4. The Mysterious Mr. Moore #2
Words left Kate completely after that statement.
This was something so unusual for her that she couldn’t find any retort to Mr. Moore’s witted remarks.
Not conditional praise dependent on her being ‘remarkable for a woman’ or accomplishing something ‘despite her sex’—just acknowledgment of expertise without qualification.
She suddenly felt a flutter in her stomach, something she had never felt before. Not in this particular way, anyway.
A dock worker approached with papers requiring signatures, breaking the spell between them. He naturally addressed Mr. Moore. “Begging your pardon, sir, but these need the Sullivan signature.”
“Then you should present them to Miss Sullivan,” Mr. Moore said at once, “as I have no authority here.”
The worker hesitated briefly before turning to Kate, who signed the paper without another word. When the man departed, Kate returned her full attention to her companion.
“You don’t make a very convincing gentleman, Mr. Moore.”
Something in his expression flashed almost imperceptible. Surprise? Amusement?
“How so?” he simply asked.
“You lack the proper arrogance.”
He smiled then, a wide, full smile that transformed his face completely.
Kate’s thoughts scattered. She couldn’t help but catalog features she had no business studying so closely: lips too rounded for a man, sharp cheekbones, the fine line of his nose, the neat beard at his chin.
Somehow, the combination struck her as extremely handsome in a distinctly masculine way, which made no sense at all given what she knew about herself.
But it was the smile itself that held her, the genuine warmth of it reflected in his eyes, opening his expression completely. Unguarded and free of any pretension.
Time seemed to slow. A breeze passed by, lifting her hair, but she felt nothing beyond this moment. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d been so thoroughly arrested by something as simple as a smile. Especially a man’s smile.
“Perhaps… I never mastered that particular aspect of the role,” Mr. Moore finally said, still holding her gaze with an intensity that felt almost physical.
For the first time in her life, Kate felt the urge to lean forward instead of backwards, the urge to close the distance between her and this man.
His green eyes seemed to darken with a dangerous assumption, while her own cheeks responded with a warmth she didn’t recognize in herself.
She couldn’t say how long they remained suspended in that moment, seconds that felt like hours, or perhaps hours compressed into heartbeats.
“May I walk you to your carriage, Miss Sullivan?” he said at last, as if to break an invisible bubble that held only them. But his voice this time was too low and too soft, like someone who wanted to caress rather than simply talk.
Kate cleared her throat to speak.
“I could have Harris take you home,” she offered. “It’s quite late.”
“I prefer to walk. The night air… helps me think.”
Kate half-smiled. “A busy mind.”
“Always.”
They moved toward her waiting carriage, their steps falling into natural synchronization. At the carriage door, Kate turned to face him.
“Thank you. For coming tonight.”
Mr. Moore bowed slightly. “Good night, Miss Sullivan.”
He helped her into the carriage, and his gloved hands touched hers briefly, as he assisted her up the step. The contact lasted only a moment, but Kate felt it long after he stepped back, watching as the carriage pulled away into the foggy London night.
Inside the gently rocking carriage, Kate sat alone with her thoughts.
Streetlamps illuminated her face as she stared out the window, her hands fidgeting with the ledger in her lap.
She replayed moments from the evening—Mr. Moore redirecting the dockworker to her, his gazes from afar without interference, the unusual intensity she’d glimpsed in his eyes.
“Why improve upon mastery?” she murmured to herself, touching her hand where his fingers had briefly rested. A soft giggle followed her words.
The carriage hit a bump, jolting her from her reverie.
She straightened, composing herself as if embarrassed by her own thoughts.
Then, slowly, a smile formed on her lips—at the corner of her mouth first, then widening with genuine pleasure.
She turned back to the window, still smiling, while London slid by in the darkness.
* * *
Meanwhile, Mr. Moore walked briskly through the fog-shrouded streets, his cane tapping rhythmically against the cobblestones.
Passing late-night gentlemen tipped their hats, and he returned the gesture lifting his briefly.
But as the streets grew quieter and the busy workers at the dock fell behind, his pace changed somehow.
The rigid posture relaxed visibly. Gloved fingers reached up to loosen the cravat just a fraction.
