Heartless: The Parasol Protectorate: Book the Fourth (5 page)

She, of course, was not being allowed to physically help, although she did toddle about pointing at objects and indicating where they should go. She was enjoying herself immensely. Her husband and coconspirators having sallied off about their own business several days ago, she felt much like a chubby general in sole possession of a field of glittery battle, directing a mass invasion of foreign soil. Although, after having to mediate a head-to-head between Boots and Biffy over the efficaciousness of velvet decorative pillows, she suspected generals had it easier. Conall and Professor Lyall had arranged for her dominion over the relocation operation in order to distract her, but as she was well aware of the manipulation and, as they were well aware that she was well aware, she might as well have fun.

What made it particularly pleasant was that it had to be covert. They didn’t want it known that Lord and Lady Maccon were actually taking up residence
inside
Lord Akeldama’s house. The vampires had only reluctantly agreed to the Maccons moving in
next door,
frightened that a werewolf and a preternatural might unduly influence the rearing of a child, even one under Lord Akeldama’s care. Further intimacy was strongly discouraged. Thus, they had made it look as though Lady Maccon were seeking refuge from the chaos by taking tea at Lord Akeldama’s, while her belongings were moved into the rented accommodations adjacent. Alexia’s personal effects were taken up one flight of stairs, down a hall, and out onto a balcony. They were then tossed over to Lord Akeldama’s balcony—the balconies being a short distance apart and conveniently hidden by a large holly tree. Her private possessions were then carried down another hall, up another flight of stairs, and eventually into her new residential closet. This involved a good deal of ruckus, especially when it was furniture being tossed.
Thank goodness,
reflected Alexia, watching Biffy catch her favorite armoire with ease,
for supernatural strength.

Lady Maccon’s minions in this elaborate charade were three younger members of Woolsey’s pack: Biffy, Rafe, and Phelan (Biffy as catcher and the other two as porter and chucker, respectively); the ever-efficient Floote; and a positive bevy of Lord Akeldama’s drones scuttling about arranging everything
just so.

After overseeing the tossing, Alexia repaired to monitor the arrangement of her new sleeping chamber. Lord Akeldama’s third closet was quite spacious, almost the size of her bedchamber back at Woolsey. Admittedly, there were
no windows, and there were gratuitous hooks, shelves, and rails covering the walls. But there was also enough room for a large bed (specially commissioned by Lord Akeldama to accommodate Lord Maccon’s frame), a dressing table, and several other bits and bobs. Conall would have to make do without his dressing chamber, but since he was prone to wandering around underdressed, anyway, Alexia suspected this would not affect his habits detrimentally. The lack of a proper valet concerned her for about five seconds before she realized no drone of Lord Akeldama’s would allow her husband passage through their hallways in anything less than tip-top, wrinkle-free condition.

Biffy was in his element, free to wander once more the luxurious, colorful, and somewhat effervescent corridors of his former master. Of all Alexia’s acquaintances, Biffy was the most thrilled by the new cohabitation scheme. He was far more comfortable bustling about hanging Alexia’s hats on hooks than he had been for the last five months at Woolsey Castle. One might even have described him as gay, no longer weighed down by the sport destiny had made of his afterlife.

The drones couldn’t have been more excited if Queen Victoria were gracing them with her presence. A female in their midst, a baby in their future, and a room to decorate in the interim—pure heaven. After a brief scuffle over repapering the walls, it was decided, wholly without Alexia’s say-so, that a new carpet and some additional lighting were sufficient to brighten up the closet.

Once Covert Operation Fling Furniture was concluded, the two other werewolves jumped easily from one balcony to the other and came to see if there was anything further their Alpha female wished of them. There was a good deal
more, as she readily informed them. She desired the bed be moved slightly to the right and her armoire moved to the other side of the room, and then back again. Also the drones wished to inquire as to the werewolves’ opinion on the matter of stacking Lady Maccon’s hatboxes, and the correct order in which to hang Lord Maccon’s cloaks.

