Tall, Dark and December #2
West crumpled the earl’s rejection into a wad and tossed it to the floor.
Sutherland had promised half the backing he needed to get the project for the Philadelphia Mint off the ground.
He couldn’t go back to America without a working prototype.
England was at the forefront of engine design and production, with steam power currently being used in textiles, mining and transportation.
Even if he loathed the truth of it, the knowledge to move him further along was here.
The funds to move him further along were here.
At this rate, the city of his birth would be employing hand-operated screw presses to create coins for another century.
Frustrated, West lashed the letters across his knee.
Why the earl had withdrawn his support was the question.
“When you mentioned I’d been reviewed, Brix old boy, what did you mean? ”
With a grimace that dragged the corners of his mouth practically to his chin, Brixworth gestured to the remaining correspondence. “You may want to start with the gossip clipping.”
Wiggling the sheet free, West skimmed a column that had already had enough handling to smear the ink.
It was one of those ridiculous chatter rags the English loved so much.
He read a few lines before coming to the good part.
“Lady P was seen leaving the leased Marylebone terrace of Mr. W__W__ in the wee hours of dawn,” he murmured.
Skimming the rest in silence, his brief scan bagged the gist. Scandalous. American scoundrel. Moonlit dinners.
The final line included the reveal, as it were: long-lost, disgraced half-brother of a duke.
“‘Tall, Dark and December’ she’s calling me,” he finished, unable to keep this horrific bit to himself.
If there was anyone in England who hadn’t known he was related to the Duke of Mercer, the secret was out now.
As for the other, he was no debaucher. Women often—as was the case with Lady P, as this mindless Belle creature was calling her—came to him.
Tall, Dark and December. Brixworth mouthed the moniker, seemingly pained to his bones if his twitching eyelid was any indication. He’d likely never had to deal with such degradation with his saintly duke.
West strode to the hearth at the far end of the cavernous space and tossed the sheet into the flames. “I’m losing a business partner over something called The Rake Review? As in, reviewing rakes? Who gives a damn, might I ask?”
“The woman you dallied with is the earl’s cousin, fourth or fifth removed according to Debrett’s,” Brixworth stammered as his cheeks stained a rosy hue.
“The Belle’s column is extremely popular and the only saving grace in this debacle is widows have more societal freedom than most. Lady P might actually benefit from being this month’s entertainment if a week of whispering behind her back doesn’t bother her, whereas you, an interloper of questionable birthright, will be given no quarter.
I assume your connection to His Grace put you in the Belle’s line of sight and some in Town may not esteem the connection. ”
West dusted his hands down his thighs thinking he didn’t esteem the connection most days. “This Debrett’s whats-it has written about me, too? What did they say?”
Brixworth grimaced, his displeasure almost splitting his cheeks in two. “You most certainly are not listed in Debrett’s. Unofficial children are never mentioned, Mr. Whitaker.”
“Bastards, you mean. Or by-blows. Isn’t that the favored term?”
“Yes, well, those. The volume is the final authority on the aristocracy, as well as a valued reference on etiquette, manners and social customs for well over a hundred years. You could”—Brixworth slid a disdainful glance down West’s person—“benefit from a passing review of said sections. I shall have a copy sent round to your terrace posthaste with a bookmark noting the relevant chapters.”
“I’m beginning to truly despise this place,” West whispered and pinched the bridge of his nose.
A headache was building behind his left eye and when his vision scattered, he’d be done working as the pain drove out every calculation.
This had been the case since he’d taken a knock to the head from his stepfather’s fist when he was eight years old.
Talk of Mercer and family had his blood churning in time to the uneven clank of his steam engine. Striving for calm, he drew a shot of the one thing he loved about London into his lungs, the rancid bouquet of the Thames. The scent reminded him of honest work and humble beginnings.
“It’s not like you can hide the association, sir, with the two of you looking rather exceptionally like brothers.
It’s the eyes,” Brixworth murmured and drew a tight circle around his own.
“The Mercer men have been carrying that particular shade for going on two centuries. Like a ripe lime, perhaps. Or a very sour apple.”
West shrugged, wishing for a whisky when he’d sworn the stuff off as a boy—before having the chance as a man to make imbibing a habit. He’d seen what too much drink did.
Felt what too much did.
However, like it or not, the eyes were what got people, even him, the only time he’d seen his half-brother up close.
On the marble steps of one of those suffocating gentlemen’s clubs, another place he’d visited only for business.
Fortunately, he’d been on the stair above Mercer, giving him the option of gazing down on a duke—but also allowing for a disconcerting reflection back.
“You might smooth things over with the Earl of Sutherland at your brother’s Yuletide ball in two weeks, sir.
You were invited, as we’ve discussed, and it is the event of the season.
Another investor or two could be in attendance as well.
” Brixworth tapped his jaw with a thin, incredibly pale finger.
“The bruise will be gone by then, one hopes.”
West scrubbed his cheek and winced. Still tender. “The race in Hackney Marshes. My highflyer got away from me for a flash on the last turn, though I captured the lead in the end. And Viscount Dudley’s purse in the winning.”
“It’s pronounced VI-count,” the manservant said and issued one of his well-crafted exhalations of dismay. “Granted, the situation could be worse.”
West drilled him with a look that said: how so?
