Still, she saw the wisdom.
And who else could she possibly ask?
Last night he’d saved her from manure and put her into a hack by herself, and she supposed in his world that counted as chivalry.
“If all of this is just a ploy to lure me into the dark, confined quarters of a hack with you, Mr. Marchand...”
“Onceagain,” he said patiently, “I have never needed to lure any woman anywhere in order to do anything with them, nor have I needed to stalk them. I assure you, eager volunteers abound. I expect it’s only a matter of time before you throw yourself atme, Miss Woodville.”
She huffed out a disgusted breath.
In truth, she was very disappointed to realize that she found his frank way of saying shocking things—as if they were ordinary, everyday, inalienable truths—a little erotic. Every moment spent anywhere near him was a revelation. For instance, now she knew she could dislike someone profoundly even as the things they said started up an indecorous tingle in her nether regions.
“Secondly, why would I subject myself to the mortal peril of being proximate to your knitting needle? Heaven forfend.”
He’d elevated “sardonic” to an art.
They both turned at the sound of hooves and wheels on cobblestones. It sounded like a hack.
“I have business elsewhere in town this morning, Miss Woodville. If you still feel you need to visit the solicitor, might I suggest at least taking along Dot, if she’s available? Because men can be awful, as you know. I will meet you in front of Mrs. Parker’s residence at two o’clock this afternoon. Here’s the direction.” He held out to her a folded scrap of foolscap.
He’d been prepared with it.
He was very efficient, for a devil.
Marchand whistled sharply when the hack pulled into view. It stopped.
She gestured to him that he should go ahead and take it.
“What, I ask, do you have to lose, Miss Woodville?” He tipped his hat to her, pulled open the door of the hack, and rolled away.
When a hackney cab delivered Ginny to the house on Finster Street at two o’clock, Mr. Marchand was already waiting at the blue wrought iron front gate. He looked tall and forbidding, the heart-stopping angles of his face distinct even from a distance.
A breeze pushed gossamer shreds of clouds across a pale blue sky. Though it was a rare sunny day, the shades were drawn on every window of the town house, except for those upstairs, which were bare of coverings. Their blank darkness seemed oddly sinister. The walk hadn’t been swept in some time; sun-crisped leaves skittered across it and others had banked in front of the door.
By contrast, curtains fluttered in the open windows of several nearby houses, and their walks were tidy, too.
“I’ve never been in this part of London before,” she mused. It was charming. She could imagine herself living here.
“It’s where all the mistresses live,” Marchand told her, spoiling her fantasy and reminding her too vividly of his recent indecent offer.
“Is that so?”
“Yes, and all the rogues live on another street, and all themerchants on another, and all the aristocrats on another. It’s a very efficient system.”
She sighed.
He was frowning up at the house. “I would have thought Mrs. Parker’s staff would keep the house looking spruce in her absence, so as not to attract burglars.”
So he thought something was amiss, too.
He touched the gate.
They exchanged a glance when it swung open.
It shouldn’t have been unlocked.
He turned to scale the steps up to the door, and she followed him.