the ground.
She’d known he was dangerous. He had that reputation.
She’d assumed he was dangerous merely in the obvious way: big and wild and reckless.
This wasn’t merely. This was deadly.
“I recommend you save yourself a great deal of bother and stop fighting me,” she said. “I want that boy, and I will stop at nothing.”
She watched while he took this in and mulled it over, his dark gaze growing distant.
After a moment, he said, “Do you know, I don’t find that hard to believe.”
“We need a boy for the shop,” she said.
“You told me you don’t need them. You said so a moment before he crashed into our lives.”
“We don’t need bullies,” she said patiently. “But we do need a lad to run errands and carry messages and packages. He’s not too young or too old to train. He’s quick and clever and well-looking. With a bath—”
“And de-lousing—”
“And proper clothes and a little instruction, he’ll be perfect.”
Longmore grimaced with what she had no doubt was the pain of cogitation.
She waited, aware of sweat trickling between her breasts. If she hadn’t been a Noirot, she would have clenched her hands and gritted her teeth to keep herself from doing something fatally stupid.
Given that she was a Noirot, it was amazing that she could keep her mind on the boy at all.
But thanks to Cousin Emma, Sophy and her sisters were made of sterner stuff than many of their kind. She stood and waited, and wondered why the devil no one came to the door. She could use some sisterly reinforcement about now.
“Very well,” he said gruffly.
His voice had dropped a full octave, and the sound made her head thick.
“I’ll admit it’s not a completely lunatic idea,” he said. “But you’d better let me break it to him. I’ll feed him first and soften him up. Then I’ll bring him back.”
“This had better not be a trick,” she said.
He gave her an exasperated look.
“What?” she said.
“Trickery is your department, Miss Noirot,” he said. “Mine is knocking people about. But I’m flattered that you imagine I’m clever enough to trick you.”
He gave a short laugh and left.
“Tell my sisters I’m back,” Sophy said, moving quickly past Mary, the maidservant who’d finally opened the door.
She hurried up the stairs and on to her room. She needed to wash and change. She needed to wash in cold water.
She tore off the ugly cloak and the ugly dress and then had a struggle with the corset strings. The struggle reminded her of that endless, tormenting time while Longmore had been working on her dress hooks.
She didn’t need reminders.
She stomped to the chimneypiece and pulled the bell cord.
She moved away and filled a bowl with water. She peeled off the mole and scrubbed her face.
She hadn’t time to wash her hair. That was a time consuming project. But she needed to get out of these clothes. Where the devil was Mary?
The door flew open. It wasn’t Mary but Marcelline.
“My dear, are you all right?”
“No. Undo me, will you? I hate these clothes. They’re nothing but trouble. When I get them off, I want them to go straight into the fire.”
“Sophy.”
“I need to get out of this corset,” Sophy said. “I’ve three extra layers underneath and I think I’m going to suffocate.”
“Sophy.”
“I’ll talk when I get these blasted clothes off,” Sophy said.
Marcelline went quickly to work on the corset. A moment later, Sophy flung it to the floor.
“I take it that matters didn’t go well,” Marcelline said.
“Matters went beautifully,” Sophy said.
She told herself not to be a nitwit. Longmore didn’t matter. He was a means to an end. What mattered was the shop.
She started pulling off her clothes. While she removed layer after layer with Marcelline’s help, she told her sister how splendidly Longmore had been himself: the thickheaded, overbearing aristocrat. She explained how, thanks to him, she’d had a good look at the pattern as well as the silk Lady Warford had selected. She told Marcelline about Dowdy’s refurbishment and the French modiste.
“That’s not good,” Marcelline said.
“It isn’t what I’d hoped for, but it could be worse,” Sophy said. “Our furnishings are still superior to Dowdy’s. All we need to do is make them even more beautiful and exciting. Maison Noirot needs to look different. It needs to look ten steps ahead of Dowdy’s. People don’t notice subtle differences.”
That would take money they didn’t have. But Leonie would think of something. She had to. Sophy couldn’t think of everything.
“And the patterns?” Marcelline said. “Lady Warford’s dress?”
“We’d give it to the girls at the Milliners’ Society to pick apart and remake,” Sophy said. “Of course, Lady Warford won’t see its flaws.”
“How can she stand next to her daughter and not see the difference?”
“She’s the way Lady Clara was before we took her in hand,” Sophy said. “Her eye is untrained. And at the moment, I don’t see a way to train her. I’m thinking I need to give my attention to Lady Clara’s problem first. Right now, she’s all that stands between us and failure. If she continues to shop with us, we have a prayer. If she marries Adderley, she can’t shop with us.”
Marcelline paced for a few minutes.
“Leonie would say we need to set priorities,” Sophy said. “We’ve three problems, and rating them from simplest to hardest, I’d put Lady Warford as the hardest nut to crack, Lady Clara’s difficulty as next hardest, and Dowdy’s as the most manageable. Do you agree?”
Marcelline nodded, still pacing.
“We know what to do about Dowdy’s—at least for the moment,” Sophy said. “So I’m tackling Lady Clara next.”
Marcelline paused in her pacing. “It would help to know what’s going on in her head.”