“You lack the proper arrogance,” he repeated softly to himself, and a quiet laugh escaped as he shook his head, remembering Kate’s perceptiveness.
At a street corner, he paused to gaze up at the night sky barely visible through London’s haze. A smile of genuine delight spread across his face—private, unguarded, and sincere.
The modest townhouse he approached minutes later was respectable but not ostentatious, well-maintained but lacking the grandeur of truly wealthy homes, perfectly suited to a gentleman of modest means.
Using a key he got from the pocket of his coat, he opened the door and entered quietly.
Mary Bennett appeared from a side room as he stepped into the tastefully appointed entryway. Her practical, intelligent face showed the familiar concern of a trusted servant, though her manner suggested something more than mere domestic duty.
“You’re later than expected, sir. I was beginning to worry.”
“The evening took an unexpected turn.” He allowed her to help remove his coat and gloves.
Mary’s observant eyes took in his expression. “A pleasant one, it seems.”
“Perhaps,” he said with a small smile.
“Your bath is ready. I’ve kept the water warm.”
In the modest elegance of his bedchamber, Mr. Moore stood before the mirror, carefully removing his cravat.
A copper tub steamed behind a decorative screen, filling the room with warmth and the faint scent of lavender.
Mary moved about with efficiency, laying out nightclothes with the familiarity of long service.
“So, will you tell me of your evening with the Sullivans?” Mary asked as she approached to help with the waistcoat buttons.
“Mr. Sullivan is every bit as shrewd as his letters suggested,” Mr. Moore replied, standing still as the buttons were methodically undone. “And as ill.”
“And his daughter?”
Mr. Moore’s expression softened noticeably in the mirror’s reflection. “Even more formidable than rumored.”
Mary helped remove the waistcoat, then the shirt beneath, revealing what lay underneath—a tightly wrapped linen binding across the chest, wound with the routine of long practice.
“Arms up,” Mary instructed.
Mr. Moore raised his arms obediently as Mary carefully began unwrapping the binding. Layer after layer fell away until finally the last strip dropped to the floor.
A distinctly feminine voice drew a deep, relieved breath. “God, that gets more painful each year.”
“You wore it too long today,” Mary observed with concern, noting the angry red indentations marking the revealed skin. “Your skin is marked.”
Standing before Mary now was Gina Moore—unmistakably feminine despite years of masculine performance. She touched the welts left by the binding around her breasts with gentle fingers, her voice carrying the exhaustion of someone who had spent hours compressed into an unnatural shape.
“The price of freedom, Mary.”
The transformation continued as Mary helped remove a cleverly constructed prosthetic made of sculpted wax from Gina’s throat—an almost-undetectable false Adam’s apple that had been secured with spirit gum at the back of her neck.
“And this contrivance?” Mary asked, carefully cleaning the sticky residue from Gina’s neck with gentleness. “Still convincing?”
“No one suspects,” Gina replied, rolling her shoulders as she was finally freed from the constraints of masculine appearance.
Mary helped Gina out of the remainder of her gentleman’s attire, revealing a slender but muscular female form shaped by years of the physical activity required to maintain her masculine performance.
“And what of your thin beard?” Mary inquired, gathering the discarded clothing.
Gina put on a robe and touched her chin where the sparse facial hair still clung to her skin. “The horsehair stays affixed remarkably well with the new adhesive. Though it itches terribly by evening.”
Mary approached with delicate instruments, carefully helping to remove the fine, sparse beard to avoid irritating the skin beneath. The process was meticulous, testament to the elaborate nature of Gina’s daily disguise.
“I’ll need a fresh application tomorrow,” Gina noted, examining her smooth chin in the mirror and marveling, as she did each night, at how different she looked without the masculine artifice.
“For another visit to the Sullivans?” Mary asked with the knowing curiosity of someone who had observed this routine for years and could read the subtle signs of her mistress’s changing moods.
Gina paused, meeting Mary’s knowing gaze in the mirror. “I was invited to review their ledgers.”
“By the father or the daughter?”
A smile played at Gina’s lips, showing the beautiful female face she truly had, delicate and soft. “By circumstance.”
