It had been their father’s. A lion’s head, with the mane twisted around the band. In the center sat an emerald.
“I saw the way you looked at each other, how familiar you were with him. I saw the threat he presented.”
“Why must he be a threat?”
“Abby.” He sighed, but instead of answering her, he asked a question of his own. “Will you tell me how that happened, when to the best of my knowledge you have spent no time with him?”
Abby wasn’t sure this was the time for that much honesty.
“I promise not to get angry, but I think we must have honesty now, Abby. I will try to be so with you if you will with me.”
“During the day, I cannot leave the house with Mrs. Secomb dictating my every move.”
“Surely she is not that bad?”
“She is worse, Gabe. I have tried so many times to tell you how much I dislike her, and yet you never listen. I am not a child. I do not need watching every minute of the day. I could walk out with a maid, and yet I am saddled with a footman and Mrs. Sourpuss. She sits outside my door when I am in my room, in case I leave and she doesn’t know it. She questions my every move when we are from the house.”
His mouth kicked up on one side. “Mrs. Sourpuss? Is that what we’re calling her now?”
“Dimity and I do.”
His fingers tightened around the glass. “I have no doubt your piano teacher who is now masquerading as a companion is involved.”
“Dimity treats me like the adult I have become, Gabe. She is my closest friend and a woman of great sense. You dislike her merely because she does not bow to your every whim.”
“I do not expect people to bow to my every whim.”
“Of course you do. You’re an earl and used to it; you just can’t see that.”
“So I am pompous too?”
“Shall we say managing?”
“Much better. Now tell me how you met Dillinger.”
She knew he wouldn’t take it lightly, but she would speak no more lies.
“I have left the house a few times after you and the others have departed for your evening’s entertainment.”
He didn’t explode as she’d thought he would.
“Surely you do not think I will be upset if you attend a literary salon or poetry reading, Abby? Of course I would rather you had told me, but see no problem with this as long as you took Mrs. Secomb with you. What events did you attend?”
“Many different ones,” she said calmly. “I met Daniel at one, and to my lasting regret I lied to him as you did to his brother. I told him I was a paid companion.”
“What event?” Gabe wasn’t looking concerned yet, which Abby took as a good sign. She doubted that would last, however.
“I went to The Duck and Goose tavern to watch a man called Eros play his lute.”
“I beg your pardon?” The roar was loud enough to rattle the dishes on the table. “You went into a filthy tavern where anything could have happened to you?
Gabe’s hands were now clenched into fists on the table in front of him. He was inhaling and exhaling out of his nose, never a good sign, as he did this only when he was trying to control himself.
“I was not alone,” Abby added quickly.
“Dimity! God’s blood it is she who is responsible for taking my sister into a tavern, isn’t it?”
“I can make up my own mind, Gabe. I wanted to go and loved every minute I spent there. I was in no danger.”
“Anything could have happened to you!”
“Don’t be dramatic.”
“Tell me that you took the carriage?”
“No. We walked.” She may as well tell him the whole of it while he was angry.
“I fear my dinner is about to reappear,” he said. “My little sister has been traipsing around London in the dark, unescorted, and could have fallen prey to any trouble and I would not have known!”
“We often took a footman with us,” Abby said.
“Which footman?”
“I’m not telling you that, you’ll sack him.”
“Abby— ”
“You wanted honesty between us, and I’m giving you that, Gabe.”
He was silent, and then he turned and she saw the anguish.
“Gabe?”
“I hired an investigative service to look into that incident on the street where you were attacked, as you know. It was not random, Abby. Someone who I have had business dealings with tried to harm you. As yet we have not located him.”