A man like Daniel should stay in the best hotel in the heart of the fashionable area. Surely his glittering ladies would insist upon it. Even Violet’s boardinghouse was in a far more respectable neighborhood than this.
Daniel climbed up to give the coachman his promised fee, then he took Violet’s elbow and steered her down the street toward the corner.
“Where the devil are we?” she asked.
“The dregs,” Daniel said cheerfully. “I’ve set up a hideaway here, where I can be undisturbed. You wouldn’t believe the distractions one has in the fancy hotels. Needy friends, little sisters . . .”
This was an older part of town, with narrow streets, plaster crumbling from bricks, and arched passages connecting lanes with even smaller lanes. Daniel took her through one of these arched passages, the wind cutting in the small tunnel.
They emerged into a courtyard. Shuttered windows broke the walls around them. A rickety wooden staircase ran up to a narrow gallery with doors and windows in it, all sheltered by a tiled roof.
Daniel pulled her up the stairs to the gallery and led her to a door at the end. He produced a thick key from his pocket, unlocked the door, and let Violet inside.
To cold and clutter. Daniel touched a match to an oil lamp, then another, lighting the small room with a warm glow.
As the light increased, Violet saw that the furniture in the room was fine, whole, and new. The clutter came from boxes, machine parts, papers, and books. Every available surface was covered with sketches of machines, list of equations, and open notebooks filled with scrawled writing. Books lay everywhere, some stacks put together to be resting places for the bits of machinery.
A narrow bed stood in the corner. It had a solid wooden bedstead, but the mattress was covered with more books, sketches, and maps.
A wide, cushioned window seat was the only place in the room not covered with things. The window’s shutters had been closed against the night, making the window seat a cozy nook.
Violet picked up a sketch from the table. “What is all this for?”
“A motorcar,” Daniel said.
Violet studied the drawing. A low-slung vehicle, looking a bit like a phaeton, had been rendered in great detail. Four wheels hugged the ground, coach lights hung alongside the doors, and the seats looked as luxurious as that of the coach they’d just ridden in. Variations on this vehicle occupied other drawings.
“That’s only the chassis,” Daniel said. “What I’m trying to do is build a more efficient engine, not just a more powerful one. Daimler’s are very good, of course, but he’s more interested in industrial machinery—motorcars are more of a sideline for him. His engines will propel his horseless carriages at about fifteen or twenty miles per hour on a flat surface—provided there’s no mud. I want to make my engine ten times as powerful, and design the carriage to be able to run even on bad roads. I want more gears to give power on hills or hard terrain, and wheels better than carriage wheels with a strip of rubber on them. I’m trying pneumatic tires—with air between the wheel and the rubber.” He moved another sheet. “I’m working on a motorbike as well, something more innovative than just putting a motor on a bicycle. Kind of like a cross between a bicycle and a car.”
Violet studied the drawings with interest. “I thought you were a balloonist.”
He shrugged. “My career as an aeronaut is a passing hobby. My real concern is designing engines to make vehicles go where I want at my command. Needs much work, as you saw, firsthand. Here’s the motorbike.”
Daniel came next to her to push papers out of the way. The drawing he pulled out showed different angles of what looked like a bicycle with large tires and a large box for the engine where the pedals should be.
“Haven’t got the design quite right, yet. The engine box can’t be too big, or the rider won’t be able to keep the thing upright. But not too small, or there won’t be enough power to make it faster than a regular bicycle. But bicycles can run across fields and through mud where even horses have difficulty.”
Daniel’s animation as he spoke about his designs made him different from the Daniel she’d observed with his friends on the street or at tonight’s ball. Both places he’d been full of lazy smiles and cultured charm, speaking with the same ease to courtesans as he did the comtesse.
Now his gaze held intensity, his focus all for the inventions he loved. His body hummed with his excitement, the heat of him next to her cutting through the cold in the room.
Violet liked him best like this, his hair rumpled, his eyes warm as he focused on his passions. Daniel was letting Violet into his world. The energy he exuded as he talked her through the drawings rendered every gentleman she’d met at the ball tonight languid and dull.
Then he stopped. “Damn, listen to me.” Daniel dropped the drawings to the table. “I bring a beautiful woman back to my rooms, and I talk about engines.”
“I like engines.” Violet did. Everything about the balloon and these motorcars and motor-bicycle fascinated her.
“I know you do. That’s why I adore you, lass. Hang on a minute.”
Daniel made a path to the fireplace in the corner, shoveled a bit of coal into it, and lit it with a few matches. After a moment, fire began to flicker around the coals, on their way to bringing warmth to the room.
“Better.” Daniel wiped his hands on a rag that was already stained with coal dust and tossed it down. “I’ll show you what I’ve done on the bike and the motorcar when we get back to London. For now . . .”
He peeled the greatcoat from her shoulders and ran his hands up Violet’s arms. In spite of him forsaking his gloves when they’d entered, his hands were already warm, dragging heat into her skin.
Violet still shook, her heart alternately squeezing in cold pulses or pounding hot.
She wanted this. She wasn’t a shrinking virgin, was she? Daniel was amazing, handsome, funny, kind. He’d brought her here to be his lover for the night, in this place of his heart, tucked away where no one would find them.
Why not take what he offered, even if only once?
But she sensed the terror lurking inside her, coiled like a waiting snake.
Daniel wasn’t the monster. Violet’s past was.
Daniel continued to caress her, his hands coming up to clasp her shoulders. His first kiss would be gentle, she already knew that. And then he’d touch her and slowly open her.
The slowness might kill her. Too much time for the fear to take over, to dictate what happened.