Page 38 of Hazard a Guest
“People call us Quakers,” he clarified, the color and heat sweeping up over his face. “Do you know that word?”
“Only in commerce,” she answered, which did make him laugh, sending the concern out of his body with a flush of relief. “I see it on dyed fabrics sometimes.”
“We do love our fabrics,” he replied. “My mother’s business is hosiery, in fact.”
“Not your father’s?” she pressed, taking small steps back toward the table.
He shook his head. “No, his is precision tools. They sometimes compare and compete about which the world needs more.”
She sat down with a thunk, like she couldn’t quite fathom this. “He let her keep her business?”
“Let her?” he repeated, amused at the thought of it. “No. Not his domain.”
“Whose domain is it?”
He watched her, unable to stop the smile from spreading over his face, unable to tamper it down. “God’s, of course.”
“Oh, I know Him,” she said dismissively. “He’d punt it back to your da. So how does that work, then? Two businesses? Will you inherit both?”
“Me?” he laughed. “What am I going to do with them? No. My sister is apprenticing with my father, and my brother and his wife are learning the hosiery.”
“You don’t fecking say!” Ember cried, clearly both delighted and a little scandalized. “Your da will just give it to yoursister?With you right there?”
“I’m a barrister,” he reminded her.
“And a man!”
“And a man,” he agreed with a chuckle. “I am that.”
She stared at him unblinking, like she wasn’t sure if she was about to wake up from a particular nonsensical dream. “So if you and I were to marry, you’d just keep practicing law like no never mind and I’d have the Forge and your people would shrug and think nothing of it?”
Ah, he thought, there was the blushing again, whipping back into him under the protective deniability of a nearby fire. He nodded, not trusting himself to answer with words.
She grinned. “I don’t believe you.”
And he laughed and said, “Maybe one day you’ll see it for yourself.”
Her smile widened, the constellation of freckles on her nose rearranging. “Maybe I will, in fact. So, if Mr. Withers had shown up for Quaker new year and picked out a clever girl, what would have happened?”
“A clever girl who is only seventeen?!” he replied, his eyes widening. “He’d have been chased out with stinging nettles, Ember. That is not how marriage works amongst us. Not only were you a child, still learning who you were, but he wasold. We don’t even consider it until we are well into our second decade, and matches must be equal. His wealth made your marriage unequal.”
“Well, to my benefit,” she retorted softly. “Right?”
“No! He had all the power,” Joe exclaimed, clearly startling her with the very slight raise in his volume.
“Oh,” she said with feeling, “I suppose he did!”
He reached across the table, taking her hand again, this time for him, only for him and what he wanted. “I know how youmust have felt,” he said softly, watching her surprise and feeling carefully for any indication that she might not want it, that she might pull away.
She didn’t. She looked down quickly at their hands entwined and then back up at him, curious perhaps, but not unwelcoming.
“How I felt then?” she asked, a little breathless. “How’s that? Powerless?”
He shook his head, watching her with that faint smile of affection on his face. “Not powerless,” he corrected, “just not quite as powerful as the force across from you.”
She gave a dry little titter, shaking her head. “You are plenty powerful, Mr. Cresson. Joe.”
“Am I?” he wondered. “Let’s find out.”
