“Have you responded to any of these invitations?”
“Not as of yet. I wanted to consult with you first. I did not know if you would want to attend such ... reputable entertainments.”
He stared at the cards as though he held messages from beyond the grave. Cautious, curious. “This world,” he murmured. “It’s strange to me.”
It touched her that this man, so proud and forthright, could feel even the slightest whisper of trepidation, and that he trusted her enough to reveal it.
“What you need,” she said, “is a guide.”
A separate world existed in the respectable hours of evening, one with which Leo rarely rubbed shoulders. Lit by hundreds of candles, it was brighter than the world Leo knew, and yet more obscure.
He and Anne stood at the side of a large chamber, watching the complex convolutions of human relations— the subtle gestures, the layered discourse with more gradations than shale. The room itself showed signs of recent remodeling, for Leo noticed plaster dust collecting against the ornamental baseboards, but the interactions within its walls bore the weight of history.
A small assembly at the home of Lord Overbury. There were refreshments and mannerly games of ombre and a girl in the corner picking out a pretty tune on a fortepiano. The guests were rich, genteel, powerful, and far, far from the company Leo normally kept. He had attended a few events like this with the Hellraisers, but he had paid such gatherings little heed, his thoughts on wilder sport later in the evening. Now, he finally observed that the movements of the aristocrats were even more cunning and artful than anything he had witnessed or engaged in at the Exchange.
By angling his body just so, one guest indicated that he refused to acknowledge another’s presence. A woman whispered into another woman’s ear as they both watched a laughing female guest. Three men stood in a group, their conversation as portentous as their waistcoats. The very air buzzed with influence.
“I feel like a naturalist accompanying a Royal Society expedition.”
Anne smiled over the rim of her glass. “There’s more treachery here than in the jungles of Suriname or Guiana.”
“Spoken as one having experience with both places.”
“Not personal experience.” She glanced away. “Barons’ daughters are seldom taken on Royal Society expeditions.”
He suddenly found her much more fascinating than the tangled encounters of the assembly. His gaze traced the slim line of her neck as she kept her face averted. “But you want to go. To Suriname or Guiana.”
She shrugged. “Having never been on a ship in my life, especially traveling somewhere over four thousand miles away, I couldn’t say if I would find the experience enjoyable.”
Interesting that she would know the distance between England and the distant northern coast of South America, when few men let alone women could locate Portugal on a map.
“There is no way to know until you try,” he said.
“I am not a fanciful person.” She turned back and her eyes were very clear. “I don’t entertain ideas that cannot come to pass.”
“Yet ...”
“Yet.” His wife glanced around the chamber, as if concerned any of the guests might be within earshot. Seeing that no one paid too much attention, she continued. “I don’t long to travel. Not so far. However, on the rare occasions I was given pin money, I spent it at print shops on the Strand. On maps.”
He could only regard his wife with genuine surprise. “Maps. Of South America.”
“Or the Colonies, or Africa, or the East Indies. Maps of anywhere. Even England. It isn’t the places so much as the drawing of the maps.”
“I had not pegged you for a lover of cartography.”
She studied him, looking, he believed, for signs of mockery or dismissal. Yet what she saw in his face must have encouraged her, for she admitted, “It is ... an interest of mine.”
“An unusual interest for a young woman.”
“I had not cultivated it on purpose. It just seemed to happen.” She smiled softly, an inward smile at some remembrance. “I recollect the day, I couldn’t have been more than eight, and I was with my father at a print shop. The printer was trying to get my father to buy a map of the Colonies. A special reduced price because the map was no longer accurate. New discoveries had been made, territory west of a great river, and there were new settlements, too. It fascinated me that something as stable and immense as land, as a whole country, could suddenly change. Not because of an earthquake or a flood, but because of human knowledge.”
She caught herself. Her voice had grown stronger, less hesitant, as she had spoken. Her eyes gleamed, and the flush in her cheeks came not from the wine nor the overheated room, but from the fire of her passion.
Leo was enthralled. The quiet beauty of his wife became altogether vibrant. And it wasn’t unnoticed. He glowered at several men who sent her admiring glances, and they averted their gazes quickly.
“Did your father buy the map?”
She shook her head. “Such things were unnecessary, and the expense profligate. In truth,” she confessed, “I never had enough money to buy maps, but I did annoy the shopkeeper by endlessly browsing.”
“Thus your knowledge of far-flung places.”
“The same places from which you buy your coffee, cotton, and spices.” She waited, then glanced at him, a faint crease between her brows. “Well?”
“Well, what?”
“This is when you chide me for my decidedly unfeminine interests. My parents certainly did.”
Leo’s sudden, unadulterated laugh drew more curious glances from the assembly’s guests. “Hell, I’m the very last person to lecture anyone on acceptable behavior.”
“Your opinion might change when I tell you something very wicked.”
He said nothing, merely waited.
She lowered her voice. “When I was thirteen, I ...” After a deep breath, she pushed on, so that her words came out in a rush. “I stole a map.”
“How?”
“I was in the print shop, looking at a map of the Moluccas. It was beautiful, but so costly. A customer came in and distracted the proprietor. That’s when I did it. Ran out the door with the map. The proprietor didn’t even notice, he did not cry thief or summon the watch. Even so, I never went back.”
“And you threw away the map. Your ill-gotten gains.”
Her eyes widened. “Lord, no. I kept it under my bed and pored over it every chance I had. Until my younger brother grew spiteful and tore it up.” She stared at Leo. “Are you not ... shocked? Appalled?”
“It would take far more than a single act of theft to appall me. Besides,” he added, smiling, “I like having a secret about you. It’s something private, only for us.” A darker heat stole into his voice, deepening it.
The blush in her cheeks grew brilliant. In her saffron-colored gown, canary diamonds at her throat and hanging from her ears, she held the pure luster of sunshine.
“The way that I know about your coins,” she murmured.
He blinked. A few words from her transported him from the radiance of her allure to the shadows of foreseen disasters. Her luminosity to the darkness of his Devil-given power. And Whit threatened everything—his power, his strengthening relationship with Anne. Yet Leo had no intention of allowing Whit to destroy all that Leo had created for himself.
“Like that, yes.” Talk of his gift sharpened his resolve. He eyed the guests. Many of them had potential for exploitation, either by benefit of their deep coffers or because they had been vocal in their denouncement of social climbers like Leo. Others he didn’t know, but wanted to—for he seldom let an opportunity to make use of someone pass.
Spotting Lord Overbury, Leo turned to Anne. “Excuse me for a moment. I want to speak with someone.” At her murmured agreement, Leo took his leave and made his way to his host for the evening.