The Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie(25)
Author: Jennifer Ashley

As he had at the other boardinghouse, Daniel stepped back and tipped his hat, then stood still, waiting for her to go inside. This time he didn’t smile, but watched her with his unnerving scrutiny.

Violet finally made herself turn away and walk the few steps to the house. Her hand trembled on the door latch, and she found the door locked.

A maid answered her knock immediately and let her in. The foyer was bone cold, but Violet was still hot from Daniel’s touch.

She went up the stairs, clutching the wooden railing for balance. Once inside her bedroom, in their little suite of rooms, Violet moved to the front window and lifted the curtain to look out.

Daniel was still there, scanning the windows, waiting to make sure she’d gone into the right boardinghouse this time. He saw Violet, broke into his smile, and gave her a lazy salute. Violet lifted her hand in farewell, then forced herself to let go of the curtain, cutting off Daniel from her sight.

Daniel arrived at precisely ten the next morning to be ushered into a dreary parlor on the ground floor. He’d had to talk swiftly to be admitted at all, but finally the landlady agreed that Violet could speak to him in the parlor, if they kept the door open, and he departed right away.

Two middle-aged ladies fled through a far door as he was let into the parlor from the hall—probably nothing masculine had walked into this room in a decade. He heard whispers and giggles from behind the cracked-open door, which he pretended to ignore.

This parlor was not as crowded with keepsakes as the sitting room at the Mortimer house in London had been, but there were enough tables draped with cloth and covered with trinkets that would make brushing past them a disaster. Daniel navigated the safest path he could to a side chair under a gaslight, where he sat, pulling his kilt modestly over his knees. The giggling intensified. Likely the ladies had never seen a man in a skirt before.

Violet walked into the parlor, thanking the severe-looking landlady who had come with her to it. Giving the far door a hard look, Violet moved to Daniel, who had sprung to his feet.

“You are punctual,” she said.

“One of my many skills,” Daniel said, trying not to be obvious about feasting his eyes on her. “Punctuality.”

Violet didn’t look as refreshed from a night’s sleep as she might. Her eyes were red-rimmed, though her hair was pulled neatly into her pompadour, her shirtwaist buttoned to her chin, her skirt holding nary a wrinkle. Even with her slightly haggard look, her skin was flawlessly smooth, and her eyes—those dark blue eyes that could reach a man’s soul—fixed on him and wouldn’t let him go.

Violet held out a wooden box about two feet wide and one high, with heavy hinges and a sturdy clasp. “Take good care of it. It cost me a bit.”

“Oh, I will, lass.” Daniel took the box, unfastened the clasp, and peeked inside. The machine didn’t look like much—a metal casing, fan blades showing through a cage, and a few wires.

Violet gave the box an anxious glance as Daniel closed it, as though she’d handed a stranger her only child. “What will you do with it?”

“See if it will enhance an engine idea I have. I don’t have the engine here, but my friend down the coast has something close, and a vehicle for testing it. He’s letting me loose on it with my theories today, trusting man.”

“What kind of vehicle?” Violet asked, interested. “Is it a motorcar?”

The excitement in the question changed her. For a moment Violet the careful woman vanished, as did the Violet who used blunt rejoinders to keep those who might hurt her at bay. Daniel liked this Violet, curious and interested.

“Not a motorcar. I haven’t finished building mine. When I do . . . that will be a fine day.”

“What, then?”

Violet’s eagerness was unmistakable, as was the wistfulness with which she looked at the box. Daniel caught her hand in a sudden, hard grip.

“Come with me, lass, and see.”

Again the hesitation, the little frown, the quick look upward, to where her rooms lay. “My mother . . .”

“She can do without you one day, can’t she? With all these ladies here to look after her?”

“Well . . .”

Daniel tightened his grip. She needed this, and he needed it. A day spent in Violet’s company, with the opportunity to peel away her layers and find out all about her, was not to be lost.

“I’m not letting you say no,” Daniel said. He gave her what he hoped was his most promising smile. “Come on with me, and I’ll give you a day out you’ll never forget.”

Madness, absolute madness. Violet’s thoughts flipped one over the other as she sent word up to Mary that she was going out, possibly all morning and on into the afternoon.

The next thing Violet knew, Daniel was leading her out of the house, past the interested ladies who’d stuck their heads out of the next room to watch them go. He took her out into the street and pushed her up into his tall, hired carriage.

The coach took them to the nearest train station, and not many minutes later, they were boarding a train, for which Daniel had already bought two tickets. Two, the presumptuous man.

The train glided out of the city, steam pumping, bells clanging. Violet and her mother and Mary had arrived in Marseille at night, traveling through most of the southern part of France in the dark. Violet had seen nothing of the countryside. Now she trained her gaze out the window to high hills, swaths of empty fields, and cliffs tumbling to the sea, which was gray under scattered clouds. The winter wind was brisk, but the private train compartment was toasty warm, with coal boxes for their feet and oil lamps to chase away any darkness.

Of course it was a private compartment. Daniel, lounging back on the seat opposite her, seemed surprised when Violet mentioned it. When he traveled in England and Scotland, Daniel said, he often used his ducal uncle’s entire private car attached to the back of whatever train he wanted to take.

He said it casually, not boasting. In the next breath Daniel explained that when he didn’t take his uncle’s private coach, he rode rough by himself or with his friends in second class. But he’d thought Violet would appreciate the soft seats of first class today.

The statement brought home how different Daniel’s existence was from hers. Violet regarded riding second class as a luxury up from third, while Daniel obviously thought nothing of making a train wait while a separate car was attached for himself and his family. Violet and her mother had often hunkered in crowded stations waiting for privileges to be given to wealthy men like Daniel.