“Former junior secretary. Smart, but lazy. He had access to that information—and he resigned recently. All fits.” He planted a kiss on her forehead and grinned at her. “You’re a treasure. Das!”
He whipped away from her, to where Das and Isaac stood outside the door, regarding him warily.
“It’s Buchanan!” he said to Das. “Let’s go cut off his kneecaps.”
It wasn’t much of an apology, but Das seemed to understand. “With pleasure,” he said.
“And Isaac. Make yourself useful, won’t you? Find these witnesses and get the truth out of them. Money, fists, charm: Use whatever works.”
Joshua handed the list of names to Isaac and twisted the letters in his hand. Cassandra stood in the doorway, cat still in her arms, eyes on the letters. Then she pasted on that cursed oh-so-nice-and-polite smile, averted her eyes, and swept off toward the stairs.
“Excuse me,” she said, brushing past him. “I must get Mr. Twit settled and fed.”
He watched her go, up to her bedroom, he supposed. He should tell her about the letters. She would understand. The world would not end. The memories would not crumble into dust. She had a right to know.
He turned back to Das.
“Cassandra’s grandfather, the Duke of Sherbourne—he makes a pretty penny from his investments with me, doesn’t he?”
Das cast him a thoughtful look. “Indeed. You have helped swell his coffers considerably.”
“Yet when my wife sought help from his wife, the duchess was not helpful. Not sure I can continue partnering with a man whose wife treats my wife so shabbily. I shall have to call on him and let him know that. Let’s arrange that.”
“Good idea.”
Joshua looked up the stairs, to where Cassandra had gone.
He looked down the stairs, to where his business lay.
“Your wife is really teaching you to waltz, Das?”
“Yes. She has joined me here in London.” Das considered his fingers a moment. “She is keen to meet Mrs. DeWitt and suggested you might both join us for dinner one night.”
Well. There was a surprise. Joshua never met his secretaries’ families. And a duchess’s granddaughter was not likely to visit the home of an employee. But Cassandra did seem to like meeting new people, and she would argue that Das was more than an employee, and Joshua was curious.
“Have her write,” he said. “It’s probably some shocking breach of etiquette but Cassandra can decide.”
He considered the letters in his hand, considered the stairs leading up, the stairs leading down.
“Mr. Isaac and I can deal with Buchanan,” Das said. “If you have other matters to address.”
“Right,” Joshua said. “I just have to…Right.”
He went to the stairs. He went up.
Joshua found Cassandra alone in her room, fussing about with a gown. As he loitered in the doorway, she offered that polite smile and didn’t quite meet his eyes. How intolerable was her politeness when she wore it like armor! He had stripped it away last night, only to force her to don it again.
Nobody’s fault but his own.
“Where’s the cat?” he asked.
“My maid is seeing to him.”
“Where will he sleep?”
“With me, usually. Unless he, too, runs away in the middle of the night.”
“Ah.”
He let himself look at her bed. His kerchief was folded neatly on the bedside table. Three roses sat in the vase, one slightly the worse for wear.
He whipped his head back to look at Cassandra, who hastily ducked and made a show of inspecting the hem of the gown.
“She’s very beautiful, isn’t she?” Cassandra said, rubbing at a spot that he suspected did not exist. “Lucy, I mean.”
“Astonishingly so.” Yet he knew which of the sisters he would rather look at. “The other one, the redhead—”
“Emily.”
“She’ll be a beauty, too, one day.”
“Yes. And Miranda was called an Incomparable.”
“I’ve heard rumors.”
“They are all great beauties, my sisters.”
“Indeed.”
He looked at the letters in his hand. From somewhere down the hallway came the laugh. He closed the door against marauding sisters and, after a brief hesitation, locked it. Again he caught her watching him; again she returned to the gown.
“So.” He strode across the room and tossed the letters onto the little table. “If you’ve finished fishing for compliments…”
“I was not fishing for compliments,” she snapped, her color rising. “I was making conversation. That’s what polite people do. But I suppose you don’t want to talk about my sisters.”
“Not really. Do you want to talk about the letters I wrote my wife?”
“I’m your—” She stopped short and smiled that infuriating smile. “It’s none of my business.”
She grabbed a clothesbrush and attacked the hem, fiercely