Gideon smiled. He enjoyed listening to Jessica think out loud. “Immensely, yes. So we’re agreed?”
“Agreed to what? What are you agreeing to, Gideon? I’ve agreed to nothing.”
“I noticed that. Are we about to have our first argument? Yes, what is it, Thorndyke?”
The butler bowed and held out a small silver salver with a folded note on it. “Excuse me, my lord. This just arrived by messenger. I was informed it’s imperative her ladyship reads it immediately.”
“Then why are you handing it to his lordship, or have I been somehow rendered invisible?” Jessica asked, snatching the missive from the tray even as Gideon reached for it.
“And now we’ve both been put in our place, haven’t we, Thorny?” Gideon remarked, laughing.
“Firmly, my lord,” Thorndyke agreed and quickly bowed himself out of the room.
“I’m sorry. I’ll apologize later.”
“To Thorny or to me?”
“Not you, certainly. Thorndyke hasn’t gotten used to having me about as yet, but you should know better,” she explained absently, eyeing the missive as if it could possibly turn into a writhing snake at any moment. She slid her fingernail beneath the wax seal and unfolded the sheet, her eyes going immediately to the bottom of the page. “It’s from Felicity Urban.”
“Our invitation?” Gideon asked, rising from his chair, in order to stand behind her as she read. “Hmm, obviously not the invitation we were told to expect.”
Jessica read the note aloud. “‘I know what you and the earl are about. Help me and I’ll help you. Four o’clock today, Le Bon Modiste, Bond Street. Ask for Fontine. I will need five thousand pounds, and safe transport.’” She tilted her head back to look up at Gideon. “So much for my belief I was subtle last evening, I suppose. I told you she was looking at me curiously, as if measuring me or some such thing. She says she can help us? Honestly, I thought I’d be much better at this than I am.”
“You got results, and that’s what’s most important. But if it’s any comfort to you, I didn’t do much better at subtlety. She knows what I’m about? It has to be that damn rose. I only wore it for a few days, but obviously Felicity Urban took notice.”
Jessica was looking at the note again. “But didn’t mention it to her husband?”
“Yes, I’ll have to ask her about that when I meet with her, won’t I?”
Gideon Redgrave—and Thorndyke, for that matter—had a lot to learn about what it meant to be married to Jessica, but there wasn’t much he didn’t know about women in general. Or at least he prided himself on learning quickly.
“When we meet with her,” he corrected almost before Jessica could take in a breath in order to disabuse him of his former statement.
After all, Trixie may have thrown a candlestick, but there were knives on the dining table, for God’s sake… .
LE BON MODISTE WAS A small shop in a tall, narrow building. Gideon had insisted they make a business of visiting several shops as they strolled along the block and even convinced Jessica to purchase a new bonnet in one of them. They walked arm-in-arm, stopping to peer into store windows. They nodded to passersby, even stopped so that Gideon could chat with a rather florid-faced matron who begged permission to be introduced to the new countess and invited them both to a delightful musical evening the following Thursday.
Gideon had promised he would do his best, but it was possible they would be adjourning to the country prior to that date.
“I never said I’d go,” Jessica had pointed out once the lady had taken her leave and they were walking on once more.
“You never mentioned a burning desire to submit to a session with the thumbscrews, either, but that would be an almost enjoyable experience when compared to listening to Hetty Frampton’s offspring—and there are an even half dozen of them—as they attack your ears with song and defile every musical instrument known to man.”
“Oh,” Jessica said quietly. “I mistook your motive. I’m sorry.”
His smile melted her knees, which he had to know. “I’m sure you’ll be able to find some way to make it up to me. Now, are you ready? I believe, rank amateurs that we are, we’ve been suitably clandestine about our approach to Le Bon Modiste.”
“In case anyone is following us? Who would be following us?”
“Other than Richard, who is prudently keeping out of sight as he watches for the Marquis of Singleton, you mean? I believe that would be Max, who returned to London late last evening.”
“Your brother? Really?” Jessica made to turn around, but a short, sharp tug on her arm reminded her that spies, or whatever it was they were playing at, didn’t stop dead on the flagway and turn about to peer into the distance, now did they?
“I begin to see the logic in banishing me to the country,” she admitted on a sigh as they turned in to the narrow shop.
“That argument sounds familiar. However, I believe it was my brother saying something of that nature concerning me. I would have taken umbrage, but he’s probably correct.”
“He actually said you’re not up to the task? That wasn’t very nice of him.”
Gideon’s smile took her by surprise. “But probably true. He reminded me I am a newly married man, and my concentration perhaps isn’t as focused as it might otherwise be.”
“Oh? So he’s blaming not you, but me?”
“He blames the marital state in general, actually. According to Max, a man who goes into battle with a woman on his mind is a danger to himself and everyone around him.”
Jessica fought a sudden urge to preen. “And you’ve a woman on your mind?”
“And plans for that woman and myself for later tonight, yes, which probably proves Max’s point. Now why don’t you go admire the pretty ribbons on that table to your left, please, while I seek out this Fontine person, all right? Discreetly, of course, and I assign that description to us both.”
Jessica looked at the displayed ribbons without really seeing them while Gideon spoke to a young blond clerk behind the counter. Her heart was pounding in a most disconcerting way as she wondered if they had just walked into some sort of trap. Villains laid traps, didn’t they? It was basically their stock in trade.
She kept her back turned, said back feeling quite vulnerable, while the blond-haired clerk came out from behind the counter and crossed to the door, lowering the shade and then turning a key in the lock.
Which, Jessica realized with a start, effectively put Richard and Gideon’s brother Max firmly on the other side of that door.
“This way, madame,” the woman said as she walked back to where Gideon was now holding wide a beaded curtain that led to the rear of the shop.
Jessica slid her hand into Gideon’s, and they followed the clerk up a narrow flight of stairs that opened into a small sitting room, the shades of both front windows pulled down, the only light coming through the dirty panes of a window to the rear.
Felicity Urban was seated on a shabby couch, a bandbox at her feet. She was so nervous her knees were visibly shaking. Gone was the hard woman from last night. In her place, a clearly terrified creature. She did not rise to greet her invited guests.
“Mrs. Urban,” Gideon said, bowing.
“My Lord Saltwood,” she replied tightly. “You have the money? And the transport? I say