“His horse was too excitable. How was I to know? Still, it was a poor plan of mine, I grant you. However, I believe this evening,” she said with confidence. “To be an inspired course of action. After all, he who hesitates is lost.”
“You’ve never read Hamlet in your life,” Willa sniffed. “And I’m uncertain if that is the exact quote.”
“As a rule, I don’t care for plays.” Josephine shrugged, though Willa couldn’t see her. “But the point is, there is no time like the present. I must strike when I can. I grow weary of my attempts to speak to Lavisham, and I cannot be the only Harrington to lose my inheritance. Honestly, this is entirely Lavisham’s fault.”
“I think you prone to exaggeration.”
“He isn’t even at home, Willa.”
“How would you even know?” Her friend made a disgruntled sound. “What if someone sees us? Our reputations will be ruined. I don’t want to be sent to Aunt Priscilla, which Mother will do if I’m caught up in scandal. Aunt Priscilla smells of camphor and obsessively tats lace.” Willa swatted the seat. “I can’t spend my days tatting lace.”
“We will not be caught,” Josephine assured her. “As I said, Lavisham is in Paris. According to my source, the duke may be gone until the end of the Season. I simply cannot delay my retrieval of the brooch until his return. Thus, I must resort to thievery.” She attempted a deep breath, careful not to fill her lungs too full as the buttons of her borrowed coat were already stretched taut across her bosom. Josephine had worried about the fit since borrowing Isaiah’s stupid coat, a necessary part of her disguise. The fabric was pulled so tight a button well might pop off and hit Willa in the nose. Or an eye. Goodness, if her friend had to go about wearing a patch over her injured eye she might never forgive Josephine. Lady Brighton most certainly would not.
“I already told you, I have it on good authority that Lavisham is in Paris,” Josephine insisted once more.
“Really.” She could feel Willa’s skepticism fill the hack.
“I am positive.”
The ‘good authority’ was Lord Wilkes, a friend of Josephine’s brother Charles, who also, coincidentally, wasclosely acquainted with Lavisham. Yet another sign that fate favored her. She’d hurried out of the drawing room when Wilkes was announced just the other day, hoping to catch him before entering her brother’s study, so that Josephine might convince him to take her to Lavisham, but she’d missed him. So instead, she’d taken up a position just outside the study door, waiting patiently for Wilkes to depart. Over the course of his conversation with Charles, Wilkes imparted a bawdy, amusing story about Lavisham, which ended with the earl inviting Charles to play cards with he and the duke, when Lavisham returned from Paris before the end of the Season.
Rather perfect.
“What about the servants?” Willa tried again. “I doubt the duke has closed his house. There is sure to be a footman or two wandering about.”
“I’ll evade them. I am silent as a mouse when the occasion calls for it. And if I see anyone, I’ll pretend to be a…stable boy.”
Willa made another worried sound. “You look nothing like a boy. Goodness, my brother’s coat barely covers you properly, and the breeches are somewhat…obscenein nature. If my mother finds out?—”
“She won’t. I promise.”
Her friend did have a valid point. The breeches were incredibly tight, but that was to be expected, given Josephine’s hips which were broader than most. The seams were stretched to their limits. If one…burst, Josephine would…pour out and be half-naked, at best.
“But the boots fit fine with a little wool in the toes.” She tugged at the coat, feeling the strain of the buttons across her breasts.
Damn these ponderous…globes.
Male attire was wholly unforgiving of a woman’s natural curves. Josephine said a silent prayer of thanks that Isaiah’s coatwas long enough to cover her backside. Or most of it. But it wasn’t as if she could scale Lavisham’s garden wall in skirts.
“I must insist we turn back,” Willa protested for at least the third time.
“I cannot.” Josephine gave a sigh. “Waiting until the end of the Season for him to return and then continue all manner of imbecilic attempts to speak to him will take far too long. This will be much quicker. He probably doesn’t even realize he has the brooch.” She made a puff of frustration. “Thus, will not notice it is missing. Thank goodness I am athletically inclined, else I wouldn’t be able to break into his home at all.”
“Yes, your supreme athleticism.” Willa cleared her throat with only a hint of sarcasm. “Which I’ve seen on display with great frequency.”
“I’m good at archery,” Josephine argued back. “Moderately.”
Shewasbetter at archery in comparison to, say…fencing, but her bosom often got in the way of a carefully aimed shot, and it wasn’t as if she could rid herself of one breast, as the Amazons had supposedly done, to heighten her skills. The Harrington footmen drew straws to see which of them would have to set up her targets and retrieve her arrows, terrified Josephine would hit one of them.
“I’m highly capable. My father always said as much. There is a reason he chose this task for me specifically.”
“Possibly he simply didn’t want your sisters or brother to know he lost a family heirloom in a game of cards.”
“So he entrusted the secret to me. Now, from what I know of gambling gentlemen?—”
“Which is very little,” Willa injected.
“They tend to merely toss markers and whatever odds and ends they’ve won in a box or a drawer, most of which are then forgotten. Not the markers, which I’m sure they debate aboutcalling in, but the odd snuffbox. Or stickpin. As I said, Lavisham probably doesn’t even know he has the brooch.”
