Page 24 of Forgery, Love, and Other Lies
I think Raph would like you, too. Usually, people prefer me to him. He’s a bit of a grump, and I’m absolutely the more charming of the two, but recent events have run me down, and I’ve not shown you my charming side as much as I would like. Perhaps that should be remedied. You have, shockingly, excellent ideas. But we cannot implement any of them in haste. Can you stay at the shop tonight after your sister and father leave?
I’ll be waiting across the street for your answer,
Mr. Muttonhead
P.S. These names, as dissociated as they are with our true ones, are acceptable.
There was that bit about her good ideas shocking him, of course. But his suggestion that they meet in the shop after hours made up for it. She’d have to find an excuse to give Papa and Posey, of course. She could tell them she was working on a new painting or practicing a new brush technique, and that she’d have Daniel escort her home. Yes, that would do. She made her way toward the door to push it open and signal to him. She saw him through the shop windows first, standing as he had those first few weeks—a dark specter on the landscape, an omen that had brought to her life the chaos it had promised.
Shockingly excellent ideas.
Hmph. He could wait a little bit. She crumpled the bit of paper in her hand just as the bell above the front door tinkled. She turned, expecting to see Lord Lysander stride into the shop. He did not. The Duke of Crestmore did, however.
“Your Grace!” She grinned, striding toward him.
“Miss Frampton.” He bowed low.
Formality ruled the shop, and they could not be as they felt toward one another here—brother and sister.
“What brings you in?” she asked.
He pulled a bit of paper from his pocket. “This. It’s a new design. Do you think you can accomplish it?”
She took the paper and unfolded it. Pearls mostly. “It’s exquisite. Your mother’s design?”
Heat stole across his cheeks. “My own, actually.”
She clapped hands over her mouth and danced a bit of a jig, propriety forgotten. “How utterly delightful.” She studied the parure with closer attention to detail. “Exquisite and complex. Yet still simple. It’s perfection.” What stories would it participate in? What life would the lady who wore it lead?
“I hope so. Can you have it done by Christmas, do you think?”
She beamed up at him. “I shall try!”
He took her hands, squeezed them, though they both knew he should not, then shot out of the shop like his heels were on fire.
She shook her head, blinked at the place he used to be, then studied the drawings once more. “So very odd.” She looked out the window. “No!”
Lord Lysander strode away.
She threw herself out the door and cupped her hands around her mouth. She yelled, “Oy!”
He stopped, one foot forward, hesitating over the ground. Slowly, he put it down, and slowly, he turned to look at her, scowl firmly in place.
Where the deuce was he going and in such a horrid mood?
And how to communicate to him that she agreed with his plan without crossing the street and speaking with him, an action that would thoroughly disgust him, considering his worry over being trapped into marriage through mere conversation. He’d likely take flight with her first footstep, screaming his head off, dodging between hacks, calling for a constable. Then he’d trip, be trampled beneath horse’s hooves, and that lovely woman she’d met, his sister, would have to wear black. Black would likely wash her out, pale as she was to begin with. But worse than that, she’d be so sad. So would the brother Lord Lysander had written about in his note, the married marquess. And then—
She shook her head. No. Focus. But just in case, best to remain on this side of the street. What to do? “Umm…” She waved.
He scowled harder. From across the street, she could see the massive and massively disapproving indentation between his brows.
She rolled her eyes, then jerked her head toward Frampton’s behind her. Hopefully that was clear. She finished off with a smile wide enough to make her face ache and returned indoors, dreaming of what might happen that evening when her family went home and she stayed. When Lord Lysander snuck inside and, together, they plotted how to save themselves.
Nine
When Zander knocked on the alley door, the sun had already dropped below the London skyline, and Miss Frampton’s family had long since closed the shop for the day. Only Miss Frampton the younger remained inside, and inadvisable as this little evening exploit was, he could not help but look forward to it. What absurdities would the woman’s mind cook up? He’d already considered a few of the possibilities she’d written in her note. The one about putting out rumors they had a Rubens to sell was particularly good. Perhaps the dowager herself would show up on her own doorstep to fill her personal galleries with priceless works of art.
The door creaked open, and Miss Frampton’s heart-shaped face peered out at him. She bit her bottom lip, and dragged her eyes up and down his frame, as if she suspected he was not himself.
