The Sugared Game - K.J. Charles Page 0,25
mixed up in very bad business, she knows Kim, and you’re his fiancée. I don’t think you should bring yourself to her attention.”
Phoebe’s eyelids drooped. “How Victorian of you. I don’t intend to sit at home doing needlework, darling. It is 1924, after all.”
“Kim,” Will appealed.
“Phoebe will be quite safe,” Kim said, with extraordinary certainty. “It is hardly out of the ordinary for her to attend a night-club. You’re more likely to attract adverse attention than she is. You needn’t come if you feel it’s a risk.”
That was gratuitously provocative. “I said I’d back you up,” Will said. “I don’t see you need to put Phoebe in danger.”
“He isn’t, darling. I am.”
“You don’t know what you’re getting into. I don’t like it.”
“Then don’t,” Phoebe said, and her cut-glass voice was sharp enough to hurt. “Because it is neither your business nor your right to tell me what to do. Is it?”
Will felt himself redden. Kim cut in while he failed to find a response. “If all goes well, Skyrme won’t even know I’ve been there. If it doesn’t, Phoebe won’t be the one in trouble.”
“There’s no need to fuss,” Phoebe added, sounding more like herself, less like the upper-class alien who’d just put him in his place. “I’ve got out of any amount of night-club raids, you know.”
“And been arrested three times,” Kim pointed out.
She widened her eyes at him. “But only three, darling, and I’ve been in positively dozens of raids.”
“That would put anyone’s mind at rest. With a bit of luck I’ll be in and out unnoticed while you dance; with slightly less luck, Will might end up having to buttonhole Fuller with a complaint about overcharging for the champagne. It really ought to be an entirely uneventful evening.”
“No trouble at all,” Phoebe agreed. “Talking of trouble, dearest, have you booked that table? I thought the Criterion but I’ll leave it to you of course. Saturday at the High-Low, then. Quarter past ten, you said? Goodbye, darlings.”
Kim went to escort her out, and they exchanged murmured words, leaving Will standing in the sitting room alone and wretched. He would have rather liked to disappear down the back stairs the way Kim did. Running away from problems was a lot easier than facing up to them.
Kim shut the front door, and returned alone. “May I say something?”
“As if anything’s ever stopped you.” Will knew it was ungracious and didn’t care. He felt stupid, and snubbed, and very obviously not part of Kim and Phoebe’s rarefied circle.
Kim ignored that. “Phoebe wasn’t really talking to you then. She’s in a rather unpleasant situation thanks to her father, and it’s wearing on her nerves.”
“This Johnnie Cheveley character?”
“Oh, she told you? Yes. He thinks she’ll come to heel if he tugs at the leash hard enough, and her father has handed him the power to do it. She isn’t happy.”
“So do something about him.”
“She doesn’t want me to.” Kim gave a mirthless smile. “The sooner she goes to Paris the better. She’s fizzing with enthusiasm about Maisie’s talent, and the prospect of this joint venture. I haven’t seen her this excited in a long time.”
“Then why let this arsehole spoil it?”
Kim shrugged. “So far, he’s just a nuisance. If he’s fool enough to apply too much pressure, he can take the consequences. Do you know about this dinner? I am to host a group of the extremely fashionable Saturday week, all for Maisie to meet. Couturiers, designers, professional clothes-wearers, and so on: Phoebe knows everybody. You’re welcome to join us—the Criterion does a very decent table—though I will quite understand if you’d rather find something rusty with which to poke yourself in the eye.”
Will had no intention of being lured away from the topic at hand by this very clear bait. “Have fun. Let’s talk about you sending your fiancée into Zodiac territory.”
“Believe me, she’ll be fine.”
“How can you say that?”
“For God’s sake. This is Phoebe, do you think I don’t care about her?”
“How the hell should I know what you care about?”
Kim’s nostrils flared. He started to reply, and stopped himself. “I suppose you have good reason to say so.”
Will opened his hands in lieu of response. Kim winced. “No, wait. You’ve found yourself in the middle of a mess again, and I’m sorry. I really do understand your concerns about Phoebe, but you must appreciate her situation. She’s had a bellyful of people telling her not to do things because they’re stupid or risky, and some of those people were right,