Book series

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First dance together in WIP Wednesday

This excerpt is from A Gift to the Heart, which is finally taking shape.

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Livy was already with Lady Marple. “You don’t have to dance with me, Mr. Sanderson,” she blurted. “I will not hold you to your offer. I know your brother dragooned you into it.”
Bane was amused. “Drake doesn’t make my decisions for me, Miss Wintergreen,” he told her.
Perhaps she thought he was laughing at her, for she lifted her chin and sniffed as if offended. “I am not interested in a pity-dance,” she said, through gritted teeth.
“Good. Neither am I. I wish to dance with the only woman in this ballroom who is worth a second look.”
He meant every word, but she had made up her mind to be contrary, or she thought he was spouting empty flattery for she snapped back, “Go and ask her, then.”
“I was referring to you, Miss Wintergreen. And before you accuse me of laying it on with a paddle, I mean every word.”
Was that alarm in the lady’s eyes? And if it was, was he to be encouraged by it or discouraged? Drake had arrived, and was raising his eyebrows at their banter. It was banter, was it not? Bane nodded at Drake but kept his attention on Livy.
“I am not sure that I wish to dance,” the lady commented, crossing her arms defensively, then shooting a glance at her aunt and letting them drop to her side again. Were ladies not meant to cross arms? Bane would never understand all the silly rules these people imposed on one another.
“Perhaps you would prefer a stroll rather than a dance?” Bane suggested, as Miss Cilla joined them.
“Perhaps you are afraid I will stand on your feet,” Livy retorted, which certainly sounded as if she wanted to step out on the floor with him.
Good, for he had been looking forward to this dance all evening. He grinned at her. “Deathly afraid, that a little sylph like you might damage me. Do you commonly suffer the experience of crippling your partners?”
Livy’s lovely eyes were alight with the joy of verbal battle. “My previous experience is not based on dancing with elephants.”
“Your previous experience is based on dancing with rabbits, if this evening is typical. An elephant is much more up to your weight.”
“Are you calling me overly large, Mr. Sanderson?”
He laughed out loud at that. “Not compared with me, Miss Wintergreen.” He winged his elbow at her and could have cheered with relief when she placed her hand on his arm and allowed him to lead her onto the floor.
Drake and Cilla joined them, and the dance was one where two couples formed a group of four people who stayed together through the dance, though they occasionally combined with another group to make a broader set of patterns with eight dancers.
It was a vigorous dance, too, with no time to stand out briefly and talk to one’s partner unheard by the rest of the crowd on the floor.
The lady he was fast growing to love was as graceful as she was lovely. Even better, she was the right size. He didn’t have to shorten his steps to match hers, or stoop to put his hands on his waist when the dance called for him to assist her in a short jump, or bend himself almost in half to go under her raised arm.
Reinforcing the point, he had to do all those things when he repeated the patterns with her sister while Livy danced them with Drake.
Bran’s mind jumped to a quite different sort of dance, a private one. He was abstemious, his mother’s fate fuelling a disinclination to promiscuity. Even so, he was no virgin, having been less disciplined in his youth, when his blood ran hot and his position as son—even illegitimate son—of the wealthiest man in town won the favour of a number of daring females.
He had always had to temper his passion to the size of his lovers, fearing he might otherwise cause an injury. And if he thought any further about how Livy’s height and size might change the experience, he would embarrass himself. Modern cut-away evening coats for men meant that the results of private thoughts became a matter of public display—not something he wanted to experience right here on the dance floor.
Time to think of something deflating. The missing engineer. The parlous state of the rural poor or, even worse, those who had flocked into London after last year’s failed harvest, looking for work that did not exist.
For a short time, his mind ran on two tracks, one matching his movements to the demands of the dance and relishing the company of his lady, and the other adding detail to a plan he and Drake had made for funding for a dame school in the slums.
A man called Basingstoke, the vicar of an inner city parish, was setting up a network of them, each paid for by private donors who believed that all children, boys and girls, had a better chance of escaping poverty if they could read, write and do basic arithmetic.
Calculating costs worked to subdue his animal appetites—they’d need enough rent a room, hire a teacher, pay for basic supplies such as slates, chalk, and coal for heating, and more. It was achievable. He hoped his courtship of Livy would likewise be merely a matter of working out the steps, calculating the costs, and putting a plan into practice. Truly, they seemed to be made for one another.

