Lorelie Brown (3 page)

“Once.” He all but drawled the word, turning it into agreement and doubt at the same time. “Though to say ‘get to’ implies a certain level of excitement that was entirely lacking.”

“I love the city.”

“How can you not?” He craned his head up, up, up toward the gray-tinged strip of sky barely visible at the tops of the buildings. “So healthy for one’s constitution.”

She shook her head as she came to a crossroads of alleys. To the right was a brighter, cleaner-looking row of smashed-together tenements that led to a larger road. She consulted the small scrap of paper in her hand upon which she’d scribbled the only address that the school had on file for Patricia. “Blast,” she muttered.

“I do so hope you’re not about to say we’re lost. I’ll be left a gibbering pile to collapse right into the gutter.”

“Don’t do that,” she said. Though she flicked only the shortest glance at him, she’d have guessed that gibbering was far from his list of intentions. His posture was supremely casual, and he continued to take in their surrounds. “We’re not lost.”

“Good.”

“I just don’t know which way to go next.”

“Blast.”

Her grin was completely unplanned. She did so hate to be taken by surprise by pure emotions. “I do believe that’s what I said.”

“Much more appropriate coming from me than a lady.”

She made a little hum in the back of her throat. “You’re quite the wit, aren’t you?”

“I try.” His changeable mouth moved again.

What would those tweaks and shifts feel like against her skin? “It would be more helpful if you knew where we were going.”

“If I knew where we were going, I wouldn’t need you at all.”

She had the childish impulse to stick her tongue out at him and stomp her foot. Preferably on his, smashing his toes. He was rather frustrating at times.

Four footmen stood side by side behind him. “Any of you? Are you from around here?”

They shook their heads as one, and the redhead stepped forward. “I’m from Bethnal Green, and Tim’s from Southwark. The other two mates are from the north.”

She turned away to focus on the knot of choices laid out before her. Sir Ian’s gaze upon the nape of her neck made her less inclined to mutter the curses she wished. Instead she nibbled on her lip until a flash of pain made her let go.

Then she saw it. A door opened two buildings down and disgorged three women into the street. They laughed and giggled in a way that made Lottie miss her friends.

“Ah-hah,” she said with no small measure of satisfaction. “We’ll have our direction in no time.”

Sir Ian’s hand flashed out, wrapping around her elbow. His grip was firm but not painfully so, and yet her first inclination was to yank away. Her heart fluttered. She didn’t like things that affected her strongly. They made her nervous. She couldn’t risk feeling something so intense.

“You can’t go speak with them. Send a footman.”

“Can I not?” She jerked her arm away and smiled as widely as she could manage. Curling her fingers under his lapel was beyond rude considering they’d recently met, but she did it anyway and was gratified that the dark centers of his eyes flared. From such a close distance, his crisp scent undercut the sticky rot of the open gutter. She patted his chest, which was solid, despite its narrowness. “I recommend you never, ever tell me what I can and cannot do. You won’t like the results.”

Ian hadn’t thought before speaking. There had been a moment, as the words slipped out from between his lips, when he’d known he’d spoken wrong. Miss Vale wasn’t the sort to take bold-faced direction. She bristled. Her green eyes went wider, her lips parting on an affronted sharp intake of air.

He’d never admit it, but she looked more handsome for the emotion. Mostly because he thought it might be one of the few true reactions he’d seen from her in their short acquaintance.

She gathered two handfuls of her fine, silk skirts and hopped over the trickling line of liquid that wandered down the center of the road. As bold as anyone he’d ever met, she walked right up to the trio of women. The three watched her warily and clutched wool wraps about their shoulders.

Henrietta would never, ever have been capable of such boldness. Of course, had they approached her, Etta would have been talked into giving up every scrap of clothing on her back, but that wasn’t at all the same thing. Etta was sweet, though inclined to be too sweet. Her involvement with Archie and Patricia had proved that. Gullible and inclined to accept people at their word. Who in the name of God gave her marriage certificate to her sister-in-law to keep safe?

But that was different. Ian and his family were lower gentry at best. Association with the middle rungs was necessary if one wanted to have any socializing at all in their little village.

Miss Vale was obviously of a different sort, fine and high flying. She was the kind of girl who was lovely to look at and enjoyable to watch, but not exactly the sort who’d make a good wife. Not for Ian. He wanted the kind of woman who’d settle down in a true love match with him. Eventually. It wasn’t as if he were looking to shove his head in the parson’s noose the next day.

It had taken him six months to track the unsigned, threatening notes from Devon to London, and that was even with their money demands. Patricia had taken a while to work up her courage to full larceny. Ian had no hope this would be figured out in a matter of days.

He hustled as quickly as he could without running to catch up with the girl before she made a hash of things. These women wouldn’t take kindly to arrogance, as Miss Vale seemed likely to issue.

But Miss Vale surprised him. She walked right up to the cluster of women and smiled brightly. “Hello, ladies.”

Obvious suspicion wrinkled across their careworn faces. Their mouths were all turned up in smiles that wavered under Miss Vale’s attention. The one in the back of the knot nodded and stepped forward. Her hair was a dingy, dark blonde and dropping around her cheeks, but under papery skin it was apparent she’d once been a beauty. Her eyes were wide and innocent, though wary. “Hullo, missus.”

In contrast, Miss Vale shone like a bright star dropped to earth. Her pale lilac skirts all but glowed with color compared to the dark, work-ready colors of the other women. “It’s Miss. Miss Charlotte Vale.”

The flash of recognition that turned two of the women’s smiles real was surprising. The one who’d spoken remained cautious, however. “We haven’t many visitors of your cant around here.”

Miss Vale shrugged. “I know. Terrible, isn’t it? Those fancy pieces like me who stay in our faraway castles and can’t be bothered to spread some blunt around.”

