Praise for the novels of
CANDACE CAMP

“Camp has again produced a fast-paced plot brimming with lively conflict among family, lovers and enemies.”

—Publishers Weekly on A Dangerous Man

“Romance, humor, adventure, Incan treasure, dreams, murder, psychics—the latest addition to Camp’s Mad Moreland series has it all.”

—Booklist on An Unexpected Pleasure

“Entertaining, well-written Victorian romantic mystery.”

—The Best Reviews on An Unexpected Pleasure

“A smart, fun-filled romp.”

—Publishers Weekly on Impetuous

“Camp brings the dark Victorian world to life. Her strong characters and perfect pacing keep you turning the pages of this chilling mystery.”

—Romantic Times BOOKreviews on Winterset

“From its delicious beginning to its satisfying ending, [Mesmerized] offers a double helping of romance.”

—Booklist

Promise Me Tomorrow
Candace Camp

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

Before you start reading, why not sign up?

Thank you for downloading this Mills & Boon book. If you want to hear about exclusive discounts, special offers and competitions, sign up to our email newsletter today!

SIGN ME UP!

Or simply visit

signup.millsandboon.co.uk

Mills & Boon emails are completely free to receive and you can unsubscribe at any time via the link in any email we send you.

Promise Me Tomorrow

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

PROLOGUE

THE CHILD LIFTED HER HEAD SLEEPILY AND looked at the man across from her in the carriage. She blinked, then scowled.

“You’re a bad man.”

The man glanced at her and sighed. “Hush. We’re almost there.”

His face was shadowed in the dim light. He was almost skeletally thin, and he fidgeted constantly. Marie Anne knew that Nurse would have snapped at him to sit still and behave himself.

“I want to go home,” she said plaintively. Everything was so confusing. It had been for weeks. She missed John, and she missed the baby. Most of all, she missed Mama and Papa. She remembered That Night and the way her mother had hustled her out the door and along the dark, scary street. She remembered the familiar scent of Mama’s perfume as she squeezed Marie Anne to her chest, whispering “Take care, ma chérie.” Mama had been crying, and Marie Anne knew that it was the bad people in the streets who made her cry.

“I want to stay with you!” Marie Anne had wailed, clinging tightly to her mother. That had made the baby cry, too, and try to scramble out of Mrs. Ward’s arms and back to their mother. Only John had stood stoically silent and still.

“Oh, chérie! If you only knew—I wish you could, too, but it isn’t safe.” Her mother, more beautiful than any other woman in the world, had wiped the tears from her cheeks and tried to smile. “You must go home to England. To your Mimi and Granpapa. You will like that, won’t you? Mrs. Ward will take you. You know Mrs. Ward. She’s Mama’s ami, and she will take good care of you. She’ll see that you get to Mimi’s house in the City. Papa and I must stay here and get Granmama and Granpere to leave. But as soon as we do, we will join you at Mimi’s house.”

“Promise?”

“I promise, my little love. I promise.”

“Where’s Mama?” Marie Anne asked now, turning to her companion accusingly, “You said we were going to see Mama.” She had cried and kicked when he’d carried her from her bed earlier, until finally he had told her to be still, that he was taking her to her mother.

“We are almost there,” the man repeated glancing out the window.

Marie Anne looked out the window, too, and saw that they were approaching a large building. But it was not their home, nor even Mimi’s large house in the country or the tall white one in the City. It was a huge squat block of gray stone, far too ugly, she knew, to be anyplace where Mama was. Tears filled her eyes.

“That’s not Mimi’s.” For a little while, she and her brother John had been at Mimi’s home in the City. Mrs. Ward, Mama’s friend from Paris, had taken them there, and at first Marie Anne’s sad heart had lifted joyfully, thinking that she was going to get to see her beloved grandmother. But then That Woman had whisked them away, taking them outside and to another house, where the Awful Man was. She had seen him before, but he was not the sort who spoke to children, and she wasn’t sure who he was.

Then That Woman had fed her something and tried to give John something, as well, but he was too sick. She had left them in a room, with John twisting and turning on his bed, sweating and shaking. It had scared Marie Anne to see him like that; it had scared her to be there without any grown-up. But it was even scarier to be away from her big brother, traveling through the dark night with this stranger. Why had Mrs. Ward left them with That Woman? Why had she taken the baby, but not John and Marie Anne? Where was Mimi?

She began to cry, although she did not want to in front of this odd, jittery man whom she did not know at all. “I want Mimi,” she said, her voice trembling. “I want Nurse. I want Mama!”

“Later, later.” His voice was impatient, and he barely waited for the carriage to stop before he unlatched the door and jumped down. He reached for her, but Marie Anne backed away, her heart thumping. The ugly building loomed outside, and she was certain she did not want to go there.

“No. No!” The word ended in a shriek as he wrapped one arm around her and dragged her out.

She screamed and began to struggle. “Mama! Papa!”

He carried her inexorably up the front stairs to the door and banged the heavy knocker. It was some minutes before the door was opened by a scowling servant, and some time more before a large, stern-looking woman swept into the entryway, a dressing gown wrapped around her and a nightcap on her head.

The sight of her was enough to freeze Marie Anne’s sobs in her throat. She stared at the woman, ice forming in the pit of her stomach. The woman was tall and heavyset, with none of the beauty and warmth that lived in Marie Anne’s mother and grandmothers. This woman’s eyes were pale and cold as metal, and her face was grim, dominated by a predatory beak of a nose. She looked at Marie Anne as though she knew every naughty thing the girl had ever done.

“I found her,” the jittery man was saying. “She was on the side of the road, obviously abandoned. I didn’t know where else to take her.”

His words were enough to jolt Marie Anne out of her fear, and she cried out indignantly, “That’s a lie! I wasn’t on the side of the road!”

The woman clapped her hands together so loudly that both Marie Anne and the man jumped. “Enough!” Her voice cracked like a whip. “Don’t presume to correct your betters, child. You will soon learn that here you speak only when spoken to, and you do not contradict an adult.”

Her tone made Marie Anne’s heart thump inside her chest, but she squared her shoulders and thrust out her chin. She was not the sort to knuckle under without a fight. She thought of the way her father would ruffle her hair and chuckle, calling her his tiger.

“But I wasn’t by the side of the road,” she insisted.

The woman’s eyes narrowed. “I can see that you are going to be stiff-necked. Redheads are always trouble.”

“I am sure she will settle down,” the man said quickly, panic tinging his voice. “Once she has been here awhile, she will be all right.”

“Don’t worry, sir,” the woman replied with a faintly sardonic smile. She looked at him as if she, too, knew what he was thinking, Marie Anne noticed. “We shall take her. I am not one to turn away a soul just because she is obviously in need of improvement. We shall straighten her out soon enough.” The woman’s eyes sparkled with anticipation.

The man let out a sigh of relief and set Marie Anne down. “Thank you.”

He turned and hurried toward the door. Little as the girl had liked him, it frightened her to see him leave. Even he was better than this hard-faced woman.

“No! Wait!” Marie Anne shrieked, turning to run after him, but the woman hooked a hand in her sash and jerked her back.

“Stop it! Stop that behavior this instant!” The woman accompanied her words with a stinging slap to the back of the girl’s legs, bare below her skirts.

Marie Anne, who had never been struck in her life, whirled and gaped at the woman. The man hurried out the door, closing it after him.

“That’s better.” The woman nodded approvingly. “The children of St. Anselm’s do not act that way, as you will soon find out. The children of St. Anselm’s are quiet and obedient. Now…” Satisfied that she had set this unseemly child on the proper path, the woman looked her over. “How old are you?”

“Five,” the girl responded promptly, rather proud of her age.

“And what is your name?”

“Marie Anne.”

“That is scarcely a proper name for a child of your sort. No doubt you are that gentleman’s by-blow. Just plain Mary will do fine for you. Do you have a last name?”

Marie Anne stared at her. “I—I’m not sure. I am just Marie Anne.”

“Do you have a father?”

“Of course I do!” Marie Anne responded indignantly. “And he will come here and get me! And he will make you sorry!”

“No doubt,” the matron said dryly. “There are many children waiting for their fathers to come. In the meantime, we shall have to give you a name. Now, what do people call your father?”

“Chilton,” she answered.

“All right. Mary Chilton. That is your name. I am called Mrs. Brown. I am the matron of St. Anselm’s.”

“But that’s not my name,” Marie Anne protested indignantly.

“It is now. Do not contradict me. I told you before that that is not acceptable behavior.”

“But you’re wrong!”

Mrs. Brown’s hand lashed out and slapped Marie Anne sharply across her ear. “You will not speak to me that way. Do you understand?”

Stunned, Marie Anne nodded, her hand going up to her cheek. Never in her life had she been treated in such a manner. Even during the past few harrowing weeks, rocking about the countryside with Mrs. Ward and John and the baby, running from those bad people and having to pretend that they were Mrs. Ward’s children—even during all that, no one had ever raised a hand to her or talked to her in this way. Tears pooled in her eyes, and for a moment she wavered on the edge of bursting into tears. But years of aristocratic breeding came to her rescue, and she stiffened her back, gazing up at the woman coolly. Mama would say that this woman was déclassée, she decided. Papa, on the other hand, would say that what she had done was “bad form.” She clung to the words, hearing her parents in her head.

“Answer me when I speak to you,” Mrs. Brown snapped.

“Yes, Mrs. Brown,” Marie Anne responded dutifully, but her voice was chilly and carried all the humility of a duchess.

The older woman looked at her sharply but could not quite put her finger on what it was in the girl’s tone that raised her hackles. Finally she turned away, saying crisply, “Follow me.”

She led her up the stairs and down a hallway barely lit by a few sconces on the wall. The candlelight flickered and flared, casting strange shadows. Marie Anne felt fear rising up in her throat, but she pushed it back down. She could hear her Mimi’s voice the time she had gone running to her in tears when John and the boys were teasing her with scary stories: “Head up, my girl. Never let them know you’re afraid. It would give them far too much pleasure.”

Mrs. Brown stopped at a cupboard and opened it, pulling out a thin blanket and a folded brown dress. To the top of the pile she added a white petticoat, faded through many washings, a pair of rough lisle stockings, darned in several places, and an overly large nightgown. She handed the stack to Marie Anne.

“Here are your clothes and a blanket for your bed.”

Marie Anne looked doubtfully at the ugly brown dress. “But I have clothes. I like my dress better.”

The older woman cast a scornful glance at Marie Anne’s attire. “Your clothes are completely inappropriate. Far above your station. You are at St. Anselm’s now, and you will wear the dress I gave you.”

Remembering the stinging slap, Marie Anne decided not to argue. She merely hugged the stack of her new possessions tightly to her chest and followed Mrs. Brown into the room beyond the cupboard.

It was a long room, lined with narrow beds along either side. Beside each bed was a small chest with three drawers. In each bed lay a girl. Marie Anne had never seen so many people sleeping in one room before. Was she expected to sleep here, among so many other children? Where was her room? She thought with longing of the nursery at home, with her own snug little room, and John and Nurse and the baby all in their little rooms across the schoolroom from her.

Some of the children slept, but most of them awoke at Mrs. Brown’s entrance. In the glow of the woman’s candle, Marie Anne could see wide-open eyes peeking out from beneath their blankets. Mrs. Brown turned to Marie Anne.

“Now, I want you to undress and get into bed. Tomorrow you will be introduced to the other children and assigned your duties.”

“Duties?”

“Of course. Everyone earns their keep around here.” The woman turned and started away.

“But—what about the light?” Marie Anne asked, unable to completely hide the tremor in her voice at the thought of being left here in the dark. “How can I see to undress?”

“There is plenty of light from the windows,” the matron answered, indicating the tall, curtainless windows that lined either side of the room. “I don’t allow children to waste candles.”

With those words, the woman strode out of the room. Marie Anne watched the flickering light of her candle recede. Tears welled in her eyes, and her chin began to wobble, no matter how hard she struggled to keep it still. She had never felt so alone in all her life, even the night her mother had handed them over to Mrs. Ward, then hurried out the door, sobbing. At least then she had had John and Alexandra, and she had known Mrs. Ward, who was a kind, soft-spoken woman. But now—now she was utterly alone and abandoned.

A small hand slipped into hers, and a soft voice whispered, “’Ere now, don’t cry. It’ll be better tomorrow, you’ll see.”

Marie Anne turned to see a girl about her size, but with a face much older than hers. She looked at the girl curiously, her tears slowly subsiding. She wiped them away with her hand and said, “Hullo. Who are you?”

“I’m Winny,” the girl responded with a shy smile. “I’m eight. Wot’s your name?”

“Marie Anne. But that woman said now I must be Mary.”

The little girl nodded. “She likes plain names. ‘Ow old are you? Would you like to be my friend?”

“Aw, don’t be daft, Winny.” A rough voice spoke from the bed on the other side of them, and an older girl swung around to sit on the side of the bed, facing them. She had curly dark hair poorly suppressed into braids, and a round, pugnacious face liberally sprinkled with freckles. “’Oo’d want to be friends with the likes o’ you?”

“I would,” Marie Anne told the other girl stoutly. “Winny seems very nice.”

