Wedded in Sin

by Jade Lee

  She didn’t answer. She couldn’t because everyone knew that women couldn’t be shoemakers. They were too weak, too soft, too mutton-headed. Everyone knew that, which was why she couldn’t get a job as a shoemaker’s apprentice even though she’d been making shoes all her life. Her father’s hands hadn’t always worked so well, and she was right there, eager to help. She’d learned every aspect of the trade by the time she was twelve, but still no one would buy from a girl.

  That was why she had started selling shoes made by Tommy’s “father,” whom no one had ever met. And yes, at the moment, she only made women’s shoes, but one day that would change. One day, Tommy’s “father” would open the shop again and send notes round to all the nobs with feet in her bag. He would offer them new shoes at a discounted price if only they would send a drawing of what they’d like. But it would be her, of course, making the shoes in secret and sending them on.

  Except now a damned toff was looking at her much too clearly. It was bad enough that she’d just lost her shop and home. Now he could expose everything else. People wouldn’t buy shoes made by a woman. And if she couldn’t sell shoes, then how would she and Tommy survive?

  “Is your father still alive then? Or an uncle or…” He glanced at the babe asleep in her arms. “Tommy’s father?”

  “Yes,” she said, forcing herself to meet his eyes calmly. “Tommy’s father. I measure the customer’s feet, manage the leather and cording, and he makes them.”

  “I’m sure he does. At night, in secret, and no one has ever met him, have they?”

  “Tommy’s mother did.”

  “Ah. Yes. Of course. But I hardly think they were discussing shoes.”

  Penny flushed and looked away. She knew everyone thought Tommy her bastard son. Hadn’t Cordwain just bellowed that to the world? She’d given up protesting her innocence. No one ever believed her, but the innuendo still made her angry. And that made her skin flush. Let him believe she was blushing in embarrassment.

  “Do you make good shoes, Miss Shoemaker?”

  Her chin shot up, but anger pushed her to say the truth. Much too loudly. “I make the finest shoes in England.”

  His brow arched at that. “England is a very large place, Miss Shoemaker. With lots of shoemakers in it.”

  “I learned at my father’s knee. And my grandfather’s, too.”

  “And you whittle new molds as well. Don’t bother to deny it. I can see the marks on your hands.”

  She looked down at her palms. There were rough patches and nicks, to be sure, but it would take a keen eye to notice that.

  “How long does it take to make a new likeness?”

  “Days if I have nothing else to do.”

  “And that’s if the customer cooperates and comes in to be measured. I begin to understand why you risked everything to grab a bag of wooden feet.” He tilted his head, his eyes narrowed in thought. “Do you really think you can make shoes for the likes of Lord Winston?”

  She nodded slowly. She was not used to telling her plans to anyone. Certainly not a man she had just met. But the truth was, she had absolutely intended to become a very successful shoemaker. And then, when everyone was wearing her shoes and she was buried in gold up to her ears, then she would finally reveal herself as the shoemaker. Her. A girl. A woman passed over by her own father because he couldn’t see past the fact that she was female. She would be the most famous shoemaker in the world because she was that good. And because she was a woman.

  “I am amazed,” he said slowly. “And I assure you, that doesn’t happen very often.”

  “Because a girl can’t make shoes?”

  “Because people, as a rule, don’t think clearly enough to plan such an elaborate deception. You quite take my breath away.”

  She gaped at him, her words torn away by his admiration for her…mind? No one appreciated her thoughts. No one understood what it took to survive as a woman alone with a babe. No one but perhaps her new friends at the dressmaker shop. And certainly no man had ever seen such a thing in her. But he had, and she was totally overwhelmed by a sense of gratitude. Good Lord, he saw her. And she was equal parts joyous and terrified by that.

  Then the moment was over. With a jaunty whistle, he started walking again, swinging her satchel back and forth as if he hadn’t just warned that a stiff breeze could have it splitting open. Then he looked back at her, his expression pulled into a slightly irritated frown.

  “Well? Are you going to tell me the rest? I can’t solve the puzzle without all the pieces, you know.”

