Claire Abbot sighed heavily, looking down at a tiny note that had been given to her not an hour before. It held a single name and address, nothing more. Less than a week from that moment she was expected to have extracted quite a bit of information from a certain Mr. Calvin Baker, or at least made initial contact. Military personnel. A higher up that, if she played her cards right, would get her where she wanted to be. He could give her endless possibilities of insight on England’s plans, which meant her cover-up of cheating, though socially damaging, must have shown she could be trusted to take one for the team.

Only problem was this marriage would put more focus on her being unavailable than she liked. While she may still be a virgin, Claire hadn’t exactly expected it to stay that way for very much longer. This probably would have been the man she’d be willing to give it up to…for the sake of her job, of course. But now it was [i]her[/i] that would be married. There were pros and cons to this, hopefully she wouldn’t be recognized, or the man wouldn’t care.

With one last look at the note Claire stood up and ripped it to pieces, tossing each shred in the trash. She wouldn’t forget the name, nor his home address, and she would get on it as soon as possible. The bad part about receiving her new objective was that it put her in a rather foul mood right before her meeting with Nicholas. He was due at any moment, and while she was physically ready, her mind wasn’t in it. Claire had chosen a simple pink dress that wasn’t nearly as fancy as the ones she normally wore out, short gloves, and her hair was up. A servant had suggested wearing something extraordinary to meet Nick, but the girl had only received a glare in response. She was not going to dress up just for him.

After a final glance in her floor length mirror Claire went downstairs, to make sure everything was being prepared. “I’m sure the Rochfords will want some tea, have that ready to be served before lunch,” she instructed, going to sit in the library as she awaited their arrival. Her stomach felt a little tight. Was she actually nervous? How silly, he was obviously faking his attraction for reasons unknown to her. There was no reason to care at all about this meeting, except to make her father happy and work out something quick with Nicholas.