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she’s only a girl.”
    “Nay.” Rhys thought of her soft body pressed to his. “Lady Juliana is not ‘only a girl.’ ”
    “Perhaps not, but you’re accusing her of being a spy.” Morgan laid a hand on his shoulder. “You’re thinking with your cock. She’s a pretty thing you can’t touch, so you’re taking that out on her.”
    Rhys recoiled from the truth in Morgan’s words. “Don’ttalk to me as if I’m some green lad. I know all about her family’s damnable tricks. Leave me be, and I’ll take care of this.”
    Morgan’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”
    “That’s none of your concern.” Rhys stalked off, wanting to be away from Morgan and his too-sound logic.
    “Don’t do anything foolish, lad! ” Morgan called after him.
    Rhys kept heading for the river. “Damn, damn, damn. Not only English, but the earl’s own daughter.”
    He could still hear her saying she wasn’t worthy of him. What stupid answer had he given? Ah yes, that he might not be worthy of her since she did honest labor. Hah! Her “honest labor” was sneaking about at night, spying on her father’s enemies, seducing them with her smiles.
    He pounded his fist into his palm and tried to blot out her image, the intent expression she’d worn as he’d talked, the satiny texture of her cheek, her yielding lips—
    Damn her for doing this to him! How could a woman look so innocent and be so deceitful?
    And she’d certainly looked innocent. Not so much beautiful as arresting. The wide eyes and full mouth had seemed to signal a generosity of spirit, as well as an unconscious sensuality. She hadn’t flirted, hadn’t smiled coyly, and she’d kissed with an untutored wonder.
    His eyes narrowed. Obviously, he was more easily fooled by appearances than he’d thought.
    By now he’d reached the bridge. He strode along it, then stopped at the railing to stare into the swirling waters where his father had leapt to his death.
    “May God have mercy on his soul.”
    Anguish hit Rhys anew. If only he’d been here a month ago, instead of racing back from Paris, summoned by an urgent letter from his father that read, “I lost Llynwydd, son.”
    Why hadn’t he followed his instincts the first time Father suggested sending him away? He should have refused to leave. But Father had insisted that he acquire an “education befitting a gentleman.”
    That was all well and good for a boy who didn’t have to shore up the family estate at every turn, who hadn’t spent his holidays poring over Llynwydd’s books. Left to his own devices, Father had never been able to settle his mind to work, and he’d always relied too heavily on a land agent who overlooked his outrageous expenditures.
    So while Rhys had played the dutiful son in Paris, making stupid notes on French architecture and history and art by day, and meeting with philosophes at night, the damned Earl of Northcliffe had deceived his father into gambling away Rhys’s inheritance. While Rhys had been traveling back across the Channel, numb with shock from his father’s letter after it finally reached him, his father had been throwing himself into the Towy. Rhys had arrived just in time to watch them pull the body from the river.
    “Well, Father,” he said, looking down into the unforgiving waters, “I’m a squire now. What good is my proper education to either of us?”
    The whistling wind was his only answer.
    He stared out into the unfeeling night. “But I’m going to make it right. You’ll see.”
    He’d already been to a solicitor about the possibility of regaining Llynwydd. The man claimed Rhys had a chance of winning a dispute over the property, since his father had not been “in his right mind” when he’d signed it over to the earl, and since there were rumors that the earl had cheated. The solicitor and his agents had been gathering facts for the case, having already notified the earl that Rhys was disputing the transfer of ownership.
    But apparently Lord