  She rushed to catch up to him. “Pieces? Puzzle? Whatever do you mean?”

  “Your parents’ murder, of course. Tell me everything.”

  Samuel found it hard not to dance in the street. Here he’d been thinking that the Season would be beyond dull this year. Certainly it was a necessary part of his life, given his current financial straits. But free food aside, nothing at all of note was happening. And then what should appear before his eyes, but a mystery! Complete with murders and villains and a damsel in distress! He couldn’t be happier if the Prince Regent himself popped by to ask for popularity advice.

  Sadly, the whole problem probably wouldn’t take more than a few days. He’d already solved the most intriguing bit. And how gratifying it was that the distressed damsel was not touched in the head when she grabbed the bag of feet, but of a surprisingly logical bent. Imagine, a woman who could think things through and settle on a practical plan! He was still shocked by it.

  Meanwhile, the lady in question was peering at him with narrowed eyes. It wasn’t an unusual look for him to receive, usually by someone who was not at all pleased to discover Samuel’s unusual intelligence, and so he slid straight into a bit of charm. It was silly, really, how easy it was to distract some people.

  “Oh, dear,” he exclaimed. “I can see that it has been much too much for you today and no wonder. But don’t you worry. You have too much to handle as it is, what with a babe and all. Is there someplace we are headed? We can get you settled there in a trice, and then sort this whole thing out. It won’t be too hard. I promise.”

  Far from helping matters, the lady’s eyes narrowed almost to the point of fury. “Yes, sir, I do have a place to go,” she said in cold, clipped tones. “But you won’t be going there with me, and I won’t be talking of my parents or lifting my skirts for a toff who’s too bored to find his own life.” Then she held out her free hand. “I’ll be taking my bag now, if you please, and you can be on your way.”

  Samuel stared at her, his mind once again stunned silent. How had this woman—this little slip of a girl, really—managed to silence him twice in the space of an hour?

  “Magnificent!” he murmured. Her eyebrows shot up at that, and he scrambled to explain. “I have no interest in your skirts, lifted or otherwise, Miss Shoemaker, so you can be at ease on that score.” It was a lie, of course. Any woman who could so effectively put him in his place had him harder than a rock. She was comely and all, but a woman who could trade verbal barbs with him was rarer than Helen of Troy and infinitely more exciting.

  And smart as she was, she called him on his bluff. “You’ve got a gleam in your eye and a swelling that calls you a liar.”

  So he did, which he acknowledged with a slight bow. “Excellent! I’ll call that point yours. But what I want isn’t of the usual sort.” She gasped at that and he rushed to explain. “I wish to solve your puzzle. It’s a worthy one, you see. An injustice done to an innocent who hasn’t the wherewithal to solve it on her own. I could do that for you and count it as a good deed on my way to heaven.”

  She snorted. “You are not a Good Samaritan.”

  “No, I’m certainly not.” He waited, looking at her with as open an expression as he could manage. But she had to know she was running out of time. Already his mind was beginning to wander. They had reached Bond Street, where the fashionable wandered. He had already seen two new couples and one decidedly bad choice in waistcoat. Much longer and he wou
ld lose interest, his mind dragging him along to something that was likely more trivial than this, but decidedly more immediate.

  “You cannot be that bored,” she snapped.

  He sighed. “I assure you, I am. And worthy mysteries are hard to find.”

  She tilted her head as she looked at him, and for a moment his mind centered on the shift in color as the light hit her hair. She was a dishwater blonde with streaks of hair going from nearly white all the way to a dull brown. But in the sunlight, her hair appeared like textures to him. An infinite variety of multifacets that boggled his mind for the complexity of it. And yet, taken as a whole, it was simply stunning.

  “You’re a daft toff and I’ll bet a lazy one,” she said, dismissing him with a sigh. “But if you want to carry my bag to the dress shop, then I won’t say no.”

  “Will you thank me?” he asked, startled to hear himself flirting. With a shoemaker of all people! And yet he found Miss Shoemaker to be intriguing. And that was not something he ever took lightly.