Ian grabbed her by the arm again. This time she didn’t pull away. He’d have gambled ready money that the working women would have been offended by such impudence, but instead the last one melted under Miss Vale’s charm and honesty.

“We around here could always do with a little of the extra.”

The one with dark hair on the right smiled. Her eyetooth was black at the gums, but the way her eyes lit up made up for it. She was still a pretty woman. “It makes a girl almost tempted to give in to some of them lads about here, for an extra coin.”

Ian sealed his lips and kept his expression calm. He couldn’t believe either the crudeness of the group, nor that Miss Vale seemed so inclined to chat along, smiling and nodding along with the rest of them.

“You can’t let them have it, though. That coin will be fast spent and you’ll be left up against the wall with your skirts a mess and your pride tinier.” She pulled a tiny sheaf of calling cards from the reticule hanging by braided cord from her wrist. “Are you already married?”

“Pshaw,” said the one in front. “Not the three of us. Same boys keep asking the same questions and they’re not apt to get us anywhere good.”

“If you’d like a step up, you’d best come to see me. My friends and I will teach you a few tricks. No cost involved for you in any way. After, we’ll introduce you to choice men looking for wives.” She handed over three of the small, cream-colored cards.

“Miss Vale,” Ian interjected. He hadn’t time for her to recruit victims for whatever scam she ran. He wanted to wrap his hands around Patricia’s scrawny neck and destroy her for having threatened his sister. He wouldn’t, of course. He’d have to settle for her rotting in prison while he carried away the key.

Didn’t mean he liked standing around.

Miss Vale waved a hand at him. But then she shot him a glance out the corner of her eyes that said she entirely knew what she did to him. “Did we have a deadline, Sir Ian? Somewhere we have to be?”

“Sir Ian?” echoed the girl who’d been silent up until now. She added a tipsy-sounding giggle at the end. “I’ve not met a sir before. Not out walking on the street in this part of town.”

“And speaking of such, we’re almost lost,” Ian said.

Her head tilted to the side and confusion darkened her eyes, but Miss Vale only laughed.

“Almost lost?” she echoed. In the dim light of the alleyway, her verdant eyes shouldn’t have been so lovely. Didn’t matter. “I had no idea you were quite so whimsical.”

He curled his fingers against his palms to hold back the urge to touch. “There’s a lot of things you don’t know about me. Such a short acquaintance and all.”

“There are certain things one knows at once.”

“It’s not whimsical,” he insisted. “We’re not precisely lost, as we could easily return to the carriage. But we don’t know how to get where we’re going.”

“Too true.” She aimed that keen-edged smile back at the women. “Which is where we were hoping you three could come in.”

The one in front laughed. “Have at it, though we’ve little resources any better than the protection at your back.”

Miss Vale waved her hand again in an airy, open gesture. “Oh, they’re mostly for show. If anyone should try to molest me, they’d have to answer to Fletcher Thomas.”

“Is that right?” the woman said with a fair measure of surprise. “I wouldn’t have figured your sort to get mixed up with him.”

Ian watched the byplay with no small measure of curiosity. His brows knotted together as he tried to work through the puzzle that was Miss Vale. She didn’t talk down to the women, and she had acquaintances that struck awe and no small measure of fear in the area’s denizens. But she didn’t once lose her brightness or shine.

“It’s a long story, anyhow. What we really need is simple. Directions. To this address.” She held forth the slip of paper with Patricia’s information writ upon it.

“Can’t read, lovey,” said the other woman, as plain as can be.

“I thought not.” Miss Vale gave a decisive nod. “Now you must promise to come visit my school. We’ll teach you to read.”

It was obvious such an enticement intrigued the woman, though not so much her friends behind her. “Maybe I will at that.”

From there, it was only a matter of moments to get directions. Miss Vale wasn’t above touching the women, patting their shoulders and backs as they eventually moved on by. She waited and gave a little wave as the black-haired woman who’d been most tempted by the idea of the school looked back.

Ian and Miss Vale started toward the turn they needed, which was apparently two streets down and past the wig maker. The footmen ranged behind them, keeping close.

Ian found himself at a loss for words. As his mother and sister would tell the world, that wasn’t a particularly common problem for him. He didn’t quite know what to make of Miss Vale. She was a flippant society girl, that much was assured. Yet he couldn’t help feeling she must have depths beneath that.

He rubbed his thumb over the etch work atop his walking stick. “You’ll marry those three off, will you?”

“Likely as not.” She studied the dark buildings that passed, gaze flicking over the soot-and-mold-covered brickwork. A baby cried in an upper window, and she craned her neck backwards to look. “It’s easiest to get them into the school with the possibility of matrimony. The idea is accessible. Something they can understand.”

“And what sorts of fantastical things would you say if you thought they’d believe it?”

Chapter Three

Lottie was fast coming to dislike this man. Or maybe she was coming to like him too much considering their short acquaintance. Her mouth pinched into a frown. Indecision crawled along her skin. She couldn’t afford it, not when the specters overhanging her life wanted their way. “I would tell them that they could train for inside service or to be a shopgirl. Or to perhaps remain in their current jobs but agitate for unions to gain better pay and benefits.”

“You would encourage them to noble heights indeed.” He said it so dryly that she had no hope of discerning his true meaning. The way his mouth bent up on that left side again made her inclined to think the best of him.

“You approve of unions?”

“I couldn’t care one way or the other about unions. They’re a waste of time.”

She laughed as they made the turn the women had described. “Spoken like a man who’s never worked for a penny in his life.”

Lottie’s pin money was less controlled than most women, but its use was split between keeping up appearances and funding the various needs of the school, which was plenty of work in itself. Any least little problem could tip the balance between a solid school and a crumbling edifice of no use to women.