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eyes.
    â€œI don’t. But most other people do, including those who wish to be guests at your inn. My father makes a great effort every holiday season to entice patrons with special Christmas treats and decorations.” She gave him a pointed look. “Perhaps if you did the same, you might have a few more of your rooms rented.”
    He grunted in response.
    â€œI’d even suggest you put a tree in the window,” Penelope continued. “Ever since Her Majesty took up the tradition, my father has adorned our home with a tree in the front parlor, which is decorated with glass balls and tinsel. Everyone speaks of how lovely it is. This year, he even put one in the window of his shop.”
    She experienced an unexpected pang at the thought of the brightly lit window in which her father took such pride.
    She started up the stairs toward what she’d come to think of as “her” room. The mail coach was coming by tomorrow, which meant she had to finish writing the message. Because she was limited to ten words for a telegraph, each word had to be of the utmost importance. Yet even if her father didn’t respond to her message, she was beginning to think that Mr. Harvey wouldn’t throw her out on her ear. Certainly it wasn’t as if he needed the room free for another guest.
    As she reached the landing, a deep male voice floated up toward her.
    Penelope went to the banister and peered down at the foyer. A tall, dark-haired man wearing spectacles stood at the front counter, his overcoat damp and boots splattered with mud. Despite the disarray of his appearance, he held himself with a straight, undeniable dignity that lent him an almost regal air. A valise rested at his feet, and he held his hat in one hand as he spoke to Mr. Harvey.
    Something about him seemed vaguely familiar, but Penelope couldn’t place him. Before she could back away from the railing, he looked up. Their gazes met, and a curious jolt of awareness coursed through Penelope’s body. She tightened her hands on the railing.
    Darius Hall. What was he…?
    â€œI’d thought to find you in the Orkney Islands with your beloved,” he said, a chill infusing his voice.
    Shock flooded her. “How did you know where I’d gone?”
    â€œYour father showed me your letter.” His voice coiled upward in the air toward Penelope, so strangely tangible that she imagined it was composed of dark colors. Midnight blue, ocher, dusky red.
    â€œI spent less than five seconds determining where you’d gone,” Darius continued. “I promised your father I would return you to London posthaste.”
    Penelope gripped the banister. Though she’d told her father in the letter that she was leaving to start a new life, she hadn’t told him that she’d planned to do so with Simon Wilkie. She wondered if her father had come to the same conclusion Darius had as to her intentions.
    â€œYou followed me all this way?” she asked.
    â€œYes. I’d have been here sooner but ran into train delays in Aberdeen.” His eyes narrowed into slits of dark glass. “Where is Wilkie?”
    Penelope straightened her spine and tried to keep her voice even. “In Belman Castle, I believe. With his rather overbearing mother.”
    She could almost see Darius’s mind working as he figured out all the hidden implications of that remark.
    â€œYou’ve saved me a longer journey, then,” he said. “I’d planned to take tomorrow’s steamer out to Kirkwall.”
    â€œAnd do what?” Penelope replied tartly. “Abduct me from the prison of Belman Castle?”
    â€œIf need be, yes.”
    Penelope’s face flared with heat. He’d come all this way with the intention of rescuing her…er, abducting her from Belman Castle?
    â€œYou’re here alone, then?” Darius asked.
    Oh, heavens. Either she had to confess that Simon the Coward had cried off their