Page 73 of Lady Waldrey’s Gardening Almanac for Cultivating Scandal

An excited hum ran across the grouping as they crowded into the entryway. Every now and then, patchy laughter broke out. Somehow, Candace had ended up with her shoulder pressed against James's arm.

He bent toward her and murmured, “I hope you know that, though I will catch the first person I come across, there are a few I will be looking for specifically.”

Her eyes went wide. “Oh?”

He nodded. “I think it only fair that the lady of the house be seeker at least once.”

A shiver of excitement trilled up her spine. “We shall see.”

“We shall, indeed.”

The last was spoken so closely that his breath gusted over the shell of her ear, and Candace blinked rapidly. She’d never felt faint before, but she wondered if that was the feeling she experienced now. She told herself it made no sense—she’d had a stout breakfast; her stays weren’t that tight; and it was perfectly comfortable in the foyer…

He turned from her dazed expression. “I’m starting! One. Two. Three...”

There were several squeals of excitement and a thundering upon on the stairs as a herd broke off from the grouping and headed up. Candace jerked in surprise as a small hand wormed its way into hers. Though he’d been ecstatic at the prospect of the game, Arthur now wore wide eyes and a white face.

Candace held her finger to her lips and tugged him out of the entry, back the way they’d come. They were the last in the hall, and James was already rounding the number ten and plunging into eleven. Seamus plodded along behind them, tongue out, his breathing inconveniently loud.

“Where should we go?” Arthur hissed.

Candace shushed him and took stock of the room. Large, but too open. Perhaps Arthur could fit beneath a sofa, but Seamus would just sit at his side, out for anyone to see. She ran through to the next room on slippered feet, tugging the boy alongside.

This room held some promise. Wooden benches, glass gun cases, and large closets for storage. A country sitting room with a large fireplace cheerfully throwing heat—the perfect place for a group of hunters to tug off their muddy boots and wet coats before heading further into the house. Candace flung open a closet door and was met with a wall of hanging fabric that smelled of cedar. The entire closet was lined with it, from the scent of things.

“Quickly, in here.” She pushed Arthur before her into the closet.

To her surprise, Seamus willingly followed them into the darkness, which turned inky black the moment Candace snapped the door closed behind them.

“Candace?” Arthur’s whisper rode a note of fear.

“I’m right here. Let’s move to the back, if we can.”

They stooped and struggled their way through the coats and blankets, rough wool abrading Candace’s face as they went. The closet spanned half the length of the room. They wrestled their way to the very end, Seamus panting humidly along beside them. Candace thought wryly that it was harder for her to move past the thick fabric than it was for the boy or the dog—they were both lower to the ground.

When they reached the cedar wall, they sat in silence for a few moments, save for Seamus’s huffing.

“Does he always sound like that?” Candace whispered, keeping her voice barely above a breath.

“It’s worse when he sleeps.” Arthur hissed. “He snores worse than Father.”

“Your papa snores?”

Unbidden, an image of James relaxed in sleep popped into her mind. Candace had always thought of snoring as distasteful—something smelly old men did. But when she applied the possibility to James, she found her opinion softened by affection.

“After he smokes a cigar. He says it’s a dirty habit, and I should never do it. But then he does it when he rides his horse alone, and he thinks I don’t know. As if he doesn’t smell like it when he comes back.” The boy punctuated his statement with a blergh, and Candace pressed her fist to her mouth to keep herself from laughing aloud.

They waited in silence for a while, until Arthur shifted beside her. “How long do you think this will take?”

“Impossible to say,” she whispered. “It depends upon how good people are at hiding, and how good your father is at seeking.”

“He’s the best,” the boy hissed back, confidently. “He’s the best at everything.”

In the darkness, Candace smiled. She remembered thinking the same of her own father once—that he was the pinnacle of excellence at everything. She was starting to hope that Arthur was right—it was stuffy in the bottom of the closet with her, Arthur, and a giant dog breathing the same air.

“This is fun,” Arthur commented a moment later. “Father won’t let me work on my new puzzle more than a quarter of an hour at a time. He says I’ll beat it too quickly.”

“When did you get a new puzzle? What is it?”