“’Winny seems very nice,’” the other girl mimicked in a high voice, striving to imitate Marie Anne’s precise diction. “’Oo’re you, a bleedin’ princess?”

Marie Anne lifted her chin. “No, but I shall be a duchess one day, if I want. Mimi said so.”

“A duchess!” This statement afforded the other girl much amusement, for she slapped her thigh and rocked with laughter. “Lookee ‘ere, everybody, we got a bleedin’ duchess among us.”

Marie Anne frowned at her. “You shouldn’t use such words. Nurse says it’s wicked and—and low class. Beside, I’m not a duchess now. But I will be, if I want to. Mimi said I could—and she’s a countess!”

“The Duchess of St. Anselm’s,” the other girl pronounced, still chuckling.

“Never mind her,” Winny whispered. “Betty don’t like anyone. I think you look like a duchess.” She touched the sleeve of Marie Anne’s dress admiringly. “But you’d best get into your nightgown now. Miss Patman will be coming through shortly. She comes every hour to check on us, and she’ll punish you if you’re out o’ bed.”

Marie Anne sighed. She didn’t want to take off her clothes and put on the rough nightgown, but she was dreadfully tired. And perhaps if she went to sleep, she would wake up the next morning and find herself back in the nursery with John and the baby, and Nurse waking them up with a cheerful hello and a cup of hot chocolate.

She unbuttoned her dress with Winny’s help, pulled it off and reached for the nightdress to put it on.

“’Ere! Wot’s that?” Betty, still watching her, leaned forward now and reached for the locket around Marie Anne’s neck.

Marie Anne stepped back quickly, her hand closing around the precious locket. Mimi had given it to her last Boxing Day. It was gold and opened to show a cunning little portrait of her mother on one side and of her father on the other. The front was inscribed with an ornate, looping M for Marie. Mimi had given one just like it to the baby, with an A on the front for Alexandra. Of course, the baby was too young to wear it, only two, but Marie Anne had put hers on and never took it off.

“Give it to me,” Betty demanded, getting up and coming around the bed toward her.

“No! It’s mine! Mimi gave it to me.”

Betty’s face lit with a wicked glee. “It’s mine now.”

Her hand lashed out and grabbed Marie Anne’s smaller fist. She jerked it toward her, and the chain of the locket bit painfully into Marie Anne’s neck. All the anger and fear of the past few weeks exploded now in Marie Anne, and she let out a feral shriek and sank her teeth into the other girl’s hand.

Betty jerked back her hand, letting out a yowl. She drew back her other fist to hit the smaller girl, but Marie Anne was on her like a wild thing, hitting and kicking and biting. Finally, laughing, the oldest girl in the room came over and hauled Marie Anne off the bully and set her on her feet. Betty sat up, hunched over, trying to nurse both her injured hand and her bleeding nose, and gasping for air from a blow that had landed square in her stomach.

“I think you met your match, Bet,” the fourteen-year-old said in an amused voice. She made a mocking bow toward the little girl standing beside her, still rigid with fury. “Pleased to make your acquaintance, Duchess. I’m Sally Gravers.”

“Thank you. I’m pleased to meet you, too,” Marie told her, giving a little curtsy, just as Nurse had taught her to do when she met important adults. Sally Gravers wasn’t an adult, but she looked the most important person in this group, so the gesture seemed appropriate.

The older girl grinned, further amused. “You’re all right.” She turned toward Betty and scowled. “You leave ‘er alone now. You ‘ear me? That trinket’s ‘ers.”

“All right, Sally,” the bully replied in a surly voice, shooting Marie Anne a venomous look.

“Right now. Let’s get some sleep,” Sally went on. “I, for one, ain’t lookin’ forward to getting up at five and scrubbin’ floors on no sleep.”

Marie Anne gaped at the older girl, scarcely able to believe her ears. Had she somehow become a maidservant? But, given the topsy-turvy events of the last few weeks, she knew that anything was possible. She scrambled into her nightgown, tucking the locket protectively beneath it.

Winny, still beside her, whispered, “She won’t steal it now—she’s too afraid of Sally. But the matron will take it if she sees it. She’ll say it’s above you. I’ve got a ‘idin’ place. No one’s ever found it. I’ll show it to you, and you can ‘ide it there.”

Marie Anne nodded gratefully as she and Winny spread the blanket over the narrow mattress. Then she crawled into bed, remembering with a sigh the deep feather mattress of her bed at home and the layers of thick, warm blankets that Nurse would tuck around her at night. The thought led her to memories of her mother coming in to kiss her good-night. Sometimes she would be already dressed to go out, her elegant brocade dress spreading out wide beneath her narrow waist, her hair powdered and towering in a confection of curls, decorated with jewels or feathers. Other times, she would still be in a dressing gown, and her thick black hair would be tumbling down around her shoulders in a curling cloud. She would bend over Marie Anne and whisper that she loved her. Marie Anne could smell again the orris root of her powder mingling with the scent of her perfume.

Tears seeped out of her eyes, and she lifted the locket out from beneath her nightgown, her fist closing around it. Why hadn’t Mama come for them? She had told them that she and Papa would join them as soon as they could. A horrible lonely feeling welled inside Marie Anne as a wicked voice whispered that Mama and Papa no longer wanted her.

But that wasn’t true! Marie struggled against the engulfing horror. She knew her mother and father loved her. They would come and get her, and they would find the baby, too, and John—and he wouldn’t be sick anymore. She just had to hold on, she told herself, and someday they would come for her. Someday her family would find her, and she would be happy again….

CHAPTER ONE

MARIANNE DREW A DEEP BREATH AS SHE surveyed the glittering crowd. She had never been to a party this large, nor one filled with so many titled people. She wondered what they would think if they knew she was plain Mary Chilton from St. Anselm’s Orphanage, not the genteel widow Mrs. Marianne Cotterwood.

She smiled to herself. The thing she enjoyed the most about her pretense was the idea of pulling the wool over the eyes of the aristocracy, of conversing with some blue-blooded member of the ton—who would have been horrified if he had known that he was speaking to a former chambermaid as if to an equal.

The thought settled her nerves somewhat. This might be a larger and more cosmopolitan set of people than she had deceived in the resorts of Bath and Brighton, but essentially they were the same. If one spoke as if one were genteel, and walked and sat and ate as if one had been trained to do so from birth, people assumed that one belonged. As long as she kept her lies small and plausible and was careful never to pretend to be someone more than the minor gentry, it was doubtful that anyone would sniff out her deceit. After all, most of the people here were too self-absorbed to spare much thought for anyone else, for good or ill. That was one of the traits which made it so easy to prey upon them.

Marianne regarded all members of the ruling class as her natural enemies. She could still remember the days at the orphanage, when the grand ladies would come on their “missions of mercy.” Well-fed and warm, they would stand in their elegant dresses that cost more than would be spent on any of the orphans in a year and look at them with pitying contempt. Then they would go away, feeling vastly superior and quite holy for their charity. Marianne had stared at them with anger burning in her heart. Nothing that happened to her after the orphanage had lessened her contempt for them. She had been sent into service at Lady Quartermaine’s house when she was fourteen, and there she had worked as a housemaid, emptying ashes from the fireplace, hauling water for baths, and cleaning, all for less than a shilling a day, with only Sunday afternoons off—and woe to her if anything was deemed ill-done or amiss. Of course, even that did not compare to what else had happened to her at Quartermaine Hall….

“It’s a lovely party,” Marianne’s companion said, and Marianne turned to her, firmly shoving aside her thoughts.

Mrs. Willoughby was a fluttery woman, so proud of her invitation to Lady Batterslee’s rout that she had simply had to invite someone along with her to witness her glory. Marianne was glad she had been the person with Mrs. Willoughby the day she received her invitation.

A party at the elegant Batterslee House was an opportunity that did not come along every day, and Marianne had seized upon it, even though it meant suffering Mrs. Willoughby’s stultifying conversation all evening.

Not, of course, that she meant to stay by Mrs. Willoughby’s side. She would stay with her long enough not to appear obvious—and to meet as many people as Mrs. Willoughby could introduce her to, for the chance to mingle with this many people who might invite her to other parties was almost as important as examining the treasures of the house. But as soon as she reasonably could, she meant to slip away and spend the evening exploring.

They were almost at the front of the receiving line now, just beyond the doorway of the ballroom. It was the sight of the ballroom filled with people whose clothing and jewelry cost more than most people would earn in a lifetime that had given rise to Marianne’s jitters. The room was enormous, all white and gilt and filled with mirrors. A small orchestra played on a raised platform at the far end, but the noise from the crush of people was so great that Marianne could barely make out a tune. The walls were lined with spindly-legged chairs, as white and gold as the room, except for the red velvet of their cushions. Tall candelabras were filled with white wax candles, and more such candles blazed in the chandeliers, setting off bright rainbows in the prisms that dangled beneath them.

It was a glittering, extravagant scene, made even more vivid and beautiful by the wealth of jewels that gleamed at the women’s ears and throats and wrists, a bounty of diamonds, rubies, sapphires and emeralds, as well as the subtler shimmer of pearls. The men were uniformly clad in the black-and-white elegance of evening wear, but the women’s gowns covered a vibrant spectrum of colors. Silk, satin and lace abounded, and—despite the warmth of the August evening—even velvet. Looking at the rose silk of the woman in line before them, the peacock-blue satin trimmed with black lace of the woman in front of her, and the white tissue embroidered with gold thread that adorned their hostess, Marianne began to wonder if her own simply cut ice-blue silk evening dress was elegant enough. It had done very well in Bath, but here in London…

Marianne glanced around, hoping to assure herself that she was not out of place here. She stopped as her gaze fell upon a man leaning against one of the slender columns of the ballroom, only twenty feet away from her. He was watching her, and when she noticed him, he did not glance away embarrassedly, as most would have. He continued to gaze at her steadily in a way that was most rude.

He was tall and lean, with the broad shoulders and muscled thighs of a man who had spent much of his life on horseback. His hair, cut rather short and slightly tousled, was light brown, streaked golden here and there by the sun. His eyes, too, were gold, and hooded, reminding her of a hawk. His cheekbones were high, his nose straight and narrow; it was an aristocrat’s face, handsome, proud and slightly bored, as if all the world did not hold enough to retain his jaded interest.

The man’s gaze unsettled her. She felt unaccountably warm, and it was hard, somehow, to move her eyes away from him. He smiled at her, a slow, sensuous smile that set off a strange, tingling reaction somewhere in the area of her stomach. Marianne started to smile back, but she caught herself in time, remembering what he was and how she felt about his sort. Besides, a genteel widow did not stand about smiling at strangers. So she kept her face as cool and blank as she could, and raised one eyebrow disdainfully, then turned pointedly away from him.

Their hostess was only two people away from her now, expertly greeting her guests and sliding them along. She greeted Mrs. Willoughby with no sign of recognition on her face, then nodded to Marianne with the same polite, measured warmth. It was such a huge party that Marianne was sure there were many people there whom Lady Batterslee barely knew, which made it a perfect opportunity for Marianne, and silently she thanked her companion for inviting her to come along despite their casual acquaintance.

There were so many people, it was difficult to work their way through the crowd. Marianne did not see how anyone could find room to dance to the orchestra gamely playing at the other end of the room. Finally they reached the wall and were able to find two empty chairs. Mrs. Willoughby plopped down in one, fanning her flushed face, and looked around with all the enthusiasm of a career social climber.

“There’s Lady Bulwen—I’m surprised she’s here. They say she is only a step away from debtor’s prison, you know.” She shook her head, clucking her tongue in apparent sympathy, then plunged on, “That’s Harold Upsmith. Do you know him? An excellent gentleman, everything that’s proper—not like his brother James. An absolute wastrel, that one.”

“Indeed,” Marianne murmured. It took little effort on her part to keep the conversation going, only an occasional nod or comment to assure her companion that she was listening. It was her great good fortune that Mrs. Willoughby was a perfect combination of social climber and inveterate gossip. Before this evening was through, she would know as much about the ton as if she had been a member for years.

After a few moments, however, her attention was distracted by the imperious tones of a woman sitting to her right. “Don’t slouch, Penelope. And do try to look as if you’re having a good time. It is a party, you know, not a deathwatch.”

Curious, Marianne glanced to the side. The voice belonged to a large woman clad in an unfortunate shade of purple. Her bosom jutted forward like the prow of a ship, and her chin had a matching forward thrust. She, too, was watching the crowd like a predatory bird, interspersing comments about this or that eligible bachelor with commands to her young female companion. The girl in question sat between Marianne and the older woman, a plain slip of a thing in a white dress. White, Marianne knew, was considered the only appropriate color for an unmarried girl at a ball, but it was not a color that did anything for this particular young woman, merely emphasizing the colorlessness of her face. Nor was her appearance enhanced by the glass spectacles that perched on her nose, hiding her best features—a pair of warm brown eyes.

“Yes, Mama,” Penelope murmured in a toneless voice, her fingers clenched together in her lap. She reached up to adjust the spectacles that sat on her nose, and her fan, lying in her lap, slid off and hit the floor, bouncing over and landing on Marianne’s toe.

