Page 75 of The Ladies Least Likely
“Call me Mal. Please.”
“Far too forward.” Her gaze fell again. He watched the sweep of her long, dark eyelashes on that soft cheek and his fingers itched to follow. He curled both hands around his coffee cup to keep them in place.
He was already using her Christian name in his head. He’d known her less than a day, but the hours they’d spent together made her feel familiar. He had more insight into her history and character than with many casual acquaintances he’d known for years.
And nothing he’d seen so far suggested she might engage in illicit activities.
He swallowed the rest of his coffee, letting the hot liquid refresh his brain. “So it remains to hire the most expensive servants. But without any ready source of income to cover their salary.”
Briefly he related the gist of his conversation with Rosenfeld, who had suggested it might take some time to grant Mal provisional guardianship of the children, and with Mr. Coutts, who was prepared to stand a loan provided Mal had some guarantee he would ever be in a position to repay it.
She remained silent for a moment, those lovely eyes veiled. “I may be able to propose something,” she said at last.
“We can’t sell off things from the house.” Most of the valuable ornaments were gone already, and the furnishings and fixtures belonged to Hunsdon.
Her eyes narrowed. “The children need to eat, Mr. Grey.”
He wrestled down his pride, which took an effort. “What do you propose?”
“I suggest you visit the hiring agency the matron told me about and arrange for a handful of prospects to come interview at the house. In the meantime, if you drop me at my house, I will look into—a matter there. You may meet me at Mr. Karim’s bookshop when you are free.
It is in Queen’s Head Passage, just off Paternoster Row. ”
“The Moor’s bookshop?” He startled at the name, with which he had but recently become acquainted.
Her eyes flashed with anger, and color rose in her cheek. “If you are reluctant to patronize the premises of a Moor, as you call him, you may of course wait for me outside.”
She was beautiful in her wrath, like an avenging goddess of old. Mal decided it was not time to bring up Mr. Thorkelson, his weighty file, his interesting intelligence.
In the course of appraising the estate of a recently deceased scholar, Thorkelsons her eyes were bright and her smile quick and wide.
“ óla , Inez. Is everything well? Did Joseph leave for Hunsdon House this morning?”
“All’s well as can be, though Mr. Illingworth didn’t like the broa I baked for him.” Inez wrinkled her nose. “A finicky eater, is he?”
“I thought I smelled cornmeal. I’ll take a piece or two with me, if there’s extra. I think your bread is delicious, and I appreciate you cooking for him on top of everything else.”
“If only he appreciated it.” Inez sniffed. “I mean to earn my keep, senhorita. You’ve given me charity enough.”
“I’ll ask you to stay a few more days, then. It looks like we need some time to set things in order at Hunsdon House.”
Inez’s dark brown eyes widened. “Is it very grand? Mr. Illingworth wouldn’t tell me a word about it.”
“It’s—” Amaranthe hesitated.
Nothing about Hunsdon House appealed to her as a place people could feel at home in.
The front state rooms, meant for public entertainment, were built and furnished on a grand scale, compounded of so many rich beauties that the eyes could hardly take them all in.
The rest of the place, like her bedchamber, struck her as stiff and empty.
Only the small parlor where the family had dined together had felt anything close to comfortable.
Being in Hunsdon House was like being on a stage. One was aware every moment of what the station and the grandeur demanded. She was glad she did not have to live there.
“It is grand,” Amaranthe allowed. “Are there any apples left in the barrel? I might take one or two with me as well. I have more errands to run, and then I must return to Hunsdon House and speak with Joseph.”
“I can have dinner here for him, if he wants it,” Inez said. “He needn’t go by the cookshop, as he threatened to do.”
“I think you needn’t take the trouble tonight, as I shall ask him to dinner at Hunsdon House. Take the evening to rest and enjoy yourself.”
“I will, at that, and perhaps he’ll settle his feathers as well.”
Amaranthe watched as Inez flounced from the room, her curiosity stirred. Joseph was customarily the most sweet-tempered of men, so why was he being contrary with Inez?
She had larger concerns at the moment. Her manuscripts were locked in a small cedar cabinet beneath the window seat, beside the cabinet where she locked her tools and paints.
Amaranthe drew her fingers over the tight folds of vellum and paper, pressed with heavy boards to keep the pages flat and the edges crisp.
It took a moment to decide which volume would be the most ready source of funds, and of most immediate interest to Mr. Karim.
She withdrew a stack of folio-sized pages and tucked them carefully into a leather valise.
She was relocking the cabinet, concealing its precious contents, when Inez reappeared with a small bundle of bread wrapped in a napkin.
“Will you return here tonight to sleep, senhorita ?”
Amaranthe’s mind flitted to the candlelight glowing on the faces of the children last night as they enjoyed a warm, filling dinner, their first in days.
She lingered overlong on the memory of Grey’s face sculpted by candlelight, the casual queue in his unpowdered hair.
The look of amused dismay on his face when she noticed the old duke’s collection of bosomy mermaids and other half-clad female figures on the shelves of the study.
The quiet, dark library and its many secrets, including, somewhere, the book she sought.
“I think to be gone at least one more night, but not longer,” Amaranthe said.
The other woman smiled shyly. “You look very fine. They dress you there, then?”
“This was left by the duchess, who seems to have departed the country. I am only borrowing it to—ah…”
She had no good reason to be wearing this gown, and Amaranthe glanced self-consciously at the indigo silk. It had begun to feel natural to be dressed so grandly. That would never do, since in a day she’d be back to plain Amaranthe Illingworth, a pigeon, no longer a dove.
And she would no longer attract the attention of men like Grey’s friend from the coffeehouse, or see heads turning in the street to regard them as they passed in the curricle.
Or the look Grey himself wore when she pranced into the parlor that morning to meet him.
She didn’t know why that look, or the strange, awakened feeling it gave her, would not leave her mind.
“I find it quite dismaying how much better one is treated when one wears a gown like this,” Amaranthe said.
Inez’s face darkened with a scowl. “Don’t I know that,” she muttered, and on that note, Amaranthe left.