‘No,’ she said. ‘I found it in the book. How did you get hold of it?’Richard ignored her question. ‘So you are claiming that neither the book nor the sheet of paper belongs to you?’ he asked.His high-handed manner lit a flicker of temper in Deb. ‘I am not claiming anything,’ she said sharply. ‘I am telling you that that is not my book. You should know—you gave it to me yourself!’Richard took the book from her hand and turned it over, scrutinising it. A shadow of a smile touched his mouth. ‘It is certainly not the copy that I gave to you, but that does not mean it is not yours,’ he said smoothly. ‘Presumably you had a copy that you were using before you received my gift?’Deb glared at him. ‘I am not entirely sure of the purpose of your questions, Lord Richard,’ she said cuttingly, ‘nor by what right you are asking them—’ She broke off as a cart came around the corner of the road, its wheels churning the dust, harness jingling. Richard gave one sharp glance over his shoulder, caught her arm and bundled her unceremoniously through the wooden gate and into the shrubbery, along the mossy path and past the tangled ranks of holly and laurel.Deb was taken aback at the manoeuvre.
