Chapter Four
LAVINIA TOSSED AND turned the entire night as sleep eluded her, her mind jammed full of measurements and orders. It was enough to keep any businesswoman awake at night.
And then there was the matter of Andrew.
After walking out on him, she’d gone straight into her shop and thrown herself into her work. The busy pace of the rest of the day had made it easy to ignore him and his proposal, and she’d sewn long after she’d dismissed Siobhan and Kelsie for the day, stopping only for a late bite of supper before resuming her tasks.
All of that activity had kept her mind occupied, and it hadn’t been hard to shove away the memory of Andrew walking into her shop. When she’d retired to bed, however, her thoughts had been free to wander, calling up dangerous memories of times she’d shared with him. Good memories.
Over the course of the night, she’d traversed their entire shared history. She recalled their first meeting, when her brother had hauled his new friend into the vicarage’s kitchen to steal bannocks from Cook and she’d followed them out to play in the kitchen garden. The innocence of childhood interactions had given way to blushing awkwardness when her brother had been sent away to school in Edinburgh but Andrew had continued to return between voyages. Then, at the Hogmanay festivities to mark the New Year, when the streets of Eyemouth had been merry with people celebrating, he’d pulled her behind the vicarage and kissed her. Any awkwardness regarding their youth and their awareness of one another had melted away like butter left on a hearth, and they’d been inseparable ever since.
Her parents had been convinced that his career would separate them and that young love would fade for lack of proximity, but the absences had only strengthened their bond. The night he’d proposed to her had been the happiest of her life. She’d believed with absolute certainty that he was the man she’d spend the rest of her life with. Until she’d thought she’d lost him.
And now he’d reappeared, a ghost from her past, to remind her of what her life could’ve been if only she’d been strong enough to choose her own path. But, like all ghosts who haunt dreams, he’d be gone by morning. This was her life: dressmaker, seamstress, widow. Her choices had brought her to this spot, and she’d do well to remember that no matter how handsome she still found him. No matter how much her body ached for him.
A banging at her front door broke the silence of her quiet house, rattling her nerves.
“Livy!”
Oh Lord, it was Caleb, and by the sound of it he was so deep in his cups he couldn’t see out.
“Livy!”
She leapt out of bed, pulling her dressing gown on as she swept down the two flights of stairs to the street. Caleb was still pounding away, and when she pulled the door open he nearly toppled over onto her.
“Livy, you’re here,” he slurred.
“Where else would I be, you numpty?” she asked, looping an arm around him and hauling him through the front room into the back kitchen.
“You cook the best breakfast, so I thought, ‘Why not come to Livy’s because it’s breakfast time?’ ”
“It decidedly is not breakfast time,” she said, dumping him into one of the wooden chairs that surrounded her table.
It was then that she realized Caleb wasn’t just drunk, he was covered in blood.
“Caleb, you’re hurt!” she cried, dropping to her knees next to him.
He lifted his chin and revealed that his nose had been punched. The blood had mostly dried, and bruises were beginning to form under his eyes.
“Have you been in a fight?” she asked.
He smiled at her dopily. “Hmmm . . . ?”
“Caleb, what happened?”
He frowned, the humor draining from his features. “Lost.”
Lavinia’s heart sank. “You lost at cards again. How much this time?”
He crossed his arms and stuck his lip out in the same sort of pout he’d used as a child when Cook refused him a treat. “Need more whiskey.”
“You can have coffee and bread and cheese, but no more spirits,” said Lavinia.
She set about raking the coals and putting on water to boil, well aware that Caleb was watching her. Sure enough, as she pulled the cheese out of the larder, he said, “Funny you doing all that. Mother would never have acted like a servant.”
“Mother didn’t marry a wastrel who lied about his income,” she said. “And I don’t mind doing my own cooking.”
That was a fib. She was exhausted at the end of every day, and the last thing she wanted to be bothered with was putting food on the table. Fiona helped a little in exchange for luncheon and tea, but the bulk of the work fell to Lavinia.
“You could’ve married again,” said Caleb. Then he laughed sharply. “But all you want is this pokey little shop.”
“Say another ill word about Mrs. Parkem’s and I’ll toss you out on your drunken backside,” she threatened, just as she always did when they reached this point in one of her brother’s drunken evenings. It was the cruel, petty side of him, and she hated it.
Tears began to run down his face. “I’m sorry, Livy. I’m a rotter. An eedjit.”
“How much was it this time, Caleb?” she asked quietly.
He was tugging at the edge of his coat, avoiding looking directly at her. “Five hundred.”
