Page 19 of The Secrets of Lord Grayson Child
She sincerely hoped he wasn’t thinking about Mrs. I. Molyneaux.
She let the curtain fall and turned away, expecting to feel relieved. Instead, her emotions were…scattered. Uncertain.
“Isadora?” A quavering voice came from the front parlor. “You’re awfully late tonight.”
Izzy smiled. “One moment, Agatha.”
She glanced at the waiting Doyle, who smiled and assured her, “I’ll tell Fields to fetch the carriage, my lady.”
“Thank you. I’ll just have a quick word—I won’t be long.” Izzy walked to the open parlor doorway and into the warmth and light.
Mrs. Agatha Carruthers, an elderly widow, sat swathed in rugs and shawls beside the fire.
Izzy bent and kissed Agatha’s lined cheek. Agatha’s halo of soft white curls brushed Izzy’s bonnet. She straightened and, taking Agatha’s hand, gently squeezed her crooked fingers. “I am rather late. Some unexpected business came up that I couldn’t ignore.”
She saw no reason to burden the old lady with news of murder.
Agatha patted her hand. “Well, late as it is, you mustn’t let me keep you.”
“Fields is getting the carriage, so I have a few minutes.” Izzy drew a footstool nearer and sat. “Now tell me, how was your day?”
She spent the next minutes chatting with Agatha about the undemanding highlights of the old woman’s day, then bade her a goodnight and went to the kitchen, where Doyle was preparing her mistress’s nightcap.
Doyle looked up and smiled. “Fields will be ready and waiting.”
Izzy smiled back. “Thank you.” With a wave, she headed for the back door. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
She opened the door, stepped outside, then closed the door and checked that the lock had properly engaged. Only Agatha and Doyle lived in the house, and Izzy’s coachman, Fields, who spent most of his days there, helped out with the heavier work.
Izzy walked down the paved path to the back gate, opened it, and stepped into the lane where Fields sat on the box of the smaller Descartes town carriage. Izzy pulled the gate closed, waved at Fields to remain where he was, walked to the carriage door, opened it, and gathering her skirts, climbed in.
She leaned out to pull the door shut. “Home, Fields—at last!”
The coachman grunted and, the instant the door clicked shut, gave his horse the office. The strong chestnut stepped out, and the carriage rattled down the narrow service lane, then slowed and emerged onto Montague Street. The pace picked up as the wheels bowled along the west side of Russell Square, then Fields turned right onto Great Russell Street.
By the time the carriage was traveling west along Oxford Street toward Lady Isadora Descartes’s home in the leafy streets just north of Hyde Park, Izzy’s perceptions of her day had shifted, reflecting the transition from Mrs. I. Molyneaux, owner and editor ofThe London Crier, who, to all appearances, lived at Number 20, Woburn Square, to Lady Isadora Descartes, unmarried elder daughter of the late Earl of Exton and elder sister of the current earl, who lived exactly where the ton expected her to live, on the fringes of Mayfair.
As she frequently did at that moment in her journey, Izzy gave thanks for the stroke of luck that had prompted her brother, Julius, to marry Dorothy Barton and thus gain as a grandfather-in-law the wise and canny Silas Barton.
Silas had become Izzy’s mentor in all things business. He had overseen her purchase of the old printing works in Woburn Mews and guided her transformation of the business into the profitable enterprise it now was. It had also been Silas who had insisted on and instituted the careful façade of Mrs. I. Molyneaux. Mrs. Carruthers was an old friend of his, and through his good offices, they’d arranged that, for a small monthly stipend, Isadora could use the house in Woburn Square as her staging post—where, every evening, she stepped from being Mrs. I. Molyneaux into the carriage of Lady Isadora, and in the morning, reversed the process.
Consequently, should anyone follow Mrs. Molyneaux, the trail would lead to Woburn Square and nowhere else.
Certainly not to the home of the Dowager Countess of Exton and her lovely daughters, the elder, Isadora, a confirmed spinster, and the delightful Lady Marietta, who had made her come-out last year.
With her gaze fixed unseeing on the façades slipping past, Izzy renewed a pledge she’d made when she’d signed the contract that had made the printing works hers. She would not allow—could not allow—any difficulty in her life as Mrs. I. Molyneaux to touch her family.
The image of Quimby slumped lifeless against the darkroom wall, the slimy feel of his blood on her hand, and most of all, the shock and threat of Perkins’s suspicions lingered in her mind.
As the skeletal canopies of the trees in Hyde Park replaced the buildings on the carriage’s left, Izzy forced herself to draw in a deep breath and push all the horror away.
She hadn’t expected to see Grayson Child—certainly hadn’t expected her pending exposé to bring her Molyneaux self face-to-face with him—yet regardless of the unwisdom of them interacting in any way, she couldn’t help but thank God he’d been there.
Chapter 3
Izzy barely slept a wink, too agitated by the multiple threats thrown up by Quimby’s murder as well as the potential ramifications of Grayson Child re-entering her life.
She walked into Woburn Mews at five minutes to eight and immediately spotted Gray leaning against the wall byThe Crier’sdoor.
