see this piece of furniture, given to Will by the French king when Will had praised it, stirred the red rage inherited from Old Dan Mackenzie.

This was plunder, spoils of war, taken by those who’d destroyed his family. The fact that it had ended up here, in the possession of the idiot Sir Harmon, was more than Will could take.

“Will.” Josette’s soft voice cut through his anger.

Will forced himself to look down at her. Josette was warning him, but her dark eyes were full of understanding. She knew.

Josette was the only person in Will’s life who grasped what he did and why. Gone were the days a Highlander could muster his clan and protect his lands—Scotland was now one country, gathered into the kingdom called Great Britain with a stroke of a pen.

Will had defended his family the only way he could, inside the nebulous world of intrigue. By becoming a dealer in secrets, he knew what truly went on behind the closed doors of the British government and used the knowledge to protect his family and friends.

In the end, it hadn’t been enough. Kilmorgan had fallen, his family scattered into hiding. All because Will hadn’t been quick enough, hadn’t understood soon enough what would happen when the Jacobites joined Prince Teàrlach when he came home from across the sea.

“Will,” Josette whispered again.

“Come with me,” Will said, fierceness in his voice. He swept her abruptly out of the room and into the cool garden.