  She snorted as if he’d just confirmed her worst opinion of him. “If you give the bag straight back to me with no argument, yes, I’ll thank you.” Then she pointed to where they were heading. “Lady Caniche’s shop is a few blocks that way.”

  “Caniche? That’s a decidedly unfortunate name.” She didn’t disagree—and how could she with a shop named “Lady Poodle” in French? So together they headed off while his mind began sorting through the pieces. The shop was a nothing place struggling to survive in a location too far off Bond Street to be noticed by anyone at all. Except that someone had noticed it. Lady Gwen, now a baroness, had commissioned her trousseau from them and everything went as it usually did. Lady Gwen’s attire was sumptuous, and Mrs. Mortimer (the owner) was well on her way to fame and fortune.

  Then the quiet dressmaker did the unheard-of and wildly fantastic feat of snagging Lady Gwen’s brother Robert, Lord Redhill, in matrimony. It wasn’t quite the bizarre situation it appeared. Unlike everyone else, Samuel had known Mrs. Mortimer’s true identity the moment he’d seen her. But that was a secret he had no interest in exposing, and besides, it had nothing to do with his current mystery.

  “I thought Lady Redhill renamed the shop to A Lady’s Favor,” he said.

  He watched as the woman’s step faltered. “I—I’m sorry. You are correct. It was renamed two years ago when Mrs. Mortimer took ownership.” He nodded. “Perfectly understandable. I surmise you have lived all your life in this area. When one’s life is in upheaval, it is easy to forget minor changes in the environment.”

  “Except you remembered.” She tilted her head, her eyes once again narrowed. As if it were his fault that he remembered practically everything, trivial or not.

  “My life is not in upheaval.”

  “Neither is this your usual environment.”

  He nodded happily. “Thank you for noticing. I assure you, it is the rare soul who does so. Now to continue, I believe you are the shoemaker making all those lovely slippers for Lady Gwen’s family.”

  “No, sir,” she said stiffly. “I am merely the girl who takes the measurements. Tommy’s father fashions the shoes.”

  “Of course,” he said, understanding that was a fiction she needed to maintain for now. Until such time as she became famous enough to reveal her true identity. But that was neither here nor there. “They will let you sleep in the shop?”

  She shrugged. “Mrs. Mortimer married—”

  “Yes, I heard.”

  “But her mother still stays in the rooms above the shop. They’ve made up Helaine’s old bedroom for Tommy for when I’m working and can’t watch him.”

  “And now it shall be for you both. At least until we can get your true home back.”

  She looked at him, her light blue eyes almost colorless in the sun. He could see she was fighting tears of frustration. She was not one to waste them on pitying herself, but fury could make one’s eyes water just as well. He had much the same reaction to lawlessness.

  “How?” she asked. “How will we do that?”

  She was overwrought, and no wonder; otherwise she would likely have figured it out for herself. Still, he was grateful that she couldn’t see the answer because that gave him a purpose. “It is the solicitor, of course. Wills, trustees, and sale of property all require a solicitor, and they can be as criminal as a bloody burglar. They just do it on paper. But one has to admire the cheek. He hears your father’s dead, draws up the documents declaring himself the trustee, and then sells your property right out from under you. And if you were to complain—”

  “Of course I’m going to complain!”

  “Well, when you complain, you’re a woman alone and a distraught one at that. Probably won’t even admit you to his office. Then what would you do?”

  She lifted her chin, a blaze of fury flashing in her eyes. “I’d go to Helaine, is what I’d do,” she said firmly.

  “Ah, but Mrs. Mortimer is now Lady Redhill and on her honeymoon. Not much help to you there, is she?”

  He watched the lady glare at him, her agile mind realizing that she would either have to wait out Lady Redhill’s honeymoon or be grateful for his help. He wondered how long it would take her to ask him for it.

  “I could hire my own solicitor,” she said. “One who will open his door to me.”

  “You could, but that will take time and, I suspect, money that you do not have. And even then the man would not have my skills—”

  She snorted at that because, of course, she had no idea how very extensive his skills were.

