“As long as they’re clean and have a steady job, it won’t be hard at all to make me happy,” the blonde woman said with a laugh.
Sera smiled indulgently. “That’s all well and good. Separate into small groups and practice the forms of address, if you please. Lady Victoria will be in shortly to practice your elocution. Mr. Thomas and I shall have to depart.”
A chorus of good-natured groans went up from the women. An unidentified voice in the back of the room complained that she’d not had her turn to “test out the mister.”
That one was lucky by half. She sounded so bawdy that if she hadn’t lucked into Seraphina’s little charitable program, she’d have ended up working for Mrs. Kordan in two shakes. Or rather, two wiggles of her bum.
“Fear not, ladies.” Fletcher stood. “If Miss Miller entreats me to return again, I fear I’d be powerless to say no.”
“If that’s true, it’s no thanks to us,” crowed Suzette from the second row. “It’d be Miss Miller with the crookin’ of her finger.”
“Hush now,” Seraphina said as she ushered Fletcher from the room. “There’s no need for pointless crudity.”
He knew quite a few instances where pointless crudity was not only needed but demanded. There would be no exploring such instances with the woman who walked down the hallway at his side. Merely the mention locked her spine more rigidly than the most restrictive corset. The tips of her ears had gone pink with an incipient blush.
Lady Victoria and Miss Vale sat in the tiny parlor. A length of embroidery draped over Lady Victoria’s lap in the general occupation of ladies at large, while Miss Vale sat poring over a fashion magazine at a round table. The scene was oddly comfortable, with a fire flickering behind the grate and late-evening sun angling through the windows to gild the room in golden light.
Fletcher had lived in squalor. He’d lived in opulence. Through the years, he’d even enjoyed tangential exposure to elegance on the rare occasions he received invitations to aristocratic offices.
Comfort was something he had little knowledge of.
In fact, he hardly knew what to do with himself. He stood awkwardly by the doorway, thumbs slung in the pockets of his waistcoat as Seraphina stepped in to collect her cloak. Lady Victoria graced him with a nod of acknowledgment. Miss Vale looked up from her fashion plates, but the expression framed by her cloud of messy hair remained imperious.
Seraphina smiled at both of them. “I’m off. The girls are waiting on you, Victoria.”
A tiny frown wrinkled Miss Vale’s brow. “Won’t you stay? We’ll leave together.”
“Not tonight, thank you.” She remained everything graceful and smooth.
Lady Victoria obviously wished to say more, but a look at Fletcher checked her words. It shouldn’t have. He was the last one to be dragging Seraphina off from pillar to post. He’d gladly leave her there if he thought she’d stay.
He knew she’d take a hansom cab and show up on his doorstep anyhow. Much better and safer to take her back in his own carriage than have her wandering alone, deep into the slums.
Once Seraphina had said her goodbyes and Fletcher endured enough silent warnings, they loaded themselves into the carriage. Seraphina watched the view slide by the window while Fletcher watched her.
He shifted in his seat, spreading his feet until his boot tips brushed the wide circle of her skirts. He’d always despised sitting in the rear-facing seat. He liked seeing where he was going—and he knew each and every back alley by heart. It must be different for Sera. She’d been gone for so long.
“How much do you remember?”
“Both too much and too little,” she answered immediately. Then she seemed to realize her response and blinked the unfocused haze out of her eyes. She twitched at the seams of her skirts, aligning the stripes to perfection. “That was silly of me. I’m not even sure what I meant.” She offered him a celluloid imitation of her regular smile, pale and stretched thin.
“I believe it made perfect sense.” He’d been there more than once, that place between innocence and cynicism.
“Still, unmeasured words are the hallmark of an unorganized mind. Unmeasured words are the quickest way to determine a body’s true emotions.”
“Determining emotions can be rather handy on occasion.”
“Ah, but see?” She looked back out the window but peeked at him from the corners of her eyes. “To hang one’s feelings out for examination is the height of vulgarity. Like hanging out one’s wash on a Thursday.”
