Free Transmuted by Karina Cooper Page B

turned out for us.
    Toast and jam, roasted potatoes with black bits still in—my favorite with crackling, I would most readily admit—and the ever-present sausage. The spring sausages imported were especially juicy and plump, and I helped myself to them with great relish.
    I had always eaten a plate full, at least before the worst of my addictions had settled in. There was a time then when I ate nothing at all but the tar that fueled me.
    I’d lost a great deal of flesh, thanks to my proclivities, and was only just beginning to earn it back. The conditioning with which I maintained my form and flexibility had shaped my figure to something much less round at bosom and hip, though I was happy to see that my ribs no longer protruded.
    These were small matters, in the scheme of such things, but I preferred my build to be sturdier, rather than small. I already had to work that much harder to toss a man on his ear.
    Therefore, I polished off first one plate, then half of another, all the while sharing idle talk with Fanny. She chuckled at various matters—my retelling of the more humorous bits of gossip I’d read, and Levi’s gamine smile around a mouth full of bread.
    When her eyes sparkled and shone, my chest squeezed tight with love.
    Making Fanny smile had become one of my great pleasures.
    “Where is Mr. Ashmore, then?” she asked, wiping her fingers upon a cloth. It was customary to remove one’s gloves for eating. The fine tremors that affected her hands did not go unnoticed.
    Was she thinner? Did she eat of her repast less than customary?
    “Abed,” I said, forcing myself to take a moment’s calm. I was overly concerned. Fanny smiled with ease, and I saw nothing in her features to indicate illness. “I gather he maintained another late evening.”
    Fanny clucked her tongue gently. “And is Zylphia still feeling the mornings?”
    “Rather,” I replied ruefully.
    “That will pass.” Sympathy colored my companion’s reassurance. “Poor dear.”
    Indeed. Zylphia carried her unborn child with the same aplomb she had much of anything else in this life, fairly unruffled save for matters of greatest import. I had seen her afraid only a few times in our friendship, and for all that, she maintained an air of capability and maturity that I often envied.
    To see her feeling so poorly was a new circumstance.
    Fanny cradled her tea in one hand, sipping delicately. Her dignity had always been such that I doubted the frailty of age would dent it. “And did I hear Hawke this morning?”
    Oh, bollocks. My cheeks flamed, for all she asked with such innocuous curiosity.
    Little my companion did was so innocent.
    I pushed my plate away so that I might pull my teacup and saucer closer. It was unnecessary, but gave me something to look at. “Oh, yes, I think so,” I said, striving for airy and managing little more than guilt.
    Fanny saw right through me. When it came to such matters, she often did. “I see.” Her lips pursed. “More of your nighttime antics?”
    Were it not for the sole fact that I had already swallowed my tea, I might have choked on it. “What?”
    “Your adventures, Cherry,” she clarified patiently.
    “Oh.” Heat seared my cheeks. Burned all the way to my hairline. “Of course. No,” I added hastily. “Not mine. Hawke has been accompanying Ashmore on his errands.”
    “Oh?” Her wispy white eyebrows rose. “You appear to be rather settled, my dove.”
    Why was it that such simple words forced more blush to my already telling skin? The heat saturating my whole being echoed a throb of tightness under my brow. “Whatever do you mean?”
    Her smile, when it came, was fond. And accusatory, all at the same time. “You are hardly a miss content to remain at home, Cherry.” An obvious enough truth that it required no support from me. “I am always expecting to see you gone come morning, out on another grand lark.”
    If it came across the table as more sad than approving, it certainly found easy