“Really, Penelope, do try not to be so clumsy. There’s nothing so unattractive as a clumsy female.”

“I’m sorry, Mama.” Penelope flushed with embarrassment and bent toward her fan, but Marianne had already retrieved it.

She handed it to Penelope with a smile, sympathy for the girl rising inside her. It must be bad enough to be sitting here against the wall, not being asked to dance, without having her mother carping at her the whole time.

“Thank you,” Penelope murmured softly, giving Marianne a shy smile.

“You’re quite welcome. A dreadful crush, isn’t it?”

Penelope nodded emphatically, causing the light to glint off her spectacles. “Yes. I hate it when there are so many people.”

“I’m Mrs. Cotterwood. Marianne Cotterwood,” Marianne told her. It was not proper to introduce oneself, Marianne knew, but she suspected that Penelope was not the sort to mind. Others, like Penelope’s mother, would meet such boldness with a rebuff.

But Penelope smiled and said, “I am Penelope Castlereigh. It’s very nice to meet you.”

“The pleasure is all mine. You must think me bold to introduce myself, but in truth, I find it excessively silly to sit here not talking because there is no one around at the moment who knows both of us to introduce us.”

“You are absolutely right,” Penelope agreed. “I would have introduced myself if I had more nerve. I’m afraid I am the veriest coward.”

At that moment, Penelope’s mother, who had been droning away the past few minutes, finally realized that her daughter was not listening to her and turned to see what she was doing. At seeing the girl engaged in conversation with a strange woman, she scowled and brought her lorgnette up to her eyes to peer disapprovingly at Marianne.

“Penelope! What are you doing?”

Penelope jumped a little, and a guilty look flashed across her face. She turned back to the older woman, saying brightly, “I was just talking to Mrs. Cotterwood. I met her at Nicola’s last week.”

Quickly, before her mother could inquire more deeply into the matter, she introduced Marianne and her mother to each other. Her mother, Marianne learned, was Lady Ursula Castlereigh.

On the other side of Marianne, Mrs. Willoughby leaned forward, saying with delight, “Oh, do you know Lady Castlereigh, Mrs. Cotterwood? Mrs. Willoughby, Lady Castlereigh. If you remember, we met at Mrs. Blackwood’s fete, oh, sometime last Season.”

“Indeed?” Lady Ursula replied in a voice that would have daunted a less determined woman than Mrs. Willoughby.

“Yes, indeed. I admired the dress you were wearing.” Mrs. Willoughby launched into a detailed description of a gown, popping up and moving around the others to plant herself in the empty chair beside Lady Ursula.

Marianne seized the opportunity to escape both women. “Shall we take a stroll around the room, Miss Castlereigh?”

Penelope brightened. “That would be lovely.”

It suited Marianne’s purpose to get away from the chattering Mrs. Willoughby, but she knew that she had proposed the stroll partly to help out Penelope, as well. Penelope, despite her social status, touched a responsive chord in Marianne. She could not help but feel for the poor girl, obviously shy, and just as obviously dominated by her dragon of a mother.

Penelope visibly relaxed as they moved away from Lady Ursula’s vicinity. Marianne glanced around them as they walked, automatically checking the room. There were few of the valuable items she sought in the large, open room. The only access to the doors was a series of long windows, open to alleviate the heated stuffiness created by the crowd of people. Marianne maneuvered Penelope in the direction of the windows.

“Ah,” she said. “It’s much more pleasant here.”

“Oh, yes,” Penelope agreed, following her. “The fresh air feels good.”

Marianne casually looked out. They were on the second floor, looking down at the small garden in the back of the house. There were no convenient trees or trellises nearby. Still, Marianne cast a professional eye over the window and its lock before she guided Penelope away.

As they walked, Marianne felt an odd prickling at the base of her neck that told her she was being watched. She turned her head, scanning the room, and after a moment she saw him—the same man who had been watching her earlier. As she looked at him, he sketched a bow to her. Warmth flooded her, a sensation she was unused to. She told herself it was embarrassment.

“Penelope…” She took her companion’s arm. “Who is that man?”

“What man?” Penelope stopped and looked around.

“Over there.” Marianne indicated him with her head.

Penelope adjusted her glasses, looking in the direction of Marianne’s gaze. “Oh. Do you mean Lord Lambeth?”

“The good-looking wretch with a superior smile on his face.”

Penelope smiled faintly at the description. “Yes. That’s Justin. He’s the Marquess of Lambeth.”

“He keeps looking at me. It’s most disconcerting.”

“I should think you would be used to men looking at you,” Penelope responded, grinning, looking at her companion. With her red hair, vivid blue eyes and creamy white skin, Marianne Cotterwood was stunning. Penelope had noticed her almost as soon as she had entered the ballroom. Marianne’s dress, though simpler than most here tonight, was the perfect setting for her beauty, showing off her tall, voluptuous figure; she had no need for the frills and bows that many women added to their clothes.

“Thank you for the compliment—I think.” Marianne smiled back at her. “But that is the second time I’ve caught him staring at me in the rudest way. And he doesn’t seem at all embarrassed by being caught doing it. He just stands there looking….”

“Arrogant?” Penelope supplied. “That’s not surprising. Lambeth’s quite arrogant. Of course, I suppose he has every reason to be. Everyone fawns over him, especially giddy young girls looking to marry.”

“He’s a catch?”

Penelope chuckled. “I should say so.” She looked at her curiously. “Do you mean you have not heard of him?”

“I’m afraid not. I have spent the past few years in Bath, you see, living rather quietly—since my husband’s death.”

“Of course. I’m sorry. I don’t suppose you would have heard of him. Bath is not the sort of place Lambeth frequents. Not exciting enough.”

“He’s a carouser, then?”

Penelope shrugged. “I don’t know whether he lives a wilder life than most men. But he despises boredom. Bucky says he will go to any lengths to avoid it. Last month, he and Sir Charles Pellingham placed bets on how fast a spider would build its web in the corner of a window at White’s.”

Marianne grimaced. “He sounds excessively silly.”

“Sir Charles is,” Penelope admitted frankly. “But Bucky says that Lambeth is a knowing one.”

“Who is Bucky?” Marianne asked.

Penelope colored slightly. “Lord Buckminster. He is a cousin of my good friend Nicola Falcourt.” She went on hurriedly, “He is considered quite a catch.”

“Lord Buckminster or Lord Lambeth?” Marianne asked quizzically.

Penelope’s blush deepened, “Well, both, I suppose, but I was speaking about Lord Lambeth. They say he’s rich as Croesus, and his father is the Duke of Storbridge, so all the matchmaking mamas consider him fair game.”

“I see.” No wonder the man felt no hesitation in staring so rudely. Probably most of the women at the party would be thrilled to have him notice them. Marianne glanced back in his direction, but he had gone. She and Penelope started their perambulation again.

“But I imagine it’s all useless,” Penelope went on. “Mother says that there’s an unspoken understanding between him and Cecilia Winborne that someday they will marry. It would be a perfect match. Her lineage is as good as his, and there has never been a scandal in her family—they’re all terribly priggish,” she added confidentially.

Marianne laughed.

Penelope looked a trifle abashed. “I’m sorry. I should not have said that. You must think me terrible. Mother says I am always letting my tongue run away with me.”

“Nonsense,” Marianne assured her. “I think you are most enjoyable company—and that runaway tongue is one of the main reasons.”

“Really?” Penelope looked pleased. “I am always afraid that I’m going to say the wrong thing—and then, when I’m expected to talk, it seems as if my tongue won’t even work.”

“I have often felt that way myself,” Marianne lied kindly. In truth, she had rarely been afflicted with shyness. The matron at St. Anselm’s had always maintained that boldness was her worst vice—the first in a long list, of course.

Her words cheered Penelope up, however, for she began to talk again. “Bucky likes Lord Lambeth, says he’s a ‘fine chap.’ But he quite frightens me,” Penelope added honestly. “He is so very proud and cold. Everyone says so. His whole family is that way. His mother is even scarier than he is.”

“She must be a terror, then.”

“She is. Personally, I think she and Cecilia Winborne are cut from the same cloth. But since Lord Lambeth quite disdains love, I suppose it won’t matter to him.”

“Mmm. They sound like a delightful pair.”

Penelope giggled.

“I say—Penelope!” A male voice sounded behind them, and the two women turned to see a man strolling toward them. He was tall and sandy-haired, with a pleasant face, and he was smiling as he looked at Penelope. “What good luck, to catch you without Lady Ursula around.”

Color dotted Penelope’s cheeks, and her soft brown eyes lit up. She held out her hand to him. “Bucky! I wasn’t sure if you would be here tonight.”

“Oh, yes. I left the opera early. Nicola’s mother will probably have my head the next time I see her, but I mean, really!” He paused, indignation clear on his face. “There’s only so much of that caterwauling a man can be expected to take!”

Penelope smiled. “I am sure Lady Falcourt will understand.”

“No,” he replied ruefully. “But she won’t say much, for fear I won’t escort her next time.” He turned toward Marianne, saying, “Sorry, frightfully rude of me—”

His words died as he looked into Marianne’s face, and the color drained from his cheeks, then came back in a rush. “Oh, uh, I—I say.”

It was all Marianne could do to suppress a giggle. Lord Buckminster looked as if someone had hit him on the head.

“Mrs. Cotterwood, please allow me to introduce Lord Buckminster,” Penelope introduced them.

“How do you do?” Marianne held out her hand politely.

“Oh. I say. Great pleasure,” Buckminster managed to get out, stepping forward to take her hand. As he did so, he stumbled, but caught himself. He took Marianne’s hand and bowed over it, then released her and stood grinning down at her foolishly.

Marianne sighed inwardly. It was obvious to her that Penelope had very fond feelings for “Bucky,” but the man seemed oblivious to them. It was just as obvious that he was entranced by Marianne. She had had other men react to her this way. Marianne knew that she had the sort of looks that attracted men, although she was not vain about it—most of her life, her vibrant good looks had been the source of more trouble than good fortune.

Usually an infatuated admirer was no worse than a nuisance; she had learned how to discourage and avoid them. This time, however, she worried that Lord Buckminster’s open admiration would make Penelope dislike her. She glanced at Penelope, who looked a trifle sad, but resigned, then at Lord Buckminster, who was still smiling vapidly.

“It is very nice to meet you,” Marianne said pleasantly to Lord Buckminster, “but I am afraid I cannot stay and chat. I must get back to Mrs. Willoughby, or she will wonder what has become of me.”

“Allow me to escort you,” Buckminster said eagerly, straightening his cuff and in the process somehow dislodging the gold cuff link. It dropped to the floor and rolled away. “Oh, I say…” The man looked with some dismay at the piece of jewelry and bent to retrieve it.

“Oh, no,” Marianne protested quickly. “You must stay here and keep Penelope company. I am sure that you have a lot to talk about.”

She slipped away immediately, while Buckminster’s attention was still concentrated on his cuff link. Her departure was a trifle rude, she knew, but she felt sure that Penelope would not mind.

Weaving her way through the throng of people, Marianne made her way to the door. Snapping open her fan and wafting it as though the heat of the crowd was what had impelled her to leave the ballroom, she strolled along the corridor past a pair of footmen. She glanced about her in a seemingly casual way, noting to herself the locations of doors, windows and stairs. She paused as if to admire a portrait, and as she did so looked out the window, checking its accessibility from the street. Then she wandered to her right until she was out of sight of the footmen.

She made a quick check to be sure that there were no other guests or servants around, then started down the hallway, looking into each room as she passed it. Every one, she saw, was filled with expensive items, from artwork to furniture, but she was concerned only with those things that were easy to transport and just as easy to sell, such as silver vases and ornamental pieces. She was primarily interested in finding the study, for she knew that it was the most likely place for the safe to be located. Finding the safe and the best entrances and exits was always the focus of her job.

She located two drawing rooms and a music room, but no study, so she turned and made her way back down the corridor. As she neared the wide hallway that crossed this one and led back to the ballroom, her steps slowed to a seemingly aimless walk, and she once again began to ply her fan and to look up at the row of portraits as if she were studying them. She crossed the corridor, glancing down it out of the corner of her eye. She could not see that anyone, either the footmen or the two men standing outside the ballroom door conversing, was paying any attention to her.

Once across the hallway and out of sight, she resumed her investigation, opening doors and peering inside. The second door she opened was obviously the masculine retreat of the house, though it appeared to be more a smoking room than a study. There was no desk, nor were there any books, but the chairs were large and comfortable, and there was a cabinet with glasses and several decanters of whiskey and brandy atop it, as well as a narrow table holding two humidors and a rack of pipes. The drawings on the walls were hunting scenes, full of dogs and horses.

With a smile of satisfaction, Marianne reached into the room, picked up the candlestick on the table beside the door and lit it from the wall sconce in the hall. Then she slipped into the room and closed the door after her. This was the most dangerous part of her mission, as well as the most exciting. There was no good reason for her to be in her host’s smoking room, and if someone happened to come in on her, she would be hard pressed to talk her way out of the situation. She could lock the door, of course, but if someone tried to get in, that would seem even more suspicious. The best thing to do was simply to work as quickly as possible and hope that, if she did get caught, a winning smile and a quick tongue would get her out of the situation.

