Page 13 of Felicity Cabot Sells Her Soul (Scandalous Sisters #3)

Seven o’clock this evening, and Felicity had arrived looking somewhat less harried and exhausted.

Even if she was garbed in another of those wretched black dresses and that same ratty old grey coat, at least she wasn’t drenched to the skin or furiously angry.

But she did look alarmingly smug, practically preening with gratification from the moment Butler had shown her into the dining room.

She had a story there, tucked into the hints of a smirk that threatened to sneak across her face, full of whichever bits of revenge she’d grasped for today.

And she was plainly eager to regale him with it.

At least she would be talking this evening.

Ian slipped his watch from his pocket and placed it on the table before him.

“Seven on the dot,” he said. “Sit. Dinner is about to be served.” Felicity selected the chair farthest from him precisely as he had expected she would and dropped into it.

A frown briefly creased her brow as she glanced down at the place setting before her, and her gaze slid over the length of the table as she realized it was the only other one upon it apart from his own.

Realizing, too, he supposed, that she had once again behaved entirely as he had predicted.

The smirk fled in favor of a scowl. “Wine?” he asked.

“No.” She nudged the empty glass that had been set before her away, and picked up her soup spoon as a footman set a bowl of white soup before her.

She frowned again as she tasted it, muttering something beneath her breath.

If she had found fault with it, Ian knew she certainly would have made it plain.

But he enjoyed the little pleat of vexation that notched itself between her brows—annoyance, he thought, that she could make no particular complaint as to the quality.

“I was inundated today with prospective employees,” Felicity said as she sipped.

“Nellie tells me I have you to thank for that.” A figure of speech, he assumed, for the snide tone of her voice suggested she had no intention of thanking him whatsoever.

“I was under the impression the school was in need of a few more hands.” An understatement to be sure.

“How many did you hire?” “All of them.” And there it was, that smirk unleashed at last. Had they not been in the company of a handful of servants, Ian suspected she might well have kicked her feet in glee and wiggled in her seat like an overexcited puppy.

“All of them,” he said. “Hmm.” The soup was good this evening.

In truth it was always good, but there was something to be said for the extra flair that was Felicity’s company for it, even if she was less pleased to be present than she was for the opportunity to needle him.

He was pleased, regardless. “ All of them,” she reiterated, as if he might have somehow misunderstood.

“And I daresay we’ll have the best paid staff in the county.

Perhaps even the country.” Ian swiped his napkin over his mouth until he had managed to quell the half-smile that wanted to linger at the corner of his lips and waved the last of his soup away.

“Probably wise,” he said. “A household can find itself in a precarious position if its staff are not well-treated and well-paid, for they will certainly seek better.” That smirk faded just a shade, just for a moment.

But she girded herself once more as a footman set down a salad of leafy greens with a tart dressing.

“Of course, your solicitor did tell Nellie that you would be paying for it—and all other expenses the school incurs. I believe she has got it in writing.” “She has,” he said lightly, and her smirk faded further, edging toward a pout as she stabbed the tines of her fork down upon a sprig of watercress.

“The cost will be…exorbitant,” she said as she chewed.

“The school will have the finest of everything. I’ll insist upon it.

” “My solicitor has got a list of merchants,” he said.

“Ones which ought to meet with your approval.” And whom he knew already to be honest in their dealings, providing quality wares and services.

Her smirk faltered in full, her shoulders slumping.

“You’re not angry?” “Do you want me to be angry?” And there; a flush of heat into her cheeks, her grand plan foiled even before she had conceived of it.

“I swear I will spend you into the poorhouse,” she said sourly, and the tines of her fork scraped the plate in her efforts to spear another bite.

“You’re welcome to try.” Ian suppressed a wince at the next scrape of her fork.

“Buy yourself a new wardrobe while you’re about it.

Yours is woefully out of date.” “I don’t want your damned money for myself,” she gritted out between the clench of her teeth.

“I won’t be grateful for your largesse, or beholden to you, or—or—” “Have I asked you to be?” Her eyes narrowed to slits in a glare that would have felled a lesser man at twenty paces.

“I mean to say,” she hissed, “that you will never see a penny of profit from the school. There will be no return on your investment.” Ah.

She’d unknowingly made a bad bargain, and now she wanted to hand him the same, however she had to do it.

“Then you’ve misunderstood,” he said. “I don’t care if the school is profitable.

The school is not the investment. You are the investment.

If it pleases you to turn your school into the most extravagant institution outside of London, then you have my leave to do so.

I can bear the expense of it.” A high, tinny laugh, rife with disappointed hopes and the undeniable shrillness of resentment.

“I truly will beggar you.” “My money makes money,” Ian said.

“I work because I’d be bored out of my damned mind if I did not, not because I require the funds.

” Although if she truly did intend to make good on that threat, perhaps he’d be wise to continue on as he had.

As a footman swept her largely-untouched salad away and replaced it with a fresh plate, he said, “You missed the lamb evening last, but my cook does exemplary beef as well.” Her cheeks hollowed as she considered her plate, utensils clutched in her fists.

“What time is it?” she inquired icily. Ian glanced down at his pocket watch.

