by C. J. Archer
High Holborn wasn't far from Worthey's clock factory in Clerkenwell where we'd seen DuPont. The Cross Keys looked as if it had sat in the same position for centuries, its wooden façade and small paned windows inviting passersby in for a quiet ale. I clamped my hand to my hat to keep it in place as I tipped my head back and looked up. The bold gold writing against the black paint glinted in the sunlight, but it didn't hold my attention for long.
"It's no wonder Chronos drinks here," I said.
Matt followed my gaze to the large clock jutting out from the center of the building, one floor up. He smiled and opened the door for me. "Be discreet."
I touched the brim of my hat to hide as much of my face as possible and entered. Matt stood just inside the door beside the umbrella stand, his own hat pulled low at the front.
A polished bar ran most of the room's length. Bottles, barrels and glasses behind it and a bartender who looked at me as if a woman had never walked into his establishment before. Empty tables and chairs occupied the other side of the room, and beside those were secluded booths that weren't visible from the front door. I quickly checked each one and returned to Matt.
"There are only six drinkers at the moment," I said. "None are DuPont. I still think you should check, just in case DuPont and Chronos are not the same man."
He nodded at the barman as he passed and looked into each of the booths. With a shake of his head at me, he approached the barman. They exchanged words and Matt reached into his pocket and passed him some money. The barman pocketed it and nodded.
Matt joined me and placed my hand in the crook of his arm. He steered me toward the coach and cheerfully asked Bryce to take us home. Matt's eyes sparkled with humor and hope amid the dark circles of tiredness. We may not have found Chronos, but we were close. We both felt it.
"What did the barman say?" I asked as I climbed into the cabin, my hand in Matt's as he assisted me up the step.
"That a man known only as Chronos drinks there occasionally. He fits the description."
I clapped my hands. "We have him, Matt! We've found him."
He closed the door but hadn't sat as the coach lurched forward. He would have tumbled into me if he hadn't pressed one hand to the ceiling and the other to the wall behind my head. The angle brought him very close to me, his chest just inches from my face.
I looked up at the same time that he looked down. His face softened and his smile slipped. The hand on the ceiling moved to my shoulder, the thumb stroking the underside of my jaw.
I swallowed, hoping for his kiss, waiting for it, aching for it. His eyes turned smoky and his lips parted. He moved closer, closer until he filled my view, scrambling my senses.
"India," he murmured, his voice thick, "when I am healed—"
We turned a corner and he lost his balance. Before I could even take a proper breath, Matt was sitting on the seat opposite me. He stared out the window, his profile uncompromising, as if we'd not just shared a charged moment.
"Are you all right, Matt?"
"Fine." He cleared his throat and tore his gaze away to look at me. "You?"
"Also fine, thank you." I clutched my reticule tighter and waited for him to continue his speech, but he did not. "You were saying?"
He stroked the crease cutting through his forehead until it cleared. "My behavior just now was unforgivable. I apologize. I…I don't know what came over me."
I hoped it was the same thing that had come over me, but it didn't seem so. He showed no signs of desire—no flushed cheeks, no quickening of his breath, and no eagerness to be close to me again. He wouldn't even look at me directly. The sting of his rejection brought tears to my eyes. I studied my reticule in my lap until I'd composed myself. I looked up, only to see that he'd been watching me.
My cheeks warmed yet he remained unmoved. "Did you pay the barman to notify you if Chronos returns?" I asked, determined not to let him see how he'd affected me.
He nodded. "I asked him to attempt to find out where Chronos lived and to also send someone to fetch me immediately. Apparently Chronos drinks there once a week, sometimes twice, always alone. He paid the innkeeper to tell him when someone asked after him. He uses the staff as a sort of messaging service."
"But if the innkeeper tells Chronos about us, he might run away again."
"That's why I paid the innkeeper more than Chronos is paying him."
I blew out a measured breath. "Let's hope he's greedy enough to sell his services to the highest bidder."
Bristow met us at the front door just as the ebony and brass clock in the entrance hall ticked over to eleven-fifty. "You have visitors, sir. Lady Rycroft and the Miss Glasses."
