She slipped out a side entrance, passing a few servants on the way, and walked into a gentle flood of sunlight. There was something wonderful about the atmosphere at Stony Cross Park. One could easily imagine it as some magical place set in some far-off land. The surrounding forest was so deep and thick as to be primeval in appearance, while the twelve-acre garden behind the manor seemed too perfect to be real. There were groves, glades, ponds, and fountains. It was a garden of many moods, alternating tranquillity with colorful tumult. A disciplined garden, every blade of grass precisely clipped, the corners of the box hedges trimmed to knife blade crispness.

Hatless, gloveless, and infused with a sudden sense of optimism, Annabelle breathed deeply of the country air. She skirted the edge of the terraced gardens at the back of the manor and followed a graveled path set between raised beds of poppies and geraniums. The atmosphere soon became thick with the perfume of flowers, as the path paralleled a drystone wall covered with tumbles of pink and cream roses.

Wandering more slowly, Annabelle crossed through an orchard of ancient pear trees, sculpted by decades into fantastic shapes. Farther off, a canopy of silver birch led to woodland beds that appeared to melt seamlessly into the forest beyond. The graveled path ended in a small circle, where a stone table had been centered. Drawing closer, Annabelle saw the thick stubs of two melted candles that had been burned directly on the stone surface. She smiled a bit wistfully, realizing that the privacy of the clearing must have been the perfect setting for some romantic interlude.

Inured to the dreamy atmosphere around them, a line of five fat white ducks waddled across the graveled circle, heading to a raised pool on the other side of the garden. It appeared that the ducks had been long accustomed to the multitude of visitors at Stony Cross Park, for they ignored Annabelle completely as they passed by. They quacked loudly in anticipation of reaching the artificial pond, their progress so comically animated that Annabelle couldn’t help laughing.

Before her amusement had faded, she heard the crunch of a heavy footstep on the gravel. It was a man, who was evidently returning from a walk in the forest. He had lifted his head to stare at her with an arrested expression, his dark gaze meeting hers.

Annabelle froze.

Simon Hunt, she thought, shocked beyond the power of speech to see him there at Stony Cross. She had always associated him with town life—she usually saw him indoors, at night, confined by walls and windows and starched neckties. However, in these day-lit natural surroundings, he seemed a different creature altogether. His broad-shouldered build, so irreconcilable with the narrow cut of evening clothes, seemed utterly right for the rough weave of a hunting coat and the shirt that had been left open at the throat, no cravat anywhere in sight. He was darker than ususal, his skin burnished amber from a great deal of time spent out of doors. The sun glanced off his close-cropped hair, striking a rich shimmer from thick locks that were not quite black, but an intense shade of brown. His features, finely delineated by sunlight, were hard and prominent and striking. The few touches of softness in his face…the thick crescents of his dark lashes, the lush curve of his lower lip, were all the more intriguing for their uncompromising setting.

Hunt and Annabelle stared at each other in silent bemusement, as if someone had posed a question that neither of them knew how to answer.

The moment lengthened uncomfortably, until Simon Hunt finally spoke. “A pretty sound, that,” he said softly.

Annabelle struggled to find her voice. “What is?” she asked.

“Your laughter.”

Annabelle experienced a sharp little ache in her midriff that was neither pain nor pleasure. The disarming stab of sensation was unlike anything she had ever experienced before. Unconsciously she put her fingers over the spot just beneath her ribs. Hunt’s gaze shot to her hand before easing slowly back up to her face. He moved nearer to the stone table, closing some of the distance between them.

“I hadn’t expected to see you here.” His gaze moved over her in a disconcertingly thorough sweep. “But of course, it’s the logical place for a woman in your situation.”

Annabelle narrowed her eyes. “In my situation?”

“Trying to catch a husband,” he clarified.

She responded with a haughty glance. “I am not trying to ‘catch’ anyone, Mr. Hunt.”

“Casting the lure,” he continued, “setting the hook, reeling in your unwary prey until he lies gasping on the deck.”

Her mouth clamped into a taut line. “You may set your mind at ease, Mr. Hunt, as I have no intention of separating you from your precious freedom. You’re the very last on the list.”

“What list?” Hunt contemplated her in the tense silence that followed, working it out for himself. “Ah. You’ve actually made a list of potential husbands?” Amusement danced in his eyes. “It’s a relief to hear that I’m not in the running, as I have resolved to avoid being padlocked into marriage at all cost. But I can’t seem to stop myself from asking…who is at the top of the list?”

Annabelle refused to answer. Even as she cursed her own tendency to fidget, she could not keep from reaching over to the lumpen stub of a candle and picking at it with the edges of her fingernails.

“Westcliff, probably,” Hunt guessed.

Annabelle made a scornful sound, half-sitting on the table. The aged stone surface was sun-warmed and glossy-smooth. “Certainly not. I wouldn’t marry the earl if he fell to his knees and begged me.”