Page 37 of A Deal with the Devil

“What? That’s a seventeenth-century book.”

He released her in order to crouch down to save the book. It was The School of Women and, naturally, had fallen open at a page with a drawing of ladies shopping for toys of a phallic nature. Kitty would not blush or squirm. She was not some young miss, sheltered and sweet.

“I asked if this kind of thing has happened before,” Devil said.

She shook her head. “No. It’s usually vegetables and diatribes. Lettuce and lectures. I could start my own penny dreadful series, all alliterative poetry.” She rubbed at her breastbone. “Nothing like this.”

“Then you’re not going to like what you find in the back room,” he said.

She met his gaze, her bones already sparking with outrage. She launched herself toward the back room, where she kept her overstock and her little table for tea and muffins for the Ladies’ Novel Society.

The contents of several boxes were tossed about. Books, periodicals, journals. Inkwells, quills, random bits and bobs from lots she had purchased from an estate sale before her entire life had been upended, much like her shop.

She cursed. A lot.

“You are vicious,” Devil remarked.

“Not like your duke’s daughters, I know.” Her hands were balled into fists again, on her hips.

“If you think that, you really have not met much of the aristocracy.”

“My father is barely a baron,” she reminded him. “And he lost his fortune some time ago. Some of it to you, I am sure.”

“Very likely.” He was not bothered. “At any rate, I happen to like vicious. I trust it far more than a swoon or a simper.” He slid her a sidelong glance. “Just don’t punch me again.”

“No promises.”

The easy repartee between them was surprising. Even more surprising was how it put her at ease, even with everything in literal shambles around her. She dropped into the chair, fatigue blurring the edges of everything. “What am I going to do?” She hadn’t meant to ask it out loud, and she certainly would not have expected a response of any kind, not from Devil. It was more a whisper to herself.

“We’re going to get it all sorted,” he said darkly. “And then I’m going to find who did this.”

She blinked up at him. “You will?”

“Yes.”

“Why?” She knew better than to look a gift horse in the mouth, but the question popped out before she could stop it. If her father were here, he would have flapped his hands with the strain of it and then walked away. Her aunt would have refused to get her gloves dusty. Her grandfather would have said, “Good riddance,” followed by the many reasons she deserved the break-in.

No one she knew, aside from her sister, would have even considered getting even. Would have already assessed what needed doing and called for Wulf through the back door to send him for whiskey and hot tea with biscuits, after which he and his brother could put the bookshelves back up where they belonged.

Kitty bit her lip very hard to stop more tears from forming. This was not the time for crying. Not for that reason, anyway—just because someone else was making the decisions for a moment. Just a moment. And they were kind decisions.

“Was anything taken?” Devil asked her.

“I don’t know.” She swallowed, forcing herself to stop staring at him. It was a very pleasant pastime, but no good would come of it. The way his hair curled lightly over the back of his cravat, as if he’d just been standing on the windy moors, would not get her books back on the shelves. “I have an inventory for the shop, of course, but these books were bought from an estate sale. I haven’t had time to really go through them.”

Devil frowned at them. Suspiciously.

“I don’t think a thief hid inside one of those boxes for the past week, just waiting for this moment to strike,” she pointed out.

“Fair enough. Do you often buy from estates?”

She shrugged one shoulder. “Sometimes. It’s not what I specialize in.”

“I know what you specialize in.”

“Everyone does.”

“Your detractors could easily have done this.”