Page 4 of A Deal with the Devil

They prowled over the ceiling, curled in the corners, scales shimmering, teeth uncomfortably sharp for a place where the air was fragrant with lingering perfume and tea. And, if he wasn’t mistaken, whiskey.

He ducked behind the counter and into the back room, curtained off by drapes secured with enormous gold tassels better suited to the opera stage. She was a dramatic little thing, if nothing else. She liked monsters and naughty fairy tales.

He could be a monster.

She read lurid chapbooks, bit the ends of her pencils, and kept a tin of sugared violets under her desk. She also kept a neat ledger, he discovered, skimming the entrances for discrepancies, bribes, hints that she might be more than she seemed. Only someone with dark connections indeed could manage to steal from him. To pluck a vowel straight from his pocket. Many had attempted the ill-advised feat, but no one had ever succeeded.

Until Miss Caldecott.

It would not stand.

Even if she was exactly as she seemed: a pesky bookseller with an impish grin and a serious lack of self-preservation. Innocent.

It did not signify.

Miss Kitty Caldecott was his now.

Now

Kitty was not having a good day.

It had not started well, and then it had rapidly proceeded to get much worse.

Much worse.

Really, if she could harness the speed and momentum at which everything disintegrated, she could afford to buy a mansion in Mayfair. Twelve mansions. And then she would not be in the pickle she found herself in.

Through no fault of her own.

Mostly.

Partly.

She was not hopeful it would get better.

She had risen early, which was never a good way to start the day, in her estimation. Mornings were meant to pass by on the other side of her window, cheerful and requiring absolutely no input from her. It had been years since such a thing was possible, of course. But her bleary morning brain would not forget—pots of warmed chocolate brought to her bedside with a basket of cinnamon-dusted pastries were hard to forget. It had only been for one summer, when her father was given his title, and before he had gambled away his fortune.

She could do without new dancing slippers, as invitations to balls were not exactly forthcoming. She could go without the newest style of bonnet or ices from Gunter’s or weekly tickets to Vauxhall Gardens. She could do without visiting the modiste. As she had proven, daily, over the last very many years.

But that pot of chocolate proved harder to forgo.

Still, she had her bookshop, which brought her more joy than she could have dreamed. Griffin Bookshop catered to the unique reader: those who gravitated toward gothic romances, salacious novels, and wicked poetry, preferably written by ladies. She carried the regular fare, of course, but she had become known for her secret shelves, stacked with the kinds of stories the newspapers disdained because they were not morally improving. Even before the Devil’s Night.

Her wares were, truth be told, downright shocking. Just as she liked it. And it was all her own.

So, nothing to complain about, really.

But people who said there was nothing to complain about had very little imagination.

She did not wish to be the kind of person who whined at every little inconvenience, but when she found herself trapped on the roof of their rented house in her nightdress—in a storm, naturally—perhaps one or two complaints might be lodged with management. Posthaste.

If only she weren’t the management.

This is what came of mornings.

When dawn poked its sharp, bossy nose through her window, she ought to have pressed a pillow over her head. Instead, she stuffed her feet into her slippers, washed her face, grumbled, swore at a chair when she stubbed her toe, and then went to make breakfast for her younger sister Evie.

Evangeline, beautiful and kind, routinely woke as though butterflies lifted her from her bed—smiling, her hair in perfect waves and gold as the sun. Kitty would have said it was as gold as coins, but she had recently been accused of being sly and mercenary.