Page 107 of The Marriage Method

“Quite,” Miles said grimly. “I don’t wonder that you think so ill of my sex.”

“I don’t,” Nell replied. Not all of them, anyway. “At the same time…my own sex would be woefully remiss if it didn’t endeavor to acquire power of its own.”

“Power comes in many forms.”

“It does,” she agreed. “Knowledge is the ultimate power.”

“To know your surroundings,” he murmured.

She smiled briefly. “Essential for any female entering a new situation.”

Shadow chose that moment to creep out from under the bed. She padded across the woven rug, step by cautious step. She’d been eating well since coming to live in St. James’s Square. Her coat was glossy and her stomach was much rounder than it had been when Nell had first met her in Miles’s office.

“Look, Miles,” Nell whispered.

Miles’s gaze followed hers, watching the little tabby approach. He didn’t speak. Didn’t move a muscle.

“You wait for them to come to you, don’t you?” Nell inquired softly. “Not me. I’m far too impatient.” Slipping from his arms, she descended to the carpet in a pool of her poplin skirts. Her left leg twinged in protest.

Shadow hesitated but a moment before resuming her course. She came straight to Nell, slowly, carefully, tail upraised and whiskers quivering with alertness. When Nell stretched out her left hand, the cat advanced to delicately bump it with her nose.

She’d let Nell touch her this way before Miles had entered the room, but now, she permitted a further intimacy. Rubbing her cheek against Nell’s fingers, she allowed Nell to pet her—first her head, then the curve of her small back, and even her tail.

Nell glowed with pleasure. She cast a beaming glance up at Miles. “Do you see how friendly she is?”

But Miles wasn’t looking at Shadow. He was looking at Nell, an expression in his eyes that made her heart skip a beat.

And Nell knew, as suddenly as she’d known anything, just why it had hurt so much to think he’d betrayed her. And it wasn’t because of her pride, or her history with her mother, or any loyalty she owed to Miss Corvus and the Academy.

It was because Nell was falling in love with him.

27

The following days unfolded in a heady mix of quiet moments interspersed with a furious haste. Nell was consumed with preparations for their departure to Hertfordshire. When she wasn’t treating her shoulder injury, applying ice and poultices and praying that her bruises would fade as quickly as possible, she was studying the plans for Northwick House, perfecting her lock-picking skills, and practicing using the new sword-cane that Effie had delivered to her on Tuesday.

Miles was equally busy. He continued going into the Courant each morning, though his days were nowhere near as long. He returned home in the afternoons, often bringing Nell articles he’d discovered in the paper’s archives on the history of the Fawn-Purvis family, or reports of various people named Innes residing in and around London.

They spent their evenings discussing their findings over long, candlelit dinners in the dining room. There, seated intimately together at one end of the table, they strategized about how they would proceed with their investigations when they arrived at the shooting party, and what they would say about themselves if anyone presumed to question them.

“I’ve already told Lady Belwood she’s not to share your connection to the paper,” Nell said. “Which means, if someone should ask, we’ll have to come up with another occupation for you.”

“There’s no need to invent an entirely new identity,” Miles replied logically. “I’ll simply say I’m a gentleman of leisure. It’s an easy enough fiction to maintain.”

Nell nodded her approval, lamenting that she hadn’t thought of such an easy solution herself. “You’re right, of course. The best fabrications are often the least elaborate.”

Miles gave her a measuring look as he drank his wine. “You have some experience with fabricating stories?”

“I was a schoolteacher,” she said. “We hear half-truths all day long. You may believe I’ve become an expert in them.”

• • • • •

As the days passed in rapid succession, they were both of them so focused on the shooting party, and on Mr. Cowgill, Mrs. Pritchard, Lord Amstead, and the mysterious Innes, that there was little time remaining to address any other concerns.

There was, however, always time for kisses.

Miles kissed her before leaving for Fleet Street each morning, and he kissed her again on returning—sometimes in full view of the servants.

And he kissed her at night.