By the end, Rafe wore the long-suffering look of an eagle being ordered about by a flock of excited pigeons.

Floote heralded completion by coming in with the last of Lady Maccon’s most prized possessions: her parasol, dispatch case, and jewelry box.

“What do you think, Floote?”

“It’s rather glossy, madam.”

“No, not that. What do you think about the whole arrangement?”

They had been organizing and packing for several days, and Floote had taken charge of leasing the house adjacent to Lord Akeldama’s (although not, much to the vampire’s disappointment, repainting it), but Alexia had not found the time to consult with him on his opinion of the scheme itself.

Floote looked grave and very much the butler. He was ostensibly Lady Maccon’s personal secretary and librarian now but had never been one to let go of good training. “It is a unique solution, madam.”

“And?”

“You have always done things differently, madam.”

“Will it work?”

“Anything is possible, madam,” was Floote’s noncommittal answer. Very diplomatic was Floote.

It was well into the night and no longer quite the time for social calls, even among the supernatural set, when
Lord Akeldama’s doorbell sounded, interrupting Alexia’s conversation and the drone’s bustling.

Emmet Wilberforce Bootbottle-Fipps—whom everyone, including Lady Maccon when she forgot herself, called Boots—trotted off in a flutter of green velvet frock coat to see who would call at such an hour. Lord Akeldama didn’t always keep a butler; he said his drones needed the practice. Whatever that meant.

Alexia thought of something she had better see dealt with before it slipped her mind and became inconvenient. “Floote, would you please see about some very discreet carpenters to build a bridge between the balconies?”

“Madam?”

“I realize that they are hardly more than a yard apart, but my stability is not what it once was. It seems likely we must persist in this charade of actually living in the one abode while sneaking into the other. I refuse to be hurled willy-nilly between houses, no matter how strong my husband or how diverting he would find the attempt. Clothing isn’t always enough of a barrier to preternatural contact, and I should hate to be the victim of unreliable catching, if you take my meaning.”

“Perfectly, madam. I shall see to the builders directly.” Floote kept a remarkably straight face for a man having heard such a preposterous statement come out of the mouth of an overly pregnant aristocrat.

Boots reappeared wearing a look of mild shock under his sculpted topiary of muttonchops. “The caller is for you, Lady Maccon.”

“Yes?” Alexia held out her hand for a card.

There was none forthcoming, only Boots’s shocked statement. “It is a
lady,
what!”

“They do happen, Boots, much as you would prefer to deny it.”

“Oh, no, sorry ’bout that. I mean to say, how’d she know you were here?”

“Well, if you told me which lady, I might be able to elucidate.”

“It’s a Miss Loontwill, Lady Maccon.”

“Oh, fiddlesticks. Which one?”

Miss Felicity Loontwill sat in Lord Akeldama’s drawing room in a dress of sensible heathered tweed with only one layer of trim and six buttons, a hat with minimal feathers, and a gray knit shawl with a ruffled collar.

“Oh, my heavens,” exclaimed Lady Maccon upon seeing her sister in such a state. “Felicity, are you quite all right?”

Miss Loontwill looked up. “Why, yes, of course, sister. Why shouldn’t I be?”

“Is there something amiss with the family?”

“You mean, aside from Mama’s predilection for pink?”

Alexia, blinking in flabbergasted shock, lowered herself carefully onto a chair. “But, Felicity, you are wearing last season’s dress!” She lowered her voice, in genuine fear that her sister might be deranged. “And
knitwear.
”

“Oh.” Felicity wrapped the ghastly shawl tighter about her neck. “It was necessary.”

Lady Maccon was only further shocked by such an unexpected statement. “Necessary? Necessary!”

