Phoebe sank into a graceful curtsy. “Welcome, Mr. Severin.”
The woman had undergone a remarkable transformation since Tom had last seen her at Pandora’s wedding. He’d thought her a beautiful woman at the time, but there had been something brittle about her composure, something frail and melancholy. Now she was relaxed and glowing.
West reached out to exchange a hearty handshake with Tom. “We’re glad you’ve come,” he said simply.
“I almost didn’t,” Tom replied. “It takes all the fun out of going somewhere when I’ve been invited.”
West grinned. “Sorry, but I had to include you on the guest list. I’m still in your debt for what you did past summer.”
“Fixing the boiler?”
“No, the other thing.” Seeing Tom’s perplexed expression, West clarified, “Helping to smuggle my friend out of London.”
“Oh, that bit of business. That was nothing.”
“You took a great risk, helping us with Ransom,” West said. “Had the authorities discovered your involvement, there would have been hell to pay.”
Tom smiled idly. “The risk was small, Ravenel.”
“You could have lost your government contracts, and possibly ended up in jail.”
“Not with all the politicians in my pocket,” Tom said with a touch of smugness. At West’s raised brows, he explained, “I’ve had to grease more palms in the Lords and Commons than you have hairs on your chin. So-called parliamentary expenses are part of every railway developer’s budget. Bribery’s the only way to push a private bill through the committee process and obtain the necessary permits.”
“You still took a risk,” West insisted. “And I’m in your debt more than you realize. I couldn’t tell you before, but Ethan Ransom has close ties to the Ravenel family.”
Tom glanced at him alertly. “What kind of ties?”
“As it turns out, he’s the chance-born son of the old earl—which makes him Cassandra and Pandora’s half brother. If he were legitimate, the title and estate would rightfully be his instead of my brother’s.”
“Interesting,” Tom murmured. “And yet you don’t view him as a threat?”
West looked sardonic. “No, Severin, Ransom has no interest in the estate whatsoever. In fact, he’s so discreet about his connection to the Ravenels, I had to cajole and bully him into attending a family event. He’s here only because his wife wanted to come.” He paused. “You’ll recall Dr. Gibson, I’m sure.”
“Dr. Garrett Gibson?” Tom asked. “She married him?”
West grinned at his surprise. “Who do you think took care of Ransom while he was recuperating at the estate?”
Noticing Tom’s perturbed expression, Phoebe asked gently, “Did you have an interest in Dr. Gibson, Mr. Severin?”
“No, but …” Tom paused. Garrett Gibson was an extraordinary woman who had become the first licensed female physician in England after earning a degree at the Sorbonne. Despite her youth, she was a highly skilled surgeon, having been trained in antiseptic techniques by her mentor, Sir Joseph Lister. Since she was friends with the Winterbornes, and had established a medical clinic next to his store on Cork Street for the benefit of his employees, Tom had met her on a few occasions, and liked her immensely.
“Dr. Gibson is a refreshingly practical woman,” Tom said. “Ransom is fortunate in having a wife who keeps both feet on the ground and doesn’t care about romantic nonsense.”
West grinned and shook his head. “I’m sorry to ruin your illusions, Severin, but Dr. Gibson is quite besotted with her husband, and adores his romantic nonsense.”
West would have said more, but he was interrupted as a little boy came charging up to Phoebe and collided with her. Reflexively West reached out to steady them both.
“Mama,” the child exclaimed, breathless and agitated.
Phoebe looked down at him in concern. “Justin, what is it?”
“Galoshes brought me a dead mouse. She dropped it on the floor right in front of me!”
“Oh, dear.” Tenderly Phoebe smoothed his dark, ruffled hair. “I’m afraid that’s what cats do. She thought it was a fine gift.”
“Nanny won’t touch it, and the housemaid screamed, and I had a fight with Ivo.”
Although Phoebe’s younger brother Ivo was technically Justin’s uncle, the boys were close enough in age to play together and quarrel.
“About the mouse?” Phoebe asked sympathetically.