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Secrets of Success in Work-in-Progress Wednesday

It’s an AI image, and I couldn’t persuade the thing to give me Regency era costumes. Pretty picture otherwise, though.

In editing Hearts at Home for publication on May 1st, I had the pleasure of revisiting old friends. This excerpt is from The Beast Next Door, first published in the Bluestocking Belles’ Collection Valentines from Bath. I thought I’d share with you Charis’s discovery about how to attract a man.

The Master of Ceremonies finally discovered Charis in her hiding place. Blushing under Lady Harriett’s wise gaze, Charis allowed the man to present the Earl of Chadbourn as a suitable dance partner.

He exuded strength in spite of his slender frame, stood tall, possessed thick brown hair, and dressed all in black down to his stockings, gloves and cravat. The armband told her the lack of colour was not a fashion choice but marked a death.

However, when she attempted to express sympathy, his friendly smile faded. He said, “Thank you,” mildly enough but nothing else as he escorted her to their place on the dance floor.

It was not as bad as she’d feared. Lord Chadbourn recovered his good humour and proved to be an excellent dancer. He even kept his attention on her with every evidence of courteous enjoyment. After some remarks about the weather and her dress failed to ignite a conversation, he admitted to being more at home on his land than in fashionable company and responded to her timid question with a brief comment on new crop succession planning, which became an enthusiastic dissertation when he discovered she was truly interested.

No. It was not bad at all, except that a succession of less interesting men followed the earl’s example. She tried fading back into the shadows, but apparently, dancing with a handsome earl destroyed her cloak of invisibility, because each time a partner returned her to her delighted mother, another waited to claim the next set.

She tried the same technique that had worked so well with Lord Chadbourn, asking questions until she hit on a topic her current partner could wax lyrical about. As the hours dragged and she continued to twirl and promenade—and smile, a fixed polite fiction as painful as the feet that were aching worse than her head—she learned more than she ever wanted to know about the best points of a race horse, how hard it was to tie a perfect cravat, and the pleasures of collecting snuff boxes.

The hour was late. Surely this torture must be over soon? She gave half an ear to the fribble who was escorting her back to Mother while, with the rest of her mind, she rehearsed reasons why Mother might consent to let her sit out a dance or two. “… don’t know when I have enjoyed a dance more, Miss Fishingham,” the fribble said. “Upon my word, I don’t. Never thought I’d meet a lady so interested in…”

So that was the secret? That was what men wanted? A listener who made appropriate noises while they rabbited on and on? Even Lord Chadbourn, though he, at least, was interesting and polite enough to stop and check that she was not bored.

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New friends on WIP Wednesday

This week’s excerpt is from The Beast Next Door, a story that appeared years ago in a Bluestocking Belles’ Collection, but which I’m currently editing for publication as part of Hearts At Home. My heroine has sought a quiet place where she can read uninterrupted by her noisy family.

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The bench outside the long-forgotten folly was wet, but Charis had expected that. She took her book from her bag, and spread the bag on the bench to protect her skirts. She never saw anyone here, not since her friend Eric left, ten years or more ago. But someone must know she came, because the area around the bench was always kept weeded, and the folly itself was cleaned from time to time, so it lacked the heavy overload of dust and cobwebs to be expected in such a neglected spot.

She was settling herself to read, when a large shaggy dog bounded out of the woods, his tongue lolling cheerfully from one corner of his grinning mouth. His tail waved enthusiastically, and she braced for whatever he intended, but he stopped a pace or two away and sat, stirring the wet grass and weeds with his tongue, lifting one paw as if hoping she would shake it.

“What a beautiful gentleman you are,” Charis said to him.

The dog tipped his head to one side, his tail speeding up.

“Shake?” Charis said. Is that what he wanted?

Apparently so. He shuffled forward, not raising his hind end completely from the ground. When he was a few inches nearer, he lifted his paw again, this time within reach if she just bent forward.

And so, she did.

The dog grinned still more broadly and half lifted again so his tail could wag at full speed.

“Yes, you are a friendly boy,” Charis agreed. “And someone has taught you beautiful manners.” She looked around, wondering if the dog’s owner was near, but no one was in sight.

