“I’ll look after her,” Severin had said.
“Good.” Sheridan had extended his hand.
Severin had taken it, surprised by the strength of the tinker’s grip and his next words.
“As you know, me Fancy don’t come with a dowry.” Before Severin could aver that he had no need of one, Sheridan went on, “But what she brings be more valuable than money. She’s learned the art o’ tinkering from me, ain’t nothing me girl can’t fix.”
Severin hadn’t wanted to damage his father-in-law’s pride or the present truce by stating the obvious: as a duke, he retained an army of people to fix things for him.
“Thank you, sir,” he said with solemn gravity. “I am certain that will prove useful.”
“I’ve a feeling it will,” the tinker replied with a sage nod. “Fancy won’t come to you entirely empty-’anded, ’owever. I’ve given ’er my best tinkering invention, and I also ’ave a special wedding gift for the both o’ you.”
Which was how Bertrand the donkey ended up leading Severin’s team of horses. According to Sheridan, the damned donkey liked to be in the lead, and for some reason the thoroughbreds deferred to the mangy grey creature. Bertrand set a brisk pace for the team and kept it going.
Near the halfway point of their journey, a rainstorm descended out of nowhere. As drops pelted the carriage, Severin and Fancy sat side by side, discussing her father’s revelations about her past.
“Growing up, did you wonder who your real parents were?” he asked.
“As strange as it sounds, not really,” she admitted. “Even though I knew I was a foundling, I never felt like one. My parents didn’t treat me any differently than my brothers and loved us all the same.”
“You were lucky.”
“Very.” Her smile was wistful. “I wish you could’ve met my ma.”
“What was she like?”
“Loving and kind. She told the best stories, faerie tales about princesses and ’appily ever afters.”
That explained his wife’s romantic streak.
“She was also practical and could tinker as well as Da,” Fancy went on. “We ’ad these ironstone dishes that my brothers kept dropping. She mended those plates countless times, but you couldn’t see the cracks—that’s ’ow good she was at it.”
“She sounds like a woman of many talents.”
Nodding, she said, “Ma would’ve been shy around you...at first. She was like that with strangers. But once she got to know you, she would ’ave made you feel like part o’ the family.”
“You take after her,” he murmured.
“I consider that the greatest compliment.” Fancy paused, canting her head. “What was your mama like?”
She was beautiful, proud, and whored for us to survive. In the end, the poverty and desperation broke her. I failed to save her, and her ending was brutal.
“She was a good woman and did her best by me,” he said. “Back to your parents. Do you have any curiosity now about who your true kin might be?”
Fancy’s brow pleated, no doubt at his abrupt change of topic. But he had divulged as much as he meant to about that part of his past. That dark time before he became a gentleman.
“Yes and no,” Fancy said slowly. “A part o’ meiscurious, but another part thinks it’s best to let sleeping dogs lie. Why would a person abandon a ’elpless babe in a field? The only reason I can think o’ is the obvious.”
“The child was born out of wedlock,” he stated.
She nodded, biting her lip.
“Are you worried about the note your father found?”
“It was written o’er two decades ago.” She knit her brows. “Whatever the trouble was, I don’t see ’ow it could find me now.”
“It seems unlikely,” he agreed. “But if you wish, I could hire an investigator—”