“No, before the mouse. Ivo said there’s going to be a honeymoon and I can’t go because it’s for grownups.” The boy tilted his head back to look up at her, his lower lip quivering. “You wouldn’t go to the honeymoon without me, would you, Mama?”
“Darling, we’ve made no plans to travel yet. There’s too much to be done here, and we all need time to settle in. Perhaps in the spring—”
“Dad wouldn’t want to leave me behind. I know he wouldn’t!”
In the electrified silence that followed, Tom shot a glance at West, who looked blank and startled.
Slowly Phoebe lowered to the ground until her face was level with her son’s. “Do you mean Uncle West?” she asked gently. “Is that what you’re calling him now?”
Justin nodded. “I don’t want him to be my uncle—I already have too many of those. And if I don’t have a dad, I’ll never learn how to tie my shoes.”
Phoebe began to smile. “Why not call him Papa?” she suggested.
“If I did, you’d never know which one I was talking about,” Justin said reasonably, “the one in heaven or the one down here.”
Phoebe let out a breath of amusement. “You’re right, my clever boy.”
Justin looked up at the tall man beside him with a flicker of uncertainty. “I can call you Dad … can’t I? Do you like that name?”
A change came over West’s face, his color deepening, small muscles contorting with some powerful emotion. He snatched Justin up, one of his large hands clasping the small head as he kissed his cheek. “I love that name,” West said unsteadily. “I love it.” The boy’s arms went around his neck.
Tom, who hated sentimental scenes, felt incredibly uncomfortable. He glanced around the entrance hall, wondering if he could slink away and find his room later.
“Can we go to Africa for our honeymoon, Dad?” he heard Justin ask.
“Yes,” came West’s muffled voice.
“Can I have a pet crocodile, Dad?”
“Yes.”
Phoebe produced a handkerchief from seemingly out of nowhere and tucked it discreetly into one of West’s hands. “I’ll take care of Mr. Severin,” she whispered, “if you’ll do something about the dead mouse.”
West nodded with a gruff sound, while Justin protested that he was being squashed.
Phoebe turned to Tom with an incandescent smile. “Come with me,” she invited.
Relieved to escape the poignant scene, Tom fell into step beside her.
“Please excuse my son’s timing,” Phoebe said ruefully as they crossed the entrance hall. “To children, there’s no such thing as an inconvenient moment.”
“No apology necessary,” Tom replied. “As this is a wedding, I expected some drama and weeping. I just didn’t think it would all be coming from the bridegroom.”
Phoebe smiled. “My poor fiancé has been flung headlong into fatherhood with no preparation. He’s doing splendidly, however. My boys adore him.”
“It’s not a side of him I’m used to seeing,” Tom admitted, and paused reflectively. “I never realized he wanted a family. He’s always insisted he would never marry.”
“‘I’ll never marry’ is the song of every libertine and the refrain of every rake. However, most of them eventually succumb to the inevitable.” Phoebe sent him an impish sidelong glance. “Perhaps it will be your turn next.”
“I’ve never been a libertine or rake,” Tom said dryly. “Those are words for blue-blooded men with trust funds. But I’m open to the possibility of marriage.”
“How r
efreshing. Any candidates in mind?”
Tom glanced at her sharply, wondering if she were mocking him. Surely West had told her about his former interest in Cassandra. But there was no glint of malice in her light gray eyes, only friendly curiosity.
“Not at the moment,” he replied. “I don’t suppose you could recommend someone?”
“I have a sister, Seraphina, but I fear she might be too young for you. What kind of woman would suit you?”
A female voice interrupted. “Mr. Severin wants an independent and practical wife. Pleasant but not demonstrative … intelligent but not chatty. She’ll go away when he wants, appear when he wishes, and never complain when he doesn’t come home for dinner. Isn’t that right, Mr. Severin?”
