Page 52 of The Forsaken

The scoundrel must have practiced mastering looking both bored and patronizing.

She saw Lord Kerr’s blinding, white smile—that said the fun he had at her expense. Here she had saved his miserable hide without a word, and he skated by without anyone the wiser of how close he’d come to absconding with her.

“Worry not, Miss Smith. We will not interfere with one another’s work.”

She glared at the viscount. How dare he try to appease her?

He took it a step further.

“I will happily ensure our paths do not cross.”

“Truly splendid, my lord.” Lord I-Can-Do-Anything was the last person she wanted or needed around.

Because she could not let herself think about what would happen if he discovered that the man he’d been sent to ferret out was none other than she, Andromena McQuoid-Smith.

Chapter 10

Retrieve for me the Malia Pendant. Prove your worth, and perhaps I will let you wear it.

Your Devoted Servant

Andromena waited only a short time for her blackmailers’ orders before she was back to work for him—and her uncle. The demand was clear: she had to steal the Gold Bee Pendant of Malia, a treasure, unearthed almost two decades ago off the north coast of the Isle of Crete and just six hundred paces from the Minoan Palace of Malia.

Though the honeybee represented a female-centered community, where the Queen guided the colony’s survival, men—artists, kings, and artisans—had, in the way of civilizations since the beginning of time, centered fertility around themselves. In the bees, men saw what mattered most all came down to what it still came down to, the patriarchal passing of lines. Titles. Wealth.

For its time, the design was a masterpiece.

Even now, a work of such fierce precision should have stolen Andromena’s breath.

Identical in image and placement, two bees touched heads, as they did with the tips of their stingers. Atop their heads, they supported a pair of matching cages, each holding a solid gold bead. From their legs hung a circular disc that dangled a delicate honeycomb. As if the elaborate work were not reason enough to inspire awe, this superb craftsmanship measured two inches by two inches.

In terms of gold, it weighed five and a half grams and was worth thirteen shillings and nine pence—a paltry sum to noblemen.

It would provide more than a dozen pound-loaves of wheat bread. Three pounds of salt and four pounds of sugar. Four pounds of beef—five gallons of ale.

With that money, one could afford fuel and heat a small room for at least a month—perhaps more.

Andromena knew all this because she asked Cook and other servants—who were like family.

If stealing could lessen someone’s burden, feed families, and keep them warm in the cold months, she would have felt at least a sense of justice. Her family certainly did not need the coin the piece would fetch.

Her uncle didn’t care about the gasps of the treasure seekers crowding the table. This wondrous piece of precious metal predated Athens by thirteen hundred years—shredding the sacred timeline of Homer’s war long before the dust of Greece even settled. For two decades, pale scholars had bent over their lamplight, losing sleep over the ghost of an empire that history had no name for.

Andromena realized the truth: her uncle was—and because of him, her entire family were—pillagers. Their urge to preserve the necklace’s history did not give them the right to steal or own it.

None of this lessened her guilt—that heavy sense of remorse for lying, deceiving, and taking what did not belong to her. Her uncle’s museum-quality collection proved he was quite comfortable with stealing, but she herself was not, and never would be.

“Never tell me you’re looking to abscond with it?”

Andromena jolted, her book sliding from her lap to the rug with a dull thud.

Edgar filled the doorway, leaning one shoulder against the frame with an infuriating, crooked grin. And damn him—he was entirely too handsome in his fitted fawn breeches and dark bottle green morning coat.

Then, what he had said sank into her head.

“Of course not,” she said, her voice pitched. “I would never—”

“I am joking, darling.”