“And you, Gerard? Where will you spend Christmas?” Lin asked smoothly.

“With Francesca at Belford,” Gerard replied, smiling at Francesca. “I wouldn’t miss James’s and Anne’s Anniversary Ball for the world.”

Francesca tried to tamp down the sudden anxiety she felt when a quizzical, concerned glance flickered across Lin’s features before she gave her usual warm smile, and wished them both a happy holiday.

* * *

When they’d started out jogging, the cool December air had been chilly. Now it felt wonderful against her heated skin.

“You were right,” Davie said as he ran next to her down North Avenue. The usually busy thoroughfare was clogged with holiday traffic as people prepared for Christmas in three days. “This weather is perfect for a jog.”

“Plus, it always makes you feel good to be on your feet when you see traffic like that,” Francesca said, grinning.

Davie glanced at her face and did a double take. He smiled when Francesca gave him a quizzical look.

“It just took me by surprise. It’s nice to see you smile again,” Davie said.

“Thanks. I’m looking forward to Christmas, which comes as a bit of surprise. I was far from being able to say that two weeks ago.”

Davie nodded as he searched her profile for a moment. “Do you think you’re getting over Ian?” he asked quietly.

Her smile faded. The void in her chest cavity ached as she focused on it. She didn’t speak for a moment as they approached a cross street, keeping her gaze averted from Davie’s. “I don’t know if I’ll ever be ‘over’ Ian. I doubt I’ll ever be able to . . . you know. Feel about anyone the way I did him,” she said, purposefully avoiding the loaded word.

Love.

“Well, time is the key. You never know what the future will bring,” Davie said briskly. “So . . . what’s it been like for you working with Ger—”

The sound of screeching brakes cut Davie off. Both of them slowed and came to a halt several feet before the street, confused as to why the car had stopped so abruptly at a green light. Their bewilderment only mounted when the back door swung open and a man with sandy blond hair, a craggy face, and wide shoulders sprung out.

“What the hell?” Davie muttered.

Something about the man’s expression as he stared fixedly at Francesca sent an alarm going off in her head. He charged them with a rapid single-mindedness that stunned her—like a walking tidal wave. Davie instinctively put out his hand and pushed back on Francesca.

“Go . . . run,” he said.

But the man was already upon them. He grabbed Francesca’s arm in a brutal grip and tried to pull her back toward the street. The jolt of pain she experienced sliced through her confusion at the turn of events. Anger and panic rolled through her. She jerked her arm backward, but the man’s grip was like steel.

“Let go of her!” Davie yelled, throwing his weight against the man’s arms and attempting to come between them. But the man just snarled and batted sideways with his massive forearm and hand, like he was swatting at a fly. Davie was thrown back. The man now had both of Francesca’s arms in a vicelike hold. He started to turn her roughly, as if to secure her in his arms from the back. Francesca took her chance while she still faced him and made a haphazard jab in his crotch area with her knee. By pure luck, she hit him bull’s-eye. Air whooshed out of her assailant’s lungs. His khaki-green eyes bulged.

She experienced a jolt of pure fear when she saw the hatred that entered his gaze. He lifted one of his hamlike hands and curled it into a fist. She twisted in his hold, desperate to escape what she suspected would be a painful blow. But then Davie reentered the fray, sinking a punch into the side of the man’s belly. The man grunted. In his momentary weakness, Davie shoved him away from Francesca. The man reacted by angrily thrusting Francesca in the opposite direction. She landed hard on the sidewalk, scraping her hand as she stopped herself from going all the way down. She barely noticed. All of her attention was on the two men.

“No, Davie! Don’t,” she shouted in panic when she looked up and saw Davie pursuing the thug as he ran toward the still-stationary car. Davie was trim and in good shape, but the man was a monster in size compared to him. Her friend hauled up short when the man clambered into the backseat and slammed the door hard. The driver punched the gas. The vehicle spun, brakes shrieking. Davie backed out of the road frantically, nearly falling in his haste.

The car shot off in the opposite direction of North Avenue and the traffic.

Davie turned and stared at her, face white and eyes wide with shock. “What the hell was that?”

Francesca just shook her head, too shocked by the abrupt storm of unexpected violence to speak.

* * *

Ian entered the dingy suite he occupied at the Aurore mansion and immediately stripped off his shirt. He’d combined his exercise with a search in the property’s many lanes, meadows, and woods, but Kam Reardon’s place of residence continued to elude him.

“You can’t hide forever, brother,” he muttered sarcastically under his breath, swiping at the glaze of perspiration on his ribs and abdomen. As he headed toward the bathroom to shower, he considered where he should search this afternoon. He came up short when he noticed the red light blinking on the answering machine. The device must have been twenty years old. Ian had hooked it up to the residential phone line and given the number to only one person.

He hit a button, sudden wariness making his sweat slickened skin roughen.

“Ian, it’s me. I know you haven’t been feeling up to returning calls, and you said you didn’t want me to contact you on this line unless there was an emergency. But something’s happened. . . .something I knew you’d want to know about right away . . .”

He listened, his backbone going stiff. After the beep signifying the end of the message, he listened to it again.

He went into the bathroom, where he rapidly extricated a pair of scissors from his grooming kit. He raised them to his neck and began to cut off his beard with a single-minded purpose.

* * *

They paused at a security gate, but the man on duty just waved them through. Francesca sat forward and looked out the window when the driver started down a long lane that ran through a forest.