"All of them?" Matt asked, handing Bristow his hat.
"All of them."
"Is my Aunt Letitia with them?"
"Yes, sir."
Matt glanced past me through the open drawing room door. Hope Glass, the youngest, waved and smiled. Her two sisters, on the sofa beside her, pretended not to notice us. Matt's two aunts weren't visible from where we stood, and I couldn't see Willie, Cyclops or Duke.
"Shall we, India?" Matt asked.
It would seem I couldn't get out of it. Nor did it seem like Matt wanted to make his excuses. Perhaps it was too late for that, now that we'd been spotted, but I didn't expect him to want to join them. His aunt and cousins had called twice in the last two weeks, and he'd sat with them. His uncle hadn't visited, and I didn't expect him to after Matt almost thrashed him in his own home. Matt's Aunt Beatrice looked as if she'd rather bite off her own tongue than chat with either of us, but her desire to see one of her daughters wed her husband's heir outweighed her distaste for the American and his unimportant assistant.
"Pssst." Willie hissed from the staircase and signaled us to approach her. She did not step off the bottom step, as if it offered sanctuary from a potentially horrid fate.
"Not joining your cousins in the drawing room?" I asked with mock innocence.
She pulled a face. "Those little twits ain't my cousins and you know it, India Steele."
"Coward."
"Clever, more like. I don't have to put up with 'em." She gave me a smug look. "Do you?"
She had me there.
"How did it go at the hospital?" she asked Matt.
"Positively," he said. "We'll talk later."
She screwed up her nose and nodded at the drawing room. "You seem eager to get in."
"I don't think all of my cousins are silly twits, Willie."
"Don't you go getting any ideas about that Hope," she warned. "Englishwomen don't do so well in the California sun."
"I have no plans on taking anyone back to America."
"And Letty don't like her," she went on, as if he hadn't spoken. "I trust your aunt's opinion more than I trust yours. Men get turned too easily by a pretty face and fine figure."
I tended to agree with her; not so much by the pretty face observation but her faith in Miss Glass's opinion. From what I'd seen of Hope Glass, she wasn't always the sweet girl she pretended to be. She was very aware of her appeal to men and, I suspected, knew how to manipulate them. I felt a little cruel for thinking such a thing when I had no proof of it. Perhaps I'd put too much stock in what Miss Glass thought of her niece.
Or perhaps I was jealous. Matt certainly seemed keen to see her. He was already striding toward the drawing room. He waited at the door for me to catch up and allowed me to walk ahead of him.
"There you are," Lady Rycroft said as we entered. "We've been waiting an age for you, Matthew."
"An age," Miss Glass echoed with a glare at her nephew. "They arrived shortly after we returned from our walk. Willemina, Cyclops and Duke scattered, of course."
"You didn't honestly expect them to have tea with us," Lady Rycroft said with a flare of her nostrils. "The girl may be Matthew's relative, but she's rougher than a navvy. And the men!" She shuddered. "That dark one with the eye patch looks like a convict."
I waited for Matt to say something in Cyclops's d
efense, but he simply sat on the piano stool while I occupied the chair beside Miss Glass.
"Mama," Hope whined.
"I think the eye patch lends a dashing quality," the middle sister, Charity, said. She wasn't as pretty as Hope, or as witty, but she seemed to have the strongest sense of adventure of all three. At least she could hold a conversation. The eldest, Patience, was very shy and rarely lifted her gaze from her lap. "It makes him look like a pirate," Charity went on. "Pirates are so romantic."
Hope rolled her eyes. "You do say the silliest things, sometimes."
"Cyclops is rather sweet," Miss Glass said. "I like him."
"As do I," I chimed in.
Matt gave me a small smile, but no one else paid me any attention. I continued anyway.
"And he most certainly is not an outlaw."
Matt shifted his weight. I frowned at him but he didn't meet my gaze.
"India, pour yourselves tea," Miss Glass said. "Now that Matthew is here, I'm sure my sister-in-law will stay a little longer."
