Sea of Desire Read Online Free Page B

shot him. Of that I’ve no doubt. I
just thought you might be...” She almost said, “... good enough to
tell me why,” a completely ridiculous thought. “I thought you might
tell me why you did it.”
    “Dammit, I didn’t shoot anyone!” God, he
wished he’d never agreed to this plan of Daniel’s. “It would have
been a neat trick, since I was unconscious. Or didn’t you notice
that detail when you discovered your father?”
    Merideth bristled under his sarcastic s tone.
“My father obviously tried to defend himself. It’s just too bad he
didn’t kill you rather than graze your head. Apparently you were
still able to fire your pistol. Or perhaps you fired first and his
shot wasn’t true.”
    “Or perhaps,” Jared mimicked, “someone
knocked me over the head and used my pistol to kill your father.”
Her noise of disbelief and disgust infuriated Jared. “The hell with
what you think. That’s what happened. I was in here discussing
business with your father, and someone came up behind me. The next
thing I knew there was a ten-ton giant standing on my
shoulder.”
    “That’s a preposterous story. I’m surprised
even you have the nerve to suggest it.”
    “I’ll suggest something even more
preposterous. The person who hit me was wearing scarlet.” Jared
cocked his brow. “You were wearing a scarlet cape earlier, weren’t
you, Lady Merideth?”
    “You can’t be suggesting that I... You
obviously have more nerve than sense, Mr. Blackstone.” Merideth
took a moment to rein in her anger. When she spoke again, her voice
was tight with control. “I shouldn’t have even wasted my time
talking with you.” Merideth moved toward the door, determined to
watch her prisoner, yet keeping as much distance between them as
possible. “I shall leave it to the constable to discover why you
were at Banistar Hall.”
    There was a pounding on the door, but it
wasn’t so loud that Merideth missed the cold deliverance of Mr.
Blackstone’s next words.
    “For your father’s sake, and yours, I don’t
believe you want the constable to know why I came here.” Merideth’s
eyes locked with the stranger’s. “What do you mean by that?” she
asked. But there was no time for him to answer, even if he planned
to; for Thurston, usually notoriously slow in answering the door,
had already opened it. The constable, followed by two of his
deputies, entered the library.
    “Your Ladyship.” Constable Samuals bowed
toward Merideth. His stoic expression wavered only slightly as he
took in the sheet-shrouded form sprawled on the floor, the pistol
Merideth still held. “What happened here? Your man came pounding on
my door, squealing something about an emergency. And this not a fit
night for man nor beast.”
    “I can hardly control the weather.” Merideth
didn’t much care for the constable’s attitude. She didn’t believe
that the retainer she’d sent to fetch him hadn’t explained what the
problem was. But then Amos Samuals hadn’t held the Banistars in
very high regard since Lord Alfred had run up a large tab at the
Three Gate Tavern, the establishment owned by Amos’s brother.
Neither of the brothers was happy when Alfred was unable to pay.
But that shouldn’t keep the constable from discharging his duty,
Merideth thought. She nodded toward Jared. “This man murdered my
father.”
    “I see.” Samuals pursed his lips as he
glanced toward Jared and then knelt beside the body. “Looks as if
he was shot.”
    “Of course he was shot!” Merideth felt her
patience slipping as sure as the weight of the gun pulled her hand
down.
    “No need to get yourself all uppity.” The
constable flipped the sheet back over Lord Alfred’s lifeless form.
“You say this fellow done it?”
    “He did.” Merideth glanced toward her
prisoner, wondering why he wasn’t saying anything in his own
defense. He simply stared back.
    “Who is he? Don’t think I’ve ever seen him in
these parts.”
    “I’m Jared Blackstone.”