Not roughly. That was what unsettled her. A rough approach she would have known how to refuse. This was something else—a man in dark livery stepping forward from beside a black carriage with the unhurried precision of someone executing a task rehearsed in advance. The brass buttons on his coat bore a crest that radiated the kind of authority that came only from houses where crests were not decorative.
“Miss Everleigh. If you would be so good as to step this way. The carriage is waiting.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“His Grace requests a word, miss. He apologises for the manner of the approach and assures you this will not take long.”
His Grace.
Her stomach dropped.
“You may informHis Grace,” she said, and the ice in her own voice surprised her, “that if he wishes to speak with me, he may do so through the proper channels. A letter. A calling card. The customary rituals of civilised society.”
The footman’s expression did not change. She suspected the Duke of Rathbourne’s staff were selected, in part, for their capacity to absorb hostility without visible effect.
“His Grace anticipated you might feel that way, miss. He asked me to tell you that the matter concerns your uncle and your sister, and that it cannot wait for letters.”
Clara.
She looked at the carriage. The door was closed, the curtain drawn. No way to see in. No way to know what waited beyond that lacquered panel except the certainty—cold, unwelcome, absolute—that the Duke of Rathbourne did not send carriages to intercept women on the Strand unless he had already decided something she had not yet been told.
She climbed in.
The door closed behind her with a sound that was quieter than the finality it carried. The noise of the Strand—the vendors, the wheels, the whole clamorous reassurance of public space—fell away at once, replaced by the padded silence of an interior built to insulate its occupants from the world they commanded.
The carriage smelled expensive and faintly smoky—not tobacco, but the kind of scent that clung to libraries and private studies, to rooms where important men made important decisions. A single lamp burned low, casting the confined space in amber and shadow.
Tristan Rathbourne sat on the opposite seat.
He had not arranged himself for comfort. His back was straight, his shoulders set against the leather with the rigid economy of a man who treated even sitting as an exercise in discipline. Dark wool, no ornamentation, no concession to fashion beyond the cut itself, which was precise enough to make simplicity look deliberate. His hands rested on his thighs, one gloved, one bare, as though he had stopped mid-task because the task no longer mattered.
“This,” Rosamund said, “is abduction.”
“It is a conversation.”
“A conversation requires consent. What you have done is station a man on a public street and instruct him to herd me into a box.”
“Your uncle’s solicitor filed a preliminary petition with the Court of Chancery this morning. The hearing is set for a fortnight hence.”
“That is not possible. He only came to me yesterday.”
“Edwin did not arrive at your door on impulse, Miss Everleigh. He arrived because his solicitor told him the paperwork was ready.” Tristan’s voice carried no inflection. He might have been reading a bill of lading. “The petition names you as financially unfit, morally unsupported, and without the protection of a male guardian willing to assume responsibility for the child. It cites your unmarried state, your lack of income, and the condition ofyour household. It does not mention love, devotion, or the fact that you have kept your sister alive for four years on needlework and will. Those details do not appear in the relevant statutes.”
Her fingernails bit into her palms. “And how precisely did you come to possess this information?”
“I made enquiries. After last night.” A pause—the first hesitation she had detected. “I have been aware of your uncle’s activities for some time. Longer than he would find comfortable, if he knew.”
“You have been watching him.”
“I have been watching the spaces he occupies. Your uncle is a careful man. He does not leave fingerprints on anything he touches. But careful men create patterns, and patterns become legible.” He leaned forward—a small motion, but in the compressed geometry of the carriage it closed a distance that had felt necessary. “Your uncle does not want Clara because he has discovered an interest in family. She represents a transaction. A girl of good birth with a guardianship that can be leveraged into a marriage contract is worth a great deal more than your father’s modest inheritance. Edwin does not intend to raise your sister. He intends to use her.”
The carriage rocked gently over a rut. Outside, London continued—vendors calling, hooves striking cobblestone. Inside, Rosamund’s body had gone very still.
“I know what he is.” Her voice came out low and tight, pressed flat by a weight she refused to let it carry openly. “I knew beforeyou did. You are not telling me anything I have not already understood.”
“Then you understand what happens if he wins.”
“He will not win.”