The dog collapsed at her feet, leaning his head against her knee, and she obliged by rubbing behind his ear, then down to his chin. He closed his eyes in ecstasy and tipped his head even higher.

“That’s what you like, is it not?” Charis asked him and continued to caress the dog as she opened her book. Her own place, her book, and a friendly dog to pat. She could feel the tension draining as she settled in to enjoy her brief period of freedom.

 

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Spotlight on Jackie’s Climb

(Book 9 of A Twist Upon a Regency Tale)
Jackie’s busy life—as a stableboy each morning and seamstress all afternoon—is threatened when she catches the eye of the local Viscount. Oscar Riese wants her in his bed, and is prepared to ruin her mother to remove all her other choices.

Apollo Allegro, a poor relation to the Rieses, has been Oscar’s steward, secretary, factotum and general dogsbody for more than half his lifetime. Pol works in the background, doing what he can for the locals, and for his frail and fading grandmother. Oscar’s threats to Jackie and her mother are the last straw that drives him into open rebellion.

When Jackie climbs into Riese Hall to steal the money her mother needs for the extortionate rent, their lives intertwine and take a different direction. Pol arranges their joint escape. But escape is not enough. Pol is beginning to uncover the Riese’s crimes, and Lady Riese is determined to eliminate the threat—even if that means killing Apollo, his grandmother and Jackie.

Jackie has more than one climb ahead of her—through the ranks of society and up the wall of a tower—before she and her hero can find their happy ending.

Meet Jackie

Jackie Haricot leads several lives, some more exciting than others. In the mornings, she is Jackie Bean, stable boy at the squire’s. Each afternoon, she is the dressmaker’s seamstress. Evening sees her transformed into Mademoiselle de Haricot du Charmont, daughter of an émigré comtesse. And from time to time, she goes out at night as Jack Le Gume, travelling gamester, to use the card skills her father taught her to help her make ends meet.

Meet Apollo

Apollo’s mother died when he was nine, and he was exiled from her home in sunny Tuscany to the cold rooms of Riese Hall, his father’s ancestral home in England. There, he was told that his parents had never married, and he was put to work by his aunt and cousins. His grandmother was the only one to offer him welcome and love, and she had faded into a shadow of her former self.

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Meet a new heroine on WIP Wednesday

I’ve made a start on A Gift From the Heart. The Winterberry sisters are my heroines.

