Page 4 of A Waltz on the Wild Side (The Wild Wynchesters #6)

The next morning, with Rufus underfoot, Viv cooked breakfast while straining to read snippets of the new novel she was enjoying.

The book was propped up against a water pitcher and held open with a rolling pin.

Between cracking eggs and flipping fried potatoes, the scene she was reading was rising to an exciting apex—when it cut off mid-word because the rest of the paragraph was hidden behind the wooden rolling pin.

She reached out with her elbow to nudge the rolling pin out of the way when the front door flew open. Quentin strode inside, the morning newspaper beneath his arm and a new mountain of letters piled in his hands.

Viv served breakfast for herself and her cousin but picked up a handful of correspondence rather than her fork. She broke the wax seals with a knife. “Question for the advice column… Question for the advice column… Another question for the advice column… And new letters from my colleagues!”

Using the word colleague was the opposite of brutal honesty. “Colleague” was a big fat fib. Viv’s playwright friends were paid professionals, who’d all had at least one play performed in a major theater.

Viv had never received so much as a flicker of interest from a minor theater.

Or even successfully tempted the amateurs who acted out scenes at parties or in parks for a lark.

But these talented playwrights were the best friends she had. They were going to be her colleagues. She just had to work harder. Be better than everyone else. And eventually, by God, someone, somewhere, would have no choice but to give her a chance.

It was hard enough to convince the male-dominated world to take a female seriously.

Much less an immigrant. Much less a Black woman.

Much less a would-be playwright. There were unspoken rules about whose stories deserved to be told, and people like her did not qualify.

No matter how fine the writing might be.

She tried to concentrate on sifting through her post. The next three missives in a row were rejections from various theaters for her play about suffrage. She had so hoped the manager of the Olympic might at least have considered … Well, it was their loss.

If Viv could write her own future, it might read like:

Olympic Theater : Please allow us to perform your magnificent play, Miss Henry.

Vivian : I’m sorry, but the Opera House has already paid handsomely for the exclusive rights for the next full year.

Olympic Theater : Then let us have something else you’ve written. Anything at all.

Vivian : Well… I do have a play about Black suffragists.

And another about the atrocities committed by British and European plantation owners on their slaves.

And another about the evils perpetuated in South Asia by the East India Company.

And another about the irreparable harm done by the British monarchy in its relentless attempts to colonize and subjugate existing communities throughout the world.

Olympic Theater : Yes! Splendid! We’ll take them all! It is past time that such truths be told, and your voice is just the one to speak out.

Unfortunately, it was just a fantasy. Particularly the scripts about suffrage. To even speak the words equal voting rights publicly risked being beheaded in the street.

Viv rose from the table to toss the letters into their specifically designated baskets in the corner.

Quentin watched her. “If you already know everyone is going to say no, then why do you keep trying?”

“They don’t all say no. Most don’t bother to respond at all. A small percentage reply with a variety of ‘I’m sure you’re a nice lady, but we receive hundreds of submissions from proven professionals and don’t have time to read the inferior first drafts from amateurs like you.’”

Quentin looked at the overflowing basket. “That’s a small percentage? How many times do you plan on asking?”

“As many as it takes. I can achieve anything if I’m good enough. The key to success is not giving up. I will succeed, and I’ll do it on my own.”

“You do everything on your own,” said Quentin. “Except eat. Your eggs are getting cold.”

Viv shoved a forkful into her mouth. He was right. Her carefully cooked eggs were now ghastly.

“I’d have more time,” she said carefully, “if I weren’t the only one managing the household chores.”

She hated how awkward it was to broach this topic.

On the one hand, it was unreasonable to expect her to accomplish twice as many tasks as could fit into a day.

On the other hand, Quentin wasn’t obliged to offer a roof over her head at all.

His meager trust was meant for him, not him and a hanger-on.

“Sorry, can’t help you,” he said with his mouth full. “Our secret society—”

“Quentin—”

“I mean ‘innocent group of non-seditious friends,’” he corrected himself. “In order to become the new wave of Wynchesters, we’re widening the region in which we operate—”

“You don’t have a region, and you don’t operate . No one with half a brain has mistaken you or any of your friends for an actual—”

“Yes, they have! They do . Every day!” he insisted. “No one knows how many Wynchesters there are, so it’s easy to pretend to be Nancy or Phineas or anyone else we make up.”