She sucked in a breath. “How did the club let it get that high?”
“Wasn’t playing at my club,” he mumbled.
“Where were you playing?” When he didn’t answer, she tried again. “Where?”
“It was a private game we’ve had going for a few months now.”
Damn you, Caleb. They’d been here before too many times.
“And they hit you because you couldn’t pay?” she asked, even though she already knew the answer.
“Yes. But maybe ladies like a nose with character.”
The half-hearted attempt at a joke fell flat.
“How much do you owe them?” she asked.
He screwed up his face, thinking very hard about the question. “For tonight?”
“For everything.” She knew enough by now to ask that.
“Close to two thousand pounds.”
Lavinia stumbled back, the lip of the sink cold against her back. It was an astronomical sum, and there was no chance her brother would ever be able to pay it on a solicitor’s salary.
His head fell into his hands and he moaned into his fingers. “I can’t pay. I’m going to throw myself in the Firth of Forth.”
“No, you won’t,” she said firmly.
“But, Livy—”
“I’ll pay it.” Just as she’d always paid Caleb’s debts.
When she’d first arrived in Edinburgh, she’d found him playing the wealthy student, awash in new clothes and fine wine, with nary a care in the world. That was how his group of friends at university lived, but she knew he couldn’t possibly keep up. The reckoning had come a few months later when he’d come to her door sheepishly asking for ten pounds to help him pay a bet he’d placed on a horse.
Over the years there had been more sheepish nights with twenty, fifty pounds doled out disapprovingly, but a year ago he’d come to her asking for five hundred pounds and she’d nearly refused to pay. Caleb hadn’t given her one moment’s peace, begging, pleading, and threatening with the desperation of a cornered man. Finally she’d cracked and given him the money out of her safe because he was her brother. He was all she had left in the world.
But two thousand pounds . . .
“Do you even have two thousand pounds?” he asked without malice but with a tired awareness that cut through her.
“No, but the prince’s visit has been good for business.”
He squinted and then sat back, as though he’d decided to believe her words—true or not—because they were the ones he wanted to hear.
“I’m sorry, Livy.”
“Don’t be sorry. It never sticks,” she said briskly. There would be time to mull this over later. Her brother needed her now, and that meant sucking up her pride and asking for help from the one woman she knew had both the resources and desire to assist her. She’d call on Moira first thing the next day.
Lavinia pulled the boiling pot off the stove and poured it over the coffee grounds, straining the liquid through a fine cheesecloth mesh and into a mug.
“Ask your creditors for a month,” she said, handing Caleb the coffee.
He nodded weakly and sipped at the black coffee.
“You’ll need a good story to tell your employer about the wounds,” she said.
Another nod.
“And, Caleb?”
He looked up, his eyes filled with sadness. “What?”
“When I tell you this is the last time, this is the last time. Don’t test me, because you won’t like what you find.”
“I won’t,” he said, and the two of them settled into an uncomfortable silence at the kitchen table.
On Tuesdays Moira Sullivan liked to take a cup of tea in her morning room and go through the week’s scandal sheets. She scanned them along with the broadsheets every morning to keep abreast of what had happened at balls, exhibitions, and concerts in Edinburgh, London, and all across Britain, but on Tuesdays she wasn’t just reading. She was taking notes.
On the walnut table in front of her were stacked the twenty-six thin, red-leather-bound volumes that were among her most valuable possessions. Each was marked with a letter of the alphabet stamped in gold on its spine, and inside were all the things she knew about every member of Edinburgh’s elite as well as many members of the ton. These notebooks were one of the things that made her so good at the matchmaking trade, as well as the several other more clandestine services she provided on the side.
She selected “H” and flipped it open to note down that the Earl and Countess of Blakeney would be traveling with their married son and his wife, Viscount and Viscountess Hathaway, from their Cumbria estate to Edinburgh for the prince’s ball.
A clearing of the throat brought her attention to the door. Fergus, her butler, stood patiently waiting, his hands clasped behind his back.
“Yes, Fergus?”
“A Miss Gibson to see you, madam,” he said.
A smile tipped the edge of her lips. She liked Miss Gibson, who, despite possessing an atrocious dress sense, was a feisty, bright young lady. She’d come to Moira two years ago when she’d been just sixteen with a proposition: that they share information—Moira regarding her matchmaking and Miss Gibson regarding her work for the War Office. The girl hadn’t even tried to pretend that Moira didn’t already know that she was employed by the War Office, and Moira appreciated that matter-of-fact approach to business.
