My Lady Quicksilver

“How do you do?” she asked, pasting a smile on her rosy lips and offering him her right hand.

Lynch stared at it. “Let us get to the point, Miss—?”

“Mrs. Marberry.” Slight emphasis on the first word.

“Married?”

“A widow.”

He frowned. “I’m afraid your services are not required. There was a mix-up with the advertisement. The position has already been filled.” His eye caught a letter on the desk, the address written in gold ink. From the Council of Dukes then. He started toward it. “Garrett will see you to the—”

“Obviously not by a woman,” she replied tartly. “With their weak constitutions and all.”

Lynch stopped and looked at her. She’d overheard him in the entry. Cool brown eyes met his. A challenge. If she thought he would be embarrassed, then she didn’t know him very well.

Opening her reticule, she tugged out a sheaf of papers. “I have references from my last two places of employ. I worked for Lord Hamilton in the War Office, and then for Lady Shipton as her personal secretary. I assure you”—her voice became a drawl—“after that, nothing could shock me or turn my stomach.”

Lynch crossed his arms over his chest. He’d dealt with the Shipton case. A jealous blue blood husband and an adulterous consort whose predilections had surprised even him. He’d thought he’d seen it all by now. “You are aware that both your previous employees are dead?”

“Not by my hand, I assure you.”

A bold piece. He straightened in interest. “I meant that I would be unable to check your references.”

“Let me be bold…I assume that is your preference anyway?”

Lynch gave a brisk nod. She was observant at least.

“My previous employers are dead, as you noted, which means I have nothing but two pieces of paper to prove my aptitude for employment. This leaves me in somewhat of a quandary. I need to earn a respectable living, Sir Jasper. I have a brother…” And here she faltered, showing perhaps the first lack of composure. “He’s young. And assorting with certain types of people I don’t approve of. I should like to let an apartment in the city, away from these influences, but at the moment I am unable.”

She needed a steady job and a good wage. Lynch’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not unmoved,” he told her, leaning his hip against the desk. “But I’ve had five secretaries in the last three months. My work involves certain grisly details and long hours, and nobody seems able to keep up with me. I’ve spent more time in the past three months training new secretaries than working, and I haven’t the inclination to waste any more of it.”

Mrs. Marberry squared her shoulders. “I’m aware of that. Garrett informed me of the nature of the job. He said you would work me into the ground, forgetting human needs such as sustenance and sleep, squire me all around the city to take your notes and examine dead bodies. You told your last secretary to hold someone’s head, so you could examine the angle of the cut that decapitated the body and that was why they resigned.”

For a moment Lynch was taken aback. “And you’re still here?”

“It’s all correct then?”

“There are some matters I believe he forgot to mention, but mostly yes. The men call me ‘that uncompromising bastard,’ though they’re not aware that I know that. It’s not the worst thing I’ve been called. Still want the job?”

“Sir Jasper.” Mrs. Marberry leaned toward him, completely unaware of the fact that her bodice gaped. He, however, noticed everything. Smooth skin, the veins tracing their way beneath her flesh, blue and pulsing with blood. Shifting slightly, Lynch glanced away. She would be trouble. He shouldn’t hire her. With her pretty little mouth and stubborn chin, the men would be all over her.

“You can’t frighten me nor can you drive me away,” she said. “You need someone who’s not afraid of you.”

Lynch’s gaze locked on hers. Her eyes were truly fascinating—dark pools that seemed to hint at infinite depths. He wondered briefly if they echoed her personality; were there hidden depths there too? Then he shook the thought off as foolish. One had only to observe to understand the true measure of a man—or a woman. He’d not met one yet whom he’d been unable to decipher down to the last iota of their soul. People were predictable. “And that person is you?”

She didn’t look away. Instead, she looked right through him, as though she could see inside him. Not once had he been on the receiving end of a stare like that. “That person is me.”

By gods, she would be trouble. And yet he was strangely tempted. The girl had gumption, glaring at him as if daring him to employ her. Not even a hint of the vapors, though she was clever enough to be wary. He was what he was, after all.

Perhaps she could manage to deal with him? Perhaps she might last longer than a week, unlike the previous Mrs. Eltham, she of the decapitated-head incident.

Mrs. Marberry glanced away, her fathomless eyes hidden beneath thick, dark lashes. Lynch’s breath caught. Devil a bit.

“You’re too pretty,” he growled.

“I beg your pardon?”

Lynch gestured at her, striding away from the desk. “This…” He made a curving motion in the air to indicate her. “This won’t work. I hire ugly women. Ones with moustaches. Ones my men wouldn’t look twice at.”

“I hardly think I’m the sort of woman to inspire riots in your guild quarters.”

“That’s because you’re a woman,” he said. “We’re speaking of four hundred and fifty men I work into the ground. They barely have time to speak to women and now you want me to place a pretty one in the middle of them all?”

Her gaze hardened. “Should I be concerned?”

“Concerned?” Then he realized she was speaking of assault. “Good God, no. They wouldn’t dare. I’d have them eviscerated. And they know it.”

“Then your objection stems from the fact you think I’d be a distraction?”

A distraction? A damned catastrophe. Lynch scowled, turning toward the window with ground-eating strides. He’d never been a man to stand still for long. It helped him to think. “I know you’d be a distraction.”

“But shouldn’t I be at your side at all times?” she asked, following him in a swish of skirts and perfume. “I daresay your men wouldn’t dare risk such foolery in front of you.”

“They wouldn’t.”

Lynch spun on his heel and found her in his path. Acres and acres of navy skirts with that tight cinched in waist and…the breasts. The dress was modest, but at his great height, he couldn’t help that the angle gave him a certain view.

Perhaps I wasn’t speaking of the men?

Heat tightened in his abdomen and he clasped his hands behind his back. Damn her, this would be a mistake. He had a thousand things to think of and a revolutionary leader to find. He couldn’t afford to have a buxom, determined redhead under his nose. Especially one who smelled like lemons and soft, freshly laundered sheets.

The thought conjured to mind the image of her upon his own sheets, that pale, flawless skin laid bare for his inspection. Her pretty little mouth parted in a gasp as he ground his hips down upon hers.

Lynch’s cock stirred, reminding him of what it felt like to be a man. Damn it. She was already affecting him. This should be evidence that this would be a bad idea.

But he needed a secretary. One who wasn’t scared of him.

A faint hint of color rose in Mrs. Marberry’s cheeks but she refused to look away. He was staring, he realized.

“Are you going to employ me or not?” she asked.

Instinct told him to say no. But as he opened his mouth, the words changed. “Yes,” he found himself saying. “On a trial basis. I’m desperate.”

“And a charmer,” she noted with an arched brow. A little smile toyed over her lips. Relief. “I shall have to watch myself with you, I see.”

I shall have to watch myself.

After the disastrous encounter with Mercury and now this, it was becoming clear that he needed a woman