Page 16 of A Spot of Tea and Sorcery: Vol. 6

Nigel cleared his throat and resisted the urge to pull at his collar. “What can I, erm, do for you?”

“You can get off your posh arse and ask that poor girl out is what you can do.”

A shot of ice went through his veins. “What?”

“It’s been a month. A month since I caught you sulking on the sidewalk over her kissing that swoony wardsman of hers.” Bryony angled her hip one way, her head the other, and raised a well-plucked eyebrow. “And I’m telling you what, I’ve never heard so much sniffling and sighing in all my born days as I have in the four weeks following. Night after bloody night! It’s enough to drive a body quite mad.”

“Sniffling and sighing?”

“Yeah.” She leaned in closer, dropping her voice. “Fromcertain parties.You get me?” And she tossed her head in the direction of the kitchen passage.

Nigel blinked. He felt he should understand, but something in his mind was slammed shut and fast. “Ward the, erm, wardsman,” he ventured. “He was gone all last month.”

“Oh, don’t try to tell me she’s been weeping into her pillow each night overhim!”Bryony snorted and shook her vibrant curls. “That man has made it perfectly clear he’s ready to jump through hoops for her if asked, poor fellow. No, no, a girl doesn’t go all weepy like that over the bird in the hand. It’s the one in the bush what’s the problem.”

“Miss Braithwait.” Nigel paused, glanced at the passage again, then shook his head and forced himself to face the young woman before him. “I’m not sure you fully understand the, erm, the nature of the dynamic between Miss Talbot and myself.”

The look she gave him was positively scathing. “Oh, don’t I?” Her lip curled, and she ran her eyes pointedly up and down his frame, ending with a little shake of her head. “You’re a cutie, Mr. Grimm, and no mistake. But, as my grandma used to say, spineless noodle never won fair maiden.”

“Faint heart,” Nigel murmured.

“How’s that?”

“The saying is, ‘faint heart never won fair maiden.’”

“Yeah, well, noodles never did any better, I’ll bet.” Bryony pushed away from the counter at last, one gloved hand planted at the curve of her jutted hip. “If I were you, I’d find a way to stiffen that noodle of yours before she rides off into the sunset with her hunky wardsman.” Her eyes ran down his body again, lingering on the front of his trousers suggestively. “If you catch my drift.”

With that, she turned and sauntered from the shop, leaving Nigel feeling vaguely violated.

As the shop bells tinkled in Bryony’s wake, Nigel turned to find that Luna had hung up the green dress on the nook curtain bar. He blinked, surprised at the sight of it—and was momentarily cast back to the evening when he had seen Luna wearing those satiny green folds. A shimmering vision, which lingered in his imagination, particularly on those dark, lonely nights when he lay still upon his pillow, staring straight up at his ceiling, and trying not to remember what it was like to hold her in his arms.

He swallowed now, staring at that dress on its hanger, easily recalling how the satin and ruching clung to her gentle curves. Though he hated to admit it, even in the privacy of his mind . . . he agreed with Ward. Luna didn’t need a ballgown. In that dress, she would outshine any woman at the Governor’s Ball. Truth be told, she would outshine them even in her rumpled work skirt and blouse.

“Never mind?”

Startled, Nigel turned to catch his raven’s knowing gaze from where she sat on her skull-pot. “Ican’t,” he said, keeping his voice down just in case. “She’s going out withhimtonight. And . . . and kissing him.”

“Never mind!”

“Yes, well, you have a point. But I don’t think she’ll want to kiss me now that she knows who I really am.”

“Never mind?”

“And how do you propose I go about asking her something like that? ‘Pardon me, Miss Talbot, but would you like to kiss me again despite knowing that I am, in fact, the foulest of villains ever to walk the face of the earth?’”

“Never mind.”

“You think of a better way to put it and let me know.”

Debbie muttered wordlessly and stomped in place on the skull-pot. Then, to Nigel’s great surprise, she launched herself abruptly from the pot and, with a great flutter of wings and raucous croaking, flew straight at the green dress.

“Debbie!” Nigel cried even as she crashed into it, wings flapping and tangling up in satin. Nigel grabbed for her, ignoring the scrape of claws on exposed skin, and yanked her back. This knocked both dress and hanger off the rail and sent the whole thing plopping to the floor in a bundle, Debbie still tangled up in its folds.

“What is going on back here?” Luna’s voice cried out. Nigel turned and saw her at the counter, setting down the tea tray. Her eyes widened as she took in the sight of him, the bird, and the dress. With a little, “Oh!” she flipped up the hinged portion of the counter.

“Miss Talbot!” Nigel gasped, yanking Debbie out from the dress firmly. “I’m so sorry, I don’t know what came over the fool bird!”

“Oh no, oh no, oh no . . .” Luna sidled past him and dropped to her knees, trembling hands gathering up the satin bundle of gown. “Oh no, Myrna’s going to kill me! And . . . Green Mother alive!” She held the dress up by its shoulders, displaying the bodice and the ugly smear down the front. Turning sharply, she fixed Debbie with a furious glare, even as the bird wrestled free of Nigel’s grasp and returned to her pot. “You fool bird, you went and messed all over it!”