  “Or my connections.”

  He let that hang in the air between them. She had no true idea who he was. Certainly she guessed that he was a hanger-on in society, a jester invited because he was entertaining. But that also meant that he had friends. A few at least, who would stand him in good stead provided that he did not tax them too much.

  Meanwhile, she came to her decision. “Very well,” she said. “I will hire you on my behalf. You’ll get ten quid when I move back into my home all free and clear. Fifteen if you put that bastard solicitor in jail.”

  He raised his eyebrows, startled once again. “I had not asked for payment.”

  “I detest favors, Mr. Morrison. Nobs never stop collecting them, and men always want something I won’t give. We’ll be writing down our arrangement on paper. I’ll be paying you for your time, and if you treat me badly and get nothing done, then you’ll be the one paying me. Same amount.”

  “Ten quid if I can’t get you back into your home?”

  “And fifteen if you can’t put the bastard in jail.”

  “So this is more of a wager, then. With you betting that I cannot do what I promise.”

  She shrugged. “Nobs like wagers, treat them more fairly than they do their honest workmen.”

  “Or workwomen.”

  She nodded, but refused to be distracted. “As you’re a nob and a daft one at that, I should like the wager written down. Doesn’t have to be public, unless you don’t pay when you fail.”

  He rocked back on his heels, surprised for the third time that day. She had neatly created a win-win situation for herself. If he succeeded in everything he planned, then she would have her life restored to her. If he failed, then she would have fifteen quid to help pay her bills. And she had found the one thing that would keep him interested beyond the usual attention of his very fickle brain: a wager. Not on a turn of a card, but on logic and action.

  “You are a remarkable woman, Miss Shoemaker.”

  “Do we have a deal?”

  “We do. And now, truly, you must tell me everything you know about your parents’ murder.” She opened her mouth to argue, but he raised his hand to stop her. “You have hired me, Miss Shoemaker, or bet me. Either way, you must allow me to work as I will. And that includes revealing every terrible detail of a painful crime. I am sorry, but I really must insist.”

  She closed her mouth and eyed him with exasperation. But she didn’t say anythin
g.

  “Miss Shoemaker?”

  “I’ll be happy to tell you, Mr. Morrison, but not in front for your jilted lover.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  Instead of answering, she gestured vaguely to the area behind him. He spun around, nearly splitting open her bag of feet on a nearby tree. But that was nothing compared to the horror he felt when he saw the woman who was right then breaking speed records as she ran pell-mell at them.

  “She’s not my mistress!” he snapped. “She’s much, much worse.”

  “Oh?” came Miss Shoemaker’s amused response.

  “Yes. She’s my brother.”

  Miss Shoemaker snorted. “How can a woman be your brother?”

  “Same way Tommy’s father is your shoemaker.” He sighed because she clearly didn’t understand. And because there was no way to avoid Georgette. “You’ll see,” he said darkly. “My brother, his wife—they both have the same brain. And it’s not that fond of me.”

  Chapter 3

  Penny knew enough to keep her mouth shut when the stern-looking German woman finally stopped, huffing and puffing, right in front of them. She was fast, despite her bulk, which meant that Mr. Morrison had no time to run, though his gaze darted left and right, obviously searching for an escape. Meanwhile, Penny had time to look at the woman more clearly.

  Under normal circumstances, Penny would have called her cheery. The woman looked exactly like the mother in a set of nesting dolls she’d once played with. She was rosy cheeked and dressed in a bright gown of yellow with light blue accents. But the gimlet eye she trained on Mr. Morrison was just short of evil. Fortunately, she hadn’t the breath to speak, which allowed Mr. Morrison to try an escape.

  “Ah, Georgette!” he cried, in clearly false cheer. “Lovely to see you, having fun shopping? Well, I can see that you’ve got other things to do, so I shall leave you to them. Good day!”

  He made to move away, but the woman grabbed hold of his arm and clutched tight enough to make Mr. Morrison wince.

  “Hold still, Samuel,” she snapped. “Your brother needs a word.”