Page 34 of A Deal with the Devil

Chapter Nine

Kitty did not sleep well.

Hardly a surprise.

She had a feeling that the man lurking across the street was there under Lord Portsmouth’s orders. He knew very well that Evie was not in Paris. He was loathsome, but he wasn’t an idiot. Pity. She would have preferred that to the cruelty that showed through his shining smile. It soured the blood.

She would have to carry on as she always did. Work at the shop, lead tours, consult with collectors and writers. Do everything as though she were not hiding her sister in a house not so far away.

Lord Portsmouth did not like being contravened in any way. He had chosen Evie, and in his mind, that was that.

Over Kitty’s dead body.

She let the curtain fall back into place. A dog barked from somewhere. A warning. She read for an hour or so, then tossed and turned in her bed, which might as well have been made entirely of thorns and iron nails.

She woke in a beastly temper.

She snuck out of the house, deciding that discretion was the better part of valor. She might actually get into a physical tussle with her aunt or her father, were she to come across them in the hall. Not a particularly refined aspect of her character, but there you had it.

The streets were mostly filled with servants rushing back from the markets and people like her getting ready for the day. It would be a few hours yet before the peerage were ready to shop or even wander about for their own amusement.

Kitty let herself in, inhaling the comforting and familiar scents, enjoying the way the soft light fell on her books. The Golden Griffin Bookshop was a balm. A port in the storm.

Also, it would seem, under attack.

Across the street, the same man from earlier appeared to be watching her. Watching her watch him watch her. When he headed her way, Kitty fumbled to lock the door and pull the curtain.

Just in time.

The handle turned under her fingers. She stepped back when the door rattled ominously. “I know you’re in there,” the man barked. “Let me in.”

It was foolish maybe to pretend she was not there when he had clearly seen her, but Kitty refused to grace him with a response. Partly because her heart was thundering and she was very afraid her voice would come out reedy and thin.

“Lord Portsmouth wants a word.”

She considered dragging a bookcase across the door but would never be able to manage it.

“Just tell him where your sister is—that’s all he wants to know.”

She went hot, then cold. Her skin prickled painfully. There was just enough fury to temper the fear. “She’s in Paris,” she said.

“Don’t lie to the earl. It doesn’t go well for girls like you.”

“We’re closed,” she shot back with false sweetness. “If you’re looking to buy a novel about the torrid love affair between a sea monster and a pirate, you’ll have to come back.”

Confused silence.

Another rattle of the door while her breath caught in her throat.

It was another quarter of an hour before she opened the curtain. The traffic on the road had increased, blocking her view. If he was still out there, she could not see him. She did not for one moment believe he had given up so easily.

She snuck out the back door and popped through the cramped kitchen of the adjoining teahouse. She could not afford the cup of very strong tea nor the macaron with chocolate shavings, but sometimes such things were a necessity. She drank her tea and let the warmth settle through her. She drank two full pots before she felt equipped to return to the shop.

Mostly out of pride. And because she could not hide out forever.

She even went to the front, but that was spite more than pride. She found them both very useful when things turned sour.

And the Golden Griffin Bookshop was hers. She would not let anyone take it from her. Not a bully sent by an earl or a bully sent by the Ladies’ Association for Moral Standards.