Page 8 of Red Masquerade

I only ever saw Lucas with his starched suits and clean hands. I realized I didn’t much ever interact with working people, other than our maids, butler, and cook.

His eyes widened in surprise. “I’m an apprentice,” he said. He glanced down at his dirty hands, as if he was only then realizing his stained skin. “For a printer.”

“A printer? Like newspapers and such?”

I must’ve seemed an oddity, being actually interested in him.

He nodded skeptically. “Books, mainly.” Then he shrugged. “Pamphlets, sometimes.”

“So, you must read a lot.” I smiled.

He smiled back, and a dimple appeared at one cheek that sent my heart fluttering. “I do.”

Completely oblivious to the bustle of the street, we stood there as cars and carriages passed, mothers with their children, working men in the same state as the young man before me. Tired and hobbling home. But he, this man before me, still had a vigor that straightened his shoulders, brightened his eyes.

I sighed and looked out on the street. The scent of roasted coffee wafted toward us from a cafe across the street. A stand with candies and fresh cakes and pastries was stationed nearby, gathering school children on their way home. A florist stood with a wooden cart full of their blooming bouquets out of the way of traffic. The sweet smells mixed with the scent of the exhaust from cars, and the occasional horse created a cloyingly particular sense that was only found in certain parts of the city. Yet once you smelled it, you knew where you were.

“I used to read,” I said. “I haven’t found the time recently.”

It wasn’t entirely true. I had not read much since my tutoring was completed, but I remembered what I did read fondly: some books recommended by my dashing tutor Samson, and many others I had to hide from Mother. Literature she thought would only lead me to debauchery—Ethan Frome, Dubliners—but they were fascinating to me all the same.

Perhaps, if I had not been so caught up with the society parties, with seeing Flora and spending our days out and about, I would’ve read more.

“That’s a shame,” the young man said simply, his voice soft.

I thought he would offer to bring me some recommendations, if only to see me again—it played out quite romantically in my head. Perhaps he thought of me as frivolous, thinking myself too important to spend time looking at a book.

“You never told me your name.” I turned back to him.

His brow rose, that easy smile still pulling at his lips. “You didn’t tell me yours,” he quipped.

I held out my hand. “Helena Quintrell.”

His eyes widened briefly at the mention of my name, then he sheepishly looked down at his hands, afraid to touch me. I rolled my eyes and took off my glove, offering him my hand again.

“Adam Vering.”

His rough hand encased mine hesitantly, his grip so light, like he thought me fragile. The moment our fingers touched, a shiver trailed down my spine. Like I was doing something scandalous, something I wasn’t supposed to do. I didn’t care if the ink stained my own skin. It would be a story to tell Mother: how I’d met a working man on the street and shook his hand.

He didn’t let go, the warmth from his palm spreading through mine. A comforting, secure sort of warmth. And a part of me didn’t want him to let go.

We stood like that for a moment, hand in hand, as his eyes searched mine. Could he read me like a book? Did he know everything about me just by looking at me? By touching me? I wanted to tell him everything about me; wanted to know everything about him.

A blush bloomed across his cheeks, the dimple appearing and disappearing, and he glanced at the ground, pulling his hand away and shoving them into the pockets of his trousers.

My hand came away clean, the ink on his flesh having dried long ago.

“Adam Vering.” I tried the name out, letting it roll off my tongue. A flash of darkness in his eyes, the sparkle returning a moment later.

“Helena…” My own sounded like golden, hot caramel from his lips. Indulgent cream and berries. My last name dropped.Quintrell.

My father’s name, and his father’s, and so on. Not wholly mine.

But I was wholly me, completely Helena.

“Do you make a habit of running into girls on the street?” I asked.

Calculation behind those hazel eyes. “Not normally, but perhaps I should.”