A Lily Among Thorns(9)
The girl went very still. “No, my lady.”
“Are you sure? I dislike being lied to. And if you imagine I’d allow any of them to exact any sort of retribution from you, you’re an even greater fool than I took you for.”
Charlotte’s lips tightened. “One of them pinched me.”
Lady Serena’s mouth set dangerously. “Did he now? I find that interesting. I thought I’d made it very clear to everyone that I would not tolerate anything of that sort in my establishment.” One of the young men began an insincere apology, but she cut him off. “You gentlemen will kindly take your leave.”
Amusement turned to shocked indignation; Lady Serena’s voice sliced through the angry babble. “Get out. Next time I will bar you from the premises permanently.”
Solomon mentally shifted her from ordinary woman back to intimidating. Very, very intimidating. She was like an ice storm, a whirlwind of glittering frozen shards. And, like the first breath of icy air after sitting dully in a warm house, she made his blood run faster. He wanted to breathe her in.
Maybe you ought to stick to chemistry and leave the overwrought poetry to Elijah, he told himself, concentrating on wiping the last of the soup from the wooden floor’s shining wax coat. But he wasn’t surprised when, grumbling but evidently mortified, the young men hastened to depart.
Lady Serena sat back down, and Solomon put the sodden apron on Charlotte’s tray. “Thank you,” the girl said quietly. He smiled at her and returned to his chair. The hushed silence in the room quickly gave way to pleasantly scandalized murmurings. Only Lady Serena was silent, her eyes fixed on the empty table behind Solomon.
Once, she picked up her spoon, but it rattled slightly against the lip of her bowl. Her eyes flew apprehensively to his, and then she looked away and set the spoon down again with an angry click. It took him a moment to believe the evidence of his own eyes. Her hands were shaking.
He felt a sudden rush of sympathy, remembering more vividly than he had in a long time how badly he’d wanted to seem cool and collected in front of those boys at Cambridge, how he’d tried for a bored drawl and could never, ever manage it. How much he’d hated them for that.
Don’t take it so hard, he wanted to tell her. You were amazing. But he didn’t need to be an empirical scientist to guess that she would hate that. She hadn’t even wanted to admit to being nettled by Lord Smollett. So he waited until the soup plates were removed and two lovely fillets of sole à la Lyonnaise were brought out to venture a “Lady Serena?”
She started like a sleepwalker. “Yes, what is it?” She picked up her first fork and began to push the sole around her plate.
“Are you—?” Her eyebrows drew together, and he gave up. “We were speaking of my robbery.”
“Yes, of course. Your robbery,” she said mechanically. “Tell me about it.”
Solomon didn’t want to discuss it either. He wanted to talk about something else, something that had nothing to do with business or family. He wanted to see if he could make her laugh. He wanted to tell her, even though he knew she would sneer (no, because he knew she would sneer; he liked her sneer) how much he’d like to be able to silence a party of young bucks with just a lifted brow and an icy tone of command. He’d always been able to manage chemical reactions, but people frequently eluded him.
But his mother was at her wits’ end. Besides, just because he liked her and they both hated Lord Smollett, it didn’t mean anything. It certainly didn’t mean they had a connection or that she wanted to talk to him. He only felt as if it did because he missed his brother so much he would have talked to a rock if it stayed still long enough. Only you wouldn’t, would you? he thought. You haven’t wanted to talk to anyone in a year and a half. “It happened Monday last,” he said. “On the road not far from London, just before High Wycombe. I assumed the earrings would be sold immediately, but I’ve had no luck tracking them down. I’ve circulated their description to as many jewelers as I could find, but I’m sure I missed dozens. The earrings aren’t in any catalog and they aren’t valuable enough to be recognized on sight.”
Lady Serena shook her head impatiently. “Jewelers won’t help you. You need to seek out receivers.”
“I don’t know any receivers.”
Bullying him seemed to restore her good humor. She gave him a small, superior smile. “Naturally you don’t, Solomon. Why would a fine, upstanding citizen like you be acquainted with anyone who traffics in stolen goods? That is why you have engaged someone who knows every rogue in London by their Christian name to act for you in the matter.”