Heart of Steel - Meljean Brook [43]
His eyes searched her face. “How do you know so much about them?”
“Don’t be dense, Mr. Fox. And don’t tell your sister, either. I’m waiting until her curiosity about my background is on the verge of killing her—and then I’ll negotiate a better royalty in exchange for each new crumb.” She appreciated the deep laugh that served as his response, the squint of his eyes as it shook through him. “Was seeing this woman your reason for sending Zenobia to London?”
His laugh faded. “Yes.”
“To the Iron Duke, no less. I thought you didn’t trust him?”
“I wouldn’t trust him to protect me. But who’s more capable of protecting her?”
Yasmeen could only think of a few names, but none who had incurred the same sort of debt to Archimedes that Rhys Trahaearn had. The Iron Duke had thrown him from his pirate ship, but Wolfram Gunther-Baptiste had boarded that ship in good faith and fulfilled the job asked of him. Trahaearn considered anyone who served his ship under his protection—which meant providing help when needed. When Archimedes asked for something of this nature, there was no question that the Iron Duke would do it.
But Archimedes probably didn’t understand that—most likely, he’d just rolled the dice.
“And if the Iron Duke is reluctant, who more likely to talk him into it than Scarsdale?”
He grinned. “Did he need to?”
“No. But you’re right. How could Scarsdale resist the author of the Archimedes Fox adventures? He and your sister have been inseparable since she arrived.” And because she couldn’t resist, either, “Perhaps Zenobia will soon be a countess.”
Archimedes’ grin fixed to his face, and he gave his head a hard shake, as if to clear it. “Eh?”
She flicked her cigarillo over the side of the ship. “She’s a practical woman. It’d be a good fit—and perfect timing. He’s searching for a wife. Duty calls, and he needs the heir and spare.”
He stared at her, as if trying to read the truth from her face. Yasmeen smiled, showing her teeth. An expression of relief slipped over his features, then worry, then relief again. Finally, he said, “I can’t decide if you’re serious. I think I ought to write her.”
“Perhaps you should,” Yasmeen agreed.
The wind picked up, chopping the harbor’s surface into rough waves, but making for a quick sail to the south docks. Mad Machen ordered the anchor dropped near the site where her lady had crashed into the water and returned to the main deck, where Big Thom ran a test of the dive suit’s air pump, checking the flow through the long, coiled tube. The hand-cranked device forced air to circulate through the waterproofed leather hose and into the diver’s brass helmet—which meant the diver relied on someone else simply to breathe.
Madness. Even the tiny enclosed space in Ivy’s submersible would be preferable, and Yasmeen wouldn’t take money to dive underwater in that.
No doubt Archimedes would do it for free. Yasmeen looked starboard, where a hoist suspended the submersible over Vesuvius’s side, copper skin gleaming in the dull sunlight. From inside the capsule, Archimedes’ exclamations of awe and questions to Ivy had echoed hollowly through the open hatch for the past twenty minutes, but his voice had smoothed out now, hints of flattery and teasing slipping through.
Trying to charm her into taking him down, no doubt. Good luck to him.
She made her way across the deck toward Mad Machen, who was holding the full-length canvas suit at arm’s length, a frown darkening his scarred face.
“How does a man get into this blasted thing?”
“There’s a double-flap fastening in the back,” Yasmeen said, but his question sparked a note of alarm in her head. “You’ve done this before, haven’t you?”
“I’ve dived before. This looks to be a hell of a lot easier. You don’t even have to hold your breath.”
Yasmeen looked to Big Thom, who rose from his crouch next to the air pump, shaking his head. The man lived up to his name, with broad shoulders made wider by the pneumatic braces across his back and chest. Combined with his steel prosthetic arms, the apparatus gave