“Don’t go around admitting such things,” Claire chided playfully. “An investigator should not be so easy to ambush.”
“Aye, maybe not,” Abe chuckled, ruffling Oliver’s golden hair. “But my wife does most of the work, truth be told. I just reap the benefits.”
“Aunt Millie is the best!” Oliver agreed, though such a statement was thoroughly at odds with the worship in his eyes as he gazed at Abe. “The smartest!”
“That’s the truth,” Abe agreed.
He was a handsome devil, Claire thought, watching as he swung Oliver up from the ottoman and into the air before placing him back on the ground. She had always thought so, in that rugged rapscallion sort of way—not quite pretty, but close enough to be dangerous. He would never be quite refined, nor classically educated—essential things Claire would have sworn her sister wanted in a partner. His canniness was entirely inherent and often completely insolent, which perhaps just kept it on better display.
Even so, they seemed blissfully well-matched. Utterly happy. Perfect.
Maybe that was because it had happened slowly, over time. Maybe that’s because it hadn’t been the bolt of lightning but rather the careful scaffolding of real love.
Maybe Claire should stop assuming she knew anything about it at all in the first place.
She frowned, looking away from the man and moving to her mother-in-law’s side.
Even nearing her fifth decade, Patricia Hightower looked every bit the glowing bride. Her hair was still soft and flaxen, her skin still pale and smooth. The crinkles at her ice-blue eyes onlyenhanced her beauty. She had that classical perfection to her, beauty cultivated through centuries of wealthy men choosing beautiful wives.
She looked quite a bit like her son.
Claire sighed.
Oliver looked like them too, golden-haired and blue-eyed.
Claire herself was entirely a palette of honey. Her hair, her skin, her eyes, all of them glinted somewhere in the murky gradient of a beehive’s bounty. Officially, she would call it brown. Light brown, even, but privately she thought it had quite a lot of color outside of such a simple descriptor.
Privately, she thought it was honey.
It was unseemly, she’d been told by her mother as a child, to describe her own looks in such poetic terms, even if they were completely correct.
“I saw the carriages in the drive,” she said to Patricia. “Who has arrived?”
“My sisters,” answered the other woman with a wrinkle of her nose, “and my father. The other carriage was a relation of Raul’s, come up from Portugal. I do hope Mr. Cresson arrives soon. I need another translator in these walls before more Portuguese people land on our doorstep.”
“Where is Raul?” Claire asked, tilting her head. “I haven’t seen him today.”
Patricia scoffed, a blushing smile finding its way onto her lips. “If I had to guess? Back with the tailor again. The man is determined to cultivate a perfect fit.”
“Bless him,” Claire answered with a smile of her own. “I hope Mr. Cresson arrives soon as well. I am missing his wife. I want all of my London people here at once, in fact. I just got my sister and she’s already gone to sleep.”
“Has she?” asked Abe, unabashed at his eavesdropping.
Insolent, thought Claire,but charming.
“She has,” Claire answered directly, the flatness of her tone at least giving the man cause to grin at his own bad manners. “Do you know when the others were planning to start their journey here?”
Abe tapped his chin. “Silas and Dot were supposed to follow the day after us,” he said as though he were dredging up their specters in his mind as he spoke. “I think Ember and Joe are planning to travel with …”
He trailed off, clicking his tongue.
“With Freddy,” Claire finished for him, crossing her arms. “You can say his name, Abe, it won’t melt me.”
“With Freddy,” Abe said immediately, inclining his head in acknowledgement. “I’m not sure when they are setting out, though. They were hot in the midst of purchasing a storefront, last I saw. I’m sure they’ll depart once that is tied up.”
Claire kept his gaze for a beat longer than she should have.
He knew, she realized immediately. He knew how badly she wanted to ask questions. She’d worn it all over her face.
