Page 19 of The Countess Caper

Roarke speared her with a glance. “Probably not?”

Tessa just shrugged.

“Please don’t murder my cousin,” Summer said. “He’s the only one I like.”

“Fine,” Rue said, clearly disgruntled. “Dinner is almost ready,” she added, before gently bullying Holly toward the kitchens. Bryony had already vanished. She did not care for people at the best of times. She spent most of her time with Foxglove, who adored the attention.

Summer raised her eyebrows. “Well?”

“Well, what?” Tessa muttered.

“Am I toasting the happy nuptials?”

“I told you to stop helping,” Roarke said. “Or I’ll tell your mother what happened to her favorite diamond brooch.”

Summer narrowed her eyes. “You wouldn’t.”

“I would. And I’d make up a few tales of my own for good measure.”

“You—”

“You should go the village,” Tessa interrupted them. She needed a moment to think, and she couldn’t do that with their friendly, familial bickering. “Fox Hollow has a pub with rooms to let. And stables for your horses.”

She had stables, but very little inside them, just enough to care for Foxglove. Also, a few rusty tools left behind. Certainly, no comfortable lodgings for Roarke’s coachman. Any lodgings at all, really. He’d have to fight the mice, a colony of cats, and possibly a badger.

“Very well,” Roarke said easily, as if he had taken a very ordinary tea in a very ordinary house. “I’ll come for you tomorrow,” he added quietly, just to her.

A promise.

Possibly a threat.

She couldn’t be entirely sure.

Dinner was loud.

It was always loud. And cheerful. If Tessa was a little more subdued than usual, she did not think anyone noticed. It wasn’t just Roarke’s offer swirling inside her skull. Iris was leaving.

Tessa was happy for her. Truly.

But she was also a little sad. She was always a little sad to be left behind. Even if that was the entire point of Magpie House. She was building it as a safe wayfaring point. She did not expect any of her guests to stay. They had lives to live, to reclaim, rebuild. Families to return to, when possible. New families, old families. Some had babies; some had inheritances. All of them had secrets.

It had been less than a year, but it continued to astound her the ways Mayfair tried to break down a woman. Follow these arbitrary rules, or else. But only you. And not like that. You bore the responsibility for it all. Oh, some had family members willing to duel at dawn or ruin an earl for mistreating a beloved sister or cousin. But sometimes, families were the problem. Especially when there were fortunes involved.

“Tessa, pass the peas.”

She forced a smile and passed Iris the peas. They were her favorite. Iris had been with them since nearly the beginning. She had helped drag all of the rotting tapestries and rugs and the broken tables into the yard for a bonfire. They’d drunk too much wine and howled at the moon. A near-perfect night, to be honest. The first time Tessa had ever spoken in anything above a polite, elegant volume.

She’d loved it.

Tessa had been playing the polite, restrained, ladylike game for so long that she had needed an outlet. Especially as that particular route had not yielded favorable results. Tessa smiled and flattered and danced, and George continued to spend her dowry and steal her annuity.

She eventually managed to steal just enough of the family silver and gold plate to buy a house that was falling down around her ears.

Summer helped. She would have done more if Tessa had let her, including having her live with her in one of her brother’s many houses. She had only left for this visit to give the duke and his new bride a bit of privacy.

Tessa had already paid her back the funds lent. Mostly by stealing from the lords and ladies who had put her guests in dire enough straits that they sought her out. Lord Willoughby, who cornered debutantes without powerful families in dark comers, still did not know that it was she who had stolen his diamond-encrusted snuffbox. Lady Tattersby, who had hidden her son’s indiscretions, sending brutes after a girl who found herself with child, assumed she had lost her emerald bracelet at Vauxhall Gardens, snagging it on a branch or while dancing.

Tessa, each and every one.