Page 20 of A Perfect Gentleman

“Please.” She rolled her eyes. “Are you about to go on again about creating a scandal?”

They had reached her hansom, and as the driver watched in interest, Graeme handed Abby up into the vehicle with a good deal more energy than was necessary, in her opinion. He climbed in behind her and swiveled to face her. She glared at him.

“You almost had me fooled,” Graeme told her bitterly. “Between you and your champion Prescott, you had me believing you were an innocent whom I had misjudged and mistreated years ago. Until that note was shoved under your door.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“I don’t know. That’s what I’m trying to find out. It was obvious you were hiding it from me.”

“Am I obliged to show you my correspondence? I must say, your view of a husband is more like a warden.”

“Of course not! I don’t give a farthing who writes you or what they say. It was your secrecy! If it were perfectly innocent, why did you immediately stick it away in a drawer? Why did you rush into the hall and look around? Why did you say you didn’t know what it was when it was clear from the look on your face that you recognized it? You snatched it out of my hand—why would you be so alarmed that I might see it?”

“You read a good deal into my putting away a letter.”

“I told myself I was refining too much on a simple matter. So when I left, I sat down in the lobby to consider what had happened. The next thing I knew, you came flying down the stairs and over to the desk, where you showed the note to the clerk and talked to him at great length. Then you hustled out to speak to the doorman. After you left, I paid him a visit. He told me you were asking about someone bringing that envelope into the hotel. He also said that you showed him an address in a decidedly unlikely area for you to visit and ordered a cab for this evening.”

“Congratulations. You found out a great deal. Perhaps you should join the police force.” She set her jaw mulishly.

“You are involved in something, just as I suspected from the beginning. I have asked you time and again, but you have never given me your reason for returning to London. What are you planning?”

“I don’t have any nefarious plans.”

“Whom did you go there to meet?”

“I don’t know.”

He made an exasperated noise and turned from her, visibly pulling the remnants of his control around him. After a long moment, he said tersely, “What do you want?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“What will it take to make you leave? What are you after? Do you want me to increase your living expenses? I’ve always given you a generous amount, I thought, but—”

Abigail let out a humorless laugh. “Are you offering to pay me money? From the money my father gives you?”

“I don’t receive money from him. I have managed your dowry well and brought the estate back into order. It now makes a profit. The remainder of the funds I have invested in—”

“Please, I don’t need an accounting.” Abby sighed. Why had she ever thought this would work? “You are welcome to increase my allowance. I am sure the settlement home would appreciate it.”

“The what? What are you talking about?”

“It’s a place where they help the women and children from the tenements. They offer food and aid and even housing. I give them the money you send me. Returning the payments to you got tiresome after a few months, so I started passing them on to a charity instead.”

He stared at her blankly. “But how do you live? Did you go back to your father’s house? Do you think to shame me by living on his charity, as if I don’t support you?”

“Of course not. I don’t have to live with one or the other of you. It isn’t scandalous to set up my own household; I’m a married woman. I have my own house; I have my own money. I am not beholden to any man.”

“But that’s impossible. I don’t understand. The moment we married, your money became mine under law.”

She cocked an eyebrow. “Under British law. I don’t live in Britain. In New York a married woman can have property; we are, you see, somewhat more forward-thinking. Your arrangement with my father involved a chunk of his money. I receive income from a family trust on my mother’s side—Thurston is nouveau riche, but my mother’s ancestors have been stockpiling cash since the Mayflower. My father settled an endowed trust on me, as well, when I married. He didn’t trust you to support me in the proper style. That is no slight on you; my father doesn’t trust anyone. In any case, I have made investments on my own. Mr. Prescott has been kind enough to advise me on financial matters.”

Graeme snorted. “I’m sure he has.”

She glanced out the window and saw that they had arrived at the Langham. “So you see, I don’t need your money. I don’t want your title or your position or even your public embarrassment, for that matter.” Abigail reached out to turn the door handle.

He caught her wrist. “What the devil do you want, then?”

She looked at him. “A baby.”