Part 6 (2/2)
”Oh, you're awful. You are like a brother.”
”And will you tell him the truth?”
”Of course not.” Mina laughed, shaking her head. ”He's already been terrified enough.”
Though in truth, Mina didn't believe a ball would frighten Rhys. He simply did not care much about it, whether one person showed or a thousand. He would not care if people said it was the best ball of the year or the worst. He would only care what Mina, her parents, and Scarsdale thought of it.
Mina could not speak for the others, but she would be equally happy sitting in a corner with her friend Felicity or dancing with Rhys-or, if she was very clever, slipping away with him into some darkened room while the hundreds of attendees had their fun without them.
Perhaps she would suggest the last plan to him later tonight.
He waited for her on the front steps again, Anne by his side. Her heart seemed to swell at the sight, and her throat ached enough that she could barely form a word when he opened the carriage door and held out his hand. He frowned slightly when he spotted Scarsdale sprawled across the bench and sawing off snores.
”Absinthe,” Mina said softly. ”A lot of it. He signed a marriage contract today.”
Dismay filled his gaze, followed by frustration. ”Christ. What can I do for him?”
She squeezed his hand. ”Be his friend. And carry him inside.”
He nodded, kissed her briefly before climbing into the carriage. Mina turned to Anne, waiting a few yards away. Her gaze swept over the girl's face, her arms. No injuries that she could see. ”Good evening to you, Tinker Anne. Are you well? I hope you are.”
The girl smiled. ”I am.”
With a few steps, Mina crossed the distance the separated them. She slipped her arm around the girl's shoulders, began walking with her toward the house. ”You aren't at the Blacksmith's today?”
The girl's small frame stiffened. ”I can't go back.”
What? ”Why not?”
Anne didn't have a moment to answer. Rhys's heavy tread sounded behind them before he drew even. He'd thrown Scarsdale over his shoulder, face down and a.s.s up.
The girl blinked. ”What happened to him?”
”He had a difficult day,” Rhys said gruffly. He looked to Mina. ”And you?”
”I think we all had a difficult day.” Mina slipped her hand into Anne's, walked up the stairs-with Rhys at her side, and his soused friend over his shoulder.
Her new little family.
”But it's already better,” she said.
Chapter 5.
Aside from the bedrooms, the library had always seemed the warmest, most comfortable room in Rhys's house, and so Mina chose to take Anne there. She poured herself a gla.s.s of wine. A maid brought in a tray with bowls of strawberries and cream. It would ruin the girl's dinner, perhaps, but Mina could not think of a better night for it.
Rhys came down after depositing Scarsdale in his room upstairs. He looked to her, appearing slightly uncertain-oh, that was not an expression familiar to his face-but Mina had no idea how to proceed. She couldn't interview the girl like a witness.
Perhaps it was best to start where they'd already begun. ”Anne, why can't you return to the Blacksmith's?”
”Oh.” The girl sank a little lower in her armchair. She glanced at Rhys before focusing on Mina again. ”I should tell you everything, right? Including my motivations.”
”If you feel that you can,” Mina said. ”Or we can wait until you're ready. But if you need help for any reason, I hope that you'll let us know.”
”I don't need help. But I thought . . . I thought someone else did.” Her lips quivered slightly, and she touched the side of her face.
Mina tensed. Oh, she knew that touch. She'd seen hundreds of women make that same gesture. Someone had hit her girl. She glanced at Rhys, saw the same banked rage burning in his eyes.
”Who did, Anne? Does this person need our help?”
The tinker shook her head, took a deep breath. ”No. It was a mistake. Geordie took an apprentices.h.i.+p with another blacksmith. An inventor. He didn't pa.s.s his test for work at the Blacksmith's, but I told him to just wait another year. And I didn't hear from him for a while, and none of the others did either, so I was worried.”
Mina decided not to make a point at that moment. ”I'd have worried, too,” she said. ”Did you try to find him?”
”Yes. It wasn't hard. I knew he was apprenticed under Wilbur the Reacher.” She glanced at Rhys when he drew a sudden breath, his lips white. ”You know him?”
Her heart pounding, Mina watched him struggle for an even tone. ”I only know of him, and the automated machinery that he builds,” Rhys said. ”And that his workshop is in Birdcage Alley.”
Smoking h.e.l.ls. Farther into Southwark than she and Newberry had ventured the night before, and although not as dangerous as some of the rookeries farther west, Birdcage Alley was still not an area that she'd ever want Anne venturing to alone.
Blast it all, Mina would not venture there alone.
”That's right.” Anne nodded, apparently oblivious to their horror.
”Did you go there?”
”I sent grams to the workshop from the Blacksmith's,” she said, but Mina's relief was short-lived. ”Geordie never answered them, though. So I went across the river a few times during the day; Wilbur the Reacher said Geordie was busy. He was always busy. So I realized I needed to go at night, instead.”
Mina barely stopped the moan from pa.s.sing her lips. Anne was here, in one piece. She'd obviously made it through. Looking a little ill himself, Rhys came to her side. The sofa legs creaked when he sat heavily next to her, took her hand. She held on for dear life.
”So on Sat.u.r.day, I sent that first gram to you,” Anne said. Her fingers began twisting together. ”But I didn't make it to the workshop. Mary and I didn't like the way a pair of lamplighters were looking at us. So we stayed on the bridge and played knucklebones at a lemon ice shop.”
”Mary?” Rhys asked.
”My friend. She's got a hammer.” Anne clenched her right fist, imitating a hammering apparatus. ”I wouldn't go alone. I'm not daft.”
”Of course not,” he said. The grip of his hand didn't loosen on Mina's. ”And you went again last night.”
”Yes. We thought midnight was a good time, just in case Geordie was working a second s.h.i.+ft. So I saw him open a shutter in the workshop, and I catted to him.” She took in their blank stares. ”Miow. We signal that way in the Creche. Then Geordie came out and he was . . . he was all in a rage. 'You just want my apprentices.h.i.+p, you jade wh.o.r.e, you get out of here!'”
Oh, Anne. Mina's eyes filled and she slipped across the s.p.a.ce between them, kneeled in front of the girl's chair. She took the small hand in hers. ”I'm so sorry.”
”It wasn't you who said it.” With a hunch of her shoulder, the girl firmed her trembling lips. ”I pounded one into his face.”
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