Mary hummed in reply as she began the delicate process of unpinning the long golden hair that had been tightly bound behind Gina’s head. Pin after pin was removed, until the golden hair finally fell past her shoulders in wild waves, completing her transformation back to her true self.
“And did Miss Sullivan seem… receptive to your presence?” Mary asked as she worked.
“She took me to the docks tonight.”
Mary’s eyebrows rose in genuine surprise, her hands pausing in their work. “To the docks? Unchaperoned?”
“To oversee damaged cargo,” Gina clarified with amusement at Mary’s reaction. “Hardly a romantic excursion.”
“If you say so,” Mary replied, though her tone suggested she wasn’t entirely convinced of the purely business nature of such an unconventional invitation.
Gina moved behind the decorative screen to step into the bath, and Mary heard the water displacement as she sank into the copper tub with a sigh that spoke of profound relief at finally being able to relax completely.
“She’s remarkable, Mary,” Gina’s voice came from behind the screen, carrying a warmth that had been absent from her earlier recounting of the evening’s events. “Utterly herself in a world determined to remake her.”
Mary began arranging the nightclothes, though her attention remained focused on the conversation. “She sounds like someone else I know.”
Gina’s laugh echoed through the room, rich with genuine amusement. “Perhaps. Though she has the advantage of doing it openly.”
Mary settled into a nearby chair, methodically folding the gentleman’s clothes that represented another’s day performance. “And has this remarkable woman given any indication she might entertain her father’s proposed arrangement?”
After a pause that suggested careful consideration, Gina’s voice came thoughtfully from behind the screen: “No. But she didn’t dismiss me outright either. Which, from what I gather, is progress.”
“Gina…” Mary’s voice carried a deep concern, the tone of someone who had watched over another person’s welfare through countless risks and deceptions. “If you pursue this… what happens when she expects a husband’s attentions?”
A long silence stretched from behind the screen, broken only by the gentle sounds of water and the distant noise of London settling into night.
“I haven’t thought that far ahead,” Gina finally admitted, her voice smaller than it had been all evening.
“For someone who plans shipping routes across oceans, that’s rather shortsighted.”
When Gina emerged from behind the screen in her nightdress, her hair damp and her face scrubbed clean of any masculine artifice, she looked completely feminine and somehow younger—as though the removal of her disguise had stripped away years along with the masculine performance.
She settled at her vanity as Mary began brushing her hair with long, gentle strokes.
“I know the risks, Mary. I’ve lived with them for ten years. ”
“This is different. This is… intimate.”
Gina met Mary’s eyes in the vanity mirror, and there was vulnerability there now that was stripped of all Jason’s confident composure. “It may come to nothing. The woman can barely tolerate suitors.”
“And yet she took you to the docks,” Mary observed, continuing her rhythmic brushing while watching Gina’s face for the truth behind her words.
In the mirror’s reflection, Gina’s defenses finally crumbled. “I only meant to secure investment in Sullivan Shipping. The letter of introduction was merely a way in.”
“And now?”
“Now I find myself… drawn to her.” The admission came quietly, as though speaking it aloud made it real in ways that mere thought could not. “There’s something in her eyes, Mary. A loneliness that matches my own.”
Mary’s hand paused in its brushing. “So you do like her.”
Gina took a long moment before answering, as though testing the truth of her words before giving them voice. “Kate Sullivan is a very likable woman,” she paused, then added with an honesty that seemed to surprise even herself, “and very intriguing as well.”
Mary squeezed Gina’s shoulder gently. “Then I shall continue to prepare fresh cravats and spirit gum, sir.”
Gina smiled gratefully at her oldest friend. “What would Jason Moore do without you?”
“Expose himself as Gina Moore within a fortnight, I expect,” Mary replied with the dry humor that had sustained them both through years of elaborate deception.
They shared a laugh that felt like a release of tension neither had fully acknowledged, as Mary continued brushing her hair and the gentleman’s attire lay neatly folded nearby—ready for another day’s performance in the elaborate masquerade that had become Gina’s life, but now complicated by emotions she had never expected to feel.