Tom stopped in his tracks as he saw Cassandra approaching from the opposite end of the hallway. She was unspeakably pretty in a pink velvet dress with pulled-back skirts that followed the shape of her waist and hips. The front hem kicked up in a froth of white silk ruffles with every footstep. His mouth went dry with excitement. His heart writhed and struggled like some live thing he’d just trapped inside a dresser drawer.
“Not really,” he replied, staying very still while she came toward him. “I’m hardly looking to marry an automaton.”
“But it would be convenient, wouldn’t it?” Cassandra mused, coming to stand just a foot or two away from him. “A mechanical wife would never annoy or inconvenience you,” she continued. “No love required on either side. And even with the expense of minor repairs and maintenance, she would be quite cost-effective.”
Her tone held the delicate snap of icicles. Obviously, she was still displeased about the abrupt way he’d taken his leave at Eversby Priory.
Only a small part of Tom’s brain functioned normally. The rest of it was busy gathering details: the whiff of perfumed dusting powder, the intense blueness of her eyes. He’d never seen a complexion like hers, fresh and faintly opalescent, like milk glass with pink light shining through it. Was her skin like that all over? He thought of the limbs and curves beneath the ruffles of her dress, and he was suffused with a sensation that recalled the way icy water could sometimes feel hot, or a burn could feel like a chill.
“That sounds like something from a Jules Verne novel,” he managed to say. “I read the one you recommended, by the way.”
Cassandra had crossed her arms, a gesture of annoyance that bolstered the sumptuous curves of her breasts just a bit higher and made him weak in the knees. “How is that possible when you left it at Eversby Priory?”
“I had my assistant purchase a copy.”
“Why didn’t you take the copy I gave you?”
“Why do you assume I left it deliberately?” Tom parried. “I might have forgotten it.”
“No, you never forget anything.” She wasn’t about to let him off the hook. “Why didn’t you take it?”
Although Tom could have easily come up with an evasive answer, he decided to tell her the truth. After all, it wasn’t as if he’d been subtle about his interest in her so far.
“I didn’t want to think about you,” he said curtly.
Phoebe, who’d been looking back and forth between them, took a sudden interest in a flower arrangement on a console table, much farther down the hallway. She went to fuss with the greenery, pulling out a fern and sticking it into the other side of the display.
Something in Cassandra’s expression eased, and the firm set of her mouth softened. “Why did you read it?”
“I was curious.”
“Did you enjoy it?”
“Not enough to justify four hours of reading. One page would have been sufficient to explain the point of the novel.”
Cassandra tilted her head slightly, her gaze encouraging. “Which is?”
“As Phileas Fogg journeys eastward, he gains four minutes every time he crosses a geographical longitude. By the time he returns to his starting point, he’s a full day early, which allows him to win the bet. Clearly, the lesson is that when one travels in the direction of the earth’s rotation in prograde motion, the hands of the clock must be pushed back accordingly—and therefore time is delayed.”
So there, he thought smugly.
But Tom was confounded as Cassandra shook her head and began to smile. “That’s the plot twist,” she said, “but it’s not the point of the novel. It has nothing to do with what Phileas Fogg comes to understand about himself.”
“He set a goal and he achieved it,” Tom said, nettled by her reaction. “What’s there to understand beyond that?”
“Something important,” Cassandra exclaimed, her amusement bubbling over.
Unaccustomed to being wrong, about anything, Tom said coolly, “You’re laughing at me.”
“No, I’m laughing with you, but in a slightly superior way.”
Her gaze was teasing. As if she were flirting with him. As if he were some callow young suitor instead of a worldly man who knew every tactic of the game she was trying to play. But Tom was accustomed to experienced partners whose strategies were precise and identifiable. He couldn’t tell what her objective was.
“Tell me the answer,” he commanded.
Cassandra crinkled her nose adorably. “I don’t think so. I’ll let you discover it for yourself.”
Tom kept his face expressionless, while inside he was dissolving in a feeling he’d never known before. It was similar to drinking champagne—one of his favorite things—while balancing on the steel framework of an elevated railway bridge—one of his least favorite things.
