Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
Hugh expected trouble the moment Miss Vane opened his carriage door. One look at the ebony wig beneath her black bonnet and he almost told Rowton to drive on. He noted one golden curl. Noted that he’d noticed it. Neither fact improved his mood.
“I said to blend into a crowd, not a funeral.” He caught her hand and hauled her inside, though he wished to God he hadn’t. Her fingers were small in his—and a damn sight more delicate than her nerves. He resisted the urge to tighten his grip, to play her protector.
“Your note said to wear dark colours.” A little breathless, she dropped into the opposite seat and brushed her hand over her charcoal-grey skirt.
“In your circles, do widows visit boxing saloons?”
“I don’t mingle in circles. I rarely mingle at all.”
No. She spent too much time being a thorn in his side.
“If you’re trying to tug on my heartstrings, you’re wasting your breath. Those who keep friends to a minimum are often the sanest.”
She smiled as she reached for the overhead strap. “Is that your way of telling me you prefer your own company?”
“More that I don’t suffer fools.”
He sat back, bracing his boot on her seat as the carriage lurched forward. The space was too small for a man of his size and a woman of her persistence. He counted to three, knowing the reprimand was coming.
“Is it too much trouble to inform me of your plans?” The words were barely out before her gaze dropped to his waistcoat. “You’re wearing teal. I was told you always wear black, hence my widow’s weeds.”
He gripped the strap, though it had nothing to do with the road or Rowton’s driving. “Miss Vane, if we’re to spend time together, might you do me one small courtesy?”
She eyed him with a constable’s scrutiny. “That depends. I’m already a guinea out of pocket.”
He would pay her for the article once he knew she valued truth over sensation. “Control your emotions. You move from reprimand to surprise in one breath. Be angry, by all means. Making you wait three days without a word might be considered rude.”
She straightened. “More than rude. It’s ungentlemanly.”
He didn’t dispute the accusation. She’d forfeited the right to expect gentlemanly behaviour the moment she held him at gunpoint.
“As you conveyed in your note.” The second Pullman handed him the letter, his damn heart had stuttered. He wondered, not for the first time, if her perfume was poison.
“Do you know how long the days feel when there’s a babe in the house?” From the strain in her tone, he’d rather not. “And Lord Howden called again yesterday, inviting us all to the theatre next week.”
“And you plan to go with him?” A bitter taste coated his throat. Likely the rich sauce on tonight’s veal. “Take comfort. A man rarely proposes at the theatre.”
“My sister accepted on my behalf, but I’ll feign a megrim.”
“From what I hear, your sister would dose you with laudanum and dump you at the doors in Drury Lane.”
She frowned. “Have you been spying on me, sir?”
“What makes you say that?” Why did it surprise her? He gathered information for a living.
“To most people, my sister is all gentleness and grace.” Her mocking snort was almost endearing. “Only those who venture into the inner sanctum know the devil wears a disguise.”
He looked at her wig and widow’s weeds but said nothing.
“I paid an informant to find you. That’s how I knew your name.” It wasn’t a secret. And it was important she knew how far he’d go for the truth. “I asked him to investigate your family.”
She sat back, lips pursed as she drew her pelisse a little tighter across her chest. He wished she hadn’t.
“You crept around behind my back? Had you questions, sir, you need only have asked.”
“Crept around?” The irony was almost too much. “Heaven forbid you come home to find me loitering in the dark, Miss Vane.”
She looked at her hands in her lap.
He had no reason to feel guilty. Yet he did.
“Must you always have the last word?” She sighed like they’d been married for a decade. “Don’t answer. I rarely escape the house without giving a detailed itinerary. Might we just enjoy the evening?”
He should remind her this was a business arrangement. That he rarely entertained women after dark. The words refused to come. “Bellingham has a ticket for the prize fights at a gaming hell in Aldgate tonight.”
“A gaming hell?”
He watched her absorb the reality of what lay ahead. He’d be lying if he said it wasn’t entertaining.
“Does that present a problem, Miss Vane?”
She gave a choked, “No.”
“Bellingham placed a wager on McCaffrey to take the crown.” The trophy was a bronze duck, but he couldn’t be bothered to explain.
“Oh.” She shifted in the seat. “Isn’t bare-knuckle fighting illegal? I thought under common law it constitutes assault.”
“The Earl of Berridge owns the establishment.” That was all the explanation one needed. “But if you’re worried about your reputation, Rowton can take you home.”
“Home? No.” She jolted as though she’d sat on a hatpin.
“Had I known, I’d have opted for a better disguise.
