Imprudence (The Custard Protocol #2)(16)

“Lovely.” Rue pulled her shoulders back and applied her décolletage. “While I must say that this wasn’t the education I asked for, I suppose you are giving me a good one. Nice to know where I stand.”

“You stand very well.”

Rue narrowed her eyes.

Quesnel’s sweet boyish face fell. “Oh, now, Rue, it’s not you I was avoiding. It’s—”

“Percy?”

“—more complicated than that. Besides, I could hardly come calling while you’re enfolded in an overabundance of parental concern.”

“So now you’re ashamed of me? Marvellous.” Rue was feeling legitimately hurt. She had thought she and Quesnel had an understanding. But lo there he stood looking tanned and fit, his blond hair flopping over his forehead in that extremely annoying way that made her want to push it back and she didn’t understand anything.

“Of course not, chérie! I’m terrified of your parents. I highly doubt they would approve of any lessons likely to take place between you and I.” He gave her a winning smile.

Rue would wager good money that Quesnel and his mother, Madame Lefoux, were the only two people in London not terrified of her parents. Why did he feel he must lie? She had thought that their friendship was at least based on honesty. She wouldn’t have been so frank with him about matters of the boudoir, otherwise.

“Oh, I don’t think that’s an accurate statement, Mr Lefoux.” Quesnel didn’t fill her pause with protestations, so Rue continued. “Fine, well, I guess that ended before it started.”

Quesnel instantly protested. “Chérie—”

Rue rolled right over him and his moronic little pet names that she liked so much. “Never mind, let’s get on to more important matters. What are you stashing in my boiler room? What does it do? And who is trying to steal it?”

Quesnel blinked. “Just something I picked up. It might come in useful.”

“Oh yes? A Lefoux original design?”

“How did you—?”

“Give me some credit, Mr Lefoux. I’m not ignorant of the styles of different inventors. That carapace has your family signature all over it.”

“I shall let my mother know we are becoming predictable.”

“Did I authorise you to install new machinery in my boiler room? No, don’t answer that. I know I did not. It doesn’t match the aesthetic of the teakettles, quite apart from everything else.”

“What if I crocheted a tea-cosy to go over the carapace?”

Rue’s ire was briefly arrested. “You crochet?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact. Although that would be my largest endeavour.”

Although Rue conceded that a tea-cosy cover would indeed go much better with the rest of engineering, she wasn’t giving him any quarter. “If you won’t tell me what that tank contraption does, you’re going to have to make a case for keeping it.”

Quesnel blinked at her. It was wildly unfair to have wasted such pretty violet eyes on a man.

Rue crossed her arms. This plumped up her breasts, straining the muslin of the neckline.

The violet eyes fairly goggled.

I do love this dress, thought Rue. At least it’s proving he’s not completely indifferent. “Go on, persuade me.”

“I don’t know what to say, mon petite chou, except that I really do think we may need it. It’s for the preservation of specimens.”

“You think we’ll be collecting samples in the near future, do you?”

“Of a kind.”

At least she’d rung some information out of him. “What makes you believe, Mr Lefoux, that you are still part of my crew?”

Quesnel frowned. “Now, chérie, I didn’t take you for one of those kinds of girls.”

“What kind?”

“Spiteful in response to rejection.”

Rue bit down on a gasp of pain. How dare he! “So it was rejection. Thank you for making your position clear. You could have said before you went to Egypt that you’d rather not be the one in charge of my education. I’m not desperate!”

“Of course you’re not! You’re stunning, exasperating, and occasionally overwhelming. And quite enthusiastic in twisting my meaning. When did I reject you? I thought this was you turning me out onto the streets. Did you not just roust me?”

“Mr Lefoux, you signed on to my crew knowing that it was for one mission. I assumed, given your disappearance and lack of communication since India, that our business arrangement had terminated. You must understand, under those circumstances, that you secretly installing a specimen tank in my hold comes as somewhat of a surprise!”

Rue’s voice had steadily risen. However, it was only on that last line that she realised they had an audience. A croquet match was paused in play to watch a lady of the realm yell roundly at her apparent paramour. At which juncture “specimen tank in my hold” took on an entirely euphemistic meaning. Rue’s face burned.

Quesnel stayed calm. “Oh, no, my darling girl, certainly not! I’ve no intention of abandoning my position as long as you wish me to stay. I love The Spotted Custard. She’s a marvellous ship. Besides, if you’re assuming I’m leaving, why not the Tunstells as well? They only agreed to one trip, but they aren’t going anywhere.”