“Another reprobate, Mr. Notorious, pierced a delicate part of his anatomy with a silver garnish of some variety and this circumstance was printed in black ink for the whole of London to see, the lowest of this year’s Rake Review lows.
Possibly due to the kindheartedness Miss Belle feels for this wondrous time of year, your story isn’t the worst by half.
Actually, December was quite mild in comparison to some of the others.
February was distressing and April not much better.
” Brixworth gestured to the hearth and the smoldering column.
“It’s filthy gossip, every line, charring just the thing for it. ”
Yet, Brixworth had committed the ‘filthy gossip’ to memory, a point West wasn’t about to mention. The old crow probably kept past editions in a cheroot box under his bed.
West crossed to his prototype and crouched before it, the spinning cylinders and pistons as much art to him as the David was to Michelangelo, as this Debrett’s absurdity was to the ton. His world was encased in brass, iron and steel mechanics, reassuring and rational.
And numbers. Glorious, often sensual (to him) numbers.
He tended to avoid the nasty stew of sentiment involved in everything else.
Debating, he glanced to the duke’s emissary, the infinitesimal glow in his chest over anyone caring enough to send this creaky dodger to check on him the lone thing keeping him from booting the valet out on his rear.
West had received little regard in this life outside the consideration of adoring women, and even if it was from a found brother he had no intention of keeping, he figured it was worth something.
West reached for a rag and scrubbed a streak of grease off a valve, needing a place to fasten his gaze while he plotted.
He’d been told the piercing look he got when he was conspiring tended to unnerve a person.
“I wasn’t planning on attending a ball. I’m not exactly the fancy party type.
” Although he’d been to loads of gatherings with Emelia, but Philadelphia didn’t compare to the folly surrounding London.
Apparently unable to stop himself, Brixworth crossed the space to retrieve Cambridge’s request from the floor, where he then did a neat tuck of the card into the depths of his waistcoat.
“Might I add, because you aren’t wholly aware, that your connection to His Grace may be startling to some, but in the end, will be very good for business.
As this seems to be your prime pursuit.” He yanked his superfine coat into place and straightened his shoulders as if preparing for battle.
“Does it matter how you get the funds you seek? Half-brother of a duke speaks volumes in England. In fact, sir, it shouts.”
West rocked back on his heels, bemused despite himself. Mercer’s majordomo strategized like a general. Impressive, because the way to get to Weston Whitaker was talk of industry and engineering.
Frankly, it was the only way.
West shoved to his feet, thumbing the rag into his waistband and enjoying like hell the fleeting grimace that crossed old Brix’s face. “What’s involved in this gambit, because I sense it’s not one without payment.”
Brixworth drew an imaginary line from West’s muddied boots to his sweat-streaked hair. “You’ll have to pass muster with society. And for that”—his derisive glance narrowed like he was squinting through a keyhole—“you require assistance.”
West wanted to argue but couldn’t. Emelia had polished off some of his rough edges but not enough. “How?”
Brixworth’s lips lifted in what could almost pass for a smile, and West’s heart gave a little quake.
Did his agreement truly mattered so much to his brother?
“A cousin of our second footman has an aunt who works in the household of a deceased earl’s daughter.
She’s on the cusp of society, admittedly hanging by a thread due to a transgression some time ago, but now so proper, she cracks when she walks.
She’s prepared multiple young ladies for their debut, and we only can hope, with sufficient fiscal enticement, she’ll agree to prepare you for yours. ”
West sighed, the vision of a spinster who smelled of camphor and mothballs flashing in his mind. “Does this cracking proper female have a name?”
Brixworth inclined his head in affirmation. “Lady Penelope Anstruther-Colbrook.”
The pain behind West’s eye began to pulse. Lady Penelope Anstruther-Colbrook. Could the name be any more English?
“My father actually worked for her grandfather as a hall boy at the beginning of his tenure serving aristocratic households. Despite any years-old scandal, the family is respected.”
“Centuries of advantageous association,” West muttered and lifted the scented letter he still held in his hand to his nose.
He wished thoughts of Emelia brought comfort when they only brought uncertainty—and the same pang of aloneness he felt while standing in a crowded parlor.
“Send the address and time to meet around to my terrace, and I’ll make it happen. ”
In accord, Brixworth flashed a set of yellowing teeth—definitely a smile—and exited the warehouse with the same regal stance he’d carried upon entering it.
The ills of his childhood and being judged every second since swirled about West like London’s soupy fog. Still, he could stomach being insulted if the degradation helped build his empire.
What was another slice of disrespect in the overall scheme of things?
Deke, a burly American version of a valet, materialized from the shadows.
He flipped a closed silver blade between his hands in time to the engine’s gentle hiss.
The docks weren’t a place for a man with means to roam without protection, even a man like West who could take care of himself.
“You’re getting yourself a governess, is that what I heard, boss?
I’ve never seen one of them in this godforsaken country who hadn’t a face like a horse. ”
“So it appears,” West whispered, wondering if his time in London was going to coerce him to drink. He glanced to the smoldering hearth, his temper flaring at the trouble this Rake Review foolishness was causing him. Interfering in his work was the final straw.
He tapped Emelia’s note against his hip, his mind clicking. “Have flowers in apology sent to Lady Pilson and, this Brazen Belle female, find her.”