“Well, yes, Alexia, do pay attention. Have you always been this frazzled, or is it your unfortunate condition?” Felicity lowered her voice conspiratorially. “Necessary because I have been
fraternizing.
”

“You have? With whom?” Alexia became suspicious. It was very late at night for an unmarried young lady of quality to be cavorting about unchaperoned, especially one who kept daylight hours and whose parents shunned association with the supernatural set.

“I am wearing
tweed.
With whom else? Some poor unfortunates of the middle class.”

Lady Maccon would have none of it. “Oh, really, Felicity, you can hardly expect me to believe that you have had anything whatsoever to do with the lower orders.”

“You may choose to believe it or not, sister.”

Alexia wished for a return of her ability to stride about and loom threateningly. Sadly, striding was several months behind her, and should she attempt to loom, she would undoubtedly overbalance and pitch forward in graceless splendor. She settled for glaring daggers at her sibling. “Very well, then, what are you doing here? And how did you know to find me at Lord Akeldama’s residence?”

“Mrs. Tunstell told me where to find you.” Felicity looked with a critical eye at the golden magnificence surrounding her.

“Ivy? How did Ivy know?”

“Madame Lefoux told her.”

“Oh, she did, did she? And how—”

“Apparently someone named Professor Lyall told Madame Lefoux your relocation was taking place this evening and that you would hole up at Lord Akeldama’s, in case there were any orders pending delivery. Have you commissioned a new hat, sister? From that crass foreign female? Are you certain you should be patronizing her establishment after what happened in Scotland? And who is this Professor Lyall person? You haven’t taken up with
academics,
have you? That cannot possibly be healthy. Education is terribly bad for the nerves, especially for a woman in your state.”

Lady Maccon grappled for some appropriate response.

Felicity added, in a blatant attempt at distraction, “Speaking of which, you
have
gotten tremendously portly, haven’t you? Is increasing supposed to cause you to swell quite so much as all that?”

Lady Maccon frowned. “I believe I have increased, as it were, to the maximum. You know me—I always insist on seeing a thing done as thoroughly as possible.”

“Well, Mama says to make certain you don’t get angry with anyone. The child will end up looking like him.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yes, emotional mimicking they call it, and—”

“Well, that’s no trouble. It will simply end up looking like my husband.”

“But what if it is a female? Wouldn’t that be horrible? She’d be all fuzzy and—”

Felicity would have continued but Lady Maccon lost her patience, a thing she was all too prone to misplacing. “Felicity, why are you visiting me?”

Miss Loontwill hedged. “This is quite the remarkable abode. I never did think I should ever see inside of a vampire hive. And so charming and gleaming and full of exquisite collections. Almost up to my standards.”

“This is not a hive—there is no queen. Not in the technical definition of the word. I will not be so easily detoured, Felicity. Why have you shown up at such a time of night? And why would you undertake such pains to discover my whereabouts?”

Her sister shifted on the brocade settee, her blond head
tilted to one side and a small frown creased her perfect forehead. She had not, Alexia noticed, modified her elaborately styled ringlets to match her lowbrow outfit. A row of perfect flat curls were gummed to her forehead in the very latest style.

“You have not paid the family much mind since your return to London.”

Lady Maccon considered this accusation. “You must admit, I was made to feel rather unwelcome prior to my departure.”
And that is putting it mildly.
Her family had always been a mite petty for her taste, even before they unilaterally decided to expel her from their midst at the most inconvenient time. Since her ill-fated trip to Scotland and subsequent dash across half the known world, she had simply elected to avoid the Loontwills as much as possible. As Lady Maccon, denizen of the night, who fraternized with werewolves; inventors; and, horror of horrors, actors, this was a relatively easy undertaking.

“Yes, but it’s been positively months, sister! I did not think you the type to hold a grudge. Did you know Evylin has renewed her engagement to Captain Featherstonehaugh?”

Lady Maccon only stared at her sister, tapping one slipper lightly on the carpeted floor.

Miss Loontwill blushed, looking toward her and then away again. “I have become”—she paused as though searching for the correct way of phrasing it—“involved.”