She couldn’t possibly bear that.
“No,” she heard herself say. “No, no, no. I can’t. I can’t possibly work for you.”
He looked at her. She wondered how she must appear now. How foolish and silly and flighty, to jump from attraction to this state on the verge of tears.
But he didn’t argue.
“The Lenity is leaving tomorrow,” he said instead. “We have a launch spot at three forty in the afternoon.”
Why was he telling her this? “I can’t be on board.”
“I heard you say no.”
She wrinkled her nose.
“You said it four times. I could not possibly miss it.”
“Good.” She exhaled. “Then it’s all settled between us. Perfect. Thank you. Goodbye then.” But she didn’t move. She kept looking at him, wanting, wanting.
She was going to imagine this for a long time—what it would have been like to go with him. How she might have learned what the little wrinkle in his brow meant. The way he watched her.
“You’re not trying to convince me,” she said in confusion.
“Yes, I am. I am convincing you with all my heart.” He looked at her. “Think on it, and you’ll see why.”
Amelia shook her head. “You’re not doing a very good job of it.”
She could hear the lie in her voice. Still, she turned around and fled.
Chapter Seven
Grayson did not watch her leave. He tried not to concentrate on the swish of her skirts or the sound of her shoes traversing the deck. To do so would be a mistake; of that much he was certain.
In some other world—a place he dimly remembered from years ago—he would have flirted just a little more. He might have followed his interest in her to see where it led. But the building of a telegraphic network would not wait through idle flirtation. If he did not end up connecting the world, piece by piece, someone else would.
Grayson had only so much room in his life, and he knew what he needed Mrs. Amelia Smith for. It wasn’t flirting.
If he could scarcely spare the time to see his own parents, he could hardly justify trying to woo her.
As if that were the reason, some sullen corner of his mind whispered.
He ignored it. He was good at ignoring it all.
“So,” Benedict announced loudly from behind him. “What did it cost you to hire the renowned Silver Fox? Half a shilling and a song?”
Grayson exhaled and turned. It took a moment to orient himself. He was a captain; he was responsible for everyone in his employ. That included this delightful loudmouthed terror. He’d promised his sister-in-law years before to try to teach Benedict how to go about things, and here they were.
“On the contrary,” Grayson said. “She has absolutely and unconditionally refused to be employed by me.”
Benedict stared at him for a moment, then shook his head in disbelief. “Not you. Not the extraordinary Captain Grayson Hunter. You wouldn’t fail.”
He could. He had. Just not this time.
The boy’s bafflement grew as Grayson said nothing. “I have seen you talk an entire company of Dutch telegraph officials into thinking that you’re giving them the opportunity of a lifetime by walking away from a deal. What is happening?”
“That’s easy. The telegraph company you mentioned? They didn’t respect me and I didn’t respect them. Neither of us imagined we would be working together after that one event. I had no desire to correct their misapprehensions about the Japanese market, and they had no desire to inform me of what they believed to be true. It’s harder when I have to engage in business with a moral qualm or two in my pocket.”
“Huh.” Benedict frowned. “I was so looking forward to hearing about your methodology. What you were going to use as leverage. That sort of thing.”
“You can’t approach hiring a person like that.” Grayson shook his head. “You’re working with them on a permanent basis. It makes sense to exercise a moral qualm or two.”
“Hmm.” Benedict nodded. “I see.”
“More importantly, I’m hiring her to make a Chinese telegraphic code in six months.”
“Yes?”
“And it’s going to be hard,” Grayson explained. “She will have to want to do it, want it enough that she won’t quit midway. She’ll have to want it enough that she’ll work through all the frustration so she can persevere to the end. When you need someone to have a will of her own, you can’t just bend her to yours.”
That was the difficulty.
They had quite a bit in common. They’d both lost family in a civil war—he back in the States, she in China. She’d reacted to what he’d said about family and telegrams as if he were a tuning fork that had been stricken by the same painful frequency that resonated in him.
He was older and harder; that was the main difference.
“So that’s what you’re doing?” Benedict asked.
“If she can’t make up her mind that she wants this, she won’t be able to do it. I have no set plan that she can follow. She’ll be heading out in the dark.”
Silence fell. Benedict tapped his lips, thinking. The boy was bright—very bright—and good at discerning how others felt. It was a useful skill, up until it wasn’t. He was nice. Far too nice.
“Are you really just going to hire her and leave her in Shanghai? The rest of the trading office is there, but if I recall correctly, the people who were working on the code have all decamped after the last debacle. I can’t imagine leaving her all alone to make code would be a good idea.”
“That wasn’t what I was planning.”
“Of course you have a plan.” Benedict shot him an easy grin.
“Of course I do.” Grayson looked at Benedict and waited for him to understand.
Several years ago, they’d encountered each other when Grayson’s younger brother had married one of Benedict’s sisters. Benedict had latched on to Grayson with the stubborn determination of a youth who’d wanted to do anything other than the thing he was told to do. He’d told his sister, Lady Trent, that he wanted to be in business, just like Captain Hunter. After she’d overcome her horror—after Benedict had wheedled and whined and insisted—Lady Trent had given in and approached Grayson for his help, offering a truly ridiculous sum of money in exchange for keeping her younger brother from running off on his own. She had been very worried about that possibility, as yet another one of Benedict’s siblings had done just that.
Honestly. He did not at all understand the family his little brother had married into.
Grayson liked being given truly ridiculous sums of money. He also liked children in general, and Benedict in particular, so he’d said yes.
Benedict was good at listening. He soaked up every lesson like a sponge. He looked at Grayson like he was an utter hero.
He was also too nice. Too eager to please—not just Grayson, but everyone. One day, he was either going to have to figure it out on his own, or… Well.
“What is it?” Benedict asked impatiently.
“I’m not leaving her alone.” Grayson looked Benedict in the eyes. “You will be her liaison in Shanghai at least through the winter.”