“Is that so awful?”
“Certainly.” She was cool and composed, but under the thick sheaf of her lashes lurked humor. “It’s terrible. One might as well instruct the servants to wait ’til the next week and simply work longer on Monday.”
He’d been blessed to avoid the ignominy of scrubbing his own undergarments. Before his father had the money to hire a washerwoman, Fletcher had worn what he’d managed to squirrel for himself, be damned how white or clean—or not—it was. He’d known no better, being only about hip-high. After that, his father had begun collecting women. First they did laundry. Then they hired it out when they spent too much time on their backs.
“I see,” Fletcher said, when really he didn’t see at all. The codes and regulations of being a woman were too much to order into a chain of logic. They simply didn’t make sense.
Most of the time he was damned glad he had a dick.
Back at the house, Hareton waited patiently to open the door and to take Fletcher’s hat and Seraphina’s cloak. She took infinitely more time to peel off her gloves finger by finger. The skin at her wrist was tissue thin and showed the faint blue lines of her veins.
He coughed. “I’m off,” he blurted abruptly.
Hareton looked nearly bewildered and moved to hand back the hat. Fletch waved him off. “No, no. To change. I’m off to change.”
Seraphina’s brows rose. “Do you dress for dinner even when you’re not entertaining?”
“Isn’t that what’s done in all the finest houses?”
She cast a judicious eye up to the randy-angel ceiling. “Yes.”
He resented that implication, but he couldn’t deny the truth. He didn’t particularly care to. Dressing in eveningwear every night when the footman served him soup seemed like a lot of work for no reason.
Though if it provided him the opportunity to see Seraphina in a diaphanous evening gown, with miles of creamy skin on display, he might be tempted to reconsider. That wouldn’t be likely any time soon, however. Though Seraphina’s clothes were finely made, they exposed nothing of her flesh. She was always wrapped from chin to toes.
He shook the image out of his head. “As a matter of fact, no. We do not dress for dinner here. I’m going out.”
“To oversee your businesses.”
“Tonight to Fair Winds.”
She flicked her dove-gray gloves against her palm. “I hope you don’t expect me to know what that means.”
“The Fair Winds is a public house that I own. It caters to sailors, captains and dockworkers.”
She smiled. “Naturally, it would be down by the docks, I suppose.”
“Naturally. The only neighborhood worse than the stews. Plenty of drink, loose women and revelry.”
She sniffed with disdain, but he suspected a glimmer of fascination in the depths of her chocolate eyes. That was impossible. Seraphina was a lady of quality. In all reality, he should not feel such a thrill of satisfaction at ludicrous fancies. When he was finally able to declare himself to her, he’d have already sold the Fair Winds. Sneaking her in for a secretive visit would be both nearly impossible and foolhardily undo much of his work in preserving her reputation.
He sketched a bow. “I shall likely see you in the morning.”
“Please do not stay out too long,” she said. “We’ve quite a lot to accomplish.”
Chapter Eight
Sera watched Fletcher disappear up the curving staircase. For a roughhewn, bulky man, he certainly moved with
an economy of flourish that ought to serve him well in society. But even in the fact of his departure did he violate the rules of propriety. He ought to have asked after her welfare and seen her settled in some quiet activity before he disappeared to attend business.
In a way, she was relieved he’d not known his lapse. It left her free to explore her new surroundings.
She wandered unchallenged through the bottom floor of the mansion. Once again she encountered hardly any servants. A downstairs maid or two should have been seeing to the cleaning. Dust lay over mantles and tables in a faint haze. Driving back the soot of London was an occupation that required constant application of diligent effort.
The grand dining room was unprepared for the evening meal. The huge table, which looked as if it could seat twenty easily, forlornly went without either cloth or platters. The crystal chandelier had been converted to gaslight, but it was dim. The staff was likely used to their employer’s evening departures.
At school, she’d usually been the last served, but now she was a guest in a supposedly fine house. Someone should have seen to her wishes. Though she’d prefer a tray brought to her room over eating alone among the grandeur, she should have been asked.