“Please show her to the drawing room,” she told Fergus as she began to clear up her books with a mind to lock them away in their drawer—the key to which always hung around her neck.
“I took the liberty of doing so already,” said Fergus. But instead of leaving, he cleared his throat. “There is a gentleman accompanying her.”
She paused. “That makes matters more interesting. What did he look like?”
“Like he’s spent altogether too much time outdoors,” said Fergus, sniffing.
She laughed at the butler’s snobbishness. “Thank you, Fergus. I will join them presently.”
When the notebooks were all locked away, she made her way out of the morning room, but before she could get far, the doorbell rang again. She heard the scrape of the locks being turned, and Lavinia’s voice drifted up to her.
“Is Mrs. Sullivan home? It’s a matter of great importance,” the dressmaker was saying.
“She’s currently with visitors.” Fergus’s voice was muffled by distance.
“I must see her. Please,” said Lavinia.
Moira popped her head over the banister. “Is everything all right, Lavinia?”
The woman looked up, distress clearly etched on her face. “It’s Caleb.”
Lavinia’s charming but wastrel brother. Moira knew that Caleb Malcolm had a reputation for being an easy mark whom a card shark could ply with drink while steadily bleeding him of money over the course of a night. And if her informants were right, which they usually were, he’d recently been seen at higher and higher stakes games. Private games where there were no club rules to maintain order and respectability.
“I have callers in the drawing room, but I imagine you’d like to keep this a private affair,” said Moira.
Lavinia bit her lip and nodded.
“If you’ll wait in the morning room, I’ll be with you in a moment,” said Moira, knowing that Fergus would dutifully serve Lavinia a bracing cup of tea while she waited. Tea always went a long way to making things right.
When Moira stepped into the drawing room, she saw that Miss Gibson was accompanied by a man who had indeed spent many days outside, but he wasn’t the stranger Fergus had believed him to be. She’d met him in Lavinia’s shop just the day before.
“Miss Gibson, how kind of you to call. And you’ve brought a companion,” she said.
“Mrs. Sullivan, may I present Captain Andrew Colter, formerly of the Endeavor?” Miss Gibson said.
He bowed respectfully, but for all his good manners, he carried himself like a man who knew to look for the exits. Another one of Miss Gibson’s spies.
“A pleasure, Captain Colter, but we’ve already met.”
“We have,” he said, his tone clipped. He was no longer the pleasant, easy man in the dressmaker’s shop, instead he examined her shrewdly with a pair of piercing blue eyes. He was something of a chameleon, she suspected, trained to slip into whatever situation he found himself in.
“How may I help you both today?” she asked.
Miss Gibson glanced at Captain Colter. “We’re attempting to recruit an asset who is somewhat resistant to the idea.”
“Is that so?” she asked, her interest piqued. Miss Gibson had never come to her for help with a reluctant recruit before. “What is it that you need this person to do?”
“Stop a plot to cause bodily harm to the Prince of Wales or members of the public who will be celebrating during his visit,” said Captain Colter.
She blinked. “He’s visiting for five days.”
“Yes,” said Captain Colter.
“And he arrives in just under three weeks,” she added.
“You can understand the need to move quickly,” said Miss Gibson.
“Do I know the person you’re trying to recruit?” she asked.
“Mrs. Parkem,” said Captain Colter.
Moira cocked her head to the side. “Is that right?”
“The target seems to have a fondness for her,” said Miss Gibson. “A Mr. Wark.”
Calling it a “fondness” was being kind. She’d seen the way Wark circled Lavinia like a shark.
“And she said no,” said Moira.
“Miss Gibson believes she could be persuaded,” said Captain Colter.
“And what do you think, sir?” she asked.
“That Mrs. Parkem wants nothing to do with the idea. She told me so yesterday.”
“Well.” Moira rang the little bell on the side table next to her sofa, “What better time than now to find out who is right?”
Lavinia wiped her damp palms on her skirts as she followed Moira’s stoic butler, wishing she could calm her nerves. She was a proud woman, and coming to her friend for help was a blow to her pride.
It’s not help for you. It’s help for Caleb.
The thought did little to calm her. The matchmaker had been her client since Lavinia’s first year in business. At some point, they’d transitioned into a pleasant friendship, but Lavinia was always aware that the lady had been her customer first. Despite what she’d told Caleb just the day before, she knew very well the difference in social class between the pair of them.
Fergus opened the drawing room door, but before Lavinia could cross the threshold, she froze. Andrew was there.
She balled up her fists, her short, blunt nails cutting painfully into her palms. The universe was cruel, playing a trick on her in retribution for what she’d done to him. There could be no other explanation for why the man was still here, standing in her friends’ home on the very day she’d learned her brother was in trouble.