At the time, Lucilla Winterbury thought the Twelfth Night rumpus to be perfectly justified. And just! Unwise, perhaps, but only because she did not want even a hint of it reaching her father. For if Father knew what she and the other young woman at the party had done, he would shut her sister Olivia in her room forever, and Cilla he would never let out of his sight again.
Father had been reluctant to allow Cilla and her sister Olivia to go to Marplehurst Hall for a twelve-day Christmastide party. No. He was reluctant for Cilla to go. Cilla was his younger daughter and his pet. As he had told Livy more than once, his elder daughter could go straight to the devil for all he cared.
In the past, he had never given permission even for Livy to go. Lady Virginia Marple, hostess of the event, was his younger sister, and the two did not get on. Indeed, perhaps his dislike of Livy was rooted in his fraught relationship with his sister, for he frequently said that Livy was just like Aunt Ginny.
As to the party, Aunt Ginny had only begun them after the end of her period of mourning for her husband, and for the first three years, neither Livy nor Cilla could have gone. Neither would have left their mother during her long illness, nor could they attend while they were in mourning for her.
The following year, Father said that Aunt Ginny had grown wild since she was widowed, though he would not disclose any details.
This year, Aunt Ginny descended on him in person, and demanded that both daughters be released into her care. Aunt Ginny was Father’s younger sister, and he swore that Livy was exactly like her. Cilla and Livy listened to their conversation from the secret passage that ran beside the fireplace.
“Olivia may go,” Father said, “but Lucilla is not out, Virginia.”
“It is an all-female party, Horace,” she told him. “My own daughters, goddaughters and their mothers. I want my nieces with me. Other girls of Cilla’s age will be there. Younger girls, too. It is disgraceful, by the way, that Cilla has not yet made her debut. The girl is nineteen, after all.”
“You shall leave me to know what is best for my daughter,” Father insisted. He sniffed. “Lucilla is delicate. I would not expect you to understand.”
Father had always insisted that Cilla was delicate. Mama had been delicate, and Cilla looked just like her, but had always kept excellent health. Livy said that Mama’s delicacy was caused by Father’s bullying, which might be true.
“Then the matter is easily resolved,” Aunt Ginny retorted. “I shall look after Cilla, and so shall Livy. You may be confident that we will not allow her to become overtired or stressed. Though I think you should trust Cilla’s good sense, Horace.”
Father was firmly of the view that women had no good sense, but were instead creatures of emotion. Livy said that this proved Father to be a creature of emotion.
“I cannot reconcile it with my conscience,” Father insisted. “Olivia may go.”
“Both of my nieces,” Aunt Ginny insisted. “I do not wish my other guests to think I am ashamed of the connection, Horace.”
Cilla winced. Father would not like that. Wealthy though he was, he was still only a merchant in the eyes of the people Aunt Ginny counted as friends. The remark worked, though. After a few other objections, each of which Aunt Ginny countered, the sisters were permitted to leave with their aunt.
They had a fabulous time. Cilla already knew and liked her cousins, and she soon made other friends. As for Livy, away from Father and in an all female environment, she blossomed. It helped that, on the first night, her slice of the Christmas pudding contained a silver crown, making her the Lady of Misrule for the whole of the party.
She threw herself into the role, showing the sly humour that she normally shared only with Cilla. It fuelled a seemingly endless succession of merry tricks and hilarious games, and inspired others to offer suggestions of their own.
Everyone was enjoying themselves. Everyone, that is, except Aurora Thornton, a girl from the next village, who did her best to join in but was clearly unhappy. Cilla tried to draw her out of her shell, but to no avail.
“It is odd,” one of the cousins said. “Rory is not normally like this.”
“She was happy when the party started,” said another cousin. “Very happy. I thought she had a suitor, but if she did, he has disappointed her.”
Poor girl. Cilla had never had a suitor. From the stories she was hearing this week, perhaps that was a good thing.
In the end, what caused Aurora to sob her heart out on Cilla’s shoulder was a game, for one of the girls claimed that she could read the cards and tell fortunes, and the fortune she told for Aurora was a tall fair headed man who would be faithful and true.
“But he wasn’t,” Aurora wailed. “Colin was not faithful, and he wasn’t true. He made all kinds of promises, and they were all lies, for he is ma- ma- ma- ma- married!” The final word was broken by sobs, and even though the young ladies—the mothers and aunts were closeted with a bottle of port and had left the damsel to their own devices—even though the young ladies gathered closely around, it was some time before the story was told.
She had had a secret suitor, who became her lover. He lived in this village, and so Aurora had arrived full of hope, certain she would be able to make arrangements to see him, to find out why he had not visited for several weeks.
And on Christmas Day, when the house party attended church, she did see him—in his pew with a woman and two children. A few questions to those who lived locally soon confirmed that they were his family—his wife and their offspring.
“Well,” said Livy, when she understood all, “you are not with child, and nobody knows except us. And we are all your friends, Aurora, and will keep your secret. The question is, what do we do to Colin Sanderson to embarrass him in public the way he has embarrassed you in private?”
Cilla had never been prouder of Livy. Though some of the maidens had been horrified to have a ruined women among them, Livy had reminded them that Aurora was a sheltered innocent and Sanderson a mature man who should have known better.
“He set out to ruin her,” she said, fiercely. “Who is to say that any of us would have fared better, believing his lies and his promises as Aurora did.” And one by one, they nodded their heads.
Even the most censorious promised to keep the secret, and all of them had suggestions about making Sanderson pay. The plan they came up with for New Year’s Eve was masterly, Cilla thought.
New Year’s Eve, in Marblestead, was the Festival of the Lady of Misrule, where the women took over the town and the men stayed indoors out of their way. It was the perfect time to make a fool out of a lying deceiver.
They had to enlist the groom who was sweet on Cilla’s eldest cousin to lure the Sanderson mountebank to the tavern in the village, but everything else, they could handle themselves.
It would be the highlight of the party.

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Memories on Monday – 10 years since Farewell to Kindness was published

Ten years ago, my first historical romance novel was published. Ten years! It hardly seems like any time at all, and yet I feel as if I have been writing and publishing forever.