I did as told and handed a cup to Matt. He looked even more tired, and I feared he needed to use his watch. He would not hurry this visit along, however. He was much too proud to reveal his exhaustion, even to family.
"We have news, Matthew," Lady Rycroft said with a triumphant smile that lifted her dour features. "Patience is getting married in the summer at Rycroft. If you're still in the country, you will be invited."
"Congratulations," Matt said to Patience. "I'm very pleased for you."
She managed to lift her chin long enough to murmur her thanks and blush profusely.
"Who is the lucky fellow?"
"A baron by the name of Cox," Lady Rycroft said.
"Widowed last year," Charity added with a sly smile. "He has four small children all the way up at the Cox's Yorkshire estate. Oh yes, he's quite a catch for our oldest sister."
Patience's chin lowered further.
"Don't be so waspish," Hope scolded.
Charity sniffed, in perfect imitation of her mother, and turned away from her younger sister.
"One down, two to go," Hope said more cheerfully. "It's a start."
Her mother clicked her tongue. "Really, Hope. There's no need for sarcasm."
"Does Lord Cox have brothers?" Miss Glass asked. "Or eligible friends? Hope is quite correct in that we have to find suitable husbands for her and Charity. You cannot put any store in Matthew choosing one of them, Beatrice."
"Exactly," Matt said, not for the first time. "I have no intention of marrying anyone at the moment."
"So you keep insisting," Lady Rycroft said, picking up her teacup. "But all men must marry, Matthew. You are no exception. It makes sense to choose a girl already familiar with the house and estate."
Conversations with Lady Rycroft always circled back to Matt marrying one of her daughters, sooner or later. Usually he managed to change the subject without too much fuss, but this time he looked impatient. I wanted to remind him that it was he who'd quite willingly entered the drawing room.
"Tell me what you've been up to today, Matt," Hope said before the tension stretched to breaking point.
He smiled at her in relief. "India and I had business affairs to attend to."
"Poor Miss Steele, traipsing hither and thither, following you about the city. I do hope you rewarded her with a little treat."
"You seem to have me confused with a lapdog," I said before Matt could respond.
Hope blinked at my snippy impertinence. Lady Rycroft's lips pinched, deepening the grooves drooping from her mouth to chin. "Really, Letitia, you ought to control your companion's tongue."
"As you ought to control your daughter's," Miss Glass shot back.
"Hope said nothing wrong."
"Indeed," Hope said, hand against her chest. "If I offended you, Miss Steele, I am truly sorry. I had no intention of being cruel. I wasn't thinking. So silly of me. I feel utterly mortified to have caused you any pain."
Somehow she'd managed to make me look like the fool for taking offence when none was intended. At least I had Miss Glass on my side—and Charity. She rolled her eyes at her sister, clearly unconvinced by her apology.
"Matt, you believe me, don't you?" Hope asked, her brow furrowed prettily.
"My opinion doesn't matter," he said. Before anyone could respond, he pushed to his feet. "If you'll all excuse me, I have work affairs that need my attention. India, I'll require your assistance."
Thank goodness for that. I finished my tea and followed him out of the drawing room and up the stairs.
"I'm beginning to see what Aunt Letitia means about Hope," he said. "Pity. I thought she was the interesting one."
We had just reached the landing when Hope called to us from the entrance hall below. She lifted her skirts and approached, her sister Charity two steps behind. Her mother, Patience and Miss Glass waited at the base of the stairs.
"Miss Steele," Hope said, joining us on the landing, "I wanted to apologize again. I didn't think my words through, and I meant no offence. I know you may not believe that, but it's the truth." She caught my hand. "I like you very much and admire you greatly."
"Me?"
"Yes, you. You're composed and poised, and I doubt you ever say or do foolish things."
I eyed Matt sideways but he did not tell her some of the foolish things I'd said and done. "Not always," I told her.
"I wish I was more like you."
Beside her, Charity rolled her eyes again, but stopped when she caught sight of Duke and Cyclops standing at the top of the stairs. "Mr. Cyclops!" she said, touching her hair. "What a pleasant surprise. Are you joining us for tea?"