Heart pounding, Marianne set the candle down on the table and began to go around the room, shifting each of the hunting prints aside to examine the wall behind it. The third picture yielded the prize: a safe set into the wall. She leaned forward, examining the lock, which opened with a key rather than a combination.

“I do apologize, but I really cannot allow you to break open my host’s safe,” a masculine voice said behind her.

Marianne jumped and whirled around, her heart in her throat. Leaning negligently against the doorjamb, one eyebrow raised quizzically, was Lord Lambeth.

CHAPTER TWO

FOR A LONG MOMENT MARIANNE COULD DO nothing but stare at him, her mind skittering about wildly. Finally she managed to paste on a shaky smile and say, “My lord! You gave me quite a turn!”

“Did I?” He grinned, showing even, white teeth. Marianne had the sudden strong image of a wolf. “I would have thought that you had stronger nerves…given your profession.”

Marianne drew herself up to her fullest height and put on a haughty face, one she had copied from Lady Quartermaine. “I beg your pardon? My profession? I am afraid I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”

“Well done.” Lambeth moved away from the doorjamb and came inside, closing the door behind him. “I might almost believe you—if I hadn’t just caught you with your hand in the cookie jar.”

Marianne’s stomach tightened with dread. “What are you doing?” She realized that her voice had skidded up, showing fear, and she forced herself to lower it. “I must insist that you open that door. This is highly improper.”

He cocked one eyebrow. “I would have thought that you would prefer we discussed your larceny outside the hearing of the rest of the company. But of course, if you insist on opening the door so that all may hear…”

Lambeth started toward the door, and Marianne stepped forward quickly. “No! No, wait. You are right. Let us clear this up privately.”

He smiled in a smug way that made Marianne long to slap him, and crossed his arms. “You have an explanation? Pray, go on. I should love to hear it.”

“I see no reason why I should give you an explanation,” Marianne retorted hotly.

Her initial spurt of fear over, her normal spirit was returning. The smirk on the man’s face goaded her. He was everything she despised in the aristocracy: supercilious, arrogant, utterly disdainful of everyone whom he considered beneath him—which was most of the world.

“Other than the fact that I should turn you over to our host for rifling through his smoking chamber?”

“Don’t be absurd! I was simply looking around. There is no harm in that, surely.”

“What about the safe?” He nodded toward the picture, still askew, with the safe behind it.

“Safe?” Marianne could think of nothing to do except brazen it out.

His mouth twitched. “Yes. Safe. The one behind that picture. The one you were breaking into.”

“I was doing no such thing!” She put on an expression of utmost indignation. “The picture was crooked, and I straightened it.”

He let out a bark of laughter. “You are a bold one. I’ll give you that. But I have you dead to rights, and you know it.” He strolled toward her. “This was a deadly dull party, but it certainly got livelier once you arrived.”

“Is that supposed to be a compliment?” Marianne took a step backward. She found his closeness disconcerting. She disliked him thoroughly; he was her enemy. Yet his smile created the oddest sensation in the pit of her stomach. And when he came near, she could see that his eyes were clear and gold, the color of sherry, darkened by the row of thick lashes around them. She found herself staring into them, unable to look away.

His gaze was knowing and amused, as if he sensed what she was feeling. “Yes, it is. Most young women bore me.”

“I am not a young woman,” she pointed out. “I am a widow.”

“Are you?”

“Yes, of course. What a thing to say!” He was so close now that she could feel the heat of his body. Marianne took another step back but came up against the liquor cabinet and could move no farther. She braced her hands on the cabinet on either side of her and tried to face him down. “You are a very rude man.”

“So I have been told. I am not, however, a flat, so I suggest that you try to stop bamming me. I have been watching you all evening.”

“I know. I saw you. That was when I first realized how very rude you were.”

“I watched you at first because you are devilishly attractive.” He smiled and raised his hand, running his forefinger down her cheek.

A shiver ran through Marianne, unfamiliar and delightful, and she twitched away from him, irritated with herself.

“I was wondering how to get an introduction when I saw you with Miss Castlereigh and Lord Buckminster. I knew they would introduce us, but by the time I got there, you were gone. I followed you out into the hall, and that is when I noticed your extremely odd behavior.”

“You were spying on me? I find that extremely odd, my lord.”

“You have the advantage of me. You seem to know who I am—that is twice you have called me ‘my lord.’ Yet I do not know your name.”

“It is scarcely any of your business.”

“You may as well tell me. I shall find out from Bucky anyway.”

Marianne frowned. “I am Marianne Cotterwood. Mrs. Cotterwood.”

“Oh, yes, a widow. I forgot.”

“I wish you would stop using that supercilious tone. Why should I say I am a widow if I am not?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps you are. On the other hand, perhaps it is simply part of your sham.”

“I am not shamming. This is a pointless conversation, and I am leaving.”

She started around him, but Lambeth reached out and grasped the low cabinet, blocking her exit. “Not until you tell me why you were sneaking up and down this hall, peering into all the rooms. And why you came into this one and proceeded to walk around it, lifting each picture, until you found the one with a safe behind it.”

Marianne’s throat was dry, and only partly because of her trepidation. Lambeth’s body was only inches from her; his eyes were boring into hers. It was hard to breathe, and she felt strangely hot and cold.

“You are a thief, Mrs. Cotterwood,” he said in a low voice. “I can think of no other explanation.”

“No.” Her voice came out barely a whisper. Her lips were dry, and her tongue crept out to moisten them.

Lambeth’s eyes darkened, and his hand came up, his thumb tracing her lower lip. “You are the most beautiful woman I have ever met, but I really cannot allow you to go about robbing my friends.” He paused, and a smile touched his lips. “On the other hand, Lord Batterslee is not really what I would call a friend. More an acquaintance, actually.”

He leaned closer, his warmth and scent surrounding her. Marianne closed her eyes, almost dizzy from his nearness. Then his lips were on hers, and she jumped slightly in surprise, but she did not move away. The sensation he was creating in her was too sweet and unfamiliar. She relaxed, giving in to the pleasure. She felt the hot exhalation of his breath against her cheek as he sensed her yielding. His arms went around her, and he pulled her closer, his mouth sinking into hers urgently.

Marianne felt as if she were melting, her loins hot and waxen, her whole body shimmering with pleasure. No man had ever made her feel like this. Indeed, she had rarely allowed a man to touch her, not since Daniel. Daniel’s kisses, too, had been sweet at first…

Marianne stiffened at the thought of Daniel Quartermaine. Another aristocrat with kisses and soft words—and no thought in his mind except using and abandoning her. Suddenly she realized what Lambeth was about. She jerked away from him, her hand cracking against his cheek in a resounding slap.

He stared at her, surprised, his hand going to his cheek.

“I know what you are trying to do!” she cried.

“It seems fairly obvious,” he replied dryly.

“You think that I will bed you to keep you from telling everyone I am a thief!”

His eyebrows sailed upward. “I never said—”

“You didn’t have to. As you just said, it is obvious. You accuse me of being a thief, then start to kiss me. What else would I think?”

“That your beauty distracts me from my duty.”

“Please. I am not a fool. Nor am I a whore. You are wasting your time. I won’t sleep with you, no matter how you might slander me to everyone you know.” Marianne’s eyes flashed. She had no idea what an arousing picture she made—her eyes sparkling, cheeks flushed, her lips soft and moist from his kisses.

“A thief with morals, in other words.”

The faint amusement in his voice goaded her, and Marianne opened her mouth to reply hotly. But at that moment the door opened, and a middle-aged man stepped into the room. He stopped and gaped at them.

“I say.”

“Lord Batterslee.” Lambeth nodded to the older man.

Marianne’s stomach turned to ice. Now it would come. He would tell the owner of the house that he had found her going through his study, searching for something to steal. Her only hope lay in the fact that she had nothing on her that she had stolen. But the accusation of a duke’s son would be enough to bring a constable.

“Oh. Lambeth. What the devil’s going on here?”

Lambeth smiled suggestively. “Exactly what it looks like, I’m afraid. I was…ah, seeking a place of solitude to, um, convince the lady of my regard for her.”

Heat stole into Marianne’s face. He was intimating that they had sneaked off to the smoking room for a romantic interlude. She was torn between relief that he had not turned her over to the authorities and humiliation that he was blackening her reputation.

“A tryst? In my smoking room? Really, Lambeth…”

Lambeth shrugged, and his hand went pointedly to his reddened cheek. “Not a tryst, exactly. As you can see, Mrs. Cotterwood was somewhat averse to my suggestions.” He looked toward Marianne. “You needn’t turn violent, you know. A simple no would have sufficed.”

“Don’t speak to me!” The emotion in Marianne’s choked voice was real enough. She felt as if she might burst into tears at any moment from all the conflicting feelings that were tearing at her. But she also had the presence of mind to seize the opportunity to flee. Spitting out, “You cad!” to Lambeth, she rushed out the door, skirting Lord Batterslee’s rotund form. Lord Lambeth could hardly come running after her with the other man standing right there.

She ran down the hallway to the stairs, only slowing when she came in sight of the other partygoers. It would attract attention to run down the stairs in full view of everyone, but she walked as quickly as she could, her body tensed for the sound of her name or a touch on her shoulder. However, she made it to the front doors without incident, and since there were several hackney coaches in the street in the hopes of catching fares from the party, she was able to scramble into one immediately.

To her relief, the hackney set off at a smart pace. She turned and looked out the window. There was no sign of Lord Lambeth. With any luck, he had gone back to the ballroom, thinking that she would have rejoined the party. Or perhaps he would not care enough to search for her. She doubted that Lord Lambeth had any trouble getting women; he would not need to track down a recalcitrant one. But why had he lied to Lord Batterslee? Perhaps he had hoped that he could still blackmail her with his knowledge, given a little more time to persuade her.

Marianne smiled to herself. He was going to find it difficult to see her again. No one there tonight, not even Mrs. Willoughby, knew where she lived. She was always careful to keep her private life separated from the world of what Piers called the “flats.” Besides, this was the first time that she had made a foray into the highest society of London. In years past, they had worked on the well-to-do, the Cits and lesser gentry both in London and in other cities. Their quarry had not moved in the highest circles. The last year or two, as sort of an audition, they had spent their time in the resort towns of Brighton and Bath, where she had mingled with the upper crust who were vacationing there. It had been only two months ago that they had decided to try their game among the ton of London.

She had spent the time establishing herself in London, calling on the women, such as Mrs. Willoughby, whom she had met in Bath and Brighton and who had encouraged her to visit them if she ever came to London. She had hoped to gradually work her way into their social spheres, meeting ever more people. It had been sheer good fortune that she had been calling on Mrs. Willoughby the day the woman received her coveted invitation to Lady Batterslee’s party. Gleeful and wanting someone to witness her triumph, Mrs. Willoughby had impulsively invited Marianne along, thus propelling Marianne higher and more quickly into Society than she had ever dreamed.

Now, of course, she thought gloomily, it was all ruined. Leaning back against the seat, Marianne closed her eyes and gave herself up to depressing thoughts. All their hard work…all the time and effort…all the hopes they had had of making enough money in London to retire from the Game…all was for naught. By the time the hackney stopped in front of her narrow, pleasant house on the fringes of Mayfair, Marianne was thoroughly blue.

Climbing out of the coach, she paid the driver and walked slowly toward the house. Before she could reach for the doorknob, it swung open. Winny stood in the doorway, grinning at her.

“I was watchin’ for you,” Winny confided, the proper English she had been cultivating for the past few years slipping a little, as it always did when she was excited.

She was still small, though the past few years of decent food had put more pounds on her frame and roses in her cheeks. But nothing could make up for the years of malnourishment in her youth. She and Marianne had been friends for as long as Marianne could remember, growing up as best they could in the orphanage. Winny, older than Marianne, had left St. Anselm’s two years before Marianne. She had gotten a job in service at the Quartermaine household, not far from the orphanage. On her rare days off, she had visited Marianne, and when Marianne turned fourteen and left the orphanage, Winny had recommended her to the Quartermaine housekeeper. They had been together ever since, except for the two years after Marianne had been thrown out of the Quartermaine house. But later, after Marianne was established in her new life, she had sent for Winny, and Winny had joined her new “family.” She had not had the skills that the rest of the family used to earn their way, but she had contributed by being their housekeeper, work she was well acquainted with.

“Everyone’s waiting in the sitting room,” Winny went on.

Marianne nodded, her heart sinking even lower. She knew that everyone had been excited about their first foray into the upper reaches of Society, and she hated to face them with her failure. They would be kind, of course; they always were. It was only with these outcasts that she had found kindness. But their very kindness made her feel even worse about letting them down.

She went down the hall into the sitting room, with Winny following her. They were indeed all there. Rory Kiernan, whom they all affectionately called “Da” because he was the oldest among them, was sitting on the couch with his wife, Betsy. Betsy was an expert at cards and at separating the flats from their money, and Da was one of the premiere pickpockets of London, but they were largely retired now. They were the parents of Della, the improbably dark-haired middle-aged woman who was sitting in a chair beside them, and who now sprang to her feet at Marianne’s entrance.

