The Songbird's Seduction by Connie Brockway Page A

Lavinia missed being present at the bank on the anniversary date, she might very well face being eliminated from securing a share altogether.
    Lavinia placed a consoling hand on her sister’s arm. “Oh, darling, that’s not true. You would have likely forgotten ten years ago, too.”
    Perhaps they ought to forfeit Lord Barton’s portion and be content with Lavinia’s?
    Bernice frowned, distracted from guilt by affront. “I am sure
not
, Lavinia. Ten years ago my memory was as clear as—”
    What in blazes was she thinking?
Of course, she wasn’t going to just give up a fortune! Not without a fight, she wasn’t.
    “It’s all right, dears. I’ll just go fetch it now. Wait here.”
    “But—”
    “If I’m not back before the boarding we’ll figure something else out. But I’ll be back,” she promised with a great deal more conviction than she felt. “Wait here for me.”
    And with that she picked up her skirts and fled down the wharf toward the street, hoping against hope that a hansom cab would be standing there with fresh horses dancing in their traces.
    A hansom cab
was
there. It stood at the curb while an enormous load of luggage was being handed down piece by piece from the top racks, the driver working at a snail’s pace. Lucy looked around. There was no other conveyance in sight. She peered closer at the cab and made out the silhouette of the man still inside. Perhaps if she appealed to the luggage’s owner?
    She went to the side and rapped on the window. “Look here, my good fellow, could you ask the driver to hurry up? I have an emergency—”
    “Don’t we all?” drawled a silky, familiar voice as the door swung open and a well-polished boot appeared.
    “Margery!”
    “In the flesh and ready to embark upon my triumphant tour of France’s many quaint but sadly entertainment-deprived towns.”He emerged from the carriage, swinging an ebony-handled cane and beaming with avuncular affection.
    “I thought you were going to Paris?”
    “My darling girl. One does not
start
a tour in Paris, one concludes it triumphantly there. I start in . . .” He frowned, pulled a face, and shook his head. “Oh, who can remember French towns? I’ll look it up when I arrive.
    “Now, what is this emergency? I do hope it doesn’t involve money. You know I never carry cash upon my person; it only encourages people in the misguided assumption that I intend to pay for something.”
    She shook her head, miserably regarding Margery’s luggage. The driver hadn’t even unloaded a third of it. Drat. Drat, drat, drat! The sense of urgency left her like air seeping from a punctured balloon. It was too late.
    Reading the disappointment in her expression, Margery took her elbow and propelled her across the street and beneath the awning of a café. “Tell me,” he said.
    The words spilled out in a brief, succinct flurry. When she was finished, Margery tipped his head and smiled with preening self-satisfaction.
    “What?” she asked.
    “But, my darling one, it is so simple.
I
shall accompany the dear old tabbies on the ferry crossing.”
    Lord, she adored the man. He had an enormous, trusting, and egalitarian heart.
    If only her aunts had been cut from the same cloth. But they weren’t. They would
never
allow themselves to become obligated to a strange man.
    “If only you could.” She smiled regretfully.
    “But why could I not?”
    “My great-aunts would never agree to being under a debt of gratitude to you.”
    Margery’s ginger brows flew up.
    “It just isn’t done amongst their generation. A gentleman simply does not impose upon a lady by placing her in a position of indebtedness.”
    “That is
so
odd,” Margery muttered, unoffended but mystified. His own antecedents were far from genteel. Though he’d polished a bright veneer of refinement about himself, it was only a veneer and he, at least, never mistook it for something more.
    “Ain’t it, though?” Lucy agreed disconsolately.
    “Truly? They