Now what? Dammit!He squared his shoulders. He was Greer Carson, son of an impoverished petroleum heiress and a dead war hero. He would make this right, even if he had to break a few more rules. Slipping between the counters, he parted the velvet curtain and strode into the unknown.
It wasn’t a dark, seedy back room as he’d feared. A window to the alley behind the row of shops brought in the sun, shining daylight upon a cast iron stove with copper counters on either side of it, a marble countertop, gleaming pans, a spiffy cooling box, shelves of what he assumed were candy-making supplies, and one extremely irritated toffee-maker staring at a pot of something black and smoking.
“Miss Rare-Foure,” he began.
“Out,” she ordered, pointing back the way he had come, before she snatched up a large metal lid and slammed it on top of the bubbling mess. Then she grabbed for a thick cloth and used it to grab the pot handle.
“Allow me,” he said, not thinking it right to stand idly by while she took care of this kitchen disaster by herself.
She started to protest, but this young lady was not going to heft a heavy, smoldering pot while he was there. Practically shoving her aside, he asked, “Where do you want me to set it?”
She hesitated, and Greer thought she might balk once again, and the handle was starting to heat through the cloth.
“Set it on the flagstone over there.” Beatrice pointed to the far wall between the window and a slim door, where stones indicated a hearth for a fireplace that no longer existed.
Having set it down, he stood and turned. “Please, if I could explain.”
“Out,” she repeated as before. “And by the time I count to three, if you haven’t left not only this room but the shop as well, then I shall be forced to flag down one of the Metropolitan police force.”
“I’ve heard of your bobbies. I would very much like to see one in action.”
“You may very soon get your wish. One,” she said, tapping her foot.
He glanced down to see what kind of footwear she wore. His uncle always said you could tell a lot about a man by his choice of footwear. Greer wasn’t sure that applied to women as well. The best he could tell, Miss Rare-Foure wore short boots, plain leather, dyed gray. Although, they might be shoes. He couldn’t quite tell.
“What are you looking at?” she demanded.
“Your feet,” he explained. “If I could just see your ankle—”
“Two,” she said in a severe tone with her hands on her hips.
“It’s no matter. Even if I knew whether you wore shoes or boots, I don’t know what that would say about you. I guess boots are more the footwear of a woman who gets things done and has to be on her feet much of the day. I suppose regular shoes could also do that, but not those fancy slippers I’ve seen in the shop window up the street. They look as though they’re thin as paper.”
“Those are for dancing,” the toffee-maker told him, “not for wearing on the street. Surely, you’ve been to a dance and seen them worn.” Then she shook her head. “Do you really not know how improper it is to try to see a woman’s ankles? Are you so uncivilized in America?”
“I had an inkling,” Greer confessed. “Not that I’ve spent much time going to dances. None in fact. Nor, quite frankly, am I much in the company of genteel women.”
“Why? What’s wrong with you?” she asked him in her surly manner.
