Her Cinderella Season. Deb Marlowe

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СКАЧАТЬ consider something different from his usual classical studies—and if his new path also brought him closer to finding information on Batiste, then so much the better. If this Beecham girl and his mother were both involved with the Evangelicals, then perhaps he could look into them as well. Charles could believe what he liked about Jack’s need to find something he was missing. He knew the truth of the matter and it involved nothing so mawkish or sentimental.

      And neither, he told himself firmly, did it have anything to do with the shine of red-gold hair or the taste of soft, plump lips.

      Chapter Three

      A stranger inhabited Lily’s skin. Or perhaps it had only been so long since determination had pumped so fiercely through her veins, it felt as if it were so. But this was the old Lily—her father’s daughter, sure and strong, confident that whatever she wished for lay within her reach. Almost as if it were happening to someone else, she watched herself talk, smile and climb into Mr Wilberforce’s barouche. He and Lady Dayle were soon engaged in a spirited debate over reform. Fortunate, since this left Lily free to turn her rediscovered resolve to answering Mr Alden’s troubling question: What sort of female are you?

      She barely knew where to start, but she did discover that some aspects of the new Lily—her mother’s daughter—were not so easily discarded. And all of them were firmly fixated on the sudden burst of light that had shone down on Mr Alden for one dazzling moment. Surely it had been nothing more than a stray sunbeam?

      Perhaps not. Her nurse’s superstitious Cornish wisdom had been a constant in her life and it had taken firm root in Lily’s mind while she was still young. In recent years it had flourished into a guilt-ridden tangle.

      So often she’d worried that she’d missed some forewarning of her father’s tragic death. The storm that ultimately killed him had been immense. Nurse had moaned that his loss had been punishment for their failure to heed several unmistakable portents of doom.

      Lily had vowed never to make another such mistake. But surely a bright beam of light was no portent of doom. Then what could it possibly mean?

      With every fibre of her being, Lily wanted it to mean the change she longed for. It had touched on Mr Alden. Could it be that he would be an instrument of change? She flushed. Or was it possible that he might be something more?

      ‘Lady Dayle,’ she spoke up into a pause in the conversation, ‘I fear that your son has re-injured his arm because of my inattention. I wish you would convey my apologies.’

      The viscountess patted her arm. ‘Do not fret yourself, my dear. Jack should not have been driving those cantankerous animals in the first place. I dare say his brother told him so. But Charles should have remembered that the instant he counselled against it, it would become the single thing in the world that must be done.’

      Lily smiled. She’d grown up with her cousin Matthew and he had acted in just the same way. ‘How did Mr Alden first injure his arm?’

      Lady Dayle frowned. ‘Oh, he got caught up in that trouble at the Egyptian Hall, at Mr Belzoni’s exhibition. I haven’t the faintest idea how or why—I had no inkling that Jack even knew Belzoni or Lord Treyford. It was just a few weeks ago—perhaps you heard of it?’

      Lily shook her head.

      ‘Yes, I heard of it,’ Mr Wilberforce intervened. ‘A ring of international art thieves, or something similar, was it not?’

      ‘Something like,’ Lady Dayle agreed. ‘Jack will barely speak of it—even to me. And believe me, when her son is shot, a mother wants to know why.’

      ‘Good heavens,’ Lily said. She stirred in her seat. ‘Shot? Mr Alden must lead quite an exciting life.’

      ‘But that is just it! The entire thing was so patently unlike him. Jack is a scholar, Miss Beecham, and a brilliant one at that. At times he is all but a recluse. He spends more time closeted with his ancient civilisations than with anyone flesh and blood.’ She shot Mr Wilberforce a significant look. ‘He is my inscrutable son, sir, and too reserved and detached from society to cause me much concern—especially compared to the rigmarole his brothers subjected me to.’

      Mr Wilberforce laughed, but Lily fought back an undeniable surge of disappointment. A scholar? Inscrutable and reserved? It didn’t fit the image she’d already built around that wicked smile.

      But what did she know of men? An image of her father flashed in her mind. He dwelled heavily in her mind today—a natural reaction on a day when her past and her future appeared destined to collide. On the rare occasion she allowed herself to dream, the portrait she drew of a husband always shared important traits with George Beecham: twinkling eyes, a ready smile and a never-ending thirst for the next new experience. Never would she have conjured up a dry, dusty scholar who hid from life behind his books.

      Lily had been hiding for seven long years. She’d done with it. She wasn’t her father’s little girl any more, but neither would she continue as her mother’s quiet handmaiden. She fought back a surge of guilt. She didn’t mean to abandon her mother, nor did she wish to give up the good works she had done along with her. She only wanted the chance to live her own life, while she worked to help others better theirs. Superstition would not make that chance happen. Neither, it seemed, would Mr Alden. She clenched her fists. She would find a way, and do it herself.

      It was time she melded the two halves of her soul and finally answered that pesky question. It was time she discovered who Lily Beecham was.

      Jack kept his senses alert, his eye sharp for movement in the roadway ahead. This was likely not the best time to be skulking about the East End, especially not on his own. But his eagerness for his brother’s company had waned after listening to his admonitions and advice this afternoon. Charles would only have tried to talk him out of coming down here at all.

      So Jack had dropped off his brother and then returned Pettigrew’s nasty bays, and now he found his feet taking him towards the river, towards the reputedly abandoned shipping offices of Gustavo Batiste.

      Little Bure Street was not exactly a hotbed of activity in the late evening. A pair of prostitutes propositioned him from a doorway, but he shook his head and continued on. No doubt anyone with legitimate business in these dockside buildings had long since gone home, but the full swing of the illicit enterprises of the night had not yet begun. It didn’t matter; the alleyway he sought lay just ahead. Jack slipped in and stood a moment, allowing his eyes to adjust to the deeper blackness before he moved forwards cautiously. He flexed his sore arm as he went. The narrow space was more a passage than a street, but it opened on to a small walled courtyard at the end. Opposite him a rickety set of wooden stairs led to an office. Across the doorway sagged a crooked sign: G. Batiste & Co.

      Mervyn Latimer and Treyford had both warned him this would be a waste of time. The offices had been deserted for months. But Jack had a need to see for himself. He eased up the stairs, careful to keep his footsteps quiet.

      The door was not locked. Jack pushed it open with his free hand and was forced to stop again and adjust his eyesight. It was pitch black in the small anteroom. It took several long moments for his eyes to adapt, but there was nothing to see once they had. A listing table, a couple of small chairs and dust lying thick on every surface. He shook his head. What had he expected? He was grasping at straws. His obsession with Batiste was not logical, his involuntary association of the villain with his dead father utterly without a rational basis.

      From the back of the building came a thump and a muffled curse. Jack froze. His pulse began to race. Slowly he reached down and pulled a knife СКАЧАТЬ