“I know exactly how many there are.”

True, but not the point. Viv was letting herself get swept into an old argument rather than insist they stay on a difficult topic.

Perhaps she never forced a reckoning about the uneven responsibilities in their household because some of the possible solutions would be worse than the problem.

“ You’re trying to change the world,” he said hotly. “Why shouldn’t I?”

Though she feared for her cousin every day, Viv didn’t want to stifle his spirit. They weren’t living in the dangerous environment where she’d been raised. Quentin’s biggest fear was spending his quarterly trust money too quickly, not the sting of a whip.

“And we do operate,” he insisted. “The Wynchesters are like Bow Street Runners, but better. Instead of helping only wealthy clients, they help anyone who needs them. That’s what my friends and I are doing.

Whatever we can, for whoever needs it. We might not have much impact now, but Newt and I have plans to—” His mouth shut tight with an audible click of the teeth.

Viv narrowed her eyes. She’d never heard of any Newt but already didn’t like him. “You’d better not have plans to do anything dangerous or stupid. Swear to me none of you are foolish enough to commit actual crimes.”

He glared at her stonily, then gave a single short nod.

It wasn’t a particularly convincing vow.

“I mean it,” she warned him. “Let your friends throw their lives away as they wish, but promise me you are clever enough never to even appear as though you might have been involved in something punishable by law.”

He lifted his chin.

She ground her teeth. This was why she hated the Wynchesters.

Aspiring to be like them was going to get her cousin killed.

At eighteen, Quentin was still young enough to believe himself invincible.

At eight-and-twenty, Viv was old enough to have seen firsthand how tragically mortal her loved ones really were.

She tried again. “The Seditious Meetings Act alone—”

“No one knows our secret society exists but you, and I’m sorry I ever told you,” Quentin burst out.

“I said we’re being careful. But if it makes you feel better, I’ll suggest we move our meetings.

No one will overhear us if we convene in the cellars of a sympathetic church, or deep in the canal tunnels, or if we’re outside the city in the mining caves. ”

“Canal tunnels?” she choked out. “They’d find you when your body floats up because you can’t swim! Either let me teach you how or stay away from the river.”

“No matter what I say or do, you always manage to find fault with it,” he said with disgust. “When will you stop treating me like a child?”

Was that what she was doing? Viv’s fears were well founded, but did that supersede his autonomy? She wondered if this was how mothers felt whose sons Quentin’s age eagerly joined the army, knowing the next time they saw their child, he might be in a casket.

If they could find the body at all.

“All right,” she forced herself to say. “I can script plays, but not your life. That’s for you to write. But as someone who loves you with all my heart, I can’t promise to stay silent if I think you’re making a terrible mistake.”

He snorted. “The only time you’re silent is when you’re sleeping, and probably not then, either.”

They exchanged tentative smiles, but the tension was still thick between them. At least today he’d left his fresh twists alone and looked mostly like himself. If a bit overdressed for eight o’clock in the morning.

She raised her brows. “Who are you supposed to be this time?”

“Baron Vanderbean,” he said proudly.

Viv frowned. “Didn’t he die a few years ago? As an old man?”

“The Wynchesters’ estranged adoptive brother inherited his father’s title.” Quentin smoothed his hands down the lapels of his finest dark-blue frock coat. A coordinating pale-blue waistcoat peeked beneath his extravagantly folded cravat. “Today, that’s me.”

Viv didn’t have the heart to tell him his clothes were handsome, but not aristocratic quality. A more pertinent detail would give up the ruse at first glance.

“Wouldn’t that be… a white man?”

“He doesn’t have to be. The Vanderbean barony is from Balcovia. That’s an abolitionist nation. Which means the baron could look like anyone, including me.”

“Still improbable,” she murmured.

“Is it? My natural father was a white British lord. If he’d married my mother, I would have an aristocratic title right now.”

“But he didn’t and you don’t. And you wouldn’t have anything to do with the Wynchesters if you were titled, either.”

“You don’t know that. In fact…” His eyes lit up. “You can do anything you put your mind to. Find a way for me to have an audience with the Wynchesters!”

“Over my dead body.”