“So you don’t believe in me.”
“No, that’s not it. I just don’t believe in dragons.”
“Is that all? You think I’m fanciful?” She stood and began pulling at the fastened straps of her trunk. “This creature was not a dragon. Not a mythical beast of any kind, but a real, living animal. And I’ve based my conclusions on years of scientific study.”
After a few minutes’ fumbling, she finally got the trunk open. “Here,” she said, lifting out stacks of journals and setting them atop the other trunk. “All my personal writings and findings. Months of notes, sketches, measurements.” She held up a thick leather-bound diary. “This entire journal is filled with my comparisons from the available fossil record. Verifying that no similar creature has been recorded to date. And if all that fails to convince them . . .”
She pushed aside a layer of fabric padding. “Here. I’ve brought this.”
Colin stared at the object in the trunk. “Why, it’s the footprint.”
She nodded. “I made a casting, from plaster of Paris.”
He stared at it some more. In the cave, in the dark, the “print” had looked like a random, three-pronged depression in the ground. The work of time and chance, not some primeval creature.
But now in the sunlight, cast in plaster relief—he could see it clear. The edges were defined and smooth. Just as with a human footprint, the toe prints were individual and separate from the sole. It really looked like a foot. An enormous reptilian foot. The print of a creature that could send a man running and screaming for his life.
Colin had to admit, it was rather impressive.
But not nearly as impressive as Minerva herself.
At last, here was a glimmer of that confident, clever woman who’d visited his quarters. The woman he’d been waiting to see again.
The brisk morning air lent her skin a pretty flush, and the misty sunlight revealed it to lovely effect. She’d coiled all that dark, heavy hair and tightly pinned it for the journey—save a few fetching tendrils that spiraled lazily from her temple to her cheek. Doeskin gloves hugged her fingers like a second skin. Her traveling gown was velvet. Exquisitely tailored and dyed in a lush, saturated hue that danced the line between red and violet. Depending on how the sunlight caught the velvet’s thick nap, that gown was either the blaring color of alarm—or the hue of wild, screaming pleasure.
Either way, Colin knew he ought to lower his gaze, back away slowly, and be done with this.
“I will win the prize,” she said. “If you still don’t believe me, I’ll prove it to you.”
“Really, you don’t need to—”
“It’s not only me who believes it. I know you think I’m mad, but he’s not.” She rummaged through the trunk’s interior side pocket and withdrew an envelope. “Here, read it.”
He unfolded the letter, holding it carefully by its edges. The message was penned in a crisp, masculine hand.
“ ‘My dear friend and colleague,’ ” he read aloud. “ ‘I have read with great interest your latest reports from Sussex.’ ” He skimmed the letter. “So on and so forth. Something about rocks. More about lizards.”
“Just skip to the end.” She jabbed a finger at the last paragraph. “Here.”
“ ‘These findings of yours are exciting indeed,’ ” Colin read. “ ‘I wish you would reconsider your plans and make the journey to Edinburgh for the symposium. Surely the prize would be yours, without contest. And though it be paltry inducement compared to a purse of five hundred guineas, I would add that I’m most eager to further our acquaintance. I find myself growing most impatient to meet, face-to-face, the colleague whose scholarship I have long admired and whose friendship I have . . .” His voiced trailed off. He cleared his throat and resumed reading. “ ‘Whose friendship I have come to hold so very dear. Please . . .’ ”
Colin paused. So very dear? In correspondence between a gentleman and an unattached young lady, that was practically a declaration of love.
“ ‘Please make the journey. Yours in admiration, Sir Alisdair Kent,’” he finished.
He’d be damned. The awkward bluestocking had an admirer. Perhaps even a sweetheart. How quaint. How precious. How unspeakably irritating.
“There,” she said. “I’m certain to win the prize. Do you see?”
“Oh, I see. I see your little plan now.” He took a few aimless paces, chuckling to himself. “I can’t believe this. I’m being used.”
“Used? What can you mean? That’s absurd.”
He made a dismissive noise. “Please. Here I was so concerned that if I consented to this trip, I’d be using you ill.” He held up the letter. “But this is all about Sir Alisdair Kent. You were going to pretend to elope with me, on the hopes of seeing him. You’re the one using me.”
She snatched the letter from his grip. “I’m not using you. You would come out richer for this, while I would be utterly ruined. I’m offering you the entire prize. Five hundred guineas.”
“A fine price for my tender heart.” He pressed a hand over the offended organ. “You meant to ruthlessly toy with my affections. Suggesting we travel together for weeks. An unmarried man and an unmarried woman, trapped in close quarters for all those days.” He cocked an eyebrow. “All those nights. You’ll be casting glances at me over those coy little spectacles, driving me wild with all your polysyllabic words. Sharing my bed. Kissing me like a brazen temptress.”
Her lashes worked furiously as she refolded her precious letter. “That’s quite enough.”
No, it wasn’t enough. Not nearly. Colin knew she didn’t respect him. But now that he was seized with lust for her, she ought to at least reciprocate with a grudging-yet-helpless infatuation. So much would only be polite. But no, she’d been pining all along for another man. When they’d kissed, had she been practicing for this geologist toad?
She said, “There’s no need to mock me. There’s no call to be cruel. Sir Alisdair Kent is a colleague, nothing more.”
“He holds you dear, that letter says. Not just dear. ‘So very dear.’ ”
“He doesn’t even—” She made a fist and drew a slow breath. When she spoke again, she’d tempered her voice. “He is a brilliant geologist. And any admiration he feels for me is strictly based on my work. He believes the creature that left this footprint will be recorded as a new species. I’ll even get to name it.”