“Marianne!” Della grinned from ear to ear and opened her arms wide to embrace Marianne. She was a short, plump woman with twinkling brown eyes and an infectious laugh, and it was clear that she had been a beauty in her day. She was the closest thing to a mother that Marianne had known. It was she and her husband, Harrison, the short, wiry man beside her, who had rescued Marianne when she came to London over nine years ago.

Marianne had been Mary Chilton then, not quite nineteen years old, frightened and alone—and pregnant. Working as a maid in the Quartermaine household, she had caught the eye of the eldest son, Daniel, when he had been sent down from Oxford. To pass the time, Daniel had first flirted with her, then wooed her with seductive words and sweet promises. Naively, she had thought that he loved her, and for a brief time she had been very happy. But when his words of love did not prevail upon her to come to his bed, he had taken her by force. Crushed and heartbroken, Marianne had gone to the housekeeper, who had told her that she had best keep quiet about the matter or she would only stir up trouble for herself. Daniel would be returning to Oxford soon, the housekeeper reminded her, and in the meantime, she would keep Marianne at work in the kitchen, where she would not have to run into him.

Before long, Marianne had realized that she was pregnant. She wrote to Daniel, putting aside her pride for the sake of her unborn child, and begged him for help, but he never replied. When she began to show, Lady Quartermaine had ordered the housekeeper to dismiss her. Marianne had been unable to get work at any other house in the area. No one wanted a servant with licentious ways. Finally, she had gone to London, hoping that in that impersonal city she would find some job where her pregnancy would not matter. Winny had given her every penny that she had saved, but Marianne could not find work in London, either, and it was not long before all of Winny’s meager savings were gone.

Desperate and hungry, she had stolen some fruit from a vendor’s stall. She had not been very good at it, and the vendor saw her take it and began to chase her. Della and Harrison, who had been watching the scene unfold, saved her. Harrison neatly tripped the vendor, then helped him up with a great many apologies, insisting on brushing off his clothes and explaining at great length how the accident had come to happen. Della, in the meantime, took Marianne by the arm and whisked her away. She had taken her to their home, a set of rooms in a less fashionable part of town, and had given her supper. Marianne, overwhelmed by her kindness, had collapsed into sobs and told Della her story.

Della’s heart had ached for the poor girl, alone in the world, with no family to help her and nowhere to go, no way to make a living. She knew that the workhouse was the only option left to Marianne, and that was a fate that Della would not have wished on anyone. So, with no fuss, she and Harrison had taken Marianne in.

Marianne knew that they had helped her more than she could ever repay, and she would have done anything for them. When she found out that Della and Harrison were thieves by trade, she had revised her moral standards. Whatever she had been taught in the orphanage about right and wrong, she knew that Della and her husband were good people, whereas the supposedly virtuous Lady Quartermaine and the matron at St. Anselm’s were at heart wicked.

Della and Harrison were not common thieves. Harrison was an “upper-story” man, skilled at picking locks, opening safes and breaking into houses without disturbing the occupants. One of the reasons for his success was the work of his partner Della. She spoke and acted like one of the gentry. Her mother, Betsy, had run a gaming hall much of Della’s life, and she had taught Della to speak and act genteelly, preparing her for the same sort of life that Betsy had led. After Della met Harrison, they had realized that if she moved among the wealthier classes, she could determine the layout of a house and the location of its valuables, and then Harrison could far more easily get in and out of the house and lighten its occupants of some of the burden of their wealth.

Marianne stayed with the two of them all through her pregnancy and for several months after the baby, Rosalind, was born. She could not help feeling that she was a burden to them, but she also could not see how she was going to support herself and her daughter, as well as raise the child. The only occupation she knew was being a maid, and she knew that no one would hire her if she had a child with her. But there was no way she could give Rosalind up.

Harrison had come up with the solution to their problem. Marianne, he pointed out, could do the same job as Della. She already spoke rather better than most of her peers, and she carried herself with a natural grace. He and Della, he pointed out, could train her in all the finer points of manners and speech. Dressed like a lady, she would be stunning, and her beauty and youth would help them obtain entré into finer houses—an idea that he expressed with a great deal of tact and circumlocution, until finally Della had chuckled and told him that she was well aware that Marianne outshone her. Indeed, Marianne outshone any woman she knew. Motherhood—and an adequate diet—had made Marianne even more beautiful, giving her skin a luminous glow and adding more curves to her slender body.

Marianne had felt some qualms about entering the world of thieves, but she had suppressed them. She would do anything Della and Harrison asked of her, and, besides, she had a mother’s fierce instinct to take care of her child. She was determined to make enough money to give her daughter an easier and better life than she had had. So she had entered into lessons with Della, and they had discovered, somewhat to their surprise, that she picked up the correct speech and manners of the upper class with ease. She was, Harrison declared, a natural, and by the time Rosalind was a year old, Marianne had adopted the name Marianne Cotterwood, making herself a respectable widow, and was making calls with Della.

It was an easy enough job, as long as one had a quick wit and good nerves, both of which Marianne possessed. In order to pass among the wealthy, one had to dress well, so she had a supply of beautiful clothes. She ate well. She had a great deal of time to spend with her daughter, and when she was not there, Della or Betsy was happy to take care of the little girl. Marianne was also good at what she did. She had a quick eye and a good memory, and without appearing to study a house, she could quickly spot the best entrances and exits, as well as the most expensive and most portable valuables, and carry all the information in her head to give to Harrison. Della readily admitted that Marianne was better than she at what she did, and Della soon slipped into a happy semiretirement, going along with Marianne only when they thought a chaperone was a social imperative.

Marianne had been scouting for Harrison for eight years now, and their fortunes had been steadily increasing all that time. They were able now to rent a fair-size home in a good neighborhood, as well as hire Winny as housekeeper and cook, and two maids to help her. Their “family” had also grown. First, Da and Betsy, growing too old for the Game, had moved in with them. Then Harrison and Della had taken in a stray adolescent who had been scratching out a living as a pickpocket, working for a hard fellow who ran a ring of youthful pickpockets, giving them a place to sleep and some food to eat and taking most of their profits in return. Piers was twenty-two years old now, and Harrison had turned him into a skilled upper-story man.

Now Della hugged Marianne and pulled her toward a chair. “Sit and tell us all about it. Was it terribly grand?”

“The grandest party I’ve ever seen,” Marianne replied honestly. She looked around at the eager faces watching her, from Betsy’s wrinkled, powdered visage to Piers’ freckled, snub-nosed one.

“I knew it!” Betsy let out a hoot of laughter. “His father used to come to my gaming house, and he was always flush in the pockets—at least when he came in the door. Drunk as a wheelbarrow, of course, but, still, a real blue blood.”

“Well, I don’t know the color of his blood, but I’d say the son is flush in the pockets, as well. The problem is…” She hesitated, glancing around at them, then sighed. “Oh, the devil! The truth is, I made a dreadful mull of it.”

“Don’t be daft,” Piers said, dismissing her words with a wave of his hand. “You always think you did something wrong.”

“He’s right. I am sure you did wonderfully,” Della agreed.

“No.” Marianne shook her head, and tears sprang unexpectedly to her eyes. She blinked them away and went on. “It wasn’t just something I did wrong. It was everything. I was discovered.”

The room fell silent. Marianne dropped her eyes, unable to look at the others.

Finally Harrison started to speak, then had to stop and clear his throat. “Wh-what? How could you have been discovered? You’re sitting right here. They couldn’t have—”

“He did not turn me in. But he saw what I did. He accused me. Oh, how could I have been so careless? I didn’t see him at all!”

“But who—I don’t understand.” Harrison came forward. “Who saw you?”

“Lord Lambeth. He had been looking at me earlier. But I didn’t see him as I left the ballroom. I went up and down the corridor looking for the study because I presumed the safe would be there—although I did see some excellent silver pieces in one of the drawing rooms. Anyway, I found a smoking room finally, and I began to hunt around the walls, looking for a safe. Then he appeared.”

Della drew a sharp breath. “Oh, no. What did he say?”

“He thought I was about to try to open the safe. Of course I told him that he had misinterpreted the scene, that I was simply straightening the picture, but he didn’t believe it. He was sure I was a thief. He had followed me out of the ballroom, you see, and had seen me looking into all the rooms up and down the hallway, and searching behind the pictures for a safe. He knew I was lying.”

“But he didn’t say anything to anyone? He didn’t betray you to Lord Batterslee?”

Marianne shook her head. “No. It was very odd. He was—well, he seemed rather amused by the thought that I was a thief. A most peculiar man. When Lord Batterslee came into the study and found us, Lord Lambeth did not say a word about what I had been doing.”

“Thank heavens!” Della replied heartfeltly.

“Yes,” Harrison agreed. “But why?”

“Come now, lad.” Da spoke up for the first time. “Don’t tell me me daughter married a nodcock. Just look at the girl.” He winked at Marianne. “Why, any man worth his salt would let such a beauty get away with a little thievery. That’s why Della’s mother was so successful.” He reached over and patted Betsy’s hand, his eyes twinkling. “She was so pleasing to the eye, they scarcely noticed the blunt leaving their pockets.”

Betsy dimpled girlishly. “Go on, you old charmer.”

Harrison ignored his in-laws’ byplay and looked at Marianne. “Is that it, do you think?”

Marianne could feel her cheeks coloring. “Well…I think he was hoping that I would agree to…ah…some sort of arrangement in return for his silence.”

“The blackguard!” Piers growled, jumping to his feet, his boyish face dark with anger. In the excitement of the moment, he forgot his careful work on his accent and plunged back into the cockney of his roots. “I ought to draw ‘is cork. You mean ‘e offered you a carte blanche?”

“Heavens, no. Oh, Piers, do sit down. Don’t get in such a taking. He never really said anything. It was just, well…” She hesitated, not wanting to tell them about that kiss. Just the thought of it made her go all strange and melting inside. “It was just a feeling I had. Perhaps I was wrong. Because I told him I would not, yet he still did not tell Lord Batterslee.”

Piers snorted. “I know ‘is type. ‘E—I mean, he—just didn’t want to give up his power over you. He’s hoping to wangle his way into your bed, that’s what.”

“That thought occurred to me. But he is bound to see that that is an empty threat. I am afraid that then he will tell Lord Batterslee. Harrison, I’m so worried. I fear I have ruined everything for us. What if he tells Lord Batterslee, and he sets a Bow Street Runner on us? Perhaps we ought to try our luck on the Continent for a few months, as you were talking about last year.”

“But what can they prove?” Harrison pointed out reasonably. “You didn’t steal anything. He didn’t even see you trying to steal something. All he saw was you wandering around, looking at things. That’s not proof.”

“They don’t always need proof,” Da put in, his voice tinged with bitterness. “One word from a lord and—” He drew his forefinger across his throat in an ominous gesture.

“Even if he did not tell the authorities,” Betsy pointed out, “all he has to do is spread it around that Marianne is a thief, and the Game will be ruined. She won’t be received in polite society after that.”

“That’s true.” Harrison rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “But we were on the verge of such opportunity—I hate to throw it away on a mere chance. I think we should wait and see. If we lie low for a few weeks, we might be all right.”

“Do you think so?” Marianne brightened a little. She hated to think that she had ruined their plans for everyone.

Harrison nodded. “Some other pretty young thing’ll come along to tickle his fancy.”

That much was true, Marianne was sure. No nobleman was going to waste his time looking for or thinking about some socially inferior girl. If one was not of their class, there was only one use for a woman, and no doubt he could find other willing participants. Marianne realized that that idea gave her no joy, but she shoved the thought aside. She was, after all, a realist; she had to be.

“He doesn’t know where you live, right?”

“No. I left the party, and I am sure that he did not follow.”

“If we take nothing from Batterslee House, it will lull his suspicions—or at least give him no proof to back them up.”

Marianne sighed. “I am so sorry. I don’t know how I could have been so careless.”

“It happens to all of us,” Harrison assured her kindly. “The main thing is that nothing happened to you.”

“Thank you. But it would have been a nice bit of change. They had some beautiful things.”

“I am sure it wasn’t all a loss. You met some people, didn’t you?”

Marianne nodded. “A few. Lady Ursula Castlereigh and her daughter. I talked to the daughter at some length.”

“There? That will get you entré into other places. You see if it doesn’t. And if not…” Harrison shrugged. “Well, we’ll try the Continent, as you said, or go back to Bath.”

Piers groaned. “Not Bath! There’s nothing but old ladies there.”

Harrison cocked an eyebrow at him. “We aren’t there for your entertainment.”

“I know. I know.” Piers sighed and subsided.

“Well.” Della glanced around. “There is nothing else to do tonight. We will just have to wait and see. I am sure Marianne would like a bite to eat and a good night’s sleep.”

Marianne smiled gratefully at the older woman. “Thank you. I don’t think I could eat anything, truthfully. But the thought of sleep is appealing. Hopefully everything will seem better tomorrow morning.”

The group broke up, starting up the stairs toward their rooms. Marianne, too, started out of the room, but Winny caught her arm. “Stay for a bit, Mary.”

Marianne looked around at her questioningly.

“I—there’s something I need to tell you.”