As the first is series, Farewell to Kindness is permanently 99c in US dollars.  If you haven’t read it, buy it today. I hope you’ll be glad that you did.

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Family interference on WIP Wednesday

Another excerpt from The Secret Word.

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“Yer young fella’s gaffer came by to threaten me today. Me! At my work! Happen I’ll lurn him that Bertram Wright ain’t to be pushed round by a useless blot of an upper crust snot rag. Says that scoundrel of a grandson is already betrothed!” Father was furious. His careful speech, much like that of the class he aspired for his grandson to join, had been slowly and thoroughly learned. It was very seldom that he slipped back into the words and accent of his youth.
Another sign of his anger was the way he was pacing, to and fro across the parlor rug.
Fortunately, Clemmie had already heard from Chris the probable topic that had so upset her father. “Our Mr. Satterthwaite was angry with his grandfather when we met this afternoon, Father. Apparently, the man turned up in Chr— Mr. Satterthwaite’s office this morning, demanding that Mr. Satterthwaite stop courting me as the older Mr. Satterthwaite had already signed a marriage agreement for Chris. Of course, Mr. Satterthwaite told him where he could put his plans.”
That stopped Father’s furious pacing. “He did? Yes, I suppose he did. Though the man is his grandfather.”
“The man abandoned our Mr. Satterthwaite sixteen years ago, when he was a child. To turn up now and dare suggest Chris owes him anything? Chris told him in no uncertain terms that whom he marries or does not marry is not the business of Mr. Satterthwaite senior, and he wants nothing to do with the man.”
“Is that right?” Father had taken up station in front of the fireplace, rocking back and forth, his hands in his pockets, and a smile on his face. His temper was gone as if it had never been.
“When are you seeing ‘Chris’. Tonight, is it?”
Father had not missed her slip of the tongue, then. It was too late to unsay it. She could do nothing more than hope he wouldn’t find a way to turn it to her disadvantage. Hers and Chris’s.
Honestly, why did the pair of them have to be cursed with such conniving selfish vicious old men?
“Yes, Father. He is escorting me to the Sutton ball.”
“Sutton as in the Earl of Sutton? That’s the Duke of Winshire’s heir.”
At her nod, he whistled. “Sutton, eh? You are flying high, Clementine, my girl. When Satterthwaite arrives, tell him I want to talk to you both before you go out.”
Clemmie could do nothing but agree, and wait with as much patience as she could muster for Chris to arrive.
Hours later—it seemed much longer—evening rolled around and with it came Chris, looking incredibly desirable in his black evening coat and silver-grey breeches and stockings, this time teamed with another waistcoat—this one in a dark blue silk brocade.
He must have chosen it to co-ordinate with her gown, which he had asked about during their afternoon drive. It was silver grey embroidered in dark blue, and was one of two new gowns she had had made. Father had reluctantly agreed to pay for a single new ball gown, but Clemmie had taken a leaf from Chris’s book and gone off Bond Street. The modiste was so reasonably priced compared to the Bond Street shop that Clemmie was able to purchase two.
“Father had a visit from your grandfather,” Clemmie told Chris.
“The vile old villain,” said Chris. “I should have expected it. What did he want?”
“Do you know? Father never said. I just assumed it was that you couldn’t marry me. I told him about Mr. Satterthwaite’s visit to you, and how you dealt with it. He cheered up, then. He wants to talk to us before he goes out, Chris, but he didn’t say what about.”
“We are about to find out, then,” Chris said, “for here he comes.”

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Tea with her messengers

Her grace poured coffee for the three men, and tea for herself. James and two of her sons had joined her today, and she was impatient to hear what Drew and Thomas had to say about their recent errand. They had travelled north to witness a wedding, both as Eleanor’s representative–the groom was the grandson of an old friend–and because they had become friends with the young man themselves.

She did not, of course, show her impatience, and the young men, who had excellent manners, did not keep her waiting. As soon as she had poured her tea, Drew said, “The wedding went off very well, Aunt Eleanor. The bride looked lovely, the groom was happy, and the entire village turned out to cheer.” It was a very good summary and made pleasant hearing, but Eleanor had questions.

“Tell me about Jackie’s gown,” she asked.

Jackie’s gown was a rose pink figured silk, simply but elegantly cut. It was embellished a richly embroidered silk ribbon—one row at cuffs and neckline, and three rows at her hem. Maman had wound the same ribbon through her hair, taking over from Jackie’s new maid.

