A Most Unconventional Match Read Online Free PDF Page B

of his voice, Elizabeth jumped, her gaze darting back to Hal. ‘N-no. He…he only frightened me a little, as I’m sure he meant to do.’
    â€˜Sure you are unharmed?’ Hal persisted, already envisioning his hands around the tough’s thick neck.
    He must have looked as fierce as he felt, for her eyes widened and a smile quirked her lips. ‘There is no need to track him down and tear him limb from limb, I assure you.’
    â€˜Won’t bother you again, swear it. Check my contacts at Bow Street. Take care of him.’
    Her wry smile gentled. ‘Thank you,’ she said softly. ‘I feel safer already. To reiterate, he said his name was Smith and his employer a Mr Blackmen, although I cannot be sure those are their actual names. He said that Mr Lowery had borrowed money to fund his antique purchases.’
    She frowned, her gaze thoughtful. ‘My husband delighted in his collection. I know he bought several fine new statues just the month before his…his death. Shall I make a note for you of what he purchased and when?’
    Hal gave a negative shake of his head. ‘No need. Have it here.’ He pointed to his head. ‘Not much conversation, but good memory,’ he said, his mind racing through the possibilities.
    Bow Street knew most of the moneylenders. Even if the man had given a false name, Hal was confident they could run him to ground.
    If Lowery had indeed borrowed money from a usurer, there was no legal way the lender could recover more than the principal. Whatever that sum had been, Hal would repay it at once to ensure Mrs Lowery received no further friendly little visits. If upon review the Lowery estate hadn’t the funds to reimburse him, he knew Nicky would pay him back when the family returned from their holiday.
    And despite Elizabeth Lowery’s reassurance that she was unharmed, he still intended to pay a little visit on the man who’d invaded her house today.
    â€˜I don’t know why Everitt would resort to consulting a moneylender,’ Mrs Lowery’s troubled voice recalled him. ‘He’s always been an avid collector—’ she gestured toward several marble busts on the shelves in the studio that even to Hal’s untrained eye looked particularly fine ‘—but I had no idea we were in financial difficulties.’
    â€˜Man of business said nothing?’ Hal asked. ‘When he called to read the will?’
    Her eyebrows winged upward in surprise. ‘He hasn’t called. Nor, to my knowledge, has there been a reading of the will. I suppose Everitt had one, but I know nothing about it.’
    â€˜Who is solicitor?’
    â€˜Mr Scarbridge.’
    â€˜Eustace Scarbridge?’ Hal echoed, astonished and taken aback.
    â€˜Do you know him?’ Elizabeth asked. ‘He is—was—a distant cousin of Everitt’s. They attended Cambridge together. Though I don’t believe Everitt consulted him very much.’
    Unsure what to reply, Hal remained silent. Eustace Scarbridge. He barely refrained from groaning. So much for his happy vision of paying a single visit on the bewitching Elizabeth and being able to conclude the rest of his dealings about the Lowery estate with the deceased’s solicitor.
    Hal was not surprised Lowery hadn’t consulted Scarbridge often. He would have to have been dicked in the nob to have confided anything of importance to a man Hal knew to be a gambler and a ne’er-do-well always looking for a high-stakes table at which to lose his blunt—if he wasn’t throwing it away on some expensive barque of frailty. Hal hadn’t even known the man was a solicitor, rather eloquent evidence in itself of the amount of time Scarbridge spent pursuing his supposed vocation.
    Hal considered himself as reverent of the bonds of kinship as anyone, but he couldn’t help damning Lowery for feeling so constrained by them that he’d not retained a solicitor