“You have a skill, Yihui. Something that is yours alone, and I envy that. I say that if Max is to parade you about thetonas his fiancée, then you should get a place of business out of the charade. And customers, too. I think every hostess who puts you on display must, I don’t know, try a headache powder or something.”
“You want me to use your brother to find customers?”
“He is using you to appease the prince. Why not get something out of it for yourself?” She lifted her chin. “That is what I plan to do.”
“How?”
“I believe I shall start asking for payment from my father. I manage the meals and the servants, plus whatever entertaining is to happen.” She looked down at her hands where they were clenched in her lap. “I shall take control of the household accounts. I will pay the bills, manage what is spent, and save what is not. Better yet, if I am to attend a party as mother’s companion, then I should be paid for that as well. I am worth at least that much, am I not?”
It was clear that Yihui didn’t understand what she was saying, and no wonder. Emma already knew that her father would hate every radical idea in her head. He would call it preposterous. Both her parents had lived in dread of thepossibility of her becoming a spinster. The shame of it had haunted her earliest days. They would be revolted by the idea of her declaring herself on the shelf, but that was what she meant to do.
“What will you do with the money?” Yihui asked, proving that she was smart enough to see to the heart of the matter.
Emmaline deflated. “I don’t know. I have spent my life fitting into the roles I’ve been commanded to fulfill. I wasn’t given a passion like Kimberly nor a skill like you.” She lifted her palms in an open gesture. “Surely God has given me a talent of some kind. I simply haven’t found it yet.” Her gaze brightened. “Perhaps you could teach me about medicines!”
Yihui released a small sigh. “Everyone wants to learn about my medicines when all I want is to be a good woman for Max.”
Emma shook her head. “No, Yihui. Believe me, you are much better as you are. A woman with a skill, a woman of substance.”
“What if I want to learn how to dance?”
Emmaline looked for a moment—truly looked—at the woman before her. Stripping away the myths around her, Yihui was a shop girl who had been thrust into the world of high society in a foreign country. Of course, she wanted the glittering world of theton.Because she didn’t see the darker side of it. She didn’t know how women tore at each other all for the chance to subjugate themselves to a husband who might or might not care for them.
It was not a world that treated those born to it with any sort of kindness. It would be disastrous for a foreigner.
“Even if your feet were not broken, Yihui, there is no way to succeed here. It speaks well of you that you want to repay Max’s kindness, but there is nothing you can give him that the world will value. You are Chinese. He is a future duke. Best you turn to your own happiness and leave him to his games with Prinny. You are nothing but a pawn here and equally powerless.”
She looked at Yihui’s face, realizing belatedly that the woman could not understand everything she’d said. What did a Chinese shopgirl know of playing chess? Or of the power games among the elite?
“Trust me,” Emma said. “Your best option is to barter for your apothecary shop. And I shall be your very first customer.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Yihui thought fora long time about what Emmaline had said. Sitting in the library with her herbs, she mulled over the words like a woman grinding seeds into paste. It was clear that no one could imagine her as Max’s wife. She shouldn’t be disappointed. As far as she could tell, England had the same social levels that China did. As a merchant’s daughter, she might bring medicines to the elite, but she could never marry one of them. Which meant she could no more marry Max than she could step into the Forbidden City and kiss the emperor himself.
It was an extraordinary twist of fate that she had come to Max’s attention at all, but that was a temporary thing. And if she were smart, she would make the most of this opportunity and be grateful for whatever she could get.
She had to put aside her feelings. It shouldn’t be hard. After all, she’d been trained from birth to be content with whatever meager portion she managed to grab.
So that’s what she did. She put away her fantasies, shored up the walls around her heart, and—most important—put away the memory of his hands on her body. By the time Max came down to carry her back to her bedroom, she had her plan in place. But that was immediately undone by the sight of him.
He was dressed exquisitely. She was used to large robes with elaborate embroidery in a riot of colors. Not so for Max. He wore black in tight-fitting attire that showed his form to perfection. Broad shoulders, trim waist, and powerful legs. His waistcoatand cravat were a silky dove gray and his shirt snowy white. Handsome, but austere. As if he couldn’t afford decoration, which she knew was not the case.
“You should have a jewel,” she blurted when she saw him. “And embroidery.” Even in her short time in London she had seen waistcoats with decoration.
He stopped and looked down at himself. “Truly? I’ve never found it necessary. But I suppose you prefer my father’s sense of style?”
She narrowed her eyes, trying to remember his father from the one time she’d seen him glare into her bedroom. She couldn’t recall except in the vaguest ways. “Was his waistcoat…?”
“Dizzying. He’s nothing like Chris, of course, who never found a color he didn’t want to splash all over the place. But Father enjoys the ornate in his waistcoat. Patterns too complicated for the eye to follow. He hides it beneath his coats, of course, but I have seen him in his shirtsleeves. Never fails to give me a headache.”
He was teasing. She knew it by the twinkle in his eye and the curve of his mouth. In China, it would be unheard of to so disrespect one’s father. Or more accurately, her father would punish her severely if she did such a thing. But she found it endearing that Max could make jokes about his parent without fear of reprisal.
“You have gone too far to distance yourself from your father. Your dress is too plain for a man of status.”
“You think so?”
She nodded. “One decoration would be enough. One jewel, one pattern—”