She left the dining room and peeped into rooms off the wide hallway. More parlors. A morning room that seemed little used. In the study she found a lived-in quality most of the other rooms lacked, with papers strewn in stacks over a large desk and the remains of a breakfast tray that carried a pot of coffee and a plate of crumbs. Three dirty glasses piled up next to decanters of liquor. Unacceptable. Any dishes should be cleared away immediately, not left to molder.
At the far end of the hallway, Sera found a glass-walled conservatory. The rattan furniture came the closest to comfortable as any she’d seen in the entirety of the house. She trailed a hand over the back of the divan as she drifted through the room. Perhaps she’d have her dinner sent in here and enjoy the leafy fall of ferns that had been crammed into the room—the better to screen the lack of greenery outside. The conservatory edged into a small garden, but beyond it high brick walls barely kept out the creep of the undesirable neighborhood. Tiny slits served as windows in the building next door, yet some intrepid woman had hung her laundry out to air, including a very obviously displayed set of drawers.
Sera couldn’t begin to imagine the ignominy of hanging one’s undergarments out for everyone in the neighborhood to see.
Yet Fletcher had decided to build his expensive, luxurious mansion in the middle of all of this. What a strange man.
He likely wished to stake out his territory more clearly. Such a move is exactly what his father had done, establishing himself as the king of a small sliver of the city.
A trilling, chirping noise made her jump from her reverie. She spun, looking for the source, and saw nothing but ferns and tiny potted orange trees. To the south side of the room was a small bank of orchids. Perhaps the chirps had come through the glass windows.
No, there it was again and too near to be obscured by the walls. Not to mention, it didn’t sound like the cooing of hardy pigeons, the most prevalent birds who survived this area of London.
She pushed aside a bank of slender ferns and found them. Two pale-breasted birds with red-feathered crowns snuggled together in a cage that was an approximation of an Indian temple. On first glance, the concrete-styled cage seemed to be decorated with bird pairings. Further inspection revealed they were actually birdlike people, all contorted in the throes of carnal passion. A petite twist of wings made up a smaller bird woman who knelt at the feet of a bulkier man, her mouth on his member.
Chuffing a noise of disgust, Sera ignored the tingle deep in her belly and left the room.
In fact, as she looked closer, every decoration revealed something sensual. The large painting over the dining room mantelpiece was another work of angels who, at first blush, appeared to be lounging in the heavenly gardens while singing the Lord’s praises. In reality they pressed entirely too close to each other. Drapes of their linens displayed scandalous lengths of limbs.
Sera sped more and more hurriedly over the thick hallway runner as she fled. Victoria and Lottie hadn’t understood her determination to move into this den of iniquity. For the moment, she didn’t understand either. Her heart was pumping too quickly for her to think. Her skin seemed alive, a stranger infiltrating her own body.
Once Sera’s eyes were opened, she saw depravity everywhere. On a table in the hallway clustered a collection of miniature bronzes. Every single one was a half-nude woman with a similarly clad man curled around her. One woman sat in her partner’s lap, tiny bronze head thrown back in obvious delight.
Sera’s breasts swelled. The tips abraded against the inside of her corset that had previously felt inoffensively smooth. Now she could feel the warp and weft of every single thread. She clutched the marble balustrade as she climbed the stairs, cooling her overheated palms with chilled stone.
Neither had Victoria and Lottie understood why Sera insisted on this foolish scheme to earn the endowment. They never needed to think of it beyond the academic consideration of the women they assisted with their school. That was play for them, a way to avoid the realities of their home lives. Sera hadn’t the words to explain how she refused to be her mother—and that this silly plan was the best way to not be indebted to a male. Though she’d sometimes like to believe Fletcher was the Digger she remembered, she couldn’t fool herself for very long. Not when she watched the thick play of his muscles under his jacket as he walked away.
She couldn’t be her mother. She wouldn’t. The past years had been any normal woman’s fill of charity. She could stand it no longer. Would stand it no longer.