The bridal flowers Jackie had chosen had prompted something of a disagreement between her and her mother. Maman thought the flowers were common. “They are vegetable flowers, Jacqueline,” she kept saying. “Why would you want to carry the flower of a vegetable?”

When Maman and Jackie had taken Papa to see the cottage where they had lived, the beans that Maman had thrown out the window had grown, and smothered one side of the house, spreading even up part of the roof. The flowers waved petals of the palest pink on long stems, and a few of the stems already sprouted rows of baby bean pods.

“They are bridal flowers,” Jackie had said. “And they go perfectly with my gown.” Not only were they lovely, but carrying them in her bouquet was a sort of poetic justice. Louella’s accusation that she—Jackie—had made up to Oscar to climb from seamstress to the rank of mistress had always been ridiculous, but had smarted a little, nonetheless.

No one she had met since the betrothal was announced had repeated the slur, at least not to Jackie’s face. Human nature being what it was, people were surely thinking it.

So, she carried the bean flowers as a symbol of her climb, and to thumb her nose at her detractors, even if they never knew it.

Only a keen gardener would know, she realized, as she looked at herself in the mirror. And even they may question it. She had been right about them complimenting her gown.

“Jacqueline, ma fifille, said Maman. “Tres belle. Tres, tres belle.” Clearly too overcome for words, she hugged Jackie instead, being careful not to crush the gown or the flowers.

Gran was next in line. “Your mother is right, dear one,” she murmured. “Very, very beautiful.”

Maman was trying to recover her usual brisk self. “Now, cherie, the carriage awaits to take us to the church, Clara and I.” She brushed a tear from the corner of her eye. “Go down to Papa after we have gone,” she instructed, her tone scolding. The arrangements had been in place for days, but if it helped Maman to scold, then Jackie would not challenge her. Not today.

“I will, Maman,” she said.

And if she rolled her eyes at Maman’s back, no one saw except Bella Whitely, who giggled, but only after Maman shut the door.

“Me own Ma be the same,” Bella confided. “More like to growl than to hug, but loves us summat fierce. You do look right purty, Miss Haricot.”

“Are you coming in the carriage with us to the church, Bella?” Jackie asked. She’d hired the eldest Whitely daughter as a favor to Pete. The girl had the makings of an excellent maid, and the housekeeper had already taken her under her wing, to teach her what was expected of a maid in a peer’s household. Jackie hoped she’d not entirely lose her habit of blurting out her thoughts in Jackie’s presence.

“Nay, Miss,” she said. “It’s nobbut a hop, skip and a jump, and it ain’t—” she caught herself and tried again. “It is not proper.” She even sounded a little like the housekeeper as she repeated what she had obviously been told. Then she, her voice, and her accent relaxed, and she added, “Not today nonewise. Just ye and yer Da, and I’ll be waitin’ for ye at the church, as will ‘’bout everyone.” She sighed her satisfaction. “And I saw ye first.”

They walked downstairs together and Papa’s reaction was as satisfying as Ma’s. “Ma petite Jacqueline,” he kept saying, with a shake of his head as if he could not reconcile the tomboy he had left behind him and the bride beside him in the carriage. “Ma petite jeune fille.”

What would Pol think? She would find out in a moment, for here they were at the gates of the church. The people standing around in the road and in the church grounds gave a cheer. Papa handed her down, and Bella was there to tidy her slight train before hurrying into the church ahead of them. She must have run through the woods like a hare!

She put her hand on her father’s arm, and the men who were waiting by the double doors flung them open. The church was filled to capacity, with the gentry in the pews and every standing place taken by somebody.

Every soul in the neighborhood must be either in the church or outside. But all of them faded from her mind as she looked down the aisle, where Pol waited for her, with his heart in his eyes.

The excerpt is from Jackie’s Climb. I hope to have preorder details soon.

 

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First meeting on WIP Wednesday

In Pol’s dream, he was chasing the gambler from the night before—Le Gume. Jack Le Gume, to be precise. Pol had asked a few questions and discovered that the man was well known in the area. And liked, too. He was remembered as a graceful winner and a cheerful loser. He won more than he lost, apparently. But not huge amounts, and those who had met the man swore to Pol that he was honest.

