He froze. “Are we, now?”
She nodded. “You, thinking I don’t find you attractive! I, not realizing you were ill instead of angry!”
“Angry! Why would I be angry?”
“At feeling obliged to ask…” She paused, wetting her lips. “To propose.”
He sank back onto his heels. “I see,” he murmured. “No, I wasn’t angry about that.”
Her face was warm. All of her was warm. She wanted to fling off the blanket—and her dressing gown and nightdress. The bed was mere feet away. “I’ve thought terrible things about you. I’m sorry.”
He brought their clasped hands to his lips and kissed the tender inside of her wrist. “I’ve thought terrible things of myself, too, but I accept your apology.”
She tried not to shiver. His mouth on her skin was intoxicating. “But I was wrong…”
He smiled, resting the back of her hand against his cheek. “You were only wrong to think I didn’t care.”
A flush of pleasure flooded her. “Perhaps we both are too inclined to think something to pieces, and lose sight of the forest for the trees.”
“Trees!” He pulled a face. “Individual leaves and twigs, more like.”
Agnes choked on a laugh. “It is a relief to speak so plainly,” she confided.
“I hope you always will with me. I’d rather be openly castigated than left to wallow in doubt of your feelings.”
She nodded. The room seemed much warmer now, and the bed was directly in her line of sight. Speaking about those wonderful, wicked things they’d done at the Assembly Rooms was doing very bad things to her. She had only wanted to talk to him, but now… “Thank you,” she said softly. “For asking if we could begin again. I—I was too proud, and too humiliated by my own actions. I never would have had the courage to say anything, but… I am very glad you did.”
“Thank you for listening,” he said, his voice gone low and raspy.
Agnes realized she was tilting toward him, the blanket around her waist. Felix still knelt at her feet, her hands clasped in his. He found her attractive. He hadn’t proposed out of guilt. It would take almost nothing to lean forward and kiss him again… and let him lead her to the bed… and show her exactly how much he wanted her without whisky or misunderstanding to confuse things…
Mouth dry, she shot to her feet. “I did listen to you before,” she said breathlessly, keeping her gaze fixed on him and not on the bed, only three steps away. “Your proposal was appalling, though.”
He rolled to his feet. “Well, I was on death’s doorstep.”
She raised her brows. “And you thought that improved your chances of being accepted?”
He pretended to ponder it. “In hindsight, I suspect it did not.”
She choked on another giggle, and gave a short shake of her head.
He grinned and followed her to the door. “Duly noted.”
“For the next time you propose marriage,” she replied teasingly, then realized what she had said and closed her mouth, mortified.
His smile faded, and his gaze was warm on her face. “Aye. I do hope the next time is more successful.”
10
Felix returned to Edinburgh in far higher spirits than he’d left it.
On the journey home, Agnes smiled and laughed and sat beside him at breakfast. It reminded him of his father’s warning, about seeing her at his table every morning.
He did like it. He liked it very much.
There was a dark moment the evening they reached the city. St. James, clearly loath to part from Mrs. Ramsay, engineered another outing to the oyster cellar, this time with Agnes. Without thinking, Felix blurted out, “Is that a good idea?” which earned him a furious look from her.
He worried that Mrs. St. James, whose goodwill he was very keen to secure, would disapprove and blame him for encouraging scandalous behavior. When he told Agnes, as they danced in the crowded, lively cellar, she beamed in relief.
“Mama will blame Drew,” she told him, her lips next to his ear to be heard over the fiddle and the stomp of the dancers. “And she’ll know why he did it.”
Both of them glanced at her brother, who had Mrs. Ramsay in his arms. No one could miss how the air seemed to sparkle and snap between those two. Felix didn’t tell Agnes that he had seen her friend leaving her brother’s bedchamber in the wee hours of their last morning at Stormont Palace. Why shouldn’t St. James fall in love, too? Felix saw absolutely no reason to spoil his future brother-in-law’s love affair.
