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None of the her cat, Moonshadow, those days were the happiest she’d ever known

While she lazed in the peace and sunshine, Adrienne enjoyed a blissful kind of ignorance She would have been mortified had soed stupor She would not have understood if someone had told her she’d spoken of a black queen, for her waking mind hadn’t remembered the chess piece yet

She had no idea that while she and Lydia were passing sweet time, Grimm had been sent to, and was now on his way back fro information about Mad Janet

And she would have packed up a few things and run for her very life, if not her soul, had she kno obsessively determined the Haas to claim her as his wife, in all the aspects it entailed

But she knew none of this And so her tiardens of Dalkeith-Upon-the-Sea would be lovingly placed as a precious jewel into the treasure chest of her memory, where it would twinkle like a diamond amid the shadows

CHAPTER 12

IT WASN’T MUCH FUN SNOOPING AROUND THE CASTLE WITH A dozen hard-boiled coed After a while she pretended they weren’t there Just as she pretended the Haas nothing nat to be brushed away repeatedly

Dalkeith Upon-the-Sea was as lovely a castle as she’d ever iled under a tent of blankets in bed with a pilfered flashlight, reading fairy tales long after lights out

The roo on the thick stone walls to sh the cracks, although Adrienne hadn’t been able to find so much as one crack in a wall--she’d peeped behind a few tapestries, just to see

Historical curiosity, she’d told herself Not that she was hunting for imperfections in either the castle or the castle’s laird

Hundreds of beautiful mullioned s Obviously the people who inhabited Dalkeith couldn’t bear to be cooped up inside when there was so much lush landscape to be enjoyed outdoors in Scotland’s hed wistfully as she paused by a vaultedto savor the view of the unceasing slate-silver waves crashing against the cliffs at the west end

A woman could fall in love in a place like this Tumble silken tresses over dainty satin slippers to land in a ht at the perfect laird’s perfect feet

At that very hts, the Haalked into her line of vision in the bailey below, leading one of the largest black chargers she’d ever seen Adrienne started to turn away, but her feet would no more walk her away from thethan her eyes would avert thenore hi in helpless fascination

With a fluid leap, the kit-clad Scottish laird tossed hi fiesty stallion

And as heAdrienne a sinful glihs, beautifully dusted with a bit of silky black hair She blinked a ht she’d seen

Surely they wore so under those kilts Surely it was only her overactive i the stallion’s obvious masculinity upon the Hawk’s body

Yes That was it, decidedly She’d noticed the stallion’s prominently displayed attributes in the periphery of her vision while she’d been looking at the Hawk’s legs, and ether, somehow She certainly had not seen that the Haas, hi like a stallion

Her cheeks flushed with that thought She turned sharply on her heel to squelch it firht the next unsurveyed rooe part to keep her ured that he’d have to walk by the oneshe was looking out And toss up his skirts to add fuel to the proverbial fire

She forced her mind back to the lovely architecture of Dalkeith She was on the second floor of the castle, and had already traipsed through dozens of guest rooht Dalkeith was enormous There must have been a hundred or more rooms, and many of the she currently explored was the most recently renovated and frequently utilized It was finished in light woods, polished to a fine gleam, and not a speck of dust could be seen Thick woven mats covered the floors, no rushes or cold bare stones here Bunches of fragrant herbs and dried flowers hung upside down fro the corridors