Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 95222 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 476(@200wpm)___ 381(@250wpm)___ 317(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 95222 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 476(@200wpm)___ 381(@250wpm)___ 317(@300wpm)
‘You’re dreadful.’
‘Shoot me,’ she quips. ‘I overheard Johnny and Sampson chastising her. My God, they were angry. And when they told her she can no longer ride with the highwaymen, can you imagine my face?’
I realise that is a rhetorical question but I nod, nonetheless.
‘They told her they were sending her away, but she told them not to bother as she was leaving London, anyway, that she no longer wanted to be here.’
So she’s leaving voluntarily? Good. ‘Well, why would she want to be here?’ I ask on a laugh. ‘With the risk of being hanged?’
‘Hanged?’ Eliza says, frowning. ‘Why, are you going to reveal her?’ She rolls her eyes. I’m getting an awful lot of that today, far more than I should like. ‘Oh, please, Frank.’
She is, of course, right, but I do not tell her so. I am angry, but I do not wish death upon Taya. I cannot reveal her identity to Fleming, of course I can’t, and I also cannot ruin both of our families, for if Taya’s identity were to be discovered, it would certainly end both the Melroses and the Winters. What a mess this is. The deal with Fleming is in the dirt. I have a machine the business cannot afford to keep, and now I cannot finish my story if I want to have any chance of saving our family and my sister’s, so sales will rapidly drop. I must face facts. I have failed, and I have let Papa and my family down. ‘I should reveal her,’ I mutter, if only for the state of my heart. Whyever would she ride with the highwaymen?
‘Oh, Frank, how you frustrate me.’ Eliza smacks my bicep. ‘You love her, you fool!’
Why does everyone keep saying that? ‘I absolutely do not love her.’ My heart kicks, as if protesting my words. ‘I assure you.’ I wince when it squeezes again. ‘She is a criminal, Eliza, and she tricked me into fall …’ My fingertips meet my forehead and try to rub away the pain that’s growing there, too. Everywhere hurts, damn her!
‘Tricked you into …?’
‘I dislike Taya Winters more than I could ever explain.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake. You’re being a stubborn, proud coward.’
‘Take that back, Eliza Melrose.’
‘My name is Lady Eliza Winters Duchess of Chester, and you will address me as such.’
‘Bugger off,’ I say over a laugh, making her stand again, outraged. ‘You are Eliza Melrose, always will be, so don’t start brandishing your new title as if you are better than I.’
She marches across the room to me, seeming to have found some energy. ‘I am better than you, Francis Melrose, who has no title, because I was not too pig-headed to admit that I had fallen in love.’ Her hands push into my chest and she shoves me out of the door. ‘Do not come back until you’ve stopped being pathetic.’ The door slams in my face, and I blink a few times, stunned. I’m sure I have heard that pregnant women can be rather challenging, and it seems the rumours are true.
‘Well, that was rather uncalled for.’ I say to the wood.
‘What was?’
I look down the corridor and find Johnny. ‘Nothing.’ I am not telling him. ‘I think Her Grace is feeling a little brighter today.’ I make my way to the front door, eager to escape before I am interrogated again.
‘You will do the right thing, Frank.’
I stop, and it becomes so very obvious to me that Taya has shared the news of my recent enlightenment with her brother. Marvellous. Will he kill me to silence me? ‘What is that supposed to mean?’ I ask, facing him.
‘It means what I say.’
‘Tell me,’ I say. ‘Why did you not come straight to me and warn me off my mission to discover her identity rather than telling Fleming not to do business with me?’
‘Because, like your tenacious sister, when you get your claws into a story, nothing can make you let go.’
That is very true, but … ‘So you must have known, even if Fleming had withdrawn from our deal, I would not have given up.’
‘Of course. That is why I have sent her away. To protect her from the consequences of being exposed.’ He turns his back on me and walks away.
He thinks I would do that? ‘Your Grace,’ I call, and he stops at the drawing room, his hand on the doorknob. ‘You didn’t send her away to keep her away from me.’
‘She would be more ruined by herself than any man could ruin her.’ He looks back, his face grave. ‘But, I will affirm, I would never have allowed it.’
‘You would never need to allow it, Your Grace. There was nothing to allow.’ Because she used me.
‘Indeed,’ he mutters, entering the drawing room, and I immediately hear Eliza vent her annoyance at him, demanding answers, or so help her God.