Instead he swung Agnes in his arms, feeling the same searing shock every time she smiled at him or clasped his hand. God above. He’d been mocking and teasing St. James for weeks about being dazzled by a woman, and look at him now.
He was still in glowing good spirits two days later when he met Hunter in Agnew’s. The visit to Stormont had lasted longer than anticipated, and Hunter had had to carry the load of their clients’ demands alone. Newly conscious of maintaining his income, Felix had buckled down with ruthless efficiency and concentration.
At least, he did until Hunter arrived. Uncharacteristically late, his partner crossed the coffeehouse in a few strides. “You’ve not heard,” he said, thumping down his satchel on the opposite chair.
“Heard what?” Felix didn’t look up from the document in front of him, about a case to be argued on the morrow. “About the Cameron case?”
“Another robbery.” Helen came by and Hunter paused to order coffee and buns.
“Damned fools, those thieves,” said Felix, still reading. There had been a flurry of break-ins during the fortnight they were away. Rewards were posted all over town. “All Edinburgh will be at their hanging.”
“Aye. Any curiosity who was robbed this time?”
Felix flipped the page. “Who?”
“A silk mercer’s shop in Shakespeare Square.”
It took a moment to register. Felix’s pencil stopped. “Whose?”
Hunter lowered his voice. “Have a guess.”
It took exactly seven minutes for him to run down the High Street, across the bridge, and into Shakespeare Square. The St. James shop stood on the north end, neat and tidy, no broken windows or concerned crowd outside. Paradoxically that made him panic, and he flung open the door fully expecting to face hand-to-hand combat. “What the bloody blazes happened?” He caught sight of Agnes, her face pale and strained, and his heart almost stopped. “Are you hurt?”
With a gasping cry she bolted into his arms. And everything else faded away for a moment as his arms closed around her and he pressed his face into her hair and inhaled, holding her tight. “My hairt,” he breathed.
“You came,” she whispered at the same time, clinging to him. “You knew.”
His heart soared, not just with relief but joy. His arms tightened.
And then… Then he became aware of the echoing silence in the room. Cautiously he opened his eyes and saw Agnes’s mother, staring in astonishment; Agnes’s brother, mouth literally hanging open; and Agnes’s sister, looking smug.
He set her back on her feet and cupped her jaw. “Whenever you need me, I will come,” he murmured. “Always.”
She nodded, her eyes shining. He released her and cleared his throat. “What the hell happened here?”
“We were robbed,” said St. James. “What just happened here?” He jerked his head toward Agnes.
Felix didn’t care who knew he was falling for Agnes, but this was probably not the moment to make that declaration. He tried to think of something besides the feel of her flinging herself into his arms. He frowned and peered around the salon, which bore all the signs of invasion so lacking outside. Drawers had been forced open behind the counter, the wood splintered. Smashed glass from a cabinet covered the floor, and ribbons of slashed red silk lay everywhere like trails of blood. “Was anything taken?”
“If nothing was taken, I wouldn’t call it a robbery, aye?” returned St. James dryly.
Mrs. St. James put an end to it by shooing them out.
Felix exchanged one last intense glance with Agnes before following her brother into the street.
The crime spree had plagued Edinburgh for months now: the victims included jewelers, grocers, merchants of all stripes. Once upon a time, he’d even gossiped about it with Agnes and Ilsa Ramsay in the coffeehouse.
St. James had missed most of it, and paid little attention even once he arrived in Edinburgh, so Felix had to fill him in. St. James listened thoughtfully, then turned to examine the shop door. “This lock was opened as easily as if the villains had a key,” he observed.
Felix bent down. The lock hadn’t been forced. “A picklock?” His thoughts raced. People in Edinburgh often left the key hanging inside the door. It was convenient, to be sure—and perhaps an invitation for a thief?
But no victim had ever reported their key missing. It would have been noted when the shopkeeper locked up for the night. And if the thief could pick the door lock, why would they smash open the locked cabinets? Still, Felix filed away the thought.
“What are you going to do?” he asked.
