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“Where there’s a will there’s a way, Lady Beatrice. Or, should I say, where there’s a Wright, there’s a way.” She giggled at her joke, beaming at them. “This calls for a fresh pot of tea.” She left, humming a happy tune.
“Why did you tell Foxton that your name was John?” Beatrice asked.
“It’s my middle name. I don’t want him knowing my full identity if I go up against him in this matter.” He removed his coat, flung it over a chair, and began rolling up his shirtsleeves. “Let’s get to work. You can sort through those crates. Coggins can help once he reappears. I’ll go examine the basement. I don’t have all the tools I need but this will help.” He brought out the tool he’d used to break into the shop.
“Mr. Wright, I think I gave you the wrong impression. I haven’t agreed to hire you.”
“You need a builder.” He removed his waistcoatand laid it over his coat. “And as your wise friend Miss Mayberry said, I’m here and so you may as well make use of me.” He unknotted his cravat and opened the top button of his shirt.
Make use of him.Her treacherous mind began inventing uses. Those sensual lips of his could be used for kissing. Those wide shoulders and strong arms for lifting her and carrying her up the stairs...
“Mr. Wright! Do stop disrobing.”
“Why?” He stopped midbutton. “This is my only suit of decent clothing. I’m not going to get plaster and dirt all over it.”
“I don’t have the permission or the means to hire you at the moment.”
“I need to speak to your brother. If I’m helping you, I’ll know instantly when he arrives.” He cocked his head. “And you’ll put in a good word for me, instead of giving him a list of everything I did to annoy you at Thornhill.”
So that’s why he was so eager to help her with the building. “I don’t require rescuing, Wright. I’ll find a way out of this mess on my own.”
“I think you do need a little rescuing. I think Foxton is going to make good on his threat, and you won’t be able to find another carpenter willing to help you.”
She removed her spectacles, which had gone a little blurry, and wiped them clean. Happened every time Wright stripped to his shirtsleeves. “But your friend is waiting for you at the docks.”
“Old Griffith? He can wait. He’s only hiring me as a favor. He can easily find someone else.”
“The HMSBoadiceais arriving soon.”
“I have a fortnight. It should be enough time to make decent progress on the renovations if I work night and day. You’ve already seen what I’m capable of, Lady Beatrice.” He spread his arms wide. “Make use of me. I’m yours.”
She wished he’d stop saying things like that. It made her brain fog over just like her spectacles. He wasn’t hers and he never would be.
“There’s the matter of the paperwork,” she said crisply, trying to keep this conversation impersonal and businesslike. “I’m not entirely certain yet of the details of my inheritance until I meet with my brother’s solicitor to review my aunt’s will and...”Every time you roll up those sleeves and expose your forearms, I become so flustered that I can’t even remember how to form complete sentences.“...I’m not ready to begin renovations. Foxton knows about the bawdy books, and he threatened obliquely to use it as leverage to force me to sell. He knows my mother would never tolerate me owning a shop with such an objectionable past.”
“You can’t let him win. He thinks he owns everything and everyone.”
“I agree. I want nothing more than to foil his plans for that awful factory.”
“You could sign the property over to your society for use as a clubhouse, and that way it wouldn’t be your family name associated with any past scandals. You keep the books but the society owns the property.”
“That’s actually a very good idea.”
He grinned. “I have a few good ones from time to time.”
His smile was a weapon employed to scramble the minds of sensible ladies. The teasing curve of his lips, the laughter dancing in his eyes, the way he proffered such ingenious solutions to her problems in that gruff voice of his . . . everything about him disarmed her and made her feel off-balance and not at all like herself. “Even so, I’m not at liberty to employ you at the moment, Mr. Wright.”
He strode toward her, throat exposed, the white of his shirt contrasting with the uneven blue of his eyes. “Could there perhaps be another reason for your reluctance to hire me?”
She backed away from all of that too-vivid virility. “Frankly, yes.” She might as well be honest. “After what happened upstairs... I don’t think it’s prudent for us to be alone together. Especially in the vicinity of bedchambers.”
“Nothing happened upstairs.”
Something had happened. She’d progressed far beyond ninnyhood and entered wanton territory. “I can’t hire you, Wright.”
He shrugged. “Suit yourself. If you hear word from your brother contact me at St. Katharine Docks where I’ll be making repairs on the shipAngela.”
After he left, Beatrice collapsed into a chair. She knew it was for the best. He was simply too dangerous to her good sense... and to her heart.
