Page 88 of A Scot Is Not Enough

Her giggle-snort was sweet music. She gave up on her vegetables and planted both elbows on the table. She smiled widely, the skin squishing the outer corners of her eyes.

“I love that about you. Your humor. No man makes me laugh so easily as you do.”

He sat taller under her praise.

“I would do much more for you.”

“I—I’m not sure that is wise. Not for a man of your ambitions. Our connection is already precarious.”

“But not impossible.” He let the moment breathe, then asked, “Are you still a staunch Jacobite?”

She tore off a bite of bread and stared at the fire’s cheery glow. “I grew up in a staunchly Jacobite home, yet I am... less ardent.”

“Making money in the heart of enemy territory can do that.”

Daylight caught dust motes in the kitchen. Cecelia was quiet, her eyes hazing as if she was retracing history.

“My first time in London was ’47. To collect my father after the Act of Indemnity freed the rebels,but the sergeant at arms turned me away. My father, a surgeon and a property owner, was considered a rebel of rank. Never mind that the English burned his house to the ground. I returned in ’48 and waited again at Tilbury Fort, quiet as a church mouse, if you can believe that. This time, a new sergeant at arms turned me away. In ’49, I received word the last of the prisoners were to be released.” She shivered, her fingers pinching her bread. “The sky was pissing rain that day. I could see theJane of Allowayanchored in the river, a sorry excuse of a ship. The stench from it was awful. I waited until the sergeant at arms informed me that my father had died the day before I arrived.”

“I’m sorry.”

His words were inadequate. Guilt was a peculiar pitchfork, heaping recriminations andwhat ifson her. It would do no good to remind Cecelia that her rebel father had made his decision; it would do no good because his daughter paid a price as one does in rebellion, and by the torment in her eyes, her debt was far from over. She had been a young woman visiting the City with no other family to speak of, and she’d been, what? All of nineteen then?

“There was the league, of course,” she went on. “At first, I didn’t want to be part of it. I was quite done with war and rebellion.”

Hers was a life built in two parts: the foundation laid in Scotland with a love for the Highlands and an unusual father, and the rest found in London. A young woman, making her own way in the world. She had claimed her father a freethinking Jacobite. How ironic, his daughter finding her liberty in the heart of the beast, as it were.

“I did what I could to honor my father. I found Mr. Munro, who took care of him on the prison hulk.”

“Mr. Munro... the hack driver.”

She nodded. “I paid the Commissioners of Scotland Yard on his behalf for his hackney license and I bought his horses. He found an abandoned carriage in a warehouse in Southwark. Mr. Munro had been Arisaig’s wheelwright before the war, so he was quite skilled in repairing it. And, like me, he had nothing left in Arisaig.”

“You are his business partner. The same for each person on the list.”

“I am.”

He was humbled by her story. She had every right to be indignant with him. Cecelia MacDonald was nothing more than a woman of business with a good heart.

He scraped his fork through his vegetables. “How did you get the funds to start these businesses?”

“Gambling.” Daylight shined on her bitter smile. “I came to London with the clothes on my back and the lessons in commerce my father taught me. I used my paltry winnings to help Mr. Munro. In return, he pays me a portion of the profits once a month and—”

“He drives you around London.”

“—free of charge.” She smiled angelically. “The benefit of commerce and friendship. Eventually, my portion grew such that I could start other ventures.”

“What about the ostentatious robin’s egg blue carriage?”

“That is Miss Elspeth Cooper-Brooke’s folly. She rents the carriage, the horses, the coachman, and an attendant to me when her passion forvingt-et-unexceeds her monthly allowance.”

“What an enterprising woman.”

“Thank you.” She nursed her tea with both hands and sipped.

He picked up the list. “What about the dyer?”

“That would be Morag, Jenny’s sister. Her husband died on theJane of Alloway. Morag lives here in Dowgate. She’s very talented with dyes.”