Page 25 of As the Devil Dares

“I plan for you to buy up as many properties for us as you can, while also identifying those at the edges that will make for good warehouses,” Winslow corrected with an eager glint in his eyes. “After all, we’ll need somewhere to store the goods we’ll unload from that fleet of new ships we’ll be able to buy.” Then he pulled a sheet of paper from his desk drawer and handed it to Robert. “And make us a fortune in the process.”

Hiding the simmering excitement that pulsed through him, he glanced at the paper. A list of street names where Winslow assumed the basins would be built. A long list.

“I want you to track down the owners of every property on those streets and find out how much it would take to convince them to sell,” Winslow ordered.

He frowned, feeling his excitement wane sharply. “Parliament has to approve the docks first.” Judging from the length of the list, it encompassed the entire area of St Katharine’s. He tossed it onto the desk. “They’ll never agree to destroy an area this large.”

Winslow gave a curt nod. “Which is why you must convince them.”

His heart stuttered. In that pain-filled beat, all the connections between his partnership and the properties in St Katharine’s instantly crystallized, and a bitter taste rose in his mouth. He felt like a fool for thinking Winslow appreciated his business acumen. “Is that the only reason you offered that partnership to me, my influence with Parliament?”

“Not at all.” Winslow straightened in his chair, his no-nonsense gaze fixing on Robert across the desk. “You possess a sharp business mind and the zeal to work hard. You’ll be an asset to me long after those docks are built. But you also know how business works, Carlisle. To be successful, a man has to use every tool at his disposal. Including his connections.”

“Including applying pressure to my friends and family until they support the new docks, you mean,” he drawled, carefully keeping the distaste from his expression.

Winslow leaned back in his chair with a dismissive wave of his hand. “It happens all the time. Canal bills, import tariffs, taxes…it’s how politics works. Ask your brother. I’m certain Trent witnesses it every day.” He shook his head. “The current London docks and wharves cannot handle the amount of ships which need to use them, and new docks will be built. It’s as simple as that. If we don’t benefit, someone else will. Why not let the profits be ours?”

Robert felt as if the devil himself were tempting him to make a deal for his soul. A tantalizing deal he very much wanted to accept. “We’ll destroy the borough and chase thousands of poor from their homes.”

“We’ll bring new jobs with good wages. The sailors, longshoremen, and their families will have better lives than they have now.”

Something else pricked at his conscience…“Isn’t the Gatewell School located in St Katharine’s?”

Winslow’s eyes flickered, and for a heartbeat, Robert thought he saw remorse on the man’s face. “It is. But running a charity school isn’t what a proper young lady like Mariah should be doing in the first place.” He rubbed his temples with his thumb and forefinger, as if working down a headache. But then, Robert conceded, hadn’t Mariah given him his own headache since the moment he met her? “Neither is running a shipping company.”

Robert swirled the bourbon in his glass and ventured diplomatically, “Your daughter seems to think differently.”

“A thought that I should have discouraged years ago.” Winslow blew out a long-suffering sigh. “When she was a little girl, I used to bring her to work with me.” A touch of pride filled his voice. “I loved taking her down to the wharves, to let her watch the workers and ships coming and going. Her face would light up whenever she saw all the strange, new things being unloaded. Once we even saw a camel.” He chuckled at the memory. “I’ll never forget the way she stared at it. Not frightened at all—oh no, not Mariah. She wanted to ride it like a pony!”

Robert smiled, easily imagining her as a little girl who wanted to do just that.

“My wife cautioned me about letting Mariah get too attached to the company. But she was only a child then, and I enjoyed having her at my side. At the time I thought, what harm could it do, to let her see that side of life? To let her experience the world as much as she could?” His voice quieted as his face grew dark. “But then her mother died, and everything changed.”

Winslow fell silent as he tossed back the rest of his bourbon in a gasping swallow. Then he pushed himself out of his chair to refill his glass.

“Mariah followed me everywhere after that—around the house, to the offices, down to the quays. I think she was terrified that if she let me out of her sight that she’d lose me as well, so I let her. But by the time she turned thirteen, I knew I’d made a mistake. She was more comfortable with sailors than she was with society ladies, more interested in learning about shipping routes and auction houses than about running a household.”

Robert resisted the urge to state that she still was.

“I’d promised Beatrice on her deathbed that I’d raise our two girls into fine ladies who would be welcomed into any drawing room in England. And I had failed.” He returned to his chair but paused to glance out the window at the few snowflakes that were making a half-hearted attempt to fall. “So I stopped bringing her to the offices, forbade her to visit the quayside and warehouses…but it was Mariah.” He grimaced with exasperation. “So of course she defied me and came anyway.”

“Of course,” Robert mumbled against the rim of his glass as he took a sip to hide his smile. Her determination was one of the things Robert liked best about her. When she wasn’t using it against him, that is.

“I had no choice but to send her away to school, hoping Miss Pettigrew could make a lady of her. I’d hoped that years away with other young ladies from England’s finest families would turn her attentions to becoming a proper miss, with prospects for a good marriage. That she’d forget this nonsense about her running the company.”

Well, that certainly didn’t happen. As far as Robert could tell, her desire to do just that was as strong as ever.

“But when she returned, she was determined to have a real hand in running the company rather than simply offering advice whenever we’d discuss business over dinner.” He gave another bewildered shake of his head, and Robert sympathized with the man. “Her sister, Evelyn, has always been a handful, too, and I worry about her just as much. But Mariah—always so willful! Determined to let nothing stop her from getting what she wants.”

Robert shrugged a shoulder. “She is her father’s daughter.”

Winslow laughed. “If she is, then she’ll eventually listen to reason. She’ll understand that fine ladies do not run shipping companies, nor do they spend their days with urchins.” He arched a brow. “Oh, she’ll be angry at first. But in time she’ll come to realize the benefit of those new docks to the company, especially when she sees how much money she’ll have to donate. She’ll be able to support dozens of charities then, if she wishes. Besides,” he said, his lips curling into a pleased smile, “no gentleman wants a wife who spends her days among street urchins. Closing down that school will only make it that much easier for you to find her a husband.”

And with that, to earn the partnership.

The words hung in the air as plainly as if Winslow had spoken them aloud, the implication clear. For all that he was eager to bring Robert into the fold, the position was still tentative. Still wholly dependent upon a marriage offer for Mariah.

“The duchess has agreed to sponsor her,” Robert reported, erasing any doubts regarding the outcome of the season. “And I’ll get started right away on the properties.” And with that, erasing any doubts that he deserved to be Winslow’s partner.