His friend scratched his jaw. “I told Mother not to mind it too much. Seems a perfect moment for her to sell the shop and come with me to Carlyle, eh? She and the girls.”
Felix tensed. “I didn’t think you meant to make them go…”
“Make them!” The other man scoffed. “As if I could make them do anything! I invited them, to provide a better situation for my family after all these many years of being away and leaving Mother and the girls to manage on their own. But if the shop is gone, or failing, that’s certainly less reason for any of them to stay.”
Felix said nothing.
“Have you got anything to say about Agnes?” St. James demanded.
Not to you, he thought, and steered the conversation back to the subject of the thieves and how they could be caught.
But Felix didn’t forget that the St. James family was still on the verge of leaving Edinburgh, and he was running out of time to persuade Agnes not to go with them.
* * *
Agnes was a sinner for it, but she was glad they had been robbed.
Not for her beloved shop, which had been cruelly violated. No money had been taken, but several rolls of gloriously beautiful silks had been stolen and several more ruined, which cost a fortune. The thieves hadn’t ruined the fashion dolls she had so carefully dressed in the latest styles, but everything else had been ripped apart, smashed to pieces, or soiled.
Not for her mother’s sake. Mama was by turns furious and terrified by the carnage wrought upon the shop, where she had struggled and sacrificed for so many years. Mama had given so much of herself to this shop, constantly trying to wring out a spare shilling for new shoes for one of the girls or more meat for their dinner. Years of her work lay broken and crushed on the floor.
Nor for her sisters’ sake. They were briefly frightened by the intrusion, and Winnie made things worse by fretting aloud about the thieves coming back to kidnap one of them, but mostly her sisters threw themselves into the task of cleaning up and repairing the shop.
And she certainly wasn’t glad for her brother’s sake. Drew was determined to see the villains caught and punished, and began using his Carlyle connection to achieve that. He took off for several days on some vague business, saying he had to visit someone about a delicate matter, even though Mama asked him to stay and help her.
No, Agnes’s joy was purely selfish. When Felix Duncan erupted into the shop, his face fierce, all the doubt and uncertainty that had clouded her mind abruptly cleared, and she was almost blinded by the brilliant truth staring her in the face: she was falling in love with him.
And when she’d leapt into his arms, he’d held her close and called her his heart. A warm bubbly feeling filled her every time she thought of that moment, which was often. Every time the shop door opened, jingling the bell. Every time she caught one of her sisters giving her a knowing look. Every time she stepped outside and spied Felix waiting there, reading a letter or laughing with a neighboring merchant or scratching the ears of a stray cat.
That also happened often. Once Drew left on his covert mission, it quickly became commonplace to find Felix waiting outside the shop. Sometimes she was alone, but often her mother or one of her sisters was with her, and he was always utterly charming, as if escorting the four of them at once had been his dearest hope all along.
“Mr. Duncan must have been turned off by his employer,” remarked Mama one day after he had walked them to the shop before departing with a gallant bow. Winnie and Bella were still at the window, waving their handkerchiefs to him and giggling. “The man has nothing else to do.”
Agnes blushed. “No, Mama, he has his own legal clients.” He had told her about it on one of their rare private walks.
“Not many, if he spends his days walking from the High Street to Shakespeare Square and back.”
Agnes took her time neatening the stack of sample books. “I never asked him to do that.”
“Oh, I’m not suspecting you did,” murmured her mother.
“Now that Drew’s gone, I thought you’d be glad of it.”
“I am. Winifred, that window needs cleaning, now you’ve pressed your face against it,” said Mama. “Isabella, go upstairs and ask Mr. Beattie for today’s appointments.” Since the robbery, a new sign had been added to the front window: By Appointment Only. They had put the main salon to rights, but the upstairs, where patrons were usually received, was still in disarray.
Bella rolled her eyes and bounded up the narrow stairs behind the counter. Winnie gave Agnes a jaunty look as she fetched a cleaning cloth. “Mr. Duncan makes a handsome figure striding away,” she whispered as she passed.