She swallowed. “What is he doing here?”
“Lavinia,” said Moira in the sort of voice one might use when placating a frightened horse, “I’m glad you’re here.”
“And who is she?” Lavinia asked, giving up all pretense at manners and jutting her chin out in the direction of a small woman who was wearing an appalling shade of puce, made even more offensive by the three tiers of swag that climbed up her skirt.
“Captain Colter and Miss Gibson have come to me for help,” said Moira, her deep-brown eyes softening with sympathy. “They’d like to put forward the proposal that Captain Colter tried to speak to you about yesterday once again.”
Lavinia’s gaze darted from her friend to Andrew, to Miss Gibson, and back to Moira. “No.”
And without another word, she turned on her heel and walked out of the room as fast as she could.
“Lavinia!” Andrew shouted after her.
Hearing her name on his lips was a shot to her soul. Why couldn’t he understand that she didn’t want to see him? She didn’t want to hear his voice. She didn’t want to think about him any more than she wanted to desire him with the low, keening pull of remembered attraction in her belly every time she set eyes on him. She could make it through this life she’d chosen, but only if he wasn’t in it.
She was at the top of the stairs when Moira’s soft voice stopped her. “Lavinia, there’s no need to run.”
Her feet stopped moving and her arms went limp at her sides as she stared at the blooming-rose-and-vine pattern in Moira’s William Morris carpet.
“If I had known how seeing Captain Colter would disturb you, I would never have welcomed him into my home,” her friend continued, rounding her and placing a hand on her arm.
Instinctively, Lavinia leaned into Moira to soak up some of her comfort. “We were engaged to be married once,” she said softly.
Moira’s brows jumped. “Before Parkem?”
That, at least, was a small victory. It took a great deal to surprise the matchmaker, who always seemed to know everything about everyone.
“Long before. My parents didn’t approve of the match, but I couldn’t imagine myself with any other man. Then Andrew’s ship was reported lost at sea. We thought he was dead. For months my mother pushed me at Parkem. My father was sick at the time and made it clear that there wasn’t much to leave Caleb, let alone an annuity for Mamma and me.”
It wasn’t the entire truth, but she didn’t think she could stand to describe all of that now. Not while he was standing in the next room.
“Two days after I was married, Andrew returned. There had been no letter. No indication that he was still alive. He just walked up Main Street, hardly recognizable because he was burnt by the sun and his hair was so long he had to wear it pulled back in a queue.
“He tried to kiss me when he saw me with my shopping basket. But I was married, Moira. I’d just been married . . .” Her voice broke.
“I’m so sorry, my dear,” said her friend.
“When he found out I was Alistair’s wife, the things he said to me—and then the things I said to him—were awful.” Betrayed, he’d been ugly, but so had she. “I never thought we could hate each other, but I was wrong.”
“I didn’t realize,” said a voice behind them.
Lavinia looked over her shoulder and saw Miss Gibson standing in the doorway, one hand against the frame.
“I was assigned to support your operation if you went forward with it,” said Miss Gibson. “I’m sorry if this feels like an ambush or an exploitation of your past. It wasn’t my intention.”
“Nor mine,” said Moira.
“I just had hoped that we might convince you to help us,” said Miss Gibson, her steady gaze never leaving Lavinia’s. “I’m still hoping that, for you’re our best hope. We’ve reason to believe that Wark may be at the center of a very serious plot, but we have almost nothing to go on. We don’t know where the weapons found at his warehouse came from. We couldn’t decipher his note, and when we sent it on its way to be delivered to the railway hotel where it was addressed, it was never retrieved. We don’t know how he plans to deploy the weapons, except we suspect the prince’s visit is the perfect opportunity to strike, if that’s what he wishes to do. We’re grasping at nothing, desperate to stop a tragedy.”
Lavinia took a steadying breath. “And you really think I can help?”
“You have his mother’s ear because you’re her dressmaker. You can be closer to the family than any agent we could deploy would get in this short time.”
“And he’s been pursuing me for some time,” said Lavinia.
“I won’t lie that it would likely help,” said Miss Gibson.
“Men say and do stupid things to try to impress a pretty woman they have their eye on,” said Moira.
“He’s a rotten blaggard of a man,” said Lavinia with a shudder.
“And we need to find out what he’s up to,” said Miss Gibson. “It could be a matter of great national importance. In the past, we’ve uncovered plots to move in munitions to arm an anarchist uprising. There’s the constant threat of bombings, and assassination attempts on the royal family are not without precedent.”