Cyclops looked to Duke. Duke merely shrugged.
"We're leaving, Charity." Hope took her sister's arm in a firm grip. "Miss Steele, please tell me you forgive me or I shan't sleep a wink."
"I forgive you," I said. What else could I say? I didn't think her apology entirely sincere, but it would make me look ungrateful to say so. "Thank you for your apology."
She bobbed me a small curtsy and wrenched her sister's arm to drag her back down the stairs. Charity shot Cyclops a smile. His eyes widened and he retreated out of sight. Duke's broad face broke into a grin.
Matt and I continued up the stairs and headed into the sitting room, a cozier space than the drawing room, reserved for members of the household rather than visitors.
"They gone?" Willie asked, sitting sideways in a chair, her legs draped over the arm.
"Leaving now," Matt said as Duke and Cyclops joined us.
"Finally." She swung her feet to the floor and leaned forward, elbows on knees. "So what happened at the hospital?"
Matt told them what Hale had revealed and how he'd convinced the innkeeper at the Cross Keys to inform us when Chronos returned.
"Well, God damn," Willie murmured. Cyclops grinned and Duke slapped his knee and whooped.
"So we wait," Cyclops said, still smiling.
Matt nodded. "We wait."
"I'm tired of waiting," Willie groaned. "We got nothing to do but go for walks and have tea with your mad relatives."
"You ain't mad," Duke said. "Just eccentric."
Willie pulled a face at him and he chuckled.
"Would you like me to dismiss the servants and you can do their duties instead?" Matt asked.
She slumped into the chair and crossed her arms.
"We're getting closer, Willie," I said. "In the meantime, you need a hobby."
"I had a hobby. Y'all won't let me play poker no more."
"Gambling was costing you a fortune," Matt told her. "So how was your walk this morning? I see you and Aunt Letitia managed not to kill one other."
"It was fine until we came home and found your other aunt and cousins waiting for us," Duke said. "We disappeared up here."
"Not that we were wanted in the drawing room," Cyclops added.
"You were wanted." Duke winked at him. "Miss Charity Glass couldn't stop staring. Careful, Cyclops, or you'll find
yourself hitched to an English rose."
Cyclops's big shoulders shook with his silent chuckle. "She's not for the likes of me," he said, without a hint of disappointment or resentment.
"Ain't nothing wrong with American roses," Willie muttered.
"True," Duke said. "But you got to watch out for the thorns."
Duke and Cyclops laughed. Willie gestured rudely with her fingers.
"I'm retiring until luncheon," Matt announced. "India, do you have a moment?"
I walked with him up the stairs, curious as to why he needed to speak to me alone. "If this is about Hope, it's all right, Matt. I've been called worse than a lapdog."
"To be fair, she didn't call you a lapdog. She merely inferred it. And I tend to believe her when she said it wasn't intentional."
My step slowed, and he matched his pace to mine. "You like her," I said flatly.
He cocked his head to the side. "I'm not sure what you mean."
"She's pretty and clever, so it's understandable." She was young, too. The perfect age to catch a man's eye.
We stopped outside the door to his rooms and he turned to face me. "India, you've got it all wrong. I have no intention of marrying her."
"That's not what I said or meant. I know you won't marry until you're cured, but that doesn't mean you can't like her." I folded my arms to chase away the sudden chill. "I'm sorry, I've overstepped. It's none of my affair." I turned to go but he caught my arm, only to suddenly let it go again.
He folded his arms and tucked his hands away. "You're right," he said quietly. "I do like her. She doesn't enjoy the situation we've been thrust into any more than I do, yet she deflects the awkwardness with humor. But liking her company for an hour or two a week doesn't mean I want to spend my life with her. Can you not see the difference?"
"I suppose." I shook my head, wanting to shake off the conversation altogether. Hope may be able to deflect awkwardness with humor, but I couldn't. "Is that what you wanted to discuss with me?"
He laughed softly. "Hardly." He sobered and cleared his throat. "I want to apologize again for what happened in the carriage."
"You don't have to."
"I do. It's not like me to take advantage of a woman alone. I feel terrible."