“Stop!” hissed Agnes, fighting back a smile. She knew he did. And an even handsomer figure coming toward her.
Her mother stopped next to her. “Mr. Duncan has improved on you a great deal, aye?”
Agnes jumped. “Mama!”
“I’m not scolding,” said her unrepentant mother. “Only asking.”
“Would it be terrible, if he had?” The sample books were lined up with minute precision, but Agnes kept adjusting them to avoid her mother’s keen gaze.
Mama put her arm around her shoulders and bent her head to touch her forehead to Agnes’s. “Nay, child. If he’s the one your heart desires, no.”
She sagged against her mother, half relief and half elation. “You said he was such a scamp…”
“As a lad of twelve, aye. Incorrigible!” She smiled. “But look at your own brother, playing at being a ghost. Reminded me of your father, that did, and how he would lead all those boys in games and pranks… He’d approve of Mr. Duncan, Papa would. He’s grown into a stalwart fellow.”
Her heart soared. “Thank you, Mama.”
Mama smiled and squeezed her hand as Bella came tromping back down the stairs, list in hand. “’Tis a welcome spot of joy to see you smile like that.”
Agnes laughed, and spent the rest of the day in very good charity with everyone, even her sisters and their smug looks.
She was upstairs in the offices at the end of the day, reviewing the orders to be placed with Mr. Beattie, when the bell jangled below. When she came down the stairs, her mother and sisters already wore their hats and cloaks. Felix Duncan stood listening to Mama, hands clasped behind his back, head bent attentively to what she was saying. Agnes paused on the stairs.
Her mother’s words had played in the back of her mind all day. Papa had been fond of Felix; he’d called him a clever, bonnie lad. Drew thought him a capital fellow, for all that he and Felix mocked each other mercilessly. Her sisters thought him handsome and charming, and Mama was smiling warmly at him now. He looked at home here in her shop. Like family.
And she loved him.
As if he’d heard that thought, he turned and looked up at her. His expression remained pleasant and polite, but something sparked in his eyes that made her blush and want to run her hand over her hair to smooth it.
&
nbsp; “Agnes, Bella has a headache. Would you finish closing? Mr. Duncan has kindly offered to escort you home,” said Mama.
Bella caught on quickly. She clapped a hand to her forehead and moaned dramatically. “Oh, I do! A terrible, dreadful, painful headache!”
“We’d better go at once, Mama.” Winnie hurried to open the door. “For Bella’s sake.”
“How I’ll make it home, I’m sure I don’t know,” whimpered Bella. Her hand was almost covering her eyes. She wandered toward Winnie, groping blindly with one hand.
“We’re going,” agreed Mama. “Thank you, Agnes.”
Agnes bit her lips as they bustled out, closing the door with exaggerated care. “My goodness,” she said when she was able to speak. “I hope Bella doesn’t require a doctor.”
“She did appear to sicken very suddenly,” said Felix, his lips twitching.
“I expect she’ll recover just as suddenly.” She came down the rest of the stairs. “Thank you for seeing me home.”
“Always.” He made one of his courtly bows. “What needs doing to close up?”
She looked around. “Very little. Put down the shade in the window, and put out the lamps.” Felix nodded and went to do that. Agnes went into the back and checked that the door there was locked and barred. She came back into a dim salon. Felix had extinguished all but one lamp, and with the shade down, the salon felt very intimate.
She inhaled a shuddering breath. “They know it won’t take long.”
He leaned against the counter. “Aye.”
“So…” Her heart was racing madly. “If you’re going to kiss me, you’d better do it now.”
His brows went up. “And here I thought you might kiss me.”
She couldn’t keep from laughing a little. “Is that how you want it?”
“I’d never say no,” he said.
Agnes cast a nervous glance at the door, as if her family might burst back in even though they’d schemed to leave without her. “I’m not very good at kissing gentlemen.” He was the only one she’d ever kissed, and both previous times she’d kissed him, things had gone awry.
How the Scot Was Won Page 10