“You owe me forty-seven minutes still.” An exasperated sigh drifted across her lips, but she slumped back in her chair and began to carve off dainty bites of beef.

Plotting as she did, no doubt, how she might next attempt to get the better of him.

Ian let several minutes tick by in silence, resolved to let her enjoy her meal, even if she was unlikely to admit to it.

Neither of them were particularly accustomed to lingering over meals as some were wont to do; he knew Felicity was accustomed to taking meals with the students at her school, while he had never seen much of a point in confining himself to a table set for one for hours on end.

When she at last laid down her silverware, he said, “Perhaps you would like a tour of the house.” “I would not.” Simple, crisp—excoriating.

Had he been foolish enough to expect anything better, he might have been devastated.

“Allow me to rephrase,” he said as he slipped his watch back into his pocket and rose to his feet.

“I am going to walk the house, and you still owe me thirty-two minutes.” Her lips pursed into the beginnings of a pout.

“Is there to be no dessert?” “There might be,” he said as he headed for the door, “if you could be trusted not to dally over it for the remainder of my time.” Felicity drew in a sharp breath, and the legs of her chair scraped across the floor as she pushed it back.

“ You ,” she said, in all incredulity, “don’t trust me .

” “I really do not,” Ian said, adjusting the cuffs off his sleeves as he paused by the door.

“Don’t take it personally. It’s just that I’m well aware that you would gleefully skewer me if you thought you could get away with it.

” His gaze flicked toward the knife she had left laying upon her plate.

“I wouldn’t advise it.” Her hands flexed at her sides, the set of her shoulders suggesting he ought to guard his tongue more wisely than he had.

“I’m rarely given to taking advice from the enemy.

” Ian rolled his eyes. “I’m not your enemy,” he said, “even if you would cast me in that role. But the house is rather large, and the staff have duties to which to attend. They can’t be expected to come find you whenever you’ve gotten turned around simply because you refuse to learn the layout.

Come along, then—thirty minutes, and you’ll be relieved of my company for the evening.

” And as it turned out, that had done the trick.

She followed, rather insolently in his opinion, some ten steps behind as he turned down a hall leading toward the rear of the house, pausing only to receive a lamp offered by a footman to light their way.

“The public rooms are all on the ground floor,” he said.

“There’s the drawing room to your right, and the library just there.

” “You have a library?” At last, a note of interest in her voice.

“Of course I have got a library. A house this size has got to have a library.” One day—perhaps years into the future, given her present antipathy toward him—he would tell her what an effort it had been to find the perfect house.

That he hadn’t purchased it for himself, but for her.

For them . But at this moment it just one more thing she wouldn’t want to hear.

She might not want to like this house—because he came with it—but she’d lost a bit of that sullen resistance which had put a plod into her steps.

Those green, green eyes lingered now over the details she had once steadfastly ignored, if not with true interest, then at least with speculation.

That charming little furrow was once more knit between her brows, as if some tiny hint of suspicion had tugged at the edges of her mind.

“The portrait gallery,” he said as he turned once more.

“Through here.” A derisive sniff as she glanced about at the bare walls.

“It’s empty.” “I haven’t got any portraits.

” Yet . “Although if you’d like to sit for one…

” “I wouldn’t.” Ah, well. It had been worth a try.

He had no noble ancestors who might have graced the walls and no particular eye for art himself.

So the walls would stay bare, then, unless Felicity cared to fill them.

“The private rooms are upstairs,” he said as he continued down the gallery.

“If you have need of an office, there are vacant rooms suitable. Butler can help find you one to your liking.” “My office is at the school.” Contrary to the damned last. Ian crammed his hand into his pocket, withdrew his watch once more.

Twenty-three minutes left. Not as much time as he would have liked—but then, it never would have been.

“Last stop for the evening,” he said. “We’ll get to the rest another time.

” He cast open the doors at the rear of the gallery, and a brisk breeze slipped in from the outdoors.

Behind him, he heard her brief inhale at the sudden shock of cold.

“It’s December,” she said irritably, and there was the rustle of her clothing, that wretched grey coat being wrenched tighter about her.

“I know.” It didn’t matter that it was December, that half the plants were dead and the other half were frozen.

Felicity had always had a particularly vivid imagination.

She would be able to see it anyway. He knew she would.

“Wait,” he said, stretching out one arm to block the path through the door.

“My kiss. I haven’t received it today.” A sound of exasperation curled up her throat.

Quick as the strike of a snake she popped up onto her toes and planted a perfunctory peck upon the side of his jaw—half a kiss at best, since she’d got a sliver of the collar of his shirt along with it.

“May I now go?” she inquired, the icy tone of her voice somehow even more frigid than the breeze that blew inside through the open doors.

“By all means,” he said, and strode out into the night, confident that she would follow.

Just as he thought, her breath caught as she crossed the threshold behind him.

Her hand stretched out, snatched the lamp from his hand—and she continued on past him without a second thought.

In moments all he could see of her was the glow of the lantern, the occasional flicker of the light across her face, the stunned wonder she could not hide.

Ian settled himself beside the door, his shoulders pressed to the cold stone of the outer wall.

Watching in silence as Felicity wandered the garden—and waiting, pocket watch in hand, for the last of his allotted time to wind down to nothing once more.