” She fell silent, and he felt a stab of pity.
“Do you think Rowton will lend me his tricorn? And might you have a spare cravat? Gentlemen always keep odd things in the cupboard beneath the seat.”
How did she know what men kept beneath the seat?
It jarred that she wasn’t wrong.
“What are you planning? To take on the guise of a highwayman from the heath?”
She shrugged a shoulder. “To look a little more jaunty.”
“Jaunty?” She had more swagger than half the men at White’s. “As it happens, I do keep a cravat and waistcoat on the odd chance I find myself dishevelled.”
“Then you don’t mind if I borrow them?”
“Be my guest. But if you’re arrested for stealing Pemberton’s ruby ring, don’t blame me.” Howden wouldn’t want her then, and the sister would have a fit of the vapours.
She grinned. “So you do have a sense of humour.”
“Like a Royal stag, it appears on rare occasions.”
Nothing Miss Vane did should surprise him.
But she dropped to her knees on the carriage floor and opened the cupboard. Her shoulder brushed his thigh. Her perfume hit him, harder than any punch McCaffrey might throw tonight.
Bloody hell.
This was going to be a long carriage ride.
He could hardly offer to help, not without them becoming a tangle of limbs rocking in time with the axle.
“It’s hard to see anything in the dim light,” she groaned.
Oh, it was hard.
He had been relegated from Satan to scoundrel. The real devil in the carriage had swaying hips and no idea of the damage she caused. Shame she hadn’t come dressed as a Cyprian. At least then he might have blamed the disguise.
“Look for the muslin bag. There is nothing else in there besides a mahogany box and a wool blanket.” At least, nothing he cared to explain.
She pulled the bag free and sat back on her haunches, brushing her hair from her brow. “Heavens. I feel like I’ve gone a round with Mr McCaffrey.”
“Would it be too much trouble for you to take a seat?” Her kneeling before him played havoc with his composure.
“This might all have been avoided if you had simply given me the facts.” She settled opposite, the glow in her cheeks suggesting she had done more than search a cupboard. She removed her bonnet and straightened the black wig. “I expected you to be more precise.”
“Why? You called my research careless. The work of a drunken primate.”
“It was.” Her fingers moved deftly over the buttons of her pelisse. She was out of it quicker than he’d have managed with both hands and a steady heart.
He watched as she tied the gold cravat in a loose bow at her throat, then slipped into the dark blue waistcoat. She smoothed it across her chest and offered him a satisfied smile.
And people thought he was dangerous.
“I confess, seeing you ferret about the floor was amusing, but I’m eager for the finale.”
“Finale?”
“How you plan to relieve Rowton of his hat.”
She arched a brow. “Rowton likes apple and blackberry tart. I shall offer to bake him one.”
This woman had an answer for everything.
“Have you been spying on my coachman, Miss Vane?”
“It’s called striking up a conversation, Mr Stanton. Best to be specific in case you put it in print.”
They fell silent. He’d sparred with easier opponents than Miss Vane and felt like he’d gone five rounds with McCaffrey. By rights, the bronze duck was his.
As the carriage rattled over the cobbles towards Aldgate, gas lamps cast light and shadow across Miss Vane as she worked on her costume.
“Pin my hem or leave it?” she asked, as though the matter were of grave importance. “You have a better idea of how I might blend into the crowd.”
“Pin it?” It was a question. She took it for gospel.
“I agree. A flash of boot gives any costume a Bohemian flair.”
He refused to watch her fiddle in her reticule and fuss with her hem. But he rarely lied to himself. He glanced more than once. Discipline had its limits.
She went still—an event shocking enough to send for the watchman. “Perhaps this is a mistake. I should have stayed at home. What on earth was I thinking?”
The sudden crack in her composure settled the air, like a brief truce on the battlefield.
“Your costume is perfectly suitable.” He kept his gaze above her knees. He was a man, not St Paul. “No one will be looking at you. All eyes will be on the contenders.”
She turned to the window and sighed. “Tonight proves I’m more like my parents than I dare to admit. I have a weakness for mischief. You should not have made me the offer.”
He’d known as much the moment she appeared on his landing in men’s clothes. Hearing her admit it took the pleasure out of being right.
“The offer?” He hoped she meant this brief partnership, and not something he’d pledged over brandy.
“I was so desperate to escape, I forgot to consider the dangers. If I’m recognised tonight, I’ll be hunting brats across the moors near Ripon.”
Hugh paused. He was an educated man, yet sometimes it was hard to keep pace with her thoughts. “A new sport to rival deer stalking?”