“We should go.” Portia grabbed her sister by the wrist and dragged her toward the stairs.
“What’s that?” Mrs. Cartwright cocked her head. “I believe I hear someone calling my name.”
The proprietress vanished from behind the counter as Portia and Dorcas’s footfalls disappeared up the stairs.
“Oh, dear,” said Allegra. “I’m all alone with a dastardly pirate. Whatever must he intend to do with me?”
John set his books aside and wasted no time pulling her into his arms for a kiss. He could not embrace her for as long as he’d like or as passionately as he’d prefer—someone could walk in the door or down the stairs at any moment—but he could not allow her mouth to go unplundered for a single second more.
She pressed against him just as tightly, destroying the carefully ironed lines of his exquisitely folded cravat. John wished he hadn’t bothered with clothes at all. There were entirely too many layers between them, conspiring to keep them at a chaste distance when all he wanted to do was scoop her into his arms and dash right back up those stairs to his bedchamber.
It was not a courtship, he reminded himself. It was chemistry, like baking a brioche. When leavening agents combined with dough, they had no choice but to react and to rise, much like John’s shaft was doing right now. What fault had the ingredients if they fit so well together, and combined perfectly into one?
The proprietress’s muffled voice came from the opposite side of the inner door: “Here I am, about to reenter the reception area to see if any guests have need of me…”
John pulled away from Allegra with reluctance. Her lips were rosy, her brown eyes drowsy with passion. Vindication coursed through him. They had that much, at least. Their courtship might be a charade, but their attraction was very real.
“Are you needed upstairs?” he murmured. “Or would you care to accompany me to the lending library to exchange a few books?”
“I’d accompany you to the seven seas,” she answered. “As long as you have me back by noon.”
“Done.” He retrieved his books and offered her his free arm.
“What are you reading? More books on cooking?”
“That, and stories of other entrepreneurs who built something from nothing. I’m studying their steps in order to find the recipe to their success, so that I can replicate it when I open my tea room.”
“You think there is one single recipe for success?” she asked doubtfully.
“I think there are as many recipes as there are cooks,” he replied. “But not all recipes are equal. Some will give you a perfectly puffed and symmetrical croque-en-bouche. Others will give you a lump of coal and a kitchen that smells like burnt hair.”
“You want the croque-en-bouche.”
“Absolutely. A golden tower of savory-sweet perfection. It requires talent, skill, experience, and the right recipe. No amount of good intentions can overcome the perils of following the wrong instructions.”
Being a solicitor was the same way. The law was like the immutable rules of physics. Water boils at this temperature, and freezes at that. As long as you knew the rules of the game, you could look at the ingredients in your pantry and predict the outcome with accuracy. John won his meticulously presented cases because water has no choice but to boil when the fire is hot enough. He would prepare his tea room the same way, leaving absolutely no element to chance.
“I can testify to the perils of incomplete instructions.” Allegra’s tone was wry. “Such as when I held the reins to my uncle’s phaeton for the first time and nearly trampled you to the pavement.”
John’s forehead creased as they stepped into the lending library. His instinctual reaction was to agree wholeheartedly. She should never have touched the reins without adequate instruction and preparation. But if that would have happened…they would never have met. She would simply have driven on by, with neither of them ever the wiser.
Allegra arched her brows as he exchanged his tall stack of books for an even taller pile. “How many of those will you have to read?”
“As many as it takes. There’s always a secret formula. A way for there to be a place for everything and everything in its place. A way to know you’ll be right before you risk being wrong.”
“Being wrong is fun,” she said, shocking the air right out of his lungs. “Like the piano game. Hardly anyone picks starting notes that sound good. The joy comes in turning a happy accident into something beautiful.”
“But you don’t know that’s going to happen!”
“Of course I know it. I’m the one making the song. It starts with those notes, but after that, the melody can be anything I want. I make it up as I go along.”
“Perhaps that works in music, but you cannot make up lemon meringue as you go along. There are steps that must be followed precisely if you’re to have any hope of an edible, recognizable dessert at the end.”
“Is there no room for creativity?”
“Some ventures may succeed by luck alone,” he allowed, “but that is the least efficient path to follow.”
“Have you always been efficient?”
“I’ve always strived to be.” He carried the newest stack of books away from the library attendant and into an empty reading room. “As an orphan, I was always searching for my place. My guardian only took interest in me when I received accolades. The only way to be noticed was to be the best.”
“The best at what?”
“Everything,” he answered simply. “Head boy at school. Top marks in every class.”
“That sounds like a lot of pressure on a small child.”
“I had guides to follow. The official codes of conduct, my transcripts of each lecture. Every question on every exam has a right answer. All I had to do was know what it was. I can probably still recite entire lessons by heart.”
“Don’t do it in front of Portia and Dorcas,” Allegra cautioned. “It’ll tarnish Captain L’Amour’s rebellious image.”
“And bore them to tears,” John added. “I didn’t say this practice was particularly interesting. I use it because it works.”
“You mean in the kitchen?”
“I mean everywhere. Continued employment as a solicitor requires top marks every day as well. Clients don’t hire a lawyer who loses. When success is the only choice, there is no margin for error and no room for mistakes.”
“Or creativity.” She wrinkled her nose. “I love mistakes. They’re an important part of my process. I won’t know what doesn’t work until I try it. And you never know when you’ll stumble across a new thing that does work, despite the odds against it. Accidents can lead to good things. New ideas, creative solutions…”
“As well as unemployment, loss of respect, broken betrothal contracts…”
“Is that a hypothetical broken betrothal?”
He shook his head. “I deviated from the prescribed path and was rewarded with the loss of my intended’s interest.”
“If she couldn’t weather an unexpected curve in the road at your side, then she wasn’t worth your time to begin with.”
“I cannot handle unexpected curves in the road. Vivian was just as practical. By altering the planned recipe, the pastry in the oven was no longer one she could enjoy. What do you think would happen if customers came into my tea room to order raisin biscuits and I served them chocolate soufflé instead?”