She was honest. Pol was certain of his impression from the night before, but now, in the dream, he tackled her to stop her from running away, and as she fell, the beard tore from half her face. Pol looked down into a face he knew. Jackie Bean, the stable boy from Squire Pershing’s.

Was he wrong, then? And yet his body insisted that the lithe shape underneath him was female and desirable.

At that point, Pol woke up. He was in the study, lying on the sofa under a rug, half aroused. Suddenly, he realized what his dream had been trying to tell him. He should have guessed sooner, for she had done little to disguise her name. Jack Le Gume. Legume. A bean was a sort of legume. Jackie Bean. Yes, and Jacqueline Haricot, too. Haricot was French for bean, and the French born Miss Haricot, the dressmaker’s apprentice and daughter, was very definitely a woman.

A lovely woman. Slender, but beautifully curved, with light brown hair that she usually wore tightly confined. But he had seen it loose, once, falling in soft waves to her shoulders. He had been riding past the field where she and her mother kept their cow, and she had not seen him, but the horse had stopped at a signal he did not know he had sent, and he had sat for a minute, staring at her with a dry mouth and an odd ache in his chest.

No wonder he had not guessed. The seamstress might be small, but she was all woman. However, now that he’d noticed it was obvious. She was was also the stable boy, and the gambler.

A soft click came from the door, which he had locked before he went to sleep. A similar sound had reached through the mists of sleep to wake him, he realized. Someone was tapping metal upon metal outside the study door.

No. Inside the door lock, for the light from the embers in the fireplace was enough to see the door open, and he had locked it himself, before he had settled on the sofa.

He watched as a slender figure slipped through the opening and closed the door. Not Oscar, then. His cousin was the only person with a right to pick the lock, though it was not likely he’d try. In the unlikely event he even wanted to enter the study and found the door locked, his style would be to hammer on it and demand to be let in.

This person was twelve inches too short and more than a hundred pounds lighter. For the same reasons, it couldn’t be the viscountess. Amanda, perhaps? But Pol already knew who it was. Perhaps it was the faint scent of violets, so vague he might have been imagining it. Perhaps it was the tightening of his body, already primed by the dream. She is safe, said a part of his mind, rejoicing far more than made sense, given they had not had even a single conversation.

Why was Jackie Haricot or Bean, or whatever her surname might be, breaking into Oscar’s study?

She had made her way to the desk and was crouching down by the drawers on one side. He shifted the rug from his legs and swung his legs to the floor to sit up, watching her the whole time. Her focus was on the drawers, and she didn’t notice him. The scratching sound suggested she was once again picking a lock.

He did not speak until he was ready, his weight balanced forward so he could make a spring for the door if she attempted to escape.

“Are you looking for anything specific?” he asked. “If it is the money Oscar cheated you out of, I’m afraid it isn’t here. Probably Oscar took it with him. He has ridden over to Civerton, I daresay for gaming and… um… other things.”

The girl froze when she heard his voice. As he kept speaking, she slowly moved, her head coming up so she was looking at him over the desk. “Is it you, Mr. Allegro?” she asked, only a small tremble in her voice indicating what was probably a turmoil of emotions.

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Interviewing a suitor on WIP Wednesday

The clothing is out of period, but I love the determined look on the model’s face. AI generated, and the sneakers made me giggle.

(An excerpt from The Secret Word, my current novel-in-progress)

Soon, they had covered the short distance to Leicester Square. Billy had suggested the destination and provided a key to one of the gates so they could walk in the private garden that filled the center of the square.

Apart from a sharp look when Chris pulled out the key, Clemmie did not react to him claiming resident’s privileges. As soon as Martha had lagged far enough behind them, he answered the question she hadn’t asked. “Ramping Billy gave me the key. I didn’t ask where he got it.”

The answer was not to her taste, Chris could tell, but he had no other, so he changed the subject. “Shall we talk about the choices each of us has before us?”

“Do I have a choice?” Clemmie asked. “Father has already said that the decision is his, and that if I refuse the groom he offers me, I will be—and I quote—‘out in the street in your shift, my girl.’”

Nasty old man. “Then your choice is whether you cooperate with me to convince your father I am the preferred suitor, or make common cause with another suitor, or simply sit back and let come what may.”

