The key component in Edison’s magical lamp?
Copper.
Adam shifted his stance, relaxing muscles that had weathered the strain of standing in place for the better part of three hours. He glanced at his pocket watch and his mouth thinned. He would give the clipper another twenty minutes, and then move on to his second choice, an enterprising young sea captain who had sworn up, down, and sideways that he could make the trip in nine days. An improbable, if not completely impossible, feat. But then so was going from the discarded bastard son of an earl to one of the wealthiest, most powerful men on either side of the Atlantic.
When the twenty minutes had expired, Adam slipped his watch back into the pocket of his burgundy frock coat, took a final, irritated look at the line of ships slowly steering into port–still no sign of a clipper with a green streak painted across the bow–and set off, the heels of his boots echoing on the uneven slabs of half-rotted wood that made up the dock.
He passed a tavern, but as he had no interest in catching typhoid or any other communicable disease, kept walking, his confident step and steely-eyed stare keeping any potential rabble rousers or pickpockets at bay despite the fine cut of his clothing and the jingle of coin in his pocket. He had grown up on a wharf just like this. Had gotten his first black eye behind a stack of shipping crates identical to those a sailor was wheeling past. Had learned how to duck andthenthrow a punch in an alley the same width as the one to his left.
It was busier than when he was a boy. The ships were larger. Faster. But the stench…the stench remained the same. As did the flat, dead eyes of the orphans as they lined up to work another bone-breaking shift for half a penny and a bowl of gruel.
He watched a lad, no older than ten, trudge past holding a bucket of bait fish, and sour heat filled his belly, a bubbling froth of self-doubt that no amount of accomplishment was able to crush. Because no matter how far he had distanced himself from the boy that he’d been, there was a piece of him that remained convinced this was where hereallybelonged. That bettering himself was a futile endeavor, and underneath his burgundy frock coat, long trousers, and polished boots, he was still that skinny, half-starved urchin who had done the unimaginable for fucking sliver of bread.
Clenching his jaw, Adam beckoned the lad over and pressed a silver crown into his dirty palm. “Buy a decent meal with it,” he ordered gruffly. “Then a new pair of shoes. Do it fast, before someone bigger takes it from you.”
The lad’s eyes went as big as the crown in his hand. “T-thank ye, sir. Thank you!”
“Go on, then.” He waved his arm. “Get moving.”
With a loud whoop, the lad scampered off and Adam turned...right into the fiery redhead that he’d met in Hyde Park.
“Why did you do that?” she asked, her eyes–as clear and blue as a New England sky on the first day of spring–peering over his shoulder. She wore a long cloak with the hood drawn up and over her head, but even a heavy layer of fabric wasn’t enough to contain her untamed tangle of curls. Tendrils sprang out in every direction, framing her countenance in a halo of russet, and before Adam could stop himself–before he could even think–he claimed a lock of hair as his own and rubbed the rough, yet somehow silky, ribbon between his fingers.Flowers,he thought.She smells of flowers and sunshine and fresh air.
“The lad was hungry,” he said simply.
Those blue eyes whipped to his. A line appeared in the middle of her brows and her lips parted, as if she were about to say something, but then she gave a tiny, bemused shake of her head. “What are you doing here, Mr. St. Clair?”
She’d learned his name, then.
He wasn’t surprised, as it seemed to be on everyone’s lips.
Exactly as he’d wanted.
“I could ask the same of you, Red.” This section of the Thames was no place for a young woman, even one as obstinate as the chit that stood before him. It was too rough, too rowdy, too damned dangerous. In the folds of his coat, Adam had a knifeanda pistol. He was prepared to use both if necessary. Whereas his counterpart, while she’d had the common sense to don a concealing outer garment, looked as defenseless as a lamb in a butcher’s shop.
“I wanted some fresh sea air,” she said with a defiant toss of her head that slipped her curl from his grasp.
Adam’s fingers curled reflexively inward, blunt nails digging into the calloused flesh of his palm, and he puzzled over the fact that he felt…robbed. As if she had taken something that belonged to him. Which was absurd. The titian tendril was not his. He took no ownership of it, nor the woman it was attached to.
The unruly spitfire was the exactoppositeof the sort of demure, mild-mannered, blue-blooded lady that he had ordered Argus to find. While she was beautiful, in a wild, unkempt sort of way, like the roses that grew along the fence in front of his house in Boston no matter how frequently the gardener cut them back, that was where her desirable traits ended and theundesirable ones began.
Adam did not want a wife who disagreed with him, or had loud opinions, or went waltzing about the city sans chaperone, practically inviting a scandal. He wanted–he required–a female of impeccable behavior and flawless appearance. One that was equal to or better than Lady Denbigh. A fine, dainty thoroughbred…not a headstrong mustang with an obstinate streak as wide as the plains.
“If it is fresh sea air that you’re after, Red,” he said, grinding his molars together, “then go to Bath on holiday. I’ve heard it’s pleasant this time of year, and far enough away that I won’t keep having the misfortune of running into you.”
Her eyes narrowed. “My name is Eloise, not Red. And you reallyareinsufferable.”
Eloise.
Eloise.
Eloise.
Silver chimes caught in a sweet breeze made the same sound.
“Perhaps,” he said with a deliberately careless shrug. “I’ve been called worse. But I won’t gut you like a fish and toss you into the water for that necklace you’re wearing, unlike that sailor over there.”
Walk away, he told himself.You’ve already wasted enough of your time, and her welfare doesn’t concern you. She is not your responsibility. So do yourself a favor, St. James, and walk–”
