Page 25 of All Scot and Bothered
Fervently wishing for that guidance now, Cecelia tried one last time to cajole the girl out. “Francesca and Alexandra wouldn’t fit under there, I’m afraid. They’re rea—” She caught herself, understanding that Phoebe’s dolls were as real to her as Alexandra and Frank actually were. “They’re grown, like me, and have homes of their own. I’m going to a party tonight at a duke’s manor to see them. Would you like to put on a pretty dress and come along?”
“Buthe’scoming back.” Phoebe shook her head, shrinking away. “He’s bringing chains and shackles, he said so.”
“Lord Ramsay won’t be back today, darling,” she soothed.
“How do you know?”
At that, she paused. She really didn’t.
A tide of uncharacteristic anger rose in Cecelia against Lord Ramsay. She realized he’d some history with Henrietta, but as far as he was concerned, he’d never been introduced to Hortense, and he still treated her as if she were rubbish he desired to discard into the Thames.
And to think, her best friend was married to his half brother. Lord Ramsay and the Duke of Redmayne were as different from each other as inverse numbers on a grid. Ramsay, of course, being the negative integer.
Lesser than.
Except in stature, because by her estimation Ramsay outweighed the duke by a half stone and was slightly taller. And also in appearance, but only because Redmayne had been disfigured by a jaguar.Notbecause she found the rather brutal planes of his face arresting.
She supposed Ramsay might have the upper hand auditorily, as well. Where Redmayne’s voice was as smooth as silk sliding over velvet, Ramsay’s had a sonorous commanding depth, graveled and grisly. Much like the stones shaped to make a cathedral. Rough to the touch but contained. Orderly.
Echoing with no small bit of judgment.
Genny bent to hand Cecelia the wet cloth and pointed to a door to the adjoining room before offering Phoebe an indulgent smile.
Cecelia took the cloth gratefully. “You stay there for a while longer, Phoebe, and look after your friends,” she said. “I’ll come check on you in a moment.”
Phoebe nodded.
Rising, she accompanied Genny through an upturnedbedchamber to a washroom, where she grimaced at her reflection in the gilded mirror.
She wouldn’t have come out from under the desk, either. The wig had ruined her hair, and without it and the mask, Cecelia’s makeup appeared clownish and overblown. Applying the washcloth to her face, she scrubbed away at it, revealing her familiar features with relief.
“You’ll have to excuse Phoebe, honey, she’s a shy little thing,” Genny explained. “Henrietta cared for her like she was her own, spoiled her like nothing I’ve seen, but rarely let her out of this house.”
“Do you know who Phoebe’s father is?” Cecelia queried, plucking the pins from her hair to shake it down.
“Another secret Henrietta took to her grave. Maybe it’s in that book there.” She motioned to the coded diary Cecelia had set on the counter.
“Perhaps.” Cecelia accepted the brush Genny handed over and tamed her mane as best she could, expertly knotting it and stabbing with pins to keep it in place. It would have to do for now. “Do you think he has anything to do with why Henrietta was killed?”
“Ramsay? Or the father?”
“Either.” Cecelia huffed out an anxious breath. “Both?”
“He might, at that,” Genny frowned, rubbing her forehead, her eyes glimmering with grief. “This establishment has long been a playground for the rich and the powerful. There are more transactions made here than poker and roulette. Business, trade, politics, and sometimes a criminal enterprise or two are struck at our tables. Fortunes won and lost. And perhaps lives bought and sold. None of us are safe until this puzzle Henrietta left for you is solved. If we can’t figure out who our enemy is, we won’t see them coming.”
“Well…” Cecelia stuck the final pin in her hair andaccepted her spectacles from Genny, grateful for the world to be in focus once more. “We certainly know one of our enemies, and next time he comes at us, we won’t be caught unaware.”
“We most certainly will not,” Genny said vehemently.
“I want to find these missing girls.” Cecelia worried at her lip. “We need to help.”
“Oh honey,” Genny took her arm firmly. “You have to forget Katerina Milovic. It’s a tragedy, terrible to be sure, but that little girl is long gone. Young ones like her disappear all the time, taken by men with unthinkable desires. If they’re found, it’s usually their corpses, or worse, the shells of what is left of them after these men steal their souls. There isn’t anything we can do but protect our own.”
Helpless tears pricked Cecelia’s eyes. “That can’t be. There must be something that can be done.” She plucked up the book of codes and slipped it into the pocket of her skirts. First she’d hire more staff to put the residence and the business to rights, then she’d coax Phoebe out from beneath the desk by promising to take her to her flat in Chelsea, where men with chains would never find her.
Once the girl was safely in the care of Jean-Yves, Cecelia would be about her business.
In order to succeed in her endeavors, she would need to acquire a great deal more information about Sir Cassius Gerard Ramsay, as he seemed determined to bar her at every turn.
