It didn’t take long to figure out the filing system Gray used, and it brought an unwilling smile to her face. He organized the work by plant taxonomy, making the files nearly irresistible to her botanist’s heart. Most of the information was about herbs, but he had files on orchids, cacti, and roses. Why roses? Why would a stern man like Gray Delacroix be interested in something as frivolous as roses? She desperately wanted to know. Every time she learned something new about Gray, it revived her fascination with him.

Unless he was a traitor. Hopefully she could absolve him of that charge. She closed the file on Mexican roses to continue looking for information about Cuban revolutionaries. The faster she paged through documents, the harder she prayed she would find nothing.

And it seemed her prayers were answered. After three days she’d found no evidence to implicate him in treasonous activity. Nothing! She’d gone practically cross-eyed reading shipping records, account ledgers, and scientific reports. She’d even read the letters Gray sent home to his father. At first it was in search of suspicious dealings, but it was impossible to look for such evidence without reading the personal messages as well.

And in so doing, she fell a little in love with him. These letters were stunning in their beauty and the affinity between Gray and his father. Most of it was business, but each letter carried a few personal sentiments as well. Many of Gray’s letters included sketches of the ports he visited, charcoal rubbings of interesting leaves, even a few drawings of the people he met, and he was a surprisingly good artist.

Everything about this job was troubling, but as she neared the end of the files, a seed of hope took root. She stood on the edge of being able to exonerate Gray and return to her normal, mundane scientific job. There were still more letters in the trunk of personal family correspondence to read, but those seemed the least likely to contain anything nefarious. She’d found nothing so far, and each night she prayed nothing would emerge.

Gray finished Sense and Sensibility shortly after Annabelle brought it to him. He hadn’t read a book for pleasure in decades, and Jane Austen’s merciless social commentary was impressive. The social-climbing Mrs. Fanny Dashwood, with her sense of entitlement and ravenous greed, reminded him of the Magruders. Despite his muscle aches, despite his fever and exhaustion, he lit every lamp in his bedroom to stay awake and keep turning the pages late into the evenings.

As for Annabelle’s assertion that he reminded her of Colonel Brandon, well, it was probably a compliment. The character was a little stuffy, but a man of honor on whom his entire family could depend.