Part 6 (1/2)
They didn't, and by the end of her s.h.i.+ft, Mina was hot and irritated. The sweltering days of summer had returned full force. Beneath her heavy hat, sweat plastered her hair to her head. Her chemise seemed a thin bit of nothing between her skin and chafing body armor. Though she had already sat an hour in this rumbling steamcoach, traffic was not moving. d.a.m.n it all. On her next spending binge, she would buy herself a two-seater balloon.
And she needed to shake herself out of this foul mood before she reached home. Anne waited.
The deep breath she took smelled of dirt and smoke. She glanced out the window as the steamcoach jolted forward a few inches. In the cab beside her, a brown-haired man sat with his face in his hands- Oh, sweet heavens. She was saved. ”Scarsdale!”
His head came up. The bleakness of his expression stabbed at her chest before he grinned, tipped his hat to her. ”Inspector! How do you-Oh, b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l.”
He suddenly hopped out of the cab into the road, and staggered. A steamcart honked. Mina covered her cry of alarm as a spider rickshaw nearly scuttled over him. She lurched for the carriage door, flung it open. On unsteady legs, he weaved his way toward her, clambered into the coach. Alcohol fumes overwhelmed the smoke and dirt.
By the starry sky, he was utterly soused.
”Forgive me.” He plopped down beside her. ”I can't sit facing backward.”
Mina could, but she didn't want him to vomit on her feet. ”Are you well?”
”I must be.” He lifted his hands, offered a beatific smile. ”I have just signed a marriage contract.”
Smoking h.e.l.ls. ”Before or after you began drinking?”
”Before.”
At least there was that. ”And so you're engaged to be married to whom?”
”Does it matter? It was one of the ladies I courted. I'm certain she was pretty. I will still have to close my eyes.”
”Did you tell her of your preference for men?”
His bitter laugh was answer enough. No, of course he hadn't. Mina didn't know whether to feel more sympathy for him or the woman. Both of them, perhaps.
She took his hand, and his fingers shook against hers. ”I used to envy you once,” she said softly. ”Because you could hide what you were from those who would hate you for it. But I am sorry that you have to hide.”
”I envy you,” he said. ”And the captain.”
Never the duke, always the captain. ”He would change the world for you, too.”
”You are kind to think so, inspector.” He lifted the back of her hand to his lips. ”He might try. But don't think that even he is capable of that change. Let him change it for his family.”
”You are his family, you blind idiot.”
His gaze sharpened. ”Do you think he knows that?”
”I think that he will eventually figure it out.”
”Ah, so you have discovered what a thick-skulled lackwit your husband is-”
Mina yanked her hand from his. ”Tread carefully, sir.”
”-when he is trying to sort his emotions.” Scarsdale finished with a grin.
Oh. Well, he was not all wrong. ”So that he cannot put into words the difference between wanting an airs.h.i.+p captain for an expedition and wanting me, even though he feels a difference?”
”Quite so. We are speaking of a man who could only think of you in terms of possession, because he didn't know the word he needed was love.” Even weaving in his seat, he looked rather smug. ”Not until I said it to him.”
”I am in your debt, then.” And about to go deeper. ”He fears for me when I work.”
”Oh, yes. Terrified.”
Her heart twisted painfully. ”How do I help him?”
Scarsdale laughed, holding his stomach. ”Oh, now who is the blind idiot?”
Yes, there was one obvious solution. ”I don't want to quit my job.”
But should she?
”Dear G.o.d. What would quitting do? Then he would be terrified when you went to the milliner's. When you took the stairs. When you used a fork.” He shook his head. ”Use your inspector's brain. Tell me, do you worry for your brother? He is out on the high seas somewhere, on a s.h.i.+p that has already been taken by airs.h.i.+p pirates once this year.”
Yes, she worried. ”But it is not a fear like Rhys's.”
”Because you have had years to become accustomed to it. But the captain has never loved before you. He has never had family. Now he does, and all of the little worries that he never felt before are cras.h.i.+ng in on him.”
That made perfect sense. And it meant that he simply needed time. Mina would give him all that he wanted. ”Thank you,” she said.
”Well, do try not to be shot through the heart again. That was beyond terror for him. And I almost lost four toes waiting with him in a freezing steamcoach outside your window.”
Mina's lips parted. She'd been in bed, stricken with bug fever, with a rusty clockwork heart ticking on her breast. Now she had a heart of mechanical flesh-though she barely noticed the difference. She could run fast and far without tiring, but it still pounded. It still ached with pain or unbearable love.
And now, that heart made of metal fibers and nanoagents seemed to squeeze tight within her chest. ”I was told he never came, that it was too dangerous.”
”Well, we were not supposed to. You were not to have any excitement at all. So we made certain that no one knew we were there.” He gave her a narrowed look. ”Did you truly think he wouldn't come?”
”I didn't know then,” she whispered. ”I didn't know.”
”And now?”
”I would climb out the window to find him, certain he was there.”
”Saving my toes, as well.” He sighed. ”They might fall off before his ball, anyway. Ah! Today we received Lady Redditch's regrets that she will not be able to attend. I'm rather surprised. We have several others coming out of mourning early for it. h.e.l.l, there are some crossing an ocean for it.”
Mina grinned. Rhys had scheduled the ball during the height of summer, when Parliament was in recess and the temperatures drove most of the aristocratic bounders away from London and into the country or back to Manhattan City. He'd hoped that would keep the numbers low and fulfill his social duty for the year.
”Does he have any idea how many people have accepted his invitation?”
There was a wicked slant to his smile. ”I've only showed him a few.”