“What?” Fear clutched at Marianne’s heart. “Is it Rosalind? She’s not sick, is she?”

“No. No. Nothing like that. It’s just…well, I got a letter today. From Ruth Applegate. You remember her, don’t you? She were—was—a scullery maid at the Hall.”

Marianne frowned. In referring to the Hall, Marianne knew that Winny meant the Quartermaines’ house, where they had both worked. The look on her friend’s face disturbed her. “Yes, I remember. You were good friends with her. What’s the matter? Did something happen to her?”

“No. She knows that I went to live with you. She wrote to warn you. There’s been a man at the Hall asking about you. She thinks a Bow Street Runner is after you.”

CHAPTER THREE

“A BOW STREET RUNNER!” MARIANNE GASPED. “Sweet Lord, I thought it couldn’t get any worse.”

Winny reached into her pocket and pulled out a piece of paper, which she unfolded to reveal a pencilled scrawl. “It’s very difficult to read. Ruth never learned to read and write very well. What she said, I think, was, ‘There was a man—two men at—’I think she means different ‘—times. They was asking about Mary C. But nobody knows about her, and I didn’t tell. I thought I should warn you. Bow Street Runners’.”

“Could we have been found out? Has someone—but no. No one I’ve met the past few years would know I was Mary Chilton or that I worked for the Quartermaines.”

Winny nodded. “I know. It’s got to be someone from the past.”

“But who? Why?”

“Do you—do you think it could be your family?” Winny asked tentatively, voicing every orphan’s dream. “If they went to St. Anselm’s, they’d have told them you’d gone on to the Hall.”

“After all this time?” Marianne suppressed the little spurt of hope that had leapt up in her at Winny’s words. It was foolish to think that there was family who wanted her after so many years. “I haven’t any family, or they would have looked for me years ago. It’s been over twenty years.”

“Maybe they didn’t know. Maybe you were stolen from them.”

Marianne smiled. “That’s a child’s dream. I used to tell myself that that was what had happened, that my parents were still alive, still wanted me, that a wicked person had taken me from them. But that’s nonsense. It’s the stuff of dramas. Why would someone steal a child and then drop it at an orphanage? Besides, she said ‘warn.’ There must have been something sinister about the man.”

“Well, if Ruth thinks he’s a Bow Street Runner, then she would think he’s wantin’ to arrest you.” Winny gnawed at her lip. “It worries me.”

“It is unsettling,” Marianne agreed. “If someone who knew me as Mary Chilton, who knew I was only an orphan and a housemaid, saw me masquerading as a lady, they could have guessed, I suppose, that I was doing something havey-cavey.”

“And gone to the trouble of hiring a Bow Street Runner?” Winny asked skeptically. The Bow Street Runners, though they pursued criminals, had to be hired.

“That seems rather absurd, too, doesn’t it? The thing is, if it was someone we nabbed a few things from, someone with the blunt to hire a Bow Street Runner, they would know me as Mrs. Cotterwood. They wouldn’t send the man to Quartermaine Hall looking for Mary Chilton.”

“Maybe it was someone like you said, who saw you and had known you as Mary Chilton.” Winny’s eyes widened as a thought struck. “Maybe it was someone who had visited the Hall, and when they saw you again, they knew you were a housemaid.”

“You think they would remember a maid that well?”

“One that looks like you, they would,” Winny replied bluntly. “And then they saw you at a party, say, in Bath.”

“And when some things went missing, they suspected me?” Marianne nodded thoughtfully. “That makes sense. But they had been introduced to me as Cotterwood. They would have looked for me under that name. Surely they would not have remembered my name from ten years ago.”

“But what if they looked for Mrs. Cotterwood and couldn’t find you? What if it was after we came back to London?”

“So they decided to trace me through the Quartermaines.” Marianne sighed. “Oh, Lord! As if things weren’t bad enough! Winny, what should I do? If I’ve brought the Bow Street Runners down upon us—” Tears sprang into her eyes. “I’m ruining everything!”

“No, you’re not,” Winny assured her friend stoutly. “They’ve all made ever so much more money because of you, and you know it. This is just a patch of bad luck. It happens sometimes. You couldn’t help it if someone recognized you.” She smiled and added, “Cheer up. Maybe it’ll turn out to be your long-lost relations after all. The gypsies took you, and they just now found out where you went.”

Marianne smiled. “Perhaps. Well, there’s nothing I can do about it now. And apparently they found a dead end at the Hall, so they won’t know where to come looking for me.” She reached out and hugged Winny. “Thank you. I don’t know what I would do without you.”

“Don’t be daft. It’s me who’d a been lost without you. Go on with you, now. You need to be getting to bed.”

Marianne nodded and went upstairs, but before she went to her bedroom, she stopped at the small room next door to hers and tiptoed inside. The curtains were open, as Rosalind liked them, and moonlight cast a pale wash across the room. Marianne moved to the side of the bed and stood for a moment gazing down at her daughter. Rosalind’s dark curly hair had escaped from her braid, as was usually the case, and spilled across her pillow. Long, dark eyelashes shadowed her porcelain cheeks, and the little rosebud mouth was open slightly. She was a handful during the day, smart and lively, full of questions about everything, but now she looked like an angel. Marianne reached down and moved the covers up over her shoulders and brushed a kiss across her forehead. She might despise the man who had done this to her, but she had never felt anything but an intense love for this child. Rosalind was her life, and the desire to protect her and nurture her was always uppermost in her mind. Whoever this man was looking for her, and whatever he wanted, she must make sure that nothing he did harmed Rosalind.

Finally she turned and left her daughter’s room, slipping down the hall to her bedroom. She undressed quickly and efficiently, hanging her dress in the wardrobe and placing her thin slippers in the neat row on the floor of the wardrobe. She pulled on a plain cotton nightgown, at odds with the expensive dress she had worn this evening, then set about the task of taking down her hair and brushing it out. Before she got into bed, she opened the small japanned box on her dresser. Inside lay her small assortment of jewelry. She lifted out a compartment and reached underneath it to pull out a locket. It was a gold locket on a simple chain, not the chain that had come with it, for that had long since been too short and she had replaced it. But the locket itself had been with her since she could remember; she had kept it through thick and thin, refusing to sell it even when she was starving. It was all she had of her past life.

The front of the locket was engraved with an ornate M, and when she slid her thumbnail between the edges, it came open to reveal two miniature portraits. Marianne sank down on the stool in front of the dresser and gazed at the man and woman pictured inside the locket. She was certain that the couple were her parents, though she could not be sure that she actually remembered them or only thought she did from having gazed at the pictures so many times. Sometimes she fancied she saw a resemblance in her own chin and mouth to the woman in the portrait, but she could not be sure whether it was real or only wishful thinking. Certainly neither one of them had her flaming red hair. Still, she knew they must be her parents—even though a cynic would have pointed out that parents wealthy enough to have miniature portraits drawn for a locket would have been unlikely to have left no provision for their child.

This locket had been her talisman all through the dark, dreary days at the orphanage. She had worn it under her dress every day and even slept with it on. As the years had passed, she had gradually forgotten whatever her life had been before the orphanage. She thought she remembered the woman in the portrait laughing, and she remembered a permeating sense of fear, of running and being so scared she thought her heart would burst. That, she thought, must have been when she was brought to the orphanage. But she could no longer remember arriving at St. Anselm’s or who had brought her there, and, of course, the matron had steadfastly refused to answer her questions about the event. She was not even sure if Mary Chilton had been her real name or merely one the orphanage had given her.

Marianne rubbed her thumb over the delicate tracery in an old habit, remembering the stories she had made up about her parents to help sustain her. She had imagined them wealthy and noble and very loving. A wicked man had stolen her from them and taken her to St. Anselm’s, but she knew that her parents were still out there looking for her. They would never give up.

She smiled a little sadly and set the locket back into its case. Children’s stories, that was all they were. No one was searching for her to bring her back to her family. Her only family was here: her daughter, Rosalind, and Winny and the others. Yet, as she climbed into bed and settled down to sleep, she could not quite still the ache in her heart for the family she had never known.

LORD LAMBETH GAZED DOWN INTO THE brandy snifter, circling it idly in his hand, and watched the liquid swirl around the balloon glass. Marianne Cotterwood. Who the devil was she?

He found it decidedly irritating that she had managed to slip away from him. Justin was not accustomed to being thwarted, least of all by a woman. Women usually hung upon his every word, smiling and fluttering their lashes, eager to be the one on whom he decided to settle his sizable fortune. He was cynical enough to realize that while his good looks might make the effort more palatable, it was his money that was the real lure. Marriageable girls had been after him since he reached his majority ten years ago. The truth was that he found all of them dead bores, and the thought of shackling himself to one of them for the rest of his life was enough to make him shiver. He supposed that someday, when he could delay it no longer, he would marry Cecilia Winborne, as she and his parents expected. Her family was equal to his in birth—or close enough to it to make the match a good one—and a future Duke had to produce a few heirs, after all. Then, of course, they would go their separate ways, and he would have mistresses to counteract Cecilia’s coldness.

Women of lighter virtue, of course, were rather more fun, not bound by the rigid rules of propriety that afflicted their more genteel sisters, but he found them just as vapid, primarily interested in their looks and his pocketbook, with few thoughts in their head. His friend Buckminster sometimes teased him that he should try his luck with a bluestocking female if he was so interested in intelligence, but the truth was that they were as serious and dull in their own way—and usually without the spark of beauty to ignite his interest.

The truth was, he had never met a woman who didn’t bore him within a short amount of time—and above all things, Lord Lambeth despised boredom. In fact, tonight he had been just about to leave Lady Batterslee’s rout, having judged it deadly dull, when he caught sight of the redhead.

He had had no idea who she was. He had never seen her before; he knew he would have remembered her if he had. She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Just looking at her across the room had sent a thrill of pure sexual desire through him, and his first thought had been that he wanted to see that flaming mass of hair spread across his pillow. Then she had looked at him in that haughty way, lifting her chin, and had turned away, snubbing him. It was a reaction he was not used to receiving from a woman, and his interest in her had heightened. Nothing that had happened afterward, from discovering that she was an apparent thief to kissing her in Lord Batterslee’s study, had lessened his interest.

He smiled faintly to himself, his lips softening sensually as he remembered their kiss. He rubbed his thumb over the smooth glass of the snifter, wishing it were her skin. This was a woman, he thought, who could hold his interest longer than most. She was somewhat infuriating, of course…Unconsciously, he raised a hand and rubbed it along the cheek that she had slapped. The sting had been well worth it, given the kiss that had preceded it. Her mouth had been soft and sweet, and there had been a certain awkward naïveté to her kiss that had been curiously arousing. It had left him wanting a good deal more—and he intended to have it.

The only problem, of course, was that he hadn’t the slightest idea where to find her. He knew only her name—if she had not been lying to him about that, which was a distinct possibility. Thieves, in his experience, rarely balked at lying. However, she was scarcely the usual thief. She spoke and acted like a gentlewoman. Was she a lady who had fallen on hard times and chosen this way to keep herself afloat? It seemed absurd. More likely she had been blessed with good looks and learned to imitate the upper classes—a lady’s maid, perhaps? Then she had somehow managed to worm her way into Society. But whatever her background, it seemed to Justin a particularly daring and unusual thing for a woman to do. He certainly could not fault her for her courage.

Damn that fool Batterslee for barging in when he did! If only he had had a few more moments with her, Justin was sure that he could have wormed more information out of her, could even have convinced her that he did not intend to use his knowledge of her illegal activities to bludgeon her into coming to his bed. As it was, she thought him the basest of men and had fled without a trace.

He was not without resources, however. He had seen her with Penelope Castlereigh and Lord Buckminster. Perhaps they knew who she was and where she lived. He would make it a point to drop in on Bucky tomorrow and pump him for information. However long it might take, he was determined that he was going to find that girl.

RICHARD MONTFORD, THE SIXTH EARL OF EXMOOR, leaned back in his chair, contemplating the man standing in front of him. “Well, well…It’s been a while since we have talked, hasn’t it? Sit down, sit down.” He waved toward the chair facing his desk. “No need to stand there like a gapeseed.”

The other man shook his head, frowning. He was younger than the Earl, and there was only a hint of gray in his hair yet. He was conservatively dressed, though his clothes were well-tailored, and his features were attractive but not memorable. He was the sort of man one might pass on the street and never notice, but anyone who met him would immediately classify him as a gentleman.

“What is this all about, Montford?” he asked, his voice rough with irritation and something else, perhaps a touch of apprehension. “We are scarcely what one would consider friends any longer.”

“No. One would hardly recognize in you the flamboyant youth I once knew.”

“Flamboyant? Hardly. In a haze of opium and alcohol, more like. But as we both know, I have put that life behind me. I cannot conceive why you should wish to speak to me.”

“It is not so much ‘wish’ as necessity, dear chap. You have heard, I presume, the gossip about this American heiress who married Lord Thorpe, Alexandra Ward?”

“Of course. The Countess’s granddaughter whom everyone thought was dead. Is that what you called me here for—to rehash yesterday’s gossip?”

