enlighten me as to the reason.”
“That’s simple. You’ve been hiding yourself, and you’re good at it. A master of camouflage.”
She laughed. “Camouflage?”
“That’s the only possible explanation. You’ve made a frock from the same silk covering the drawing room walls, trimmed it with cat hair and feathers. Then when gentlemen visit, you stand still and blend in.”
“You have a surprisingly vivid imagination.”
“What I have is experience.” He stopped in the road and turned to face her. “I’ve built a fortune by spotting things that are undervalued, dusting them off, and selling them at the proper price. I know a hidden treasure when I see one.”
“Oh.”
Looking away, he pushed his hand through his hair. “Not this again.”
“Not what again?”
“Every time I speak three words, you look as though you’re going to swoon into my arms.”
“I do not,” Penny objected, knowing very well that she probably did.
“You sigh like a fool, blush like a beet. Your eyes are the worst of it. They turn into these … these pools. Glassy blue pools with man-eating sharks beneath the surface.”
“I hope you’re not planning a career in poetry.”
“For the good of us both, you have to cease gazing at me.”
“Then you have to cease wooing me.”
“Wooing you.” He grimaced, as if the words were a pickled lemon on his tongue. “I don’t woo.”
“You do too woo.” She lowered her voice to match his gruff timbre. “‘I need you,’ ‘I’m not letting you go.’ A woman can’t help but go soft inside. Those sorts of declarations are unbearably romantic.”
“You know very well I don’t mean them that way.”
She couldn’t help but roll her eyes. “I suppose if I didn’t already, I would now.”
“Exactly. So don’t go swooning on me.”
“I assure you, you needn’t worry about that. If I did swoon, it would be from the heat.”
Pounding hoofbeats behind them announced the prospect of salvation. Penny turned, hoping to see the carriage.
It wasn’t Gabriel’s carriage, but it was the next best thing. A stagecoach, passing their way. Penny darted to the center of the road, waving her arms until the driver pulled his team to a stop.
“You’re a guardian angel,” Penny said. “Can we ride to the village?”
The driver looked them over warily, taking in their bedraggled attire. “In that state? You’d have to ride up top with the trunks.”
“We can do that.” Penny extended her hand to the driver. “Will you help me up?”
The driver didn’t take her hand. “Not so hasty. I need the fare in advance.”
“How much?” Gabriel asked.
“Let’s see.” The driver squinted. “Fare for the two of you, plus tuppence for the baggage—”
“Oh, this isn’t baggage.” Penny lifted the cage for him to see. “She’s a parrot.”
“Then that’s fare for two of you, plus thruppence for the parrot … A shilling, all told.”
Penny reached for her reticule.
She didn’t have her reticule.
Her reticule was back in the carriage. Along with Gabriel’s coat.
“Deuce it,” Gabriel said dramatically. “If only I had a shilling.”
She sighed.
“I was certain I had one here somewhere.” He made a show of patting all his pockets. “Oh, that’s right. Someone tossed it away.”
“Please,” Penny begged the driver. “Take pity on us. We’ve had an accident. It’s only to the next village.”
“Sorry, miss.” The driver flicked the reins, setting the horses in motion. “No fare, no ride.”
In silence, Penny and Gabriel watched the stagecoach travel down the road, until it rounded a curve and disappeared.
On they walked. There was simply nothing else to do.
“I always keep a shilling in my pocket,” Gabriel muttered after a few minutes of angry silence. “Always. Do you know why I always keep a shilling in my pocket? Because everything I am today, everything I’ve earned—it all started there. I was once worth a single shilling. Now I’m worth hundreds of thousands of pounds.”
“No, you aren’t.”
“Shall I produce the bank ledgers to prove it?”
“Ledgers are meaningless. I have a sum placed on me, you know. A dowry of forty thousand. And yet if I were to lose my virtue, some would deem me worthless.”
“You could never be worthless.”
“I could certainly drive down the price of your house. You never miss a chance to remind me.”
He shook his head. “That’s not the point.”
“Here is the point.” She stepped into his path, forcing him to meet her eyes. Man-eating sharks and all. “No one can be reduced to numbers in a ledger, or a stack of banknotes, or a single silver coin. We are humans, with souls and hearts and passion and love. Every last one of us is priceless. Even you.”
She set her frustration aside and took his face in her hands.
He needed to hear this. Everyone needed to hear it, including her. Perhaps that was why she spoke the words so often, to so many creatures. Simply to hear them echo back.
“Gabriel Duke. You are priceless.”
You are priceless.
Gabe’s heart kicked him in the ribs.
There were responses he’d prepared in his life—saved up for the day he might need them, no matter how unlikely. He had an acceptance speech ready for the London Business League award. He had his murderous threats well-rehearsed in case he crossed paths with that cruel bastard of a workhouse guardian someday.
Gabe even knew what
