Page 66 of Fairest of Heart

“What this is, Madame, is your missing corset. Recognize it?”

His insolent tone irked, but she let it slide in light of the more pressing development. Perhaps Cecil possessed half a brain after all.

Narcissa shuffled forward as fast as her ungainly costume would allow and snatched the corset from his hand. She sought out the boning channel positioned beneath the place the wearer’s left arm would fall and ran her fingertips down its length. They were there. The stones were there!

“How did you get this?” Champagne bubbles danced in her belly. Having the corset simplified everything. Success was all but guaranteed!

“It was hanging on the line with the rest of the laundry,” Cecil said, his breathing still a touch ragged. “I snagged it when everyone went in for lunch.”

“Hanging on the line?” Her victory champagne flattened, souring her stomach.

Prudish Penelope Snow hung her corset out on the line for all those ranch hands to gape at? Petticoats were one thing, but a corset? Narcissa found that hard to believe. Harder, even, than the idea that Penelope had actually washed the thing. Women didn’t wash corsets. The undergarments could stretch and lose their shape. The metal supports could rust. To remove a stain, a lady might clean a localized spot, but she would dry the undergarment in her chamber, not leave it to flap about in the breeze for all of creation to see.

A small throbbing developed behind Narcissa’s right eyebrow. She held the corset up to the sunlight and examined the seam. The stitches. So tiny and neat. Neater than Narcissa’s passable skill should have produced.

“Give me your knife.” Not taking her eyes from the stitches, Narcissa thrust out her palm.

When Cecil moved too slowly for her liking, she growled her displeasure, batted his hands out of her way, and pulled the blade from his belt on her own.

“Watch it!” Cecil dodged backward when the exaggerated arc of her arm brought the knife’s tip a little higher than intended.

So what if she nicked his chin the tiniest bit? It was no worse than what he’d likely done to himself shaving. He’d get over it. She had much more important things to worry about. Like finding her jewels.

Narcissa wedged the tip of the knife inside a stitch at the top of the boning chamber, then sliced through the thread. She snipped the next. And the next. Until she could wiggle her finger inside the small hole. Hooking the first stone beneath her fingernail, she dragged it out. Her breath stilled as her finger twisted to reveal the stone. The ugly, gray, worthless stone. She flicked it into the dirt where it belonged, then reached for the next. Dragged it out. Cursed. Went back a third time.

Trash. Nothing but useless, miserable trash.

She jabbed the blade deep into the seam and yanked it upward. Pebbles, seeds, and a few tiny screws exploded like buckshot. A snarl rumbled in her throat as she shook every last counterfeit bauble from the corset.

Months of work—gone. Narcissa crumpled the corset in her fist and flung it to the ground. This was not how her story ended. Not after all the risks she’d taken. The sacrifices she’d made. Leaving Chicago to travel through rustic Western villages with their tiny stages and uncultured audiences. She’d camped in the wild, on dirt floors, for crying out loud. And for what? To let some little nobody steal her glory? No one upstaged Madame LaBelle. She was the one who’d performed offstage, fawning over old men with wrinkled skin and bad breath. She’d pampered their egos and stroked their vanity. She’d done the work, and she deserved the reward. That deceitful cow would not steal Narcissa’s future.

Fire licked her insides, lighting a fuse that burned hot and fast. When the explosion came, Narcissa did nothing to temper it. A primal scream clawed out of her throat as her grip tightened on the hilt of Cecil’s knife. She hurled the weapon with all her strength, the release sweet as it left her hand. The force of her throw stabbed the blade deep into the bark of a nearby tree. A tree that took on the face and form of Penelope Snow. Penelope Snow with a dagger embedded in her traitorous, thieving heart.

Narcissa smiled at the image. A wicked, delicious smile. “‘The croaking raven doth bellow for revenge.’”

“What?” Cecil’s confused gaze searched the treetops as if expecting to see an actual raven.

The simpleton. Hamlet was wasted on him. But it fed her soul. Fueled her with determination. Helped her get into character. For she had a role to play. Perhaps her most important role to date. The role that would allow her to reclaim her future. Her freedom.

“Fetch my shawl,” Narcissa ordered as she adjusted the padding around her midsection, ensuring it lay precisely where it must to conceal her figure beneath the oversized black dress she’d procured from the costume trunk.

In a stroke of creative genius, she’d stuffed a small bag with cotton batting and sewn it to the outside of her chemise, behind her left shoulder. It gave her a rather convincing hump, the perfect detail for eliciting sympathy from a naïve girl with a soft heart. Soft for everyone except her former employer.

“You still mean to go through with this?” Cecil retrieved the tattered shawl from where she’d draped it over the side of the wagon, his expression grim.

“Of course I mean to go through with this. Why else would I be dressed like an overweight crow?” She gestured to the widow’s weeds she’d donned, fighting the urge to roll her eyes. “We need those jewels. And since you are apparently incapable of recovering them, the duty falls to me.” She marched over to where he stood near the wagon, turned, and presented her shoulders to him.

Thankfully, Cecil took the hint and helped her with the charcoal gray shawl. His hands smoothed the knitted yarn down her shoulders, then paused to squeeze her upper arms.

“I don’t like you going in there alone. It’s dangerous. Seven men, Narcissa. If even one fails to go along with your plan, you’ll be vulnerable. And what if Miss Snow recognizes you?”

“She won’t.” Really, did the man have no faith in her acting abilities? His concern was sweet but completely misplaced.

“Forget about the jewels.” Cecil’s grip tightened on her arms. “We can still make a good life together. We have the gold. We can sell it and buy a pretty little piece of land somewhere. Just you and me.”

A little hovel in the wilderness with only Cecil for company? No society. No luxuries. No audience to impress. Narcissa suppressed a shiver. What a dreadful thought.

Besides, they didn’t have the gold. Not anymore. Neither did they have each other. Not after this afternoon’s adventure.