“I don’t need to be attentive; I know all the lessons,” came Glory’s petulant reply. “The lessons are for bacon-brained babes. I hate them. I hate school.”
Maggie knew there was no point trying to reason any further. Suppressing a sigh, she touched her daughter’s shoulder. “Sleep well, my darling.”
By the time she reached the door, she heard the first snippet of a snore.
She made her way past the other two small bedchambers and headed down the narrow stairs of the small cottage. On the main floor were the kitchen, Paul’s study, and the parlor, which served dual purposes as dining and sitting room. Maggie found her sister-in-law in the last chamber.
Loose chestnut curls tumbling over her chintz wrapper, Patty was reading on the settee. She had a pot of tea and two cups on the table in front of her.
“Abed at last?” she inquired, setting her book on her lap.
“Atlonglast,” Maggie said.
She dropped into the armchair, which creaked in protest. Like much in the cottage, the chair needed to be fixed up, but there had never seemed to be time or money for renovation, even when Paul was alive. Looking at the faded floral wallpaper, scratched-up furnishings, and threadbare rug, Maggie thought ruefully that the only style she could lay claim to was “shabby gentility”…which was still better than what she’d grown up with.
Thinking of her family, as she’d been doing on and off throughout the day, knotted her insides. She couldn’t help but cast a look at the battered clock on the mantel.
Nine o’clock. Three hours until her brothers would be bringing in their shipment.
And I still don’t know what I should do.
“What is the matter, Maggie? You’ve been woolgathering all day.” Above her spectacles, Hypatia’s brows were raised. “Now that Pickering-Parks has come to heel, I would think you would be relieved.”
“I am relieved,” Maggie said quickly.
This afternoon, when Nigel Pickering-Parks had appeared at Foley’s and put down a commission of one hundred pounds, Maggie had barely been able to conceal her shock. She’d gathered her wits sufficiently to thank him. Unable to stop herself from looking the gift horse in the mouth, she’d hesitantly asked what had changed his mind.
To which Pickering-Parks had declared, “I have it on the authority of a true gentleman that your services are in high demand. Thecrème de la crèmeof fossil hunters, he called you. Told me that he’d offered you five hundred pounds to do an expedition for him, and you refused. Well, I fully expect you to honor our initial agreement of a hundred pounds for I shan’t pay a penny more.”
Thus, Maggie knew the reason for Pickering-Parks’s change of heart: Rhys.
You don’t want to feel cornered, to work for me because you have no choice. I appreciate that. We’ll work around it.
She hadn’t taken Rhys seriously. Now she was forced to realize that he was behind her windfall. That he’d secured her a customer…in order to give her a choice.
With Pickering-Parks’s money, she could make a payment to the bank. And she’d have an easier time drumming up more business when it was known she had a commission in her pocket. She wouldn’t need to accept Rhys’s proposition out of desperation.
He had given her that freedom despite it being detrimental to his own cause.
He’d given her more, too. Called her “passionate,” “honest,” and “hard-working.”
To top it off, she didn’t even have to question his motivations because he’d been so blatantly honest about them.Business first, pleasure later…
Last night, she’d tossed in her bed, tortured by sensual memories. Of the pleasure Rhys had once shown her and that she hadn’t experienced again until he kissed her at the inn. The desires she’d been bottling up for years popped free like a cork, effervescent need spilling through her veins. She hadn’t been able to stop her hands from wandering to her breasts, from caressing the budded tips until the ache expanded in her core, and her fingers had drifted lower and lower…
“There you go again.”
Patty’s exasperated words yanked Maggie from her reverie.
“Apologies,” she mumbled. “I have a lot on my mind.”
Between an ex-lover, brothers who smuggle, a brilliant and relentless child, and the world’s most irritating patron, it’s a wonder I don’t have bats in the belfry.
“Does it have to do with Mr. Jones?”
Maggie’s face warmed. “Why would you ask that?”
“Come now, I may be a spinster, but I am not stupid.” Patty set her book aside and reached for her tea. “I see the way the man looks at you. His interest is not purely professional.”