Clemmie bowed her head so all he could see of her was her bonnet. A pretty confection, but he’d have preferred it back in her wardrobe so her face was visible. She had not mastered the art of keeping her thoughts to herself, which was probably what her father meant by saying she needed to be more ladylike.

Personally, Chris preferred her openness.

“But if you are at risk of being thrown out, Clemmie, send for me, and I will meet you with a cloak and take you some place safe.”

She turned her head up at that and searched his face. Let her. He meant every word. Some of the women who had raised him took to their way of life because they’d been thrown penniless into the street—by a lover, a father, even a husband. For their sakes, he’d come to the rescue of anyone in such need.

Perhaps she did not believe what he saw. Certainly, her harrumph sounded dismissive. “What choices do you face, Chris?” she asked.

That was a victory! She had called him by his preferred name. He hoped his exultation did not show on his face. “Two, but each has options and both benefits and costs. Do I accept your father’s challenge or do I walk away? If I accept, can we manage your father’s expectations or will we end up paying his price? I think we can avoid being his puppets, and I know Billy will help, but what will Billy’s price be?” He paused for her comment, but she said nothing. That pestiferous bonnet was back in the way again.

“If I walk away, what will your father do to force my hand? Or can I convince him that I would be too much trouble, so that he dismisses me. And what of Billy? He is taking an interest in this match. If I refuse it, what will it cost me?”

She had a tart comment about that. “My, Mr. O’Hara is taking an interest in my affairs. I wonder that you let him push you around. I know that you owe him, but does he own you?”

“In much the same way as your father owns you, Clemmie. And I daresay Billy has been as much a father to me as my own was. More, in fact, for he…” He trailed off, not sure if he was ready to share that particular piece of dirty laundry.

He expected her to demand that he finish his sentence, but instead she asked a question that got to almost to the heart of his discomfort with her knowing his past. “Why do they call you Fingers? The people at Mr. O’Hara’s.”
They turned a corner and walked along the next side of the square. She didn’t press the question except by her silence.

Well, and why not? If she rejected him once she knew his story, so be it. If they were to decide to marry, he wanted a relationship based on honesty and trust. “When I was nine, my mother died,” he said, eventually. “My father had not been home for some time. I found out later that he was dead, too, which I suppose is why his debts were called in. The debt collectors took everything and left me homeless and alone.”

Out in the streets, in fact. In more than his undershirt, but that didn’t last. A gang of boys beat him up for his clothes, which were still sturdy though not new. Fortunately, they were impressed at how well he fought and how many of them it took to subdue him, so they took him back to the den they’d made in the cellar of a burnt out building.

“I was lucky. I found a place to live with some people who taught me a skill with which I could pay my share of food and board.” For nearly a year, he worked in a team lifting purses and watches, swiftly graduating from decoy to pick pocket as his skill grew. “They taught me to be a pickpocket, Clemmie.”

An indrawn gasp was her only comment. After a pause, he picked up the story. “Then I was caught. Ramping Billy had me, and not only that, he recognised me, because he was one of the men who had collected money from my father in the past, though not one of those who stripped my mother’s rooms. He took me back to Fortune’s Fool—at that time, it was his only establishment. He handed me over to the ladies who worked there.”

Chris could remember exactly what he said to them. “Wash him, delouse him, dress him in something that isn’t rags, and put him to work. We’re keeping him.”

“He told them to watch me, because I was light fingered. So they called me Fingers, and they still do. I never stole again, though.”

He shuddered at the memory of the hungry, terrifying year from which Billy had saved him. He’d been well aware of his fate if he were caught, and scared every time he lifted something.

And it had been made clear that if he was caught stealing from Billy or any of his employees or customers, he’d be out on his ear again. By that time, he’d been a street rat for long enough to know how lucky he had been the first time. Being beaten and stripped was far from the worst fate to befall a handsome boy alone in the stews of London.

“So that is why they call me Fingers, and that is why, between your father and Billy, I’ll take Billy every time. He is a villain, Clemmie, I’ll grant you that. But he’s an honest villain.”

“Whereas my father is a dishonest upright citizen. I accept your point, Chris.”

She was not yelling for her maid and stalking off in outraged disgust. That was a bonus. Instead, she seemed to have decided on an interrogation. “Do you gamble?”