He edges closer. “Cora, I know I can’t solve this conflict in Württemberg, but I am certain I can help us. Er...you.”
“You’ve helped me so much already,” she protests faintly, edging subtly away so that he drops his hand.
“I can hardly convince my father of anything, but I believe the dynamic between us may finally be shifting. I explained the emerald mines opportunity to him, and he’s now just as eager to invest as I am.” Harry smiles, standing an inch taller. “The fact that half of my father’s old associates are desperate to carve out pieces of the business for themselves didn’t hurt matters.”
Cora shakes her head, the very model of innocence. “I’m not sure I understand.”
Harry cups her shoulders. “Cora, he plans to be the primary investor in your mines. Theprimaryinvestor.”
“That’s... that’s wonderful! I shall speak to my cousin about it, but I’m sure, given our engagement...” Cora lets out a tempered laugh as she embraces him. “Oh, Harry, for once, the future feels bright and grand and—”
“Free,” Harry finishes, whirling her around in a sudden dance. “So very, very free!”
“Harry!” Cora laughs.
She closes her eyes as they spin, trying to pinch away the memory of Cal’s somber face, the hitch in his breath as he shared his story, his father’s ill-fated boast.A railroad man now.
And now the train she has helped put into motion, one built to correct the wrongs of the past, is garnering its final momentum. Hurtling forward, unstoppable now, just as Alice intended.
Perhaps that’s why Cora feels as if she’s stepped onto a runaway car, mere moments from careening off the rails.
Chapter 25
The Scorpion and the Frog
“I do declare.” Ward removes his hat as if in church, strolling about the soon-to-be Württembergian embassy, taking in the reception room’s curtains, sofas, tables, and other furnishings—all included, thankfully, in the rental fee. “It is all falling into place.”
“Béatrice is working on finding a flag,” Alice says. Her footsteps echo across the hardwood floor as she walks toward the “consulate’s” office and motions upward. “I thought to hang it here. And we’ll have to find a way to install a double-sided wall safe. Directly beside the door of the ambassador’s office.”
“Perfection!” Ward cries, striding over to rap the edge of the marble fireplace. “Perhaps the mantelpiece for the market ticker, as the embassy has only brought it in for this rare occasion. I suppose you’ve got someone in mind to read it off to the assemblage?”
“Our ambassador himself,” Alice answers.
“Quite right,” Ward says with a smirk. “I’ll look forward to meeting the esteemed gentleman. I thought I’d take on the task of marking down bids, unless you have any objections. One thing my unfortunate state of relative penury has afforded me is a gift for numbers.”
“I’d be very glad for you to do that,” Alice says. “I’ve a fair head for numbers myself, but I don’t suppose anyone will trust the accounting of a woman on the day.”
“I, for one, would trust nobody so much as I trust you, my dear,” Ward says.
Alice looks away to hide her smile. After all the annoyances and setbacks she’s faced of late, she must admit to a certain growing warmth in her chest tonight. Hope, exhilaration—but more than that, pride. No small feat, all this, and rather invigorating to stand here, on the invented ambassadorial grounds of a nation she has never set foot in.
And to have Ward McAllister by her side to witness it feels appropriate. Cora, Dagmar, Béa: They may live in her home, but the stakes are different for someone like Ward, who has no criminal record, no wolves snapping at his heels. He jumped aboard this little endeavor purely because he believed in the brilliance of it. And he’s proven at every turn a stalwart and upstanding partner.
She’s forming the right sort of words to express those thoughts without undue sentimentality when Ward turns to face her again. And Alice sees a glint in his eye that over the past year has become a familiar warning signal.
Though never before has it been pointed in her direction.
“Well, my dear duchess,” Ward says. His grin widens like the Cheshire cat’s. “Seems as good a time as any to revisit our arrangement.”
Alice remains cool, her own porcelain smile fixed on her face. “In what sense?”
Instead of answering directly, Ward begins to prowl the edge of the room, trailing his pointer finger around the top of the wainscoting as if marking it all as his own.
“Yes, it is indeed all in place,” he says. “Might not have been if I hadn’t warned little Cora not to broadcast her nefarious intentions to the entire Metropolitan Opera House.” He glances smugly at Alice. “And if I hadn’t faked a faltering wheel on my carriage to prevent a catastrophic escalation of your flirtations with Brett Ogden, he might have lost his interest then and there once he’d gotten what he wanted.”
Alice feels a chill from the calculation in his words. No concern for her welfare, no. Only for the plan.
“No, all of that was fixed,” he croons. “But when I look ahead, puttin’ myself in your shoes, as it were, I can identify a weak spot. Only the one, really, which makes it all the more remarkable.”