“Yes, people do seem to shoot at the queen rather a lot,” she murmured. “You speak of threats and plots, but it all sounds like speculation. You don’t yet know what you’re fighting, do you?”
“No.” A light sparked in Miss Gibson’s eyes. “But wouldn’t it be something to be the woman who figured it out and brought a man like Wark to his knees?”
The young lady’s hard determination and enthusiasm were infectious. Yes. Yes, it would be something else to fell a man like Wark who had harassed her for years. Wealthy and well-connected, he was a bore who expected everyone to bend to his will. That no doubt was why he was still doggedly pursuing Lavinia even after all the times she’d said no. She was a prize, and Andrew and Miss Gibson wanted to let him win her.
“I know you share a past, but I can assure you that Andrew has one of the most distinguished records in the War Office. He knows that the job comes first, and protecting and helping you will be the job. He wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize that,” said Miss Gibson.
“She’s right,” said Andrew, stepping out from behind the door. “If I’m your handler, you’re my asset.”
She swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry at the realization that she was actually considering this. “I don’t know the first thing about this sort of subterfuge.”
“I’ll instruct you,” said Andrew. “We’ll set up a system so that we can keep in communication. We’ll find a way to meet, and you can tell me what you’ve learned.”
“How?” she asked.
“You’re fond of walking in Princes Street Gardens on Wednesdays,” he said. When she started, his gaze slid over at Miss Gibson. “I’m learning that Gillie is remarkable at surveillance and information gathering, despite her taste in dresses.”
“There’s nothing wrong with my dresses,” said Gillie.
“They’re so . . . bright,” said Andrew.
Miss Gibson pulled a face. “I can’t wear colors like this when I’m following someone, which is why I wear them now.”
“Lavinia, you and I would meet in the gardens, but we’ll vary the time so that it seems natural. Gillie and I will find a way to let you know when that will be each week so that no one else will know, even if they intercept the message,” he said.
“And we’ll prepare a drop spot where you can leave us messages if you need to communicate urgently. You won’t be alone,” said Miss Gibson.
They made it sound so simple. So simple, in fact, that the idea was beginning to take root.
“What do I actually do?” she asked.
Andrew stepped forward into the hall, eyes fixed on her with an intensity that would’ve been seductive if she didn’t know how much he hated her. “Let Wark in. You want to string him along so subtly that he doesn’t know that he’s a fish caught on a hook.”
Like you did to me. He didn’t say it, but she knew that was what Andrew must be thinking.
Lavinia drew her shoulders back. He needed to know what he was asking her.
“He wants me,” she said.
Andrew hissed in a breath, but Moira and Miss Gibson just shook their heads, weary with the tale all too familiar to women of every rank and class.
“He’s not a stupid man,” she continued. “He might very well only tell me what you want to know if I make a commitment to him.”
“I’ll never ask you to compromise yourself,” said Andrew with a vehemence that surprised her.
“But that’s exactly what you’re doing,” she said. “Maybe you don’t mean for me to invite him into my bed, but by entertaining this man I could damage my reputation. If my clients believe that I’m a kept woman, they’ll flee to Mrs. McGloughlin or Madame Hollande.”
“Leave that to me. I can send such a steady stream of clients to your doors that you and your girls will hardly be able to keep up,” said Moira.
She knew Moira, who had sent clients to her in the past, was as good as her word. Still, the risk she would be taking was monumental.
She snuck a glance at Andrew, who still looked a little wild despite being land-bound. She knew this mission wouldn’t just be about persuading Wark. It would put her right in front of Andrew, tempting her to remember the heat of his breath on her neck when he would lean down to kiss her and the way their bodies fit together so intimately they were one. It would mean curling her fingers up when all they wanted to do was reach out and touch his jaw or thread through his thick hair. It would be dangerous on so many levels, yet she was considering it because he had asked her to.
And then there was the matter of Caleb.
“I’ll do it for two thousand pounds.”
Miss Gibson sputtered a laugh.
“My superiors will never agree to allocate that sort of money to an operation like this,” said Andrew.
“Then I’ll walk away.”
She placed a hand on the banister, but before she could take a step, he called out, “Wait.”
When she glanced over her shoulder, he looked positively murderous, but he nodded all the same. “I’ll figure out a way to get you your two thousand.”
“Paid out by the end of the month,” she said. “Regardless of whether the operation is successful or not.”
His lips fell into a grim line, but he nodded once more.
“Then it’s settled,” she said, but she couldn’t help feeling as though she’d signed a contract with the devil.