Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
“I do not care for this.” When Quinn Wentworth, known to the best society as His Grace of Walden, took a situation into dislike, his voice radiated his displeasure as clearly as a winter night crackled with cold. “I don’t like this at all, Jane.”
Her Grace of Walden, whom the duke esteemed exceedingly, was accustomed to her husband’s moods and tempers.
She was less adept at dealing with his worries, so thoroughly did he usually hide them from sight.
She was learning, though. With each passing year of marriage, Jane felt closer to her husband and to the family she’d married into.
“Joshua might not have been on the ship,” she said, topping up her tea cup. “He might have decided not to risk a winter passage after all.”
Quinn sent a disgusted look at the window. “He promised me, Jane. Said he’d be here by the New Year. Why didn’t I tell him that spring would suit? Why did I send him to the rubbishing New World to begin with?”
From worry to woe. The sitting room boasted a few cloved oranges hanging in the windows, and the ties holding back the burgundy velvet drapes had been decorated with sprigs of holly.
The oranges and spice scented the room with a rich aroma Jane had always associated with Yuletide, and the snow drifting down outside should have been pretty.
Her Grace rose and moved around the sitting room to deposit herself in her husband’s lap.
“You did not send Joshua to New York. He sent himself.” Jane had a few theories as to why Joshua had banished himself. Of a certainty, opening a bank branch in New York had been shrewd business, but shrewd business could hide a multitude of more complicated personal motivations.
Quinn’s arms came around her, and his chin rested against her temple. The sense of peace and safety Jane had found with her unlikely spouse still surprised her, still counted as one of her greatest blessings.
“Joshua did not send himself,” Quinn rumbled. “He looked about, saw that his banking partner was newly besotted, and took a notion to absent himself. If he needed a respite, why not just go to Paris?”
“He went to New York because the Americans have money. Now we have some of their money, thanks to Joshua.”
Quinn shifted, which allowed Jane to snuggle closer.
Her husband always smelled good, no matter the hour of the day or season of the year.
He was fanatic about his personal hygiene and immaculate in his dress.
Years clawing his way up from the gutter had given the duke a focus on hygiene and attire that the Joshua Penroses of the world acquired by casual right of birth.
“Of course the Americans prosper,” Quinn said. “They are a nation of unchecked thieves. Their papas and grandpapas stole fortunes from nearly every shop owner and manufactory in England.”
Even for Quinn, that was bitter and exaggerated. “England lost the war, Quinn.” Nearly two generations ago. “Victors generally dictate the terms, and some of the Americans did pay their British creditors.”
“Damn few. The larger the debt, the less likely it was ever paid. Privilege of the peerage, American-style. A banker recalls these things. And I sent Joshua to deal with that lot.”
Quinn was a superb banker, in part because he excelled past all bounds at carrying responsibility. For his family, for his customers, and certainly for the only man willing to throw in with him when the City itself was betting that Quinn’s bank would fail.
“Joshua has managed quite well in New York,” Jane said, kissing Quinn’s cheek. “The bank will benefit enormously from the years he spent across the sea.”
“Joshua did not benefit.”
Jane rose. This was a topic they’d danced around for more than a year. “You don’t know that, Quinn. If I was carried away by an ague tomorrow, would you regret having married me?”
Quinn was on his feet, Jane’s hand seized in a warm grip. “Don’t speak like that. Don’t speak of the devil and draw him nigh. I could never, ever regret marrying you.”
“But you assume Joshua regrets marrying his Maureen. His letters were ebullient, Quinn. Over the moon, rhapsodic, top over tail. He’d found his true love at long last and blessed the ship that had brought him to New York.”
Quinn cradled Jane’s hand against his cheek. To employees, competitors, or slacking tradesmen, he could be the most forbidding judge they ever encountered. When private with Jane, he was unfailingly affectionate.
“Joshua has likely since cursed his decision to leave England, assuming he didn’t jump overboard.”
Dark thoughts indeed, but then, Quinn had dwelled in hell and faced death on his way to the peerage. “Quinton Wentworth, what in the name of the herald angels put such morbid thoughts into your head?”
“He hasn’t sent word of his arrival, has he? The snow was already a foot deep when his ship docked yesterday. He knows we expect him to spend the holidays with us, and yet… we have no idea where he is. If ever I lost you, Jane…”
“Joshua did not jump overboard. Winter makes you morose, Quinn. London boasts any number of comfortable inns where Joshua might have stayed.”
