If there were anything as reliable as clockwork, it was Evie's twice-monthly Tuesdays with Dru. Two weeks to the day after Bernard's untimely death, there Drucilla was, standing on the corner of Picadilly and Bond right outside their regular tea shop.

But it was not an ordinary Tuesday. Evie stepped out of her autowheeler in full mourning attire, dressed head to toe in black, a crepe bonnet and heavy veil covering all of her hair and most of her face. Normally it was her vehicle that was the spectacle; today it was she. By now, there wasn't a man, woman or child in London who hadn't heard about her husband's murder. Every lurid detail was printed in the papers. The journalists must have had a grand old time alliterating "murder" with "manhood." They weren't above speculating on the culprit either. No one had gone so far as to name her the murderer, but it wasn't hard to read between the lines. In the court of the public, she'd already been tried, convicted and hanged. Everyone wanted to look one last time at the dead woman walking.

Thank God for Dru. She wasn't too proud to greet her scandalous sister. Instead, she took one look at Evie and wrapped her into a hug.

"Ignore them," her sister murmured into her ear. "Let's have our tea."'

Evie nodded and pulled herself together, following Drew into the little shop. Inside the tea room, you could hear a pin drop. Dru gave Evie's hand a squeeze and glared at the other patrons, who were openly gawking at them. Evie felt a surge of affection for her younger sister.

The hostess recovered first. Pasting on a wobbly smile, she asked, "Will you have your usual, Mrs. Remmington? Mrs. Blakely?"

"We will, thank you," Dru said primly. She tucked Evie's hand into her elbow and all but dragged her to a secluded table in the back. Stares and whispers followed them, undeterred by Dru's fierce glare. Evie's shoulders hunched as she willed herself elsewhere.

The sisters said nothing to each other until after the hostess brought them their first pot of chamomile. It was too hot to drink just yet, but Evie poured herself a cup anyway. She needed to do something with her hands, and pouring tea was better than nothing. But her hands also gave her away.

"You're shaking," Dru said quietly.

Evie set the teapot down and folded her hands in her lap, forcing them to lay still. She had unusually strong hands for a woman of her station, the result of hundreds of hours spent tinkering in her laboratory. She'd listened to Detective Doyle and stayed away from the lab since his visit. Already, her hands had started to soften and lose their calluses. She felt like an opium addict in the early stages of withdrawal. Creating things with her hands was more than a passion for her; it was her reason for being.

"I'm sorry I couldn't come see you sooner," said Dru. She glanced down at her still-empty tea cup. "Tobias needed me in the shop."

Evie's upper lip curled involuntarily. She'd never liked Dru's husband, though she'd never say as much to Dru. So all she said was, "I'm glad you're here."

"Of course," said Dru with a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. She grabbed the teapot and filled her cup to the brim. "Have you made the funeral arrangements?"

Evie shook her head. "Not yet. I suspect it will be delayed for some time. His body is still with the coroner."

Dru dumped a heaping spoonful of sugar into her tea. Yet another difference between Evie and her sister: Dru had a tooth as sweet as she was, and Evie didn't care for sweets. Stirring the sugar with a small spoon, Dru asked, too casually, "The police are sure it was a homicide?"

Evie flinched as if struck. Her own sister wasn't sure of her innocence. "I'm sure you've read the papers The evidence is significant."

Dru continued stirring, not meeting her eyes. "It couldn't have been an accident? Everyone knows his work was dangerous."

"No." Evie lowered her voice to just above a whisper. "Dru, you know Bernard never came near one of my machines without my say-so. He wasn't stupid."

Dru blinked. "Right. Sometimes I forget that you're the one behind Remmington Inventions. You don't ever talk about it."

That was because they never talked about anything that mattered to either one of them. Besides, Evie couldn't risk being overheard. Bernard had built an empire on her success—and if their secret was discovered, it would all come crashing down. The past five years of her life would mean nothing. "You've never told anyone, have you?" she asked.

"Of course not," Dru said with a huff.

"Not even Tobias?"

"He's the last person I'd tell."

Evie raised an eyebrow at that. Dru had never before said a bad word about her husband, though they both knew he wasn't a good man and made a worse husband. Where Evie liked to make things, Dru liked to fix them. Dru had too much pride to admit Tobias was beyond fixing.

"You could come clean," her sister suggested. "Let the world know you're the real mind behind London's greatest inventor."

Evie set down her cup with a clatter. "No."

"Why not?"

Evie stared at her sister. "You're serious. Even if I told the truth, who would believe me? Bernard was too well loved, if not well-liked. The queen attended one of his lectures."

"A lecture that you wrote for him, I'll bet."

She had, but that was irrelevant. Her words only mattered if they came from Bernard. "It doesn't matter. I'm a woman. The scientific community sees us as an inferior species."

"So show them they're wrong. Make something new. They would have to believe you then."

Evie shook her head. "I can't. Not until the police find Bernard's killer. If the police find me in the lab again--"

"Again?"

"I fell asleep," she said defensively.

Her sister groaned into her tea cup. "You really can't help yourself, can you?"

"It's a compulsion," she admitted. "I'd go mad if the things I imagined stayed inside my head."

"Madder, you mean."

Evie grinned in spite of herself. Lord, when was the last time she'd smiled? She hadn't always been this bitter, thorny creature. She was only three and twenty—far too young to be a dried-up old shrew. Her grin faded. "I can't go back to the lab until the investigation's over."

Dru snorted as she reached over to grab the teapot and pour herself another cup. "Good luck with that. Remember when Papa forbade you from his workshop for an entire month?"

Evie winced. She remembered. She really had gone mad then. Her brain was overcrowded with ideas and curiosities, and without an outlet for them, she'd simply...shut down, like an automaton overloaded with too much information. She'd stopped talking, stopped eating, stopped sleeping. According to their family physician, Evie suffered from monomania, or, in less clinical terms, partial insanity due to her strange obsession with machines and metal. The disease functioned like an addiction: She needed to be weaned off; immediate deprivation was fatal. Papa never barred her from his workshop after that.

"Could you find another protector?" asked Dru. "Someone like Bernard who will allow you to continue your work under his name?"

"Bernard has been gone two weeks. How would it look if I took up with a new man so quickly? The police are already half-convinced I killed him."

"All the more reason to do it. A man can protect you from the law far better than you can protect yourself."

Her sister had a point, except for one significant oversight. "I didn't kill him, Dru. I won't pretend I loved him, but I needed him. If the real murderer is found—"

"That's a big if, Vee. The police will want to wrap up this case quickly. You're a convenient scapegoat. In the eyes of the public, you're already guilty."

Damn Dru for being right. She was in over her head, and she needed help quickly.

Her sister reached across the table and covered Evie's hand with her own. "This is a man's world," she said, her eyes sad. "You and I are just living in it."

A/N: Sorry for the delay! Still writing this story, but had to take a pause to get married (happened on Saturday! I've got a husband! Ah, I'm old!) Stay tuned for the next chapter, which is when we'll meet our male protagonist :)