Page 9 of A Lady’s Guide to Mystery and Mischief

She folded her gloved hands in her lap. “I see.”

“Are you not curious to know what accounts I speak of?” he asked, antagonism spiking through him. Francis didn’t deserve her. Perhaps Grey ought to scare her away from joining the family.

As a favor, of course.

“No,” she said, looking down to examine the folds of her skirt. “I do not. I expect Francis to spend his time the way any gentleman of his standing would.”

“You expect him to waste it away, you mean,” Grey said. “Like all gentlemen of leisure.”

Miss Rafiq shrugged, as if the subject did not warrant her attention. “If you do not care for your cousin’s happiness, then what of mine?”

Thank goodness for the nearby bookshelf to prop him up because he’d have toppled over in surprise otherwise.

“Yours?” he croaked, caught off guard.

“Yes, mine,” she said, placing special emphasis on the second word. “How could any woman be expected to wait five years to marry?”

Grey recovered in time to give her a blunt response. “I would move on, if I were you.”

“I couldn’t do that,” she said. “I love him.”

Another silence fell, this one far more tense than the last. Grey studied Miss Rafiq’s face carefully, from her dark eyes to her straight mouth. Something about the way she’d declared her love for Francis rubbed him the wrong way.

Not that he knew a damned thing about love, but still. It had almost sounded artificial. Practiced.

Abruptly, he asked, “What drew you to him?”

Her fidgeting started without a moment’s delay. “His kindness. And generous spirit. And—and his sense of responsibility.”

Ah. So she was lying about being in love with his accursed cousin. Grey wondered what Francis had promised this young woman to get her to play along with this little scheme. His cousin had been racking up debts for the better part of five years, so it was no surprise that he was hoping to get his hands on his fortune sooner rather than later. After all, what was he to do once he was in debt to every gaming hell in London?

“Qualities you could easily find in another.”

“I beg to differ.”

“Regardless, my answer remains the same. I cannot release a shilling of Francis’s inheritance before he meets the terms of my grandfather’s will.”

“Is there nothing I could do to convince you?”

“No,” he bit out. “Not a thing. I run an honest business, Miss Rafiq. If I make an exception for Francis, then I’ll have to make an exception for every other man who comes in here begging for his money to be released to him.”

“Or woman.”

“Or woman,” he agreed.

“Do you really not care for your own cousin’s happiness?” she asked, dismayed.

Grey circled his desk and made for the front of the room. Miss Rafiq followed, and he held the door open, gesturing for her to step out. “I don’t. In fact, I harbor a very intense dislike for my cousin. You could even call it hate.”

Miss Rafiq stood a little too close for Grey’s comfort, her chin tilted so she might look him in the eyes. While he was larger than most, she was short enough to strike one as ridiculous and seemed determined to put in as much effort as was needed to stare him down.

“Really, Mr. Montgomery,” she admonished. “You don’t seem capable of hate.”

“Oh, I’m no stranger to strong emotions,” he murmured. She was, after all, close enough to hear him.

“Neither am I.”

Liar.