Richard did not answer except to give him a thin, tight smile that conveyed the opposite of amusement. His visitor looked at him for a moment, trying for an air of unconcern, but the tapping of his fingers against his thigh gave him away.

Finally, when the Earl said nothing else, he burst out, “What the devil does it have to do with me? She is your cousin, not mine.”

“Ah, but your past is intertwined….”

“Not with hers! I never saw the child. You said she was dead.”

“So I believed.” Exmoor’s hazel eyes hardened in his thin, almost ascetic face. “The damned woman lied to me!”

“I don’t know why you care. You had nothing to do with her disappearance. From what I heard it was her mother—her supposed mother—who pretended that she died.”

“Yes, but Alexandra’s return alerted them to the fact that the other two children did not die in Paris, either. The Countess knows that this Ward woman brought them to Exmoor House.”

“But you were not implicated, surely. I thought their disappearance was blamed on this woman who confessed, the Countess’s companion, and she is dead.”

“The Countess suspects me. She knows that I am the only person who would benefit from the boy’s death. For all I know, that fool Miss Everhart told her I was involved.”

“But she cannot prove it, or surely she would have by now.”

“Yes, and I don’t want her to be able to prove anything in the future. She won’t drag the Exmoor name through the mud for no reason, but if she were able to prove that I was involved, even the fear of scandal would not hold her back.”

“How could she possibly prove it? The Everhart woman is dead, and I certainly am not going to say anything. I have as much to lose as you.”

Again the Earl’s lips curled up in a cruel smile. “I know. That is why I sent for you. The Countess is looking for the girl, Marie Anne.”

The other man stiffened, his fidgeting hand going still. After a long moment, he cleared his throat nervously. “She cannot find her.”

“They’ve put a Bow Street Runner on it. I understand that he has tracked her down to the orphanage.”

“St. Anselm’s?” Sweat dotted the man’s lip.

“I’m surprised you remember.”

“How could I forget?” His mouth twisted bitterly. “Not all of us are blessed with your lack of conscience.”

Richard raised one eyebrow. “It wasn’t your boringly pedestrian morality I questioned. Frankly, I’m surprised you remember anything from that time.”

The other man pressed his lips together. “It was a sobering experience.”

“That was what caused you to give up your old life?” Richard’s voice was tinged with amusement.

“Yes. When I found myself standing in my room holding a pistol to my head.”

“How very dramatic.”

“I am sure the scene would have afforded you a great deal of amusement. But I realized then that I had to die or I had to change. I could not go on as I was. I chose to give up my vices. God knows, there were moments in the weeks that followed when I wished that I had pulled the trigger.”

“I, for one, am glad that you did not. I have a task for you.”

“A task?” He looked astonished. “You think that I am going to do something for you? I paid my debt to you when I took those children for you. I wouldn’t lift a finger for you again.”

“Ah, but what about for yourself?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I am not the only one who would suffer if certain details from the past came to light.”

“How could it? The older one, the boy, didn’t even live, did he? He was at death’s door when I left him.”

“The boy is dead,” Richard replied curtly. “That is not the problem. It is the girl.”

“She can’t have been more than five or six. She couldn’t remember.”

“Perhaps not. But if she saw a face—the face of the man who had ripped her from her brother, say, who had taken her to an orphanage and placed her in that hellhole—who is to say that she might not remember then?”

“Surely—you’re not telling me that they have found her.”

Richard shrugged. “I doubt it. Not yet. But I sent a man to St. Anselm’s, too, when I heard that the Countess was looking for the chit. They told me where she went when she left there.”

“Where was that?” The words seemed pulled from him, as if he did not really want to know, yet could not stop himself from asking.

“She went into service with one of the local gentry. Family named Quartermaine.”

“Good God!” He paled a trifle. “The daughter of generations of earls, a maid.”

“Mmm. Ironic, isn’t it?”

“Tragic, I would say.”

“She was cast out of the Quartermaine house—pregnant.”

The other man closed his eyes. “God forgive me.”

“God may, but I doubt the polite world would.”

“I did not want to!” he lashed out, goaded. “You know I tried to argue you out of it. Sweet Jesus, when I handed the little thing over to that dragon of a matron, and she was kicking and screaming and crying….” His hands clenched into fists at his sides.

“Yet you did it.”

“You made me! It was the only way I could wipe clean my debt to you. You kept giving me the money, urging me to take it, and I couldn’t stop myself. I had to have that sweet oblivion.”

“I hardly forced it on you. You begged me for the money, shaking and sweating, the color of a corpse. What else could a friend have done? As I remember, at the time you praised me for my generosity.”

“I did not know then why you did it! How you got people in your debt and made them do wicked things! How you twisted and crushed them into monsters scarcely recognizable as themselves.”

“Really. Dear fellow…do you think you would have done it if you hadn’t had it in you already? You could have refused, you know.”

“I know.” Self-disgust filled his voice. “I was weak.”

Richard did not comment. He could have pointed out that the man was still weak or he would not have come in answer to his summons. But there wasn’t any point in antagonizing him unduly. It might put his back up enough to give him some spine.

“Do you think that will help you any? If people know that you took Chilton’s daughter from her family and put her in an orphanage because you had to have money for opium? For gambling and drinking and whoring? Do you think they will feel any sympathy for you?” Richard asked. When the other man glared at him, he went on, “Quite so. You and I both know what would happen to this exemplary little life that you have built up if the ton knew what you had done. Oh, no doubt some people with long memories still can recall that you were wild in your youth—so many men are, and then sober up and become responsible citizens. But none of them know about this.”

“What are you threatening? To tell everyone what I did? It will only implicate you!”

“Oh, no, I shan’t tell…not unless I am forced to. But if the Countess’s man finds the girl…if she tells everyone what happened, and I am brought down because of it, I promise you, I shan’t go down alone. I will take you with me.”

“You are disgusting.”

“What has that to do with the matter at hand? And just think, what if this girl identifies you? You are the one who took her there, you know, the last face she saw. It is you she will remember best.”

“I tell you, she won’t remember! You forget the things that happened to you when you were a child.”

“Even something that changed your life forever? I don’t know. It seems to me to be something she might remember. Or say she chanced to meet you and at the sight of your face those long forgotten memories came back? But if you are willing to risk it…” He shrugged eloquently.

“Damn you! What is it you want of me?”

“I want you to make sure that the Countess’s man doesn’t find her.”

“And how am I supposed to find her?”

“That will not be so very hard. All the servants disclaimed knowledge of her whereabouts, but one of the grooms pulled him aside and told him some interesting facts—for a price, of course. The world is so venal. It seems that little Mary Chilton—yes, that is what she called herself—had a special friend among the other servants, another maid named Winny Thompson. A couple of years after Mary left, this Winny apparently came into some good fortune. She received a letter, and promptly after that she quit her job and took the stage to London. He says the rumor was that Mary had found some means to support herself and had invited her dear friend to come live with her. My man paid him to keep the information to himself, and then he tracked this Winny Thompson to London. It seems that one of the maids gets letters from her every so often, and the housekeeper has seen the most recent address.”

“So he found…Mary?”

“I think so. He found Winny Thompson, in any case. She is the housekeeper for an apparent family, one of whom is a ‘widow’ with a nine-year-old daughter. That is the right age for Mary Chilton’s ‘delicate condition.’ The supposed widow’s name is Marianne Cotterwood. She is in her mid-twenties, and her hair is a bright red.”

The other man groaned.

“Yes. It sounds very much like the girl we seek.”

“If your man has found out so much, why don’t you have him keep her away from the Countess? He sounds quite competent.”

“Oh, he is. He is. But there are two problems. One is that I would like to make sure that Mrs. Cotterwood really is the woman I seek. The other is that I do not like to hire someone for an operation as delicate as this. A paid servant of that type can so easily turn around and gouge more money from you for being silent, you see. You, on the other hand, could scarcely extort money by threatening to break your silence. That is why I realized that you would be the perfect man for the job.”

“What is it you want me to do—pay her to leave London before the Countess’s man can find her?”

“An easy solution, of course, but too unreliable. I find that people so rarely keep their word.”

“Then what am I supposed to do?” he asked, his patience obviously wearing thin.

“It’s quite simple. This woman appears to a gentlewoman, not a former maid. She moves in your sort of circle. You could easily meet her and ascertain whether she is, in fact, the woman we seek. Then…”

He paused and fixed a gaze of pure iron on the man. “Then you will kill her.”

CHAPTER FOUR

MARIANNE SMILED DOWN AT HER DAUGHTER. One of her favorite things was teaching Rosalind, who had a quick mind and a ready wit. At nine, Marianne thought she was approaching the age where she would need a tutor. The Quartermaine girls had had a beleaguered governess, a round little brown wren of a woman over whom the three girls had run roughshod. Though Marianne’s knowledge was adequate for the basic subjects she had been teaching up until now—and she could still, with her extensive reading, do a passable job of teaching literature and history—she knew that to be educated as a lady was, she needed someone who could teach music and drawing adequately, as well as mathematics, French, and possibly Latin, as well. Marianne had always thirsted for knowledge. Though the orphanage had seen to it that they were able to read, write and do figures, they had been given no opportunity to venture into the upper realms of education. Most of what Marianne had learned she had gotten from books, which she had read over and over at every opportunity.

They were in the kitchen, books and tablets spread out on the table, deep in a lesson combining vocabulary, spelling and handwriting. Across the table from them, Betsy was enjoying a late morning cup of tea, while Winny, with help from Della, was beginning to prepare dinner. Rosalind, tongue firmly between her teeth, was carefully writing with the stub of a pencil.

“Beautiful,” Marianne encouraged her, watching the copperplate writing slowly unfold. “Now what is that word?”

“S-p-e-c-u-l-a-t-e. Speculate.”

“Very good. Do you know what it means?”

Rosalind looked at her, her big blue eyes, so like her mother’s, serious in her small face. “Mmm. Is it like speculation?”

“Yes. Speculation is the noun form of the word. Speculate is the verb. Do you know what speculation is?”

Rosalind nodded, pleased that she knew the answer. “Yes. Gran taught me yesterday evening when you were gone.”

“Gran?” Marianne turned toward Betsy, who was the only grandmother Rosalind had ever known. Betsy, who had only a rudimentary education, hardly seemed the type to engage in vocabulary lessons.

Betsy gazed back at her guilelessly, her hand halting with the cup of tea halfway to her lips. Marianne’s eyes narrowed. “All right, Roz. Exactly what is speculation?”

“Well, it’s where you ante up a certain amount of money. Gran and I did a ha’pence. Only the dealer antes up double. Then he gives everyone three cards, and—”

“A card game?” Marianne swung to Betsy. “You were teaching her a card game?”

Betsy shrugged. “Just a simple one, to pass the time.”

“It was fun, Mama, and I even won!” Rosalind said excitedly. “Gran says one day she’ll teach me loo, but that takes five people, and we couldn’t get the others to play. They’re always too fidgety when you’re at a party.”

“Betsy, I told you about teaching Rosalind to gamble!”

“She has a natural gift,” Betsy protested. “It’s a shame, it is, to waste it. I never met anyone who caught on faster.”

“Rosalind is not going to be a cardsharp.”

“Of course not. But it never hurts to be able to pick up a little pocket money when you need it.”

Marianne groaned and closed her eyes. She heard a muffled snort and looked over to see Winny and Della smothering their laughter.

“Go ahead and laugh, all of you,” Marianne grumbled.

“I’m sorry, Mary,” Winny said, still smiling. “It’s just—she looked so cute, sitting there, holding those cards and dealing them like a professional.”

Marianne could well imagine it, and even her own lips twitched at the thought. “Honestly, Betsy,” she said, trying to remain stern. “She is only nine years old.”

“I know. That’s what makes it so amazing. I’d ‘a thought she was much older, the way she played.”

Marianne smiled. “Well, in the future, please, could you teach her something besides gambling games? And don’t teach her any of your tricks, either.”

Betsy widened her eyes innocently. “Tricks? Why would I teach the child any tricks?”

“You taught me one last week,” Rosalind pointed out. “You know, about how if you prick the ace with a pin, you can feel it as you deal, but it doesn’t show, and—”

“Betsy! That’s exactly what I’m talking about.”

Betsy shrugged. “Well, of course, if that’s what you want. But it seems to me that a girl can always use a leg up, if you know what I mean.”

Shaking her head, Marianne resumed the lesson. It was useless, she knew, to try to get Betsy to understand the desire she had for Rosalind to lead a normal life. She didn’t know how she was going to achieve it, but Marianne was determined that Rosalind grow up not knowing poverty and want and lack of love—or the fear of living outside the law.

The rest of the lesson passed without incident, for Rosalind wanted no delays for her afternoon treat: Piers had promised to take her to fly kites. Promptly after dinner, they set off, and Marianne, faced with the prospect of an afternoon free, decided to visit the lending library.

It was one of her favorite things to do. She loved to read, a habit that everyone else in the house found a trifle odd. She was used to that attitude. All the children in the orphanage had found it even stranger. She had hidden her reading from everyone at the Quartermaine house, sneaking books out of the library in the Hall and spending her entire afternoon off reading in a special place she liked to go down by the brook. When she moved to London and started living with Harrison and Della, she had discovered the joys of a lending library.

