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“For kissing me. You have a look about you as if you thought you’d committed a sin.”
“No.” But she thought he sounded unconvinced.
“Do you ever lose control?” she asked, suddenly interested.
“In what way?”
Even his responses were cautious and thought out.
“Do you swear?” she asked hopefully. “Take the Lord’s name in vain? Become blasphemous?”
He thought about that.
She thought about the fact he had to think it over, and decided to try to stop using her favorite epithet, bastardo. Though it reminded her of her mother, a good Catholic woman…
“On occasion,” he decided.
“What sort of occasion are we talking about? Is this a lion-chasing-man occasion, or a hit-elbow-on-doorframe occasion?”
There was a glimmer of a smile in his dark eyes and she thrilled to it like an Italian hearing an opera. “Lion-catches-man occasion.”
She quirked up the corner of her mouth. “I thought so.”
Just like that, his eyes went serious again. “If you’re prepared for all eventualities, there’s no need to react with fear or anger to the unknown.”
“Because there is no unknown?”
“Exactly.”
“So you’ll never shout at me?”
“I hope not. I would be ashamed to shout at my wife. Or at an underling of any kind.”
Isidore’s brows snapped together and her back straightened all by itself. “An underling of any kind—one of those kinds being the spousal variety?”
“There’s nothing unusual about my position on marriage, Isidore,” he said. “I do not mean any lack of respect. From what I’ve already learned of you, I think that you are better at managing people, better read, and more generous than I am. I would be honored to serve under you, were you the captain of a ship.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“But I am worried.” He seemed to be picking his words carefully. “It would not have been my choice to throw money in the direction of Mopser’s store.”
Isidore stood up and then said, “In addition to paying him for the wool, I also gave him twenty-seven guineas.”
Simeon’s mouth fell open for a moment. “You—what?”
“I gave him twenty-seven guineas. For delivering the wool.”
“You—you mean ha’pennies, don’t you? You gave him a—you gave him twenty-seven guineas?”
Being a great screamer herself, Isidore had never believed anyone who claimed never to shout. She whipped around. “You’re howling at me,” she pointed out, with some satisfaction.
Simeon had surged out of his chair, but he caught himself. His voice calmed, but his eyes were searing with anger. “Do you know how much money twenty-seven guineas is?”
“You never returned to claim me as your wife,” she said. “Therefore I took over management of my estate when I turned nineteen.”
Simeon stared at his wife. “I’m proud of you,” he said woodenly. This was a disaster. A total disaster. Isidore was like a walking version of a succubus, the kind of woman who twisted a man’s resolution and manliness and turned him into porridge.
“You’re not proud of me!” she shouted at him. Suddenly she sounded much more Italian than she normally did.
