And Then Comes Marriage (18 page)

Criminals. These were the children of the inhabitants of Newgate, no doubt. “No, no, I suppose that wouldn’t suit.”

It did not escape him that the reason for this grim prediction had been caused by people who were not even here. Lawbreakers, and yes, probably a few perfectly innocent ones as well, who were a bit too busy trying to survive the stew within Newgate to worry over much for the welfare of those they’d left behind.

Cas thought uncomfortably about the many times he and Poll had defied the law, pushing their games right to the edge. They’d not been caught, nor ever charged with anything, but the idea that if they had—

Their sisters would be destroyed. Like the girls who worked these looms and spinning wheels in this cheerless room, they would be left with few choices. The icy chill that hardened in his belly like ice was only the first moment of understanding the true consequences of his past actions, but it was a start.

“Mrs. Talbot was one of the fortunate ones,” the woman was saying as they left the trades room. “With her grandmother willing to take her in and getting that nice Mr. Talbot to wed her despite her past and all.” The woman nodded stoutly. “She’s a credit, she is. All the children look up to her so.”

Cas stopped midstep. Miranda? He cast his gaze about the place, with its peeling paper and cracking plaster. Miranda had been a child like the ones here?

It seemed impossible, yet at the same time, it made perfect sense. Miranda, so circumspect at all times, unless he was bullying her into doing something outré for his own amusement. Her manner, so quiet, as if every thought must be examined and reexamined and then polished before it was allowed to be uttered, had been honed by a lifetime of trying to live down her family’s ruined reputation.

Had old Gideon known? If he had, Cas’s estimation of the fellow went up several notches. That had to be why Miranda never spoke ill of him, not even when she let slip something of her old life. Did she still feel grateful to the man?

“Sir, if you’ll excuse my impertinence, but what the missus said to you.…”

When Cas failed to hide his blank lack of understanding, she gripped the sides of her apron in discomfort. “I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t mean to overhear.”

“No.” Cas really wanted to know, and this woman was as good as a witness to his twin’s relationship with Miranda. “Please, go on. I’d like to hear your opinion.”

She blinked at that, but stopped wringing her apron so forcefully. “When Mrs. Talbot said, ‘I wonder, would the world stop spinning if, just once, you did something other than play?’”

Ouch.
The words, though they’d been uttered to Poll, held the same sting for Cas. “Yes?”

She fidgeted, so great was her distress. “Maybe it’s not my place to say so, but Mrs. Talbot, she didn’t mean anything by it. She’s a good woman, real generous-like. And so proper, even after all she’s been through. She is an inspiration to these little ones, I’ll give you that. Shows them that having their family incarcerated doesn’t mean they’ll always be looked down on. I shouldn’t want—well, ladies can be swayed by what their gentlemen think and all—I shouldn’t want her to give up on this place.”

Cas looked around at the great, drafty, shabby house and found it admirable, cracking plaster and all. “No,” he said quietly. “No, neither would I.”

*   *   *

Home at last. Miranda leaned back on the door she had just allowed Twigg to shut in Mr. Worthington’s face and let out a sigh.

She hadn’t meant to say anything. She’d only meant to show him the place that meant so much to her. He’d always seemed interested in her stories before—of course, that had been before the explosion in the alleyway, hadn’t it?

Had he only pretended interest in order to get closer to her? Or had she thrown too much at him at once? She shook off a tide of combined hurt and regret. She hadn’t handled the afternoon well—but then, neither had Mr. Worthington!

Standing before her still, Twigg cleared his throat.

Miranda opened one eye. “Yes, Twigg?” She hoped she was not in for another discussion about the insubordination of her carefully chosen staff. Heavens, she was weary of his insecurities.

But it was not Twigg she was to be dealt now.

“Mr. Seymour, madam. He called while you were out. He asked to wait, but after nearly an hour he took his leave.”

Twigg looked a bit sour at the notion of having a visitor to tend to without his employer to view what a good job he was doing. “He left behind a parcel for you. I placed it in the parlor. I hope that is acceptable.”

Miranda could not help a weary sigh. “Yes, Twigg, that is acceptable.”
Yes, Twigg, you are the finest butler in the history of mankind. You are a genius, a beacon of high servitude, a legend in your own time.

Knowing that venting her sarcasm would only wound him, she nodded and escaped his hovering by going to the parlor for the parcel herself.

“Oh … bother.” A few moments later, she sat frowning down at the opened parcel in her lap in consternation. Now, what in heaven’s name was she supposed to do about this?

Mr. Seymour, for some odd reason uniquely his own, had purchased her a gown.

What sort of man bought a dress for a woman without consulting her, making sure of her approval? Or even her consent?

The gown itself was fine silk, but it was of such a muddy green that the sheen very nearly looked to be slime. After pondering it for several long moments, it occurred to Miranda that the color had been chosen to match her eyes—if her eyes were the color of pond scum!

Her fingers found a note tucked into the folds.
My dearest Miranda—

Presumptuous fellow. She had no memory of ascending to a given-name basis with Mr. Seymour.

I hope you accept this trifle in the spirit in which it is meant. I only wish to assist in speeding you from your mourning and back into the sparkling life you deserve.

Well, that was rather dear … and if she was not mistaken, precisely the same reason she’d been introduced to the great Lementeur. But that had not been Mr. Seymour’s doing. This ugly silken offering assured her of that.

I hope that you will wear it for me soon, and often. I long to sit next to you in your parlor and consider you in my chosen raiment.

“Oh, dear.”

It was odd, and inappropriate, considering that they’d only taken tea in this parlor a bare dozen times, and what was more, it seemed rather scheming.

Did Mr. Seymour assume the right to decide her wardrobe with this “offering”?

