Sweet Deception Read Free Page A

view. “Do people in this village routinely find themselves in dire circumstances? Have you had a rash of dastardly events?”
    Emma pinched the bridge of her nose. The Derick she remembered hadn’t been so tiresome. But then, she’d known only the boy. He had been seventeen when she’d seen him last, a whole lifetime of changes ago.
    “Of course not,” she said. Being situated at the south end of the Peak District, they’d had a bit more crime than perhaps was normal due to the number of strangers that passed through. Even a few suspicious deaths, but nothing like that for at least two years.
    “Were there signs of a struggle?” he persisted.
    “No,” Emma admitted.
    “And yet you suspect foul play…” Derick lifted his hand and crossed his arms with a slow negligence that set her teeth on edge. “The girl is young. She’s probably visiting with a…
friend
, and lost track of the time.”
    The tips of Emma’s ears burned with indignation. She glanced around, grateful that neither of Molly’s parents was in the room.
    “Or perhaps she eloped with the lucky chap,” he offered.
    Emma nearly gasped at his cheek. Could Derick truly have become such an insensitive boor? A lifetime of changes or not, people didn’t usually transform into someone completely unrecognizable.
    Regardless, she’d heard enough. She raised herself to her full height, which unfortunately barely put her at his chest level. Her cheeks warmed as she remembered that horrid nickname he used to call her as a child. Still, she gave him her fiercest glare. He was
going
to take her seriously and get out of her way, so help her.
    “I suppose that in the realm of possibilities, these are all reasonable questions. However, if I may point out”—she emphasized the point with a poke of her finger rightto his breastbone—“that you don’t know Molly from Eve. You can credit those of us who do that we have considered all other likely scenarios and have exhausted them.”
    Another rolling boom of thunder sounded, ever closer. A quick glance confirmed that the sunlight was fading fast.
    She turned her gaze back to Derick and narrowed it on him. “Molly is out there, somewhere, and the more time we waste chatting about it, the less chance we have of finding her before dark.”
    Derick regarded her. He still looked as though he doubted her conclusions, but gone were the arrogant tilt to his nose, the pinched lines around his mouth, the bored ease of his stance. “I su—”
    “She tweren’t anywhere, Miss Emma.” Two footmen came through the door then, cutting off whatever Derick had been about to say. The taller one spoke for them. “We searched the whole spot ye told us.”
    Emma grimaced. The men stood in the doorway, taking great gulps of air and wiping moisture from their faces. Her frown deepened at their rain-sodden coats. She waved them toward the kitchen, not caring if Derick took issue with her directing
his resources
. “Thank you. Go on and get a hot drink, then hurry right back. We’ll need you both as soon as you’re able.”
    She turned back to the map, bracing herself on the table with her left hand and using her right to draw lines through the section the men had been assigned—another search area combed through without success. Emma scanned the darkening sky through the window, mentally calculating how much daylight remained. She’d always been able to tabulate numbers in her head faster than even her father, an esteemed mathematician, had been able to do on paper. She factored in how much area a man could cover on foot in that time, and divided the result by the number of servants available.
    Rain pelted the glass in an ever-increasing tattoo.
    She’d better account for that variable in her time estimations. She was doing just that when a large bronzed hand planted itself to the outside of her smaller pale one. Emma sucked in a breath, startled by the long, blunt-tipped fingers, the knuckles and skin dusted with a