He could not help but be impressed. “I don’t know who is in charge of the Balcovian Royal Guard, but if they have any brains in their head, they’ll give you all the special training at their disposal.”
She snorted. “I’ll tell Floris and Reinald you said so.”
“Your brothers? They shouldn’t need me to point out the obvious. You’re gifted and tenacious, the perfect qualities for any aspiring acrobat.”
“Don’t you mean ‘soldier’?”
“Do I?” He motioned her down from the tree and over to a section of soil with several humps of protruding roots. “As before, we’ll jump onto completely inappropriate surfaces from a distance easy to recover from if you fall. Once you can do it with perfect balance, we can talk about the wall. But I warn you—this bit is deceptively tricky. It can take weeks or months to master a high beam.”
Or never, in most cases. But, as Graham was rapidly learning, Kunigunde wasn’t like mostanything. If anyone could learn to leap atop a narrow beam during the free moments of a four-week reconnaissance mission in a foreign country, that person would be Kunigunde.
“Tell me about your information network,” she said as she practiced hopping onto an uneven narrow tree root. “Do you have spies on every corner?”
“Almost every,” he said with pride. “It took years to build up contacts in so many places. I won’t bore you with the details.”
“Bore me,” she begged. “I’m fascinated.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Are you going to copy my espionage techniques, too?”
“I’d try if I thought I’d have any success at it,” she admitted without any shame. “I’m much better at tossing daggers into people than I am sweet-talking information out of them.”
“Hmm, I don’t know. It seems to be working withme.”
She batted her eyelashes at him before jumping onto a tree root.
As she practiced, he gave her a brief overview of where a few of his informants were located and how they passed him information, expecting her eyes to glaze over at any moment. Instead, she gazed at him with rapt interest, impressed enough that she kept forgetting she was meant to be jumping on top of things.
Soon, they were seated hip to hip on a low, thick root, having given up on acrobatics entirely in favor of giving their full attention to their conversation and each other.
Graham’s siblings considered his fact-gathering missions a useful addition to the Wynchester wheelhouse. Kunigunde understood in a way he had never previously been able to verbalize.
She didn’t just want to belong to the Balcovian Royal Guard. She wanted to be invaluable. Indispensable.
That was what Graham wanted with his family. He never wanted the show to go on without him. He wanted to be thestarof the show. To have an act so essential to the whole, there would be no performance without all the pieces working together.
His wish to become a star had inadvertently come true when his sister Chloe married the Duke of Faircliffe. Without Bean as head of household—and without Chloe, who had briefly taken over—the role had fallen to Graham.
He could never take Bean’s place. Nor could he attempt to replace Chloe. But Graham could—no,did—lead his family on their missions in the best way he knew how. Which meant practicing his acrobatics, expanding his network of informants, compiling detailed compendiums containing every bit of information he gathered…and staying right here in London, directing the entire spectacle from his home.
His face was no longer on playbills, but his family’s fame grew day by day. Soon, thanks to his current clandestine assignment, his name would appear on the front pages of the newspapers he scoured so voraciously. He would be important not just to his siblings, but to his entire town. The whole country.
Graham Wynchester, indispensable. Protector of London. Local hero.
Perhaps one day, personally recognized by royalty.
15
After nuncheon, Kuni tried not to stare at the Wynchesters in abject envy as they made their goodbyes. Four of them were going: free-spirited Tommy, bookish Philippa, softhearted Jacob, and dashing Graham. No matter who they might meet, one of the four was bound to be able to coax the next signature.
This afternoon was completely unlike the day when each of Kuni’s older brothers set off to join the Royal Guard and left their little sister behind, and yet she had the same foolish twisting ache in her belly.
Her brothers had never allowed her to accompany them because they thought girls were useless. Not only had the Wynchesters invited Kuni, but it was also clearly not a case of only the men of the family being deemed important. There was no doubt Graham’s invitation to join him had been sincere.
Nor was he leaving Kuni all alone. The duke and duchess were at their home in Mayfair or off in Parliament. But observant Marjorie and bloodthirsty Elizabeth were staying behind just like Kuni.
The butler entered the salon where all of them had gathered to make their goodbyes. “The coach is ready and waiting.”
Philippa tied her bonnet while Tommy and Jacob put on their hats.