“Not bloody likely!” After the exquisite silks she’d had to chose from in Lementeur’s salon, the gown made her actually shudder. She pushed it aside and stood.

She was most decidedly going to have to do something about Mr. Seymour!

*   *   *

When Poll returned to Worthington House, he hesitated before entering. He still felt out of sorts and restless from his blunder with Miranda. He knew that if Ellie started in on him, or if Dade gave him that ridiculous look of disappointment—ridiculous since Dade was only a few years the elder!—that he might just end up in Newgate himself!

Therefore, since whom he really had to avoid was Cas, it would be a good idea if he cooled off before he saw anyone. Instead of going inside, he ducked around to the back of the rambling old house by way of the mews and entered the old carriage house. This was where Dade and Callie had banished the twins’ workshop when they were twelve and that truly inspiring experiment in lamp oil had taken a sadly wrong turn.

It still seemed like a good idea—a lamp oil in a solid form that would burn in a cake. It wouldn’t spill when overturned and there would be vastly fewer fires but it had never quite gelled and there had been a great many fires. If his mood hadn’t already been sour, it would have made him smile to remember Callie, barely sixteen, standing in the doorway of their smoking bedchamber, with her foot a-tapping with vexation.

Now it only made him twitch under the cloak of the weight of his family’s ever-present … well, presence.

The mews consisted of the barnlike structure that held the carriage and the stables where lived the two elderly mounts who had taught all eight Worthington siblings everything they needed to know about lazy, stubborn, intractable mounts. Also residing there, side by side with the ancient nags, much to his evident equine bemusement, was Dade’s rather lovely gelding, Icarus.

One really couldn’t envy Dade his good fortune for possessing such a creature, for Dade had actually scrimped and saved and worked for him. The acquisition had taken years, what with the family’s finances being, ah, unstable.

That was fine for Dade, but Poll still held out the hope that he would win a good horse of his own in a card game or at dice, so why bother scrimping when there were tempting waistcoats to purchase and good-natured barmaids to impress?

Except that he didn’t feel like playing cards at the moment and he had lost interest in dandified attire and he hadn’t so much as spoken to a barmaid in a month and a half. Was that all he was, in the end—cards and clothes and pretty, forgettable women? Was that all he was ever going to be? Was that all there was to look forward to, year after year of
playing
?

He rubbed a hand over his face, not quite sure what he should do with his unexpectedly serious existence.

I wonder, would the world stop spinning if, just once, you did something other than play?

With this thought roiling through his brain, it was no wonder that he opened the door of the workshop with a kick and shut it with a decided slam.

“Do you mind?” came a voice from one side of the doorway.

Poll turned to see Cas seated on a stool at one of the worktables, surrounded by lanterns and bent close over some sort of intricate drawing.

Once he would have pulled up another stool, eager to hear all about his twin’s new idea. At that point, he would usually take over the drawing, for he had a knack for such things.

Instead, Poll turned his back on Cas and strode thoughtfully to the other, second-best workbench, the one with the wobbly leg and the grain so scorched and burned that it was difficult to write legible notes on.

There was nothing on the table, other than dust and the odd wooden splinter from that unfortunately under-built guillotine trial. They’d be finding those fragments for years, no doubt.

He didn’t have a current project of his own, at the moment. The last thing he’d made alone was the jouncing ball toy, and that had been more than six weeks ago.…

Yes. Well. He was beginning to see a pattern emerging that he truly didn’t feel like facing tonight.

Well, he was here now and he’d be damned if he would leave in order to suit Cas! Just so he would look like he had a purpose and required the workroom just as much as Cas did, he lighted the last lantern and dug out a fresh quill and several sheets of paper.

Bloody hell. Cas had all the ink.

Poll took a deep breath. With infinite patience that practically trembled with rage, Poll put the quill away and found a stub of a pencil that he sharpened carefully with his penknife. It was no more than two inches long. When he wrote, it looked as though he were laying down lines on the paper from his own magical fingertip.

Damn. Damn. Damn.

With his jaw clenched, he commenced to sketch a box. It began as a simple one, just to be doing something, until he imagined that the edge had a graceful double curve and the top was inlaid with ebony and rosewood in a pattern that looked like …
ivy.

Yes. Miranda would remember the ivy.

As he drew out the design, his rage faded, soothed away by his easy skill with the pencil. One part of his mind fiddled with the proportions and the curve and created a clever little secret compartment while another part of mind was lolling with Miranda on the palace lawn on a fine afternoon.

He didn’t know if a jewel case was an important contribution to society—definitely not like aiding an orphanage—but it was pretty and it might make Miranda smile at him again.

Or he could allow her to remain upset with him—he could allow Cas the advantage, just this once.

To Poll’s knowledge, his brother had never
lurked
for a woman before. Cas didn’t lurk, or loiter, or even long. Women longed for Cas, not the other way around.

Yet there Cas had been, lurking outside Miranda’s house, following them in the hack—and, if Poll wasn’t mistaken, there had been a definite prickle on the back of his neck, the unmistakable sensation of being watched, as he and Miranda left the children’s home.

Cas wasn’t just competing with Poll. He wasn’t simply attending Miranda out of boredom, or the hopes of an easy conquest.

Which meant, what?

Could it be? Could the infamous cocksman Castor Worthington finally have fallen in love?

Poll frowned down at his hands, allowing them to continue the work while his mind went round and round a single question.

If Cas were really in love with Miranda, if his twin had finally found a mate for his troubled soul—

Should he, Poll, stand aside?

*   *   *

On the other side of the workshop, Cas bent over the plans on his worktable and tried to ignore his brother’s presence. He’d been working so well, too, before Poll’s obnoxious entrance.