“You’re not as sweet as everyone thinks you are,” he said darkly.
“I know.” Cassandra grinned and looked back over her shoulder at Phoebe, who had rearranged at least half the flowers by then. “I won’t delay you any longer, Phoebe. Are you showing Mr. Severin to the guest cottage?”
“Yes, we’re lodging a few of the unattached gentlemen there.”
“Will I be seated near Mr. Severin at dinner?” Cassandra asked.
“I was instructed to keep the two of you as far apart as possible,” Phoebe said dryly. “Now I’m beginning to understand why.”
“Piffle,” Cassandra scoffed. “Mr. Severin and I would be perfectly amicable. In fact …” She glanced up at Tom with an inviting half smile as she continued, “… I think we should be friends. Would you like that, Mr. Severin?”
“No,” he said sincerely.
Cassandra blinked in surprise, her expression cooling. “That makes things easy, then.”
As she walked away, Tom stared after her, mesmerized by her supple walk and the swish of intricately draped skirts.
When he finally thought to look in Phoebe’s direction, he found her speculative gaze on him.
“My lady,” Tom began warily, “if I could ask you not to mention—”
“Not a word,” Phoebe promised. Seeming deep in thought, she set a slow pace along the hallway. “Shall I alter the seating arrangements,” she asked abruptly, “and put you next to Cassandra?”
“God, no. Why would you suggest that?”
Phoebe looked wry and a bit sheepish. “Not long ago, I felt a sudden attraction for a man who couldn’t have been more unsuitable. It was like one of those summer lightning storms that strike without warning. I decided to avoid him, but then we were seated next to each other at dinner, and it turned out to be one of the luckiest things ever to happen to me. Just now, seeing you with Cassandra, I thought perhaps—”
“No,” he said tersely. “We’re incompatible.”
“I see.” After a long pause, Phoebe said, “Something might change. One never knows. There’s a very fine book I could recommend, titled Persuasion—”
“Another novel?” Tom asked, giving her a long-suffering glance.
“What’s wrong with novels?”
“Nothing, as long as one doesn’t mistake them for advice manuals.”
“If it’s good advice,” Phoebe countered, “why does it matter where it came from?”
“My lady,
there’s nothing I want to learn from fictional people.”
They exited the main block of the house and went outside to the paved garden path that led to a redbrick guest cottage.
“Indulge me in a game of pretend,” Phoebe said. “Just for a moment.” She waited for Tom’s reluctant nod before continuing. “Recently a good friend of mine, Jane Austen, relayed to me that her neighbor Anne Elliot just wed a gentleman by the name of Captain Frederick Wentworth. They were betrothed seven years ago, but Anne was persuaded by her family to break it off.”
“Why?”
“The young man lacked fortune and connections.”
“Weak-minded girl,” Tom scoffed.
“It was a mistake,” Phoebe allowed, “but Anne has always been an obedient daughter. After years passed, they met again, when Captain Wentworth had made a success of himself. He realized he still loved her, but unfortunately at that point Anne was being courted by another man.”
“What did Wentworth do?” Tom asked, interested despite himself.
“He chose to keep silent and wait for her. Eventually, when the time was right, he wrote a letter to express his feelings, and left it for her to find.”
Tom sent her a dark glance. “I’m not impressed by anyone in this story.”
“What should Captain Wentworth have done instead?”
“Pursue her,” he said emphatically. “Or decide he was well rid of her. Anything but wait in silence.”
“Doesn’t pursuit sometimes require patience?” Phoebe asked.
“When it comes to business, yes. But I’ve never wanted any woman enough to wait for her. There are always more women.”
Phoebe looked amused. “Oh, you are a difficult case, aren’t you? I think you should read Persuasion to find out what you might have in common with Captain Wentworth.”
“Probably not much,” Tom said, “since I exist and he doesn’t.”
“Read it anyway,” Phoebe urged. “It may help you to understand what Cassandra meant about Phileas Fogg.”
Tom frowned in bewilderment. “He’s in that book too?”
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