“I hate winter.” Quinn dropped Jane’s hand and went to the window. A casual glance might miss the fact that it was even snowing, so fine were the flakes. Sneaky snow like this would add up by the hour.
“I am not fond of the darkness,” Quinn said, “or the bitter cold. I am beyond intolerant of the forced joy of the holidays when, for many, the New Year will bring only hardship, or worse, no matter how many carols they sing in December. You do not want to be a banker in December, Jane. January is even worse.”
Jane did not want to be a banker ever. “You feel responsible for Joshua’s sorrow, but, Quinn, that matter was entirely out of your hands. Influenzas, agues, and lung fevers come every winter.”
Jane joined him at the window and slipped an arm around his waist. She fit against him as she would never have fit a shorter man.
Another blessing. Their physical compatibility was the outward symbol of a union of respect and affection that baffled most of Quinn’s aristocratic peers.
But then, Quinn himself was an enigma to them too.
He worked hard, he had no use for appearances, and he was devoted to his family. He was neither a jumped-up cit nor a haughty toff. He was simply Quinn Wentworth, and if Jane ever lost him…
What Joshua must be suffering, to have buried a spouse at the holidays. No wonder he’d left New York rather than suffer through another Yuletide in the house he’d shared with his true love.
“A double cruelty,” Jane said, resting her head on Quinn’s shoulder. “To lose a wife and to lose the joy of the holidays. We cannot expect him to be our old Joshua.”
A rap on the sitting room door had Jane dropping her arm from Quinn’s waist. He was the duke, and his dignity, much less Jane’s, required occasional concessions to decorum.
“Enter,” Quinn growled.
Ned bounced through the door, cheeks ruddy, eyes alight, his dark hair damp with melting snowflakes.
He was leaving boyhood behind and emerging into manhood with a sense of self-possession Jane would never have predicted of a former pickpocket.
Ned wasn’t the spectacular specimen Quinn was, but dear Neddy was quietly handsome, if Jane said so herself, and people found him easy to talk to.
“He’s here,” Ned said, grinning. “Penrose left the docks on foot, heading toward the City.”
Thank heavens. “That is good news.” Jane approached Ned and fussed his tousled dark hair. “The traveler is on home shores. We’ll see him again soon.”
“Or,” Quinn said, “the traveler was set upon by footpads and has expired behind a ruddy snowbank. Good work, Ned, but please keep looking.”
“We are, Your Grace. We won’t stop until we find him. Penrose knows his way about Town, and we’ll likely come across him being waited on hand and foot by some lucky innkeeper’s daughters.”
Ned departed at an exuberant pace, closing the sitting room door behind him unquietly.
“Ned is still at home on the streets,” Quinn said. “We’ve taken the pickpocket out of Newgate, but a bit of the urchin remains.”
“He’s quite grown up, Quinn, and a fine testament to your guiding influence.” And to Jane’s unwavering patience. Ned had been infernally quick as a boy and absolutely incapable of sitting still.
“We’re going to lose him,” Quinn said, wrapping Jane in a loose hug. “He’ll fall in love, and we’ll lose him to some dairymaid or seamstress.”
Quinn loved fiercely and forever. Jane adored that about him, but he had some odd notions about the particulars such devotion entailed. A loved one no longer needing protection left Quinn all at sea.
“The family will not lose Ned,” Jane said. “We will gain a dairymaid or seamstress. Honestly, Quinn. Must I order mistletoe hung from every lintel to improve your mood?”
His smile, always so warm and unexpected, held a hint of teasing. “Yes. Such measures will improve my mood significantly, though I will have to spend my days lurking in doorways.”
“You awful man.” Jane found herself challenged to an impromptu kissing match, which felt to her to be part mutual reassurance and part marital silliness.
“You know,” Quinn said when combat had been fought to an honorable draw, “Joshua did not suffer a double cruelty. If we consider the child, the blow was treble, at least.”
Jane had refrained from mentioning the boy, but Quinn never flinched in the face of difficult topics, another necessary quality in a banker.
“Awful blows, I agree,” Jane said, “but Joshua is home now, and recovery from fate’s buffeting is always easier with good friends about. I have it on the best authority that companionship in this life can make all the difference.”
“Some duke or other told you that?”
“A grouchy banker. Come along, Quinn. I will need help hanging another two dozen sprigs of mistletoe.”
Quinn came along, but Jane knew he would not be truly amenable to holiday cheer until Joshua Penrose was found, safe and sound.