Sera teetered on the precipice. Owe a man too much and who knew what type of trade he’d demand. Convincing Fletcher she’d made a difference in his business endeavors, even by smoothing out his social and home life, would ensure he didn’t think he owned her. Not as his father had owned her mother. Not like the other men had owned Mama. Not like the other girls at Waywroth believed they owned Sera.
She tossed open the door to her temporary room, determined to hide in its quietness. Anything inappropriate that lingered in the corners would soon find itself tossed out in the hall.
But she found worse than a licentious statue.
Her belongings had been strewn about the room in total disarray. Every gown was piled across the bed. Dozens of books tumbled open, their spines cracked and pages fanned out. A snarl of hair ribbons had been plopped under the window seat.
With one hand gripping the wooden doorframe, Sera blinked. And then blinked some more, unable to believe what she saw.
At first she wondered if some poorly trained maid had begun unpacking for her, only to be called away. She saw more malice than that. The lace collar of her best day dress had been rent at the seams.
Pain lanced through her teeth from grinding together. Her nails curled into the wood as her anger flamed into a hot, mean kernel.
Spinning away, she stormed down the corridor, tossing open doors on each side. In the third bedroom she caught a red-haired maid on her knees before a footman. The man’s back was to the door, but the uniform was unmistakable. His head had dropped down to his chest, his hands sunk into her curls. When the door banged the wall, the girl leaned aside to peer around the footman’s hips. Her mouth was wide and slick with fluids, her eyes almost as big.
Sera didn’t let the bawdy scene disturb her righteous fury. She pointed. “You two. Tell everyone to assemble in the foyer. Immediately.”
The girl nodded.
Sera slammed her way down the hallway. She was a woman on a mission and nothing, not even tartish maids and whore-mongering footmen, was going to stop her.
She found her goal at the very last door on the far end of the house. The room had pale blue wallpaper and a sitting room that was everything manly. Hard, looming furniture and dark colors.
Across the room, Fletcher stood stripped to his waist, bending ov
er a basin.
His shoulders were every bit as broad as they’d appeared under his jacket. Maybe even more so, without the dark colors to minimize his impact. Golden skin was tinged ever so pinkish from scrubbing with the cloth in his hand. His waist was trim before it nudged out into a gentle swell at his hips. He gripped the basin’s mahogany table, and small muscles along his spine twitched and stretched with the movement. The white pull of a scar rounded over his thick—oh so thick and wide—shoulder.
Sera snapped shut her mouth, pulse racing. Her wrists throbbed with it, and she felt lightheaded, though she’d never been one for artful faints. She’d let her anger verge into hysteria, surely. There could be no other reason.
“I demand your assistance.”
He didn’t flinch or jump or demonstrate any other indication of surprise. His motions were as slow as honey when he straightened and reached for a length of Turkish toweling hung on a bar at the side of the table. He rubbed it first over the back of his neck, where tiny droplets of water absorbed the golden gaslight, then dragged his hand down, down over his torso while he turned.
“You…demand?”
His hands kept up the idle movements over his torso, drying himself. Two heavy curves of muscle banded the top of his chest. His belly was bisected into individual ridges that were almost boxlike, except that they moved and shifted with every breath.
It was indecent to be so muscled. Surely.
Not that Sera had much experience with the male form beyond the artistic interpretations of the Greeks and Romans. Those had been more lithe and lovely than anything else. Not hard. Not everything powerful, like he could hurt her without thinking twice.
She gulped.
She was being scandalous as well. Bad enough she was in his private chambers. She shouldn’t be gawking, no matter how imperious her intentions. She forced herself to look away, at a corner in the ceiling—where a long-legged spider had spun her web. Disgraceful.
This whole household was disgraceful.
“Cat got your tongue?” he purred. Even his voice was contemptible, the way it promised things that shouldn’t be hinted, even in the dark of night between husband and wife. Evil appetites. Hot lust. “Or are you reconsidering your choice of words, considering you have established yourself in my home?”
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