As the Devil Dares (Capturing the Carlisles #3)(5)

Mariah darted to her feet. “Is he terribly angry?”

“I should begin packing my things for Miss Pettigrew’s,” Evie answered matter-of-factly, repeating Papa’s words.

A knowing smile tugged at Mariah’s lips. “So the usual threat, then?”

With a frown of distraction, Evie nodded. Then she captured Mariah’s hands in both of hers, with worry darkening her face. “I’m so sorry, Mariah! He blames you.”

Of course he did. But he wasn’t completely wrong. As the older sister, wasn’t it her responsibility to keep Evie from harm?

Evie’s bottom lip quivered with guilt. “He’s talking about punishing you this time. Seriously punishing you.”

“It’s all right.” She squeezed Evie’s hands reassuringly. “What can he do to me? I’m too old to be tossed over his knee and spanked.”

Most likely, he would forbid her to spend any time during the next fortnight at the Gatewell School in St Katharine’s, where she donated the better share of her time and allowance to keeping the doors open, instructors in the classrooms, and food in the children’s hungry bellies. Oh, how she loved St Katharine’s! It was the same parish where her mother had been born and raised. The same narrow, winding streets where Mariah had often walked hand in hand with her as a little girl. Now, every time Mariah walked through those streets, she felt connected to her mother. Mama was so distant now that Mariah could no longer remember what she’d looked like, knowing her beautiful features only from the portrait in Papa’s study. But in St Katharine’s, she could remember her mother as clearly as if she still walked beside her.

She wouldn’t like being kept away from the school, certainly, but it would be a fitting punishment, both for her and for Whitby, who assisted her at the school and would miss having her help. After all, he was complicit for letting them borrow his phaeton in the first place.

“Mariah,” her father called out, “I will see you now.”

“Good luck!” Evie placed a kiss to her cheek, then hurried away to her room as she did after every one of these morning talks with their father. Ostensibly to pack for Cornwall, only to be reprieved by dinnertime when Papa always changed his mind.

Drawing in a deep breath, Mariah walked into the study and stopped in front of her father’s large desk. She contritely folded her hands in front of her and awaited the ritual tongue-lashing.

“This time, my dear, you have gone too far.”

She resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

He wouldn’t be scolding her like this if she were a man. No, he’d have been crowing with pride that his son possessed the skills to match any of the best drivers among the gentry. On the other hand, if he’d treated her with the same respect and pride that he would have treated a son, she would have been too busy with the business to look for ways to disrupt a dull afternoon in the first place.

She swallowed down the bitter taste of frustration. At twenty-five, she should have already been a partner in the company, fulfilling the dream she’d wanted since she was a little girl. To have a serious role in running the family business. To participate in the merchant trade that was such a large part of her father’s world and that still connected her to her late mother. Instead, he saw her as nothing more than a young miss to be dressed up in furs and silks like a doll, who should be content wasting away her days at silly teas and boring balls.

But Mariah wasn’t like that. Had never been. One good look should have told him that.

These days, however, Papa never truly saw her at all. Unless she was standing in front of him, being scolded. Like now. But instead of gaining his attention, he saw her behavior as simply another act of rebellion.

He shook his head. “A phaeton on St James’s Street.”

“I drove that team well,” she countered. “You cannot deny that.”

“Yes, you drove well.” For a moment, she thought she saw a flicker of pride in his eyes. “But you are not a driver at the Ealing Races. You are a young lady from a respectable family—”

Her chest fell. No, not a flicker of pride after all.

“—one who scandalously flaunted herself by racing down St James’s Street—”

“I did not flaunt myself,” she corrected firmly but quietly. Heavens! He made her sound like an actress strutting the boards at Covent Garden.

“—risking both her neck and her sister’s, in addition to ruining their reputations.”

“Our reputations are not ruined.” That was one thing about which she was always careful. No matter how bold her antics, she always danced the fine line that separated acts for idle rumors from acts of ruination. Oh, she’d let the fops and hens of the so-called quality gossip about her behind her back all they wanted to, as if she didn’t know that they already did just that. As if she didn’t know that they’d nicknamed her the Hellion. She couldn’t care less what those busybodies thought of her.

But ruining her reputation meant possibly ruining the business’s reputation, and she would never do anything to harm Winslow Shipping. She loved the company as much as her father did, and what she desired more than anything was to work side by side with him in growing the business for the next generation of Winslows who would continue the company that her grandfather had started. She held no delusions about running the business herself. As a woman, she’d never be able to do that. But it was certainly within her reach to be a partner, one who oversaw day-to-day responsibilities. And then it would truly be a family business in every way.