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to see her brother step out on the terrace, she forced a smile. ‘‘Noah. You arrived so late I had no chance to talk to you before the wedding.’’ His priorities never had been with family or the earldom. ‘‘Did you get the new racehorse settled in at Greystone?’’

    ‘‘Horses,’’ he corrected. ‘‘I bought two. And they’re both doing well, yes. I’m hoping for a good showing at Ascot. While I was home I asked for an inventory to be taken—’’

    ‘‘An inventory of what?’’ Since when did Noah care about anything at Greystone Castle?

    ‘‘Of everything. While dining there alone, I noticed that old portrait of the first earl over the fireplace and got to thinking about what might have accumulated in the hundred and fifty years since he was granted the title and lands. The servants aren’t yet finished—I expect it will take them weeks to catalog all they find. But one thing they discovered was an old trunk in the attic with Mama’s wedding dress and a few other items. Nothing important—’’

    ‘‘I want to see it.’’

    ‘‘I knew you would,’’ he said with a wry smile. ‘‘That’s why I’m telling you they found it. I had it brought down and put in my room so you can go through it after the Season.’’

    ‘‘I want to see it now. Can we go to Greystone tomorrow?’’

    ‘‘I just got back from Greystone, and the Jockey Club meets tomorrow. Besides, I told you nothing in it is important. You can wait a few weeks.’’

    ‘‘No, I can’t, Noah.’’ He didn’t know what was important. The trunk might have something in it that would reveal her father’s identity. ‘‘I’m going tomorrow.’’

    ‘‘I’m not going with you, and you cannot travel that far alone or with Claire or Elizabeth. It wouldn’t be safe.’’

    ‘‘I know that.’’ But she knew another man who might be willing to accompany her in his place. ‘‘When you go back inside, will you ask Griffin to step out here a moment?’’

     

‘‘Can you come for me at seven?’’ Rachael asked, a few loose tendrils of her hair blowing in the breeze that crossed the terrace.

    ‘‘That anxious, are you?’’ Griffin’s sisters were never ready to leave the house so early in the morning, but none of them were nearly as focused as Rachael. ‘‘That will be fine. Will one or both of your sisters come along, too?’’

    ‘‘I think not.’’

    ‘‘Hmm. Aunt Frances is too far gone with child, so I guess I’ll ask one of my sisters to join us.’’

    ‘‘Why?’’

    ‘‘As a chaperone, of course.’’

    ‘‘We don’t need a chaperone, Griffin.’’

    He sipped orange brandy, watching her warily over the rim of the glass. ‘‘It’s a long journey.’’

    ‘‘Only half a day each direction. We won’t be gone overnight. Other than you and my siblings, no one knows about my true parentage, and I want to keep it that way, at least for now. Besides,’’ she added, ‘‘you’re my cousin. Would I require a chaperone to go visiting with Noah?’’

    ‘‘I’m not Noah,’’ Griffin pointed out. ‘‘A cousin is not the same as a brother.’’ But he didn’t point out that he wasn’t, in the strictest sense, her cousin. Not by blood anyway, not since it had been established that John Chase hadn’t been her father. He didn’t want to upset her, and more to the point, he’d just as soon have her think of him as a cousin.

    ‘‘You’re practically my brother,’’ she insisted.

    Maybe having her think of him as a brother was even better. ‘‘Very well,’’ he said. ‘‘I’ll come for you at seven.’’

    ‘‘Thank you!’’ she exclaimed, looking happier than he’d seen her since that disappointing day when they’d gone through her mother’s belongings and found nothing. As he watched her glide back into Stafford House, her luscious derriere swaying as she went, he gritted his teeth.

    Griffin remembered Rachael as an awkward adolescent, a