Page 7 of I Will Steal You the Stars
‘And lying about it. What would Matron say?’
He took her hand, and with his thumb, uncurled her fingers. He pressed the penny into her palm and closed her fingers over. But when she opened them, instead of copper, she found a shiny silver shilling.
‘What is this for?’ she asked.
‘Anything you like. Fancy a baked potato?’ He pointed across the park at a man standing before a large, black cart hitched to an old pony. ‘Or would you like to watch a puppet show performed by a veteran of Waterloo with one leg and a terrible Italian accent? You could fritter it all away on fresh vegetables.Or buy enough flowers to cover your bed, and you can spend the night beneath a sheet of roses.’
One entire shilling… twenty whole pennies,forty ha’pennies, to spend as she pleased. It was far too luxurious. She should save it. At least some of it. She might get as far away as Leicester. Even Nottingham.
‘Don’t you dare even think about being sensible.’ Enzo half growled his warning. ‘Or you’ll break the spell, and your coin will vanish.’
She’d never had so much money for indulgences before. Mina tried to measure her smile, but couldn’t, and instead beamed with the perverse, sumptuous glee of it.
‘An entire shilling? Just for me?’
‘You might use a little of it to buy me another coffee.’ He peered into his mug with faux longing. ‘That one barely wetted my cheeks, let alone woke me up.’
She clicked the air in imitation of how he had at the coffee man at his kiosk. ‘Duke Enzo requires another,’ she called. ‘That is, I mean, please. If it’s no bother. Would you mind?’
The coster laughed, spun a mug from the stack and filled it before sending his boy scampering over to them. She gave the boy the shilling, and he dug into his apron pocket then poured a jingling mass of pennies, half pennies and a couple of bronze farthings into her palm.
Mina curled her fingers around the little collection of coppers, and their hard edges dug into her skin. She didn’t even know how to carry so many. With a flourish, and a hint of magic, Enzo whipped a square of linen from inside his pocket and held it taut before her. She tipped the coins into it, and he tied it with a confident knot.
‘I’ve never had ice-cream,’ she confessed as she shoved the little bundle into her pocket. ‘I’ve always wanted to try.’
‘There’s a man on the other side of the park who makes the most sensational cucumber ice. And he uses good milk.’ Enzo spun his bowler high into the air, then stepped into its descent where it landed askew, but firmly, on his head. He offered his elbow. ‘Shall we?’
For a man who prided himself on not working, Enzo understood the lives of those who did. When he imagined a path through the city, he must have seen a constellation of street sellers and costermongers at work, all with stories of some hardship, but also sporting the best version of their trade. This one had the best orange biscuits and was supporting two nieces, that one sang as beautiful as a Vauxhall performer and had been clean off gin for more than a year. One widow had taught her daughters how to find the best flowers at the markets, even in the dark, so if they lost their sight like she had, they’d still be able to work their trade. Mina lost a penny at a card trick, which Enzo won back. She bought a scarlet ribbon, and he helped her tie it in her hair. A fortune teller read her palm and told her she was destined for a bright future across the seas, while another read her coffee grounds and predicted imminent doom.
Her pocket became lighter and her arms and stomach fuller, until it not only settled, but felt satisfied. She hadn’t been properly full since she’d left the house on Grosvenor Square.
When the day began to darken, the street sellers packed their belongings back into carts. Others, those who plied nights, filled their places. Mina and Enzo angled back over the river, toward Southwark. Their ambling steps turned to a dawdle until they pulled up before her boarding house.
‘I’ll miss you,’ he said.
Mina laughed, partly at his bluntness, but also to deflect the warm discomfort that squeezed her chest. ‘It’s been years since we’ve seen one another. How could you miss me?’
‘I’ll miss the idea of you being in the same city as me. I won’t look for you in a crowd anymore, because I’ll know I won’t find you.’
There was no ambiguity with Enzo. No convoluted statements with scope to be misunderstood. For a man who built his life on thievery and deception, he spoke with stark honesty.
Enzo shoved his hands into his pockets as he looked beyond her, his gaze tracing the skyline. ‘I could get you enough money for what you need. You might not like how, but I could give you a purse full of coins to set off with.’ He pulled a gold sovereign from his pocket and rolled it over his fingers so that it flipped over each ridge.
The indignity of her dismissal flashed in her memory. The screeching of the house mistress, the damning looks of the other staff, but mostly, the shadow at the top of the stairs, who walked into his office, and softly closed his door, as quiet as his whispers had been in the basement.
‘I can’t be part of thievery, even if it is from coves with nice boots. You must think I’m silly. But it’s the principle of it. I don’t need more than I’m owed, but if I don’t try, I’ll never be able to lift my chin from my chest again.’ Mina shifted the bunch of daisies from one elbow to the other. She’d spent two whole pennies on flowers. She brushed at a petal. Tonight, she would hang them to dry, and sew a little bag from linen scraps to hold the dried blossoms, so she could tuck them into her clothes drawer to keep forever. ‘Thank you for reminding me of the good in this city. I shan’t miss it, but nor shall I hate it. Goodnight.’ With her hand on his arm, she pushed herself to her tiptoes, intending to kiss his cheek. But before she brushed his skin, he, perhaps misreading her intention, tilted, and instead she met his lips.
It began as an innocent breath, so delicate she barely registered what had happened. Surprise, shock and energy thrummed at his touch.
Enzo brought one hand to her waist and cupped his other palm to her cheek. They angled away to draw closer to one another, their connection gorgeous, beautiful and descending into some kind of reluctant oblivion. He was bad, so very bad for her, bad news in every way. He was the sort of man that might wind up under the eye of the watch with no means to bribe himself out of trouble, or without funds to secure a lawyer to plead his case. The sort of man who went out for bread, only to come home three years later after a stint in Newgate.
His lips were so gentle, his exploratory tongue so sweet, and his grip that fisted her waist so possessive.
Everything in her surrendered.
Warning bells clamoured.
This weakness was exactly what got her into trouble to begin with.
