“You’re quiet,” Renard said.
“Many men consider silence a woman’s virtue.”
“Only idiots.”
She glanced his way.
He waved off the question in her eyes. “I’ve a sister, remember? When things go quiet, I lock up the rifles and liquor, just in case.”
She wouldn’t be moved by the tender note in his voice. “Is she really so much trouble?”
“She once set an army of ants on her governess because the woman had said a proper lady shouldn’t question a man. ‘The man’ being me and ‘me’ having foolishly expected my little sister to follow my order to stay away from the stables without complaint.”
“How old was she?”
“Twelve.”
“She was only a child.”
Renard shook his head, but she could tell his frown was for show.
“Shealsoput a jar of worms in her chaperone’s bed for insisting a man doesn’t like his wife to read so much.”
The lady sounded marvelous! “When was that?”
He smirked. “Last month.”
She’d like to meet a woman who used insects to fight off injustice towards a woman’s independence. “Is she coming for the summer?”
The Prodding Pony had been fully booked since Midsummer. Less than a fortnight and the balls and soirees of the elite would double up events and pull the wealthy and titled clients away, meaning she may finally get a night off.
Renard’s expression darkened. “She stays in the country.”
“While you’re here?”
“It’s saferthere,” he said.
Camille didn’t understand his emphasis on ‘there.’ The city was dangerous, true enough. She’d been chased down by demons not three hours ago, but a well-bred lady—in a stone mansion with butlers and maids and an army of other pompous and starched servants—surely had little to worry over. The lady sounded like she’d take thetonby storm, or better, drop beetles in the punchbowl when the head-in-the-clouds debutante darlings needed their feet dragged back to the ground.
“You should bring her,” she said. “If not for society, then for the sights.”
If one ignored the lung-retching smog and urine-soaked streets, London was a wealth of grand entertainment and local beauty. Camille hadn’t been to Bond Street since she’d been a girl, but even with her cynical and tainted views of the elite, she had exclaimed at the elaborate shop windows and smells of fresh pastries sold at the bakeries.
The hard look was still present on his face, but his tone was thoughtful when he said, “Charlotte does like to paint, and the bookshops have the latest edition of Dickens.”
Camille imagined the buttery and flakey texture of croissant on her tongue. “And pastries.”
His brows rose. “You liken bread with literature?”
“I’d take a lemon tart over Shakespeare any day.”
His frown vanished and his grin reemerged. “Many claim Shakespeare’s plays are the best food for one’s soul.”
“Then they’re never had a tart.”
“I confess I’ve never had one,” he said.
She snorted. “No wonder you read plays.”