“You’ll get a view of Belford Hall once we round this bend up here,” the Nobles’ driver—a man named Peter—said, noticing her piqued interest through the rearview mirror. She’d met Peter before when she’d stayed with the Nobles in London.

“I’m very excited to see it. We studied it briefly while I was in school for architecture,” she said breathlessly.

They took the curve. Her expression flattened in amazement at the view that unfolded. Peter must have noticed.

“Sight to behold, isn’t it?” he asked quietly, pride in his voice.

“It’s incredible,” Francesca replied. A strange feeling crept over her as the black sedan glided toward the enormous, stately Jacobean-Tudor mansion set amongst elaborate gardens and woods that would be ablaze with color during the spring and summer. She’d seen grand homes many times in her studies as a student of art and architecture . . . but this.

For some reason, the entire experience struck her as surreal. The past year of her life, everything that had happened since she’d looked into Ian’s eyes at Fusion over a year ago seemed to collapse into an insignificant minute. Suddenly, she was again the awkward, slightly defensive girl who had lived much of her life overweight and bullied by her peers.

What in the world was she doing here?

She’d known Ian’s grandparents were titled and wealthy, of course. She’d known Ian grew up in the midst of splendor for a good part of his young life. But she was quickly realizing that she hadn’t really gotten it. Not in the sense of true understanding. Could an American ever truly comprehend the elegant, rich history and tradition of a British nobleman? It struck her fully for the first time, coming like a disorienting blow, that just a half year ago, this fairytale house would have been one of her and Ian’s future homes.

She glanced down at herself nervously as they neared the entrance and several people stepped out the front door onto the drive. Thank goodness she’d taken some items from the penthouse’s dressing room before she’d returned to Davie’s. She’d never been gladder that Ian had gone against her wishes in the beginning of their relationship and purchased her a wardrobe. She’d never been more thankful he’d specified the items he wanted her to have. It was almost as if he’d been there to advise her as she’d packed. As in all things, Ian’s taste in clothing was exceptional, conveying a sense of effortless taste and understated class. The black skirt, silk blouse, leather boots, and cashmere coat she wore weren’t showy by any means, but they were of the highest quality. At least she had nothing to be ashamed of in that arena. She must rely on prayer and good luck to prevent her from making a fool of herself in some other situation at Belford.

James opened her door before Peter could come around, he and Anne anxious to greet her. Their warm hugs went a long way to calm her anxiety. James’s face was deeply lined with worry as he examined her closely after they embraced.

“We heard from Lin about what happened. Gerard couldn’t believe his ears when I told him; he was livid. He’s already at Belford, by the way, but ran over to Chatham—that’s his house, just a stone’s throw down the road—to take care of some business,” James added as an aside. “He says to tell you he’ll be back for dinner tonight.”

“Did they catch the perpetrators?” Anne asked, also referring to the jarring assault on her and Davie that had occurred in Chicago several days ago.

“No, not that I’m aware of. We gave our descriptions to the police, of course, although neither of us got a good look at the driver. But I wasn’t really expecting them to make an arrest, as random as the whole thing was. Davie tried to get the license plate, but it was obscured. Intentionally, probably.”

“You did tell them about your connection to Ian, didn’t you?” James asked pointedly.

Francesca froze. There is no connection between Ian and me, she wanted to scream, but checked herself when she saw James’s lined, worried face. He only meant well, of course, and she understood what he was getting at. Ian and she shared a past connection, but a connection nonetheless.

“It never really came up, James. I’m afraid the whole incident was a typical, mundane one to the Chicago PD.” She braced herself against a wind that whipped some escaped hair against her cheek.

“Come on, let’s get you out of the cold,” Anne urged.

“Welcome to Belford,” James said as they escorted her inside the massive oak doors, Peter following with her luggage. Once again, Francesca heard that tone of pride. It rang even stronger in James’s voice than it had in Peter’s. And why shouldn’t James be proud of his ancestral home? Francesca wondered as she stared openmouthed at the entrance hall: the richly carved oak-paneled walls, the grand staircase bedecked in fresh evergreen garland, the master paintings of various ancestors, the twenty-foot-tall lit Christmas tree, and the stunning domed stained-glass ceiling.

This is where Ian had grown up?

Somehow the idea of an energetic, scampering ten-year-old and this grandeur just didn’t mix in her brain, she realized dazedly as her boots tapped on a meticulous design of marble tile. But then again, Ian had never been a carefree child. These surroundings were perfectly suited to his cool self-containment, his consummate confidence in almost every decision he made.

She stopped in the middle of the hall and spun around once on her feet, trying to soak it all in. She met James’s sparkling, dark eyes.

“What do you think?” he asked, smiling.

“I’m awestruck, of course. It’s magnificent. I feel like a bumbling American,” she added under her breath.

“The only thing we want you to feel,” Anne said, stepping forward and taking her hand and with a significant glance, “is at home.”

* * *

Anne escorted her to her assigned suite on the second floor. While they chatted about the schedule for the next few days, a woman knocked and asked politely if she could unpack. At first, Francesca was confused by her request. The woman was young and pretty—in her twenties, probably about Francesca’s age. She didn’t wear the stereotypical clothing of a maid, but instead an attractive dark blue dress that belted at the waist, a tasteful silk scarf, and fashionable flats. She looked more like a chic young executive than a maid.