She shook out her skirts and then tossed a smile back over one shoulder, countering Reeve’s question with one of her own. “Are my clothes still upstairs in our room, or have you tossed them out?”

Reeve scowled, wishing he could find it within himself to toss Loretta, as well as her damned clothes, out into the storm. “I don’t come here very often, Loretta,” he said evenly. “So your clothes are just where you left them.”

Loretta was shaking out her voluminous skirts again, leaving puddles of rainwater on the hearth. “Good,” she sighed softly, and then she countered that gentleness by flinging back her head and yelling, “Kala!”

Reeve winced, but before he could protest Loretta’s officious manner, Kala had appeared, silent as always, her expression questioning.

“I want a hot bath drawn,” Loretta dictated snappishly, “and I’ll have a glass of sherry the moment I’m settled in the tub. Once you’ve brought that, you may lay out—let’s see—my blue lawn gown. The one with the feathers stitched to the neckline.”

“Loretta—” Reeve began in a dangerous rumbling voice as Kala hurried off to start the bathwater running.

Loretta turned, her face puckered into a childish pout. “Oh, Reeve—surely you wouldn’t deny me the comforts of your home on such a nasty night! I don’t have anywhere else to go, after all—”

“You have the inn. And I’m taking you there as soon as you’ve changed clothes, so you might want to put on something more practical than lawn and feathers!”

Loretta’s dark eyes snapped. “So it’s true! You have brought that little Yankee scrap into this house!”

Loretta’s network of efficient informants never ceased to amaze Reeve. “Surely you didn’t come all the way from Sydney just to see if Maggie would be here?”

“Of course I didn’t. I knew you were here to race Samaritan and I came to try to talk some sense into you.”

Reeve kept his distance, his arms folded across his chest, one eyebrow rising in silent question.

“I can’t accept that it’s over,” Loretta said briskly. “You loved me once and I’ll make you love me again.”

“I never loved you and you never loved me, Loretta,” Reeve pointed out. “We agreed on that from the beginning, didn’t we?”

Theatrical tears swelled in Loretta’s eyes, shimmering in the firelight. “My feelings have changed.”

“Actually, it’s your fortunes that have changed, isn’t it? Have you found your allowance inadequate for your needs, my dear?”

“You’re a beast,” Loretta muttered miserably, going so far as to let her shoulders sag and lower her head a little. “How can you say such things, after all I’ve been to you?”