Trifling Favors (Redcakes Book 7) Read Online Free Page B

God,” Greggory muttered. “I’d hate to think the sister of whoever you’d marry would want me. We’re chalk and cheese.”
    Dudley nuzzled his niece’s plump shoulder. “Two peas in a pod, you mean.”
    “Au contraire. I couldn’t wait to settle down into comfortable domesticity. You still don’t seem to have found what is going to make you happy.”
    “You aren’t happy,” Dudley said.
    “But I am,” Greggory protested. “Or at least I was, when Letty was alive.”
    “I know you loved her, but courtship seemed to suit you better than the actual marriage.”
    “She had a rough time, carrying twins. It all happened so fast,” Greggory said. He blinked rapidly.
    “I know.” The corners of Dudley’s lips turned down. “It was a sad thing, and you ended up with these two lovely scamps to raise all alone. Not fair. Letty was the best of girls.”
    “She was. Do you think Sia looks like her?”
    “She has a face like a pudding. She’s a baby, Greggory.”
    Greggory wiped at Artie’s nose with his handkerchief. “The shape of her eyes? The height of her forehead? You can’t deny she has the same hair.”
    “I’m sure she’ll be beautiful, even if she takes after you,” Dudley said. “Not much to hope for with Artie, though.”
    “He’s beautiful, too, in a baby way.”
    Mrs. Roach came into the room. “That good for nothing is out of our lives. Her nerves, indeed.”
    “I can feel your outrage from over here,” Dudley said. “Did the girl drink?”
    “I wonder,” Mrs. Roach replied. “I did think the sherry decanter in the parlor was down an inch or two on occasion.”
    “Did you try it? Is it watered?” Greggory asked, having learned this trick during youthful exploits of his own.
    “Oh, I couldn’t sample it,” she said, horrified.
    “You might as well. It’s a ladies’ drink,” Dudley said. “Go ahead. A tot might do wonders for your nerves.”
    Mrs. Roach stared at him, aghast.
    “Ignore my brother, please,” Greggory said. “But we’ll need the nursemaid’s room refreshed. Dudley is going to stay there tonight.”
    “I can stay in the nursery, sir,” Mrs. Roach said.
    “Let my brother do it. He can use a dose of fatherhood. Thinking about finding a wife, you see.”
    Mrs. Roach nodded thoughtfully. “One night up here will make him extend his bachelorhood at least another year.”
    Greggory’s jaw dropped as she strode, businesslike, out of the room. Had his esteemed housekeeper just made a joke?
     
    Betsy picked up the bundle containing her ruined dress at lunchtime on Wednesday. She’d eaten a hearty bowl of Redcake’s potato bacon soup at her desk outside of the accounting room so she had time to take it to her seamstress to have it repaired. She was afraid she would have to spend the money on material for an entirely new dress panel and flounce, but it couldn’t be helped. Her wardrobe needed to be tightly managed due to the expense of clothing, but she still needed the dress. At first, when she’d started at the Kensington Redcake’s, she’d worn her old cakie uniforms, but Mr. Redcake said it diminished her authority as assistant manager and asked her to wear street clothing instead.
    She wished she could afford to dress like Lady Fitzwalter did, back when she was plain Matilda Redcake and managed the Redcake’s factories in Bristol. Matilda had looked stunning in her severe clothing, so ladylike yet professional. No wonder she’d attracted Lord Fitzwalter, when he was merely Ewan Hales. Betsy did her best to emulate Matilda’s fashion sense, but at a seven-shilling-per-gown cost. If only she’d learned to sew, but one learned that from a mother, and she hadn’t had one.
    She walked a few blocks north toward Paddington to a modest residential street where the dressmaker she used lived and worked. Mrs. Fair, whose husband sold carriage parts and daughter worked as a Redcake’s cakie, shared two rooms with her family. The front room was devoted to