So she tied her bonnet beneath her chin and set off. When she was a half block from the lending library, she saw a young lady walking toward her, trailed properly by her maid. As she drew closer, she recognized the young woman’s features.

“Miss Castlereigh!” Marianne was surprised by the quiet leap of pleasure she felt upon seeing the woman she had met the night before.

Penelope, who had been walking along with her eyes down, glanced up, and a smile lit her face. “Mrs. Cotterwood! What a pleasant surprise.”

“Yes. Isn’t it? I was just on my way to the lending library.” Marianne looked at the book Penelope carried. “It looks as though that is where you have been.”

“Yes, it is.” Penelope’s smile grew wider. “Do you enjoy reading, too?”

“Oh, yes,” Marianne confessed. “It is my favorite pastime.”

“Really? Me, too.” Penelope looked delighted at finding a fellow bibliophile. “Mama calls me a bookworm. But books are so much more…exciting than real life. Don’t you think?” Her eyes shone behind her spectacles. “I am quite addicted to the gothic sort of books, with mad monks and haunted castles and evil counts. One never finds that sort of thing in real life.”

“No.” Marianne dimpled. “Though I expect we should not enjoy it so much if it really happened to us.”

“I’m sure you are right.” They stood for a few minutes, chatting about their favorite books. Then Penelope reached out a hand impulsively and touched Marianne’s arm. “Do come visit me, won’t you? We can talk about books and such. I would love for you to meet my friend Nicola, as well. I am sure you would like her.” She hesitated uncertainly. “I—I hope I’m not too forward.”

“Goodness, no. I would be delighted to come.” It was an opportunity that Marianne would not dream of passing up, but she knew that she would have agreed even if it had helped her not at all. She liked this shy girl, and it was an unusual pleasure for her to get to talk to someone about books.

“That’s wonderful.” Penelope told her where she lived, a tony Mayfair address that confirmed Marianne’s initial impression of her mother’s social standing.

Behind Penelope, the maid stirred and said warningly, “Miss…”

“Yes, I know, Millie.” Penelope smiled apologetically at Marianne. “I wish we could talk longer, but I am supposed to meet Mother at my grandmother’s house, and I don’t want to be late.”

“Then I won’t keep you.” Marianne felt sure that the fierce Lady Ursula would ring quite a peal over her daughter’s head if she inconvenienced her.

“But you will come to see me?”

“I promise.” Marianne said her goodbyes and continued on her way to the lending library.

PENELOPE TURNED AND HURRIED OFF toward her grandmother’s house. She knew that her mother would not be well pleased at her making friends with someone she barely knew, and she did not want to make it worse by arriving late.

Rushing into the drawing room of her grandmother’s house, however, she found her mother in a pleasant mood. Lady Ursula smiled at Penelope, saying, “There you are, dear. My goodness, you look quite flushed. These girls…” She flashed a coy look across the room at the two men who had stood up when Penelope entered the room. “Always running about, looking at frills and geegaws.”

Penelope, following her mother’s gaze, understood Lady Ursula’s mellow attitude. Lord Lambeth and Lord Buckminster had come to call on her grandmother, the Countess of Exmoor, and while Lady Ursula dismissed Bucky as a “fribble,” she, like most of the other women in Society, was dazzled by Lord Lambeth. Penelope groaned inwardly. Frankly, Lord Lambeth made her a trifle ill at ease, and she was certain that he had absolutely no interest in her, despite her mother’s fond hopes regarding London’s most eligible bachelor. Though he was polite to her, the only reason he called on them was because he was friends with Bucky.

“Actually, I was getting a book from the lending library,” Penelope corrected her.

Lady Ursula frowned at her horribly. “Now, dear, you don’t want the gentlemen thinking you’re a bluestocking, do you?”

“I’m sure I don’t know why she should care.” The Countess spoke up for the first time. “Any man worth having admires a woman with a brain. Isn’t that right, Lord Lambeth?”

“But of course, my lady,” Justin replied smoothly. “After all, look how much you are admired.”

The Countess laughed. She was a tall, regal woman whom age had bent only a little, and it was clear that she had been a beauty when she was younger. “You are such a flatterer, Lord Lambeth. Fortunately, you are quite good at it.” She turned to her granddaughter. “Come here, child, and give me a kiss and show me what book you got.”

Penelope did as she was bid, kissing the Countess’s cheek and dropping onto the low stool beside her chair. While the Countess took her book from her hand and examined it, Penelope decided that it was better to get her news out now while her mother’s protestations would be tempered by the fact that Lord Lambeth was present.

“I met Mrs. Cotterwood while I was out,” she began.

Both Buckminster and Lambeth straightened at her announcement.

“Did you?” Buckminster asked admiringly. “By Jove, I might have known you would be the one who’d know how to find her. You always were a downy one.”

At his words, Lambeth turned and looked at him consideringly. “Were you trying to find her, then?”

“Well, I—that is—” Color rose in Buckminster’s cheeks. Finally he said, “Thought Nicola would probably want to invite her to her little soiree on Friday. You know. Have to send an invitation.”

“Ah. I see.” Justin thought that he did see, indeed. It was rare for his friend to be so interested in a woman. That certainly complicated the matter a bit. He glanced over at Penelope and saw that she, too, was watching Bucky, a wistful look on her face. He wondered what she made of it.

“Who?” Lady Ursula demanded. “Who is this Mrs. Cotterwood?”

“You know, Mama, the lady we met last night at the party. That woman you know, Mrs. Willoughby, introduced us.”

“I scarcely know Mrs. Willoughby—encroaching woman! I doubt that any friend of hers is someone we want to know.”

“Perhaps she is no more a friend of Mrs. Willoughby’s than you are,” Penelope suggested.

Her mother’s eyes narrowed, somewhat suspicious that Penelope in her quiet way was making game of her. But Lord Buckminster said seriously, “There you go. Probably Mrs. Willoughby was encroaching to her, too. Mrs. Cotterwood is perfectly respectable, I’m sure.”

Lady Ursula’s pursed mouth made clear her opinion of Lord Buckminster’s ability to judge respectability. She turned toward Lord Lambeth. “Is she known to your family, Lord Lambeth?”

“Oh, yes,” Justin replied easily. “I’ve been acquainted with Mrs. Cotterwood for some time.”

Penelope shot him a grateful look as Lady Ursula remarked, somewhat reluctantly, “I suppose that she is all right, then.”

“I invited her to call on us,” Penelope went on, pressing her point.

“Without asking me first?”

“Well, you were not there,” Penelope pointed out reasonably, “and I quite liked her.”

“Are you going to call on her, Pen?” Lord Buckminster asked, blithely unaware of Lady Ursula’s disapproving look at his use of Penelope’s nickname. “I would be happy to escort you.”

“I’m afraid I cannot. I don’t know where she lives,” Penelope confessed. “She did not tell me, and I didn’t think to ask.”

Buckminster’s face fell so ludicrously that Lambeth had to smother a laugh.

“Who is she?” the Countess asked. “Have I met her?”

“I don’t think so, Grandmama. She is very nice—and she’s beautiful, as well.”

“Ah. A rare combination, to be sure.” Lady Exmoor smiled at her granddaughter.

“Yes. But that isn’t even the best part. She likes to read. We had a nice chat about books. She had read this one I borrowed, and she said it was thrilling. In fact, that’s where I met her. I was coming from the lending library, and she was going to it.”

“I hope I shall meet her.” The Countess looked across at Lord Buckminster, who seemed to have sunk into a gloom, and Lord Lambeth, whose attention was focused on a tiny piece of lint he was picking from his trousers. “But I am afraid we are boring our visitors. Lord Buckminster came to see if we had had any word from Thorpe and Alexandra.”

“Oh! And have you?” Penelope’s interest was diverted.

“Yes. I got a letter from Alexandra this morning. They are still in Italy on their honeymoon—Venice now, it seems. She waxed quite ecstatic over the beauty of it, but she did say that they planned to come home shortly.”

“Good. I shall like to see her again.”

“Yes. I say, that will be bang-up,” Lord Buckminster agreed, abandoning his glumness. “Thorpe’s a good chap.” He paused. “Lady Thorpe, too, of course—well, what I meant was, not a chap, of course, but still—though I don’t know her all that well—I mean—”

“Yes, Bucky,” Lady Ursula stuck in blightingly. “I feel sure we all know what you meant to say.”

“Er—yes. Quite.” Buckminster subsided.

“I feel sure you will be very glad to have Lady Thorpe back, Lady Castlereigh,” Lord Lambeth said blandly to Ursula, observing her through half-closed lids.

The Countess smiled faintly and carefully avoided looking at her daughter. Lady Ursula colored. Most people in the ton knew how little she had believed that Alexandra Ward was her long-lost niece when the American heiress had arrived in London a few months ago, and how vigorously she had fought against the Countess’s accepting her as such. When finally it had been proved, she had given in with ill grace.

“Of course I will,” she told Lord Lambeth, reproof tinting her voice. “Now that I am sure that Alexandra is really Chilton’s child, I am fond of her, as I am of everyone in my family.”

“Naturally.” Given the fact that he had never seen any evidence of true fondness from Lady Ursula toward her daughter or son, Lambeth supposed that perhaps she was as fond of Alexandra as she was of others in her family.

He did not know all the facts of the case, not being close friends with the family or Lord Thorpe. However, ample gossip had passed around the ton this Season for him to know that the Countess’s son, Lord Chilton, and his French-born wife had been visiting in France at the outbreak of the revolution twenty-two years earlier. They and their three children had been reported dead, killed by the mob. This spring, at the beginning of the Season, an American woman had shown up in London and had somehow proved that she was in reality Lord Chilton’s youngest child. It had ended with the long-lost heiress marrying Lord Thorpe. The whole story, in Lambeth’s opinion, sounded like something out of a lurid novel of the sort Penelope professed to enjoy.

Lambeth’s purpose in persuading Buckminster to call on Penelope and her family had been accomplished. He had not found out the secretive Mrs. Cotterwood’s location, but he had discovered all that was to be gotten out of Penelope. It would be enough, he reasoned. A book lover—not what he had expected of that redheaded temptress—would return to the same lending library. A servant set to watch the place would soon find out where she lived.

Accordingly, Lambeth took his leave, having no wish to endure Lady Ursula’s presence any longer than was absolutely necessary. As soon as the front door closed behind him and Lord Buckminster, Lady Ursula turned on her daughter, scowling.

“Really, Penelope! Did you have to go on about those silly novels? One would think you could have made a little effort to impress Lord Lambeth.”

“Oh, Mama, Lord Lambeth has no interest in me,” Penelope replied, flushing with embarrassment. “I wish you would not say such things.”

Lady Ursula sighed. “Sometimes I quite despair of you, Penelope. Any other girl would have at least made a push to be appealing.”

“What nonsense, Ursula,” the Countess put in. “Lord Lambeth and Penelope would not suit at all. I wonder you can even think of such a match.”

“Would not suit? How could a marquess with a family back to the Invasion and barrels full of money possibly not suit?”

“I am sure I would not suit him, Mama. Everyone says he will eventually marry Cecilia Winborne, and even if he did not, well, I am sure that I am hardly his style.”

“Who a man flirts with and who he marries are two entirely different things,” Lady Ursula said pedantically. “Our family is as old and genteel as one could hope to find—the equal of Lord Lambeth’s and certainly better than the Winbornes, I should hope.”

Penelope gave up the struggle. She had found out long ago that it was useless to try to make her mother see reason. Her grandmother spoke quickly to forestall Ursula, who was gathering herself for another attack.

“Of course we are,” Lady Exmoor said. “Indeed, I wonder that you should think a Montford should marry an upstart like the Duke of Storbridge’s son.”

Ursula turned a startled gaze to her mother, then grimaced as she saw the twinkle in the Countess’s eyes. “Really, Mother, this is scarcely something to joke about.”

“I think it is precisely the sort of the thing to joke about. As if Penelope would want to marry Lord Lambeth. Do let us stop talking such nonsense.” She turned back to Penelope. “I have had a report from the Runner I set on finding Marie Anne.”

“Did he have any luck?” Penelope asked eagerly.

Lady Exmoor sighed. “Partially. I had told you that he found an orphanage outside London where a child named Mary Chilton had been taken, and it was the right time. When he went there, he found that the matron was retired, but one of her assistants still worked there, and she remembered the child. ‘Redheaded spitfire,’ was the way she put it.” A smile trembled on the older woman’s lips, and Penelope saw moisture in her eyes. “That sounds like Marie. He managed to worm out of them where the child went when she left the orphanage.”

The Countess paused and swallowed hard before she could continue. “She went into service at a local house.”

“Oh, no!” Penelope cried, reaching out and taking her grandmother’s hand. Lady Exmoor squeezed it hard, pressing her lips together to stop their trembling. “That’s awful! I mean, well, to think of my cousin having to scrub and clean.”

“Yes. For nobodies like those Quartermaines,” Lady Ursula added, her indignation roused by the slight on the family. “I’ve never even heard of them.”

“Local gentry,” Lady Exmoor explained. “Still, I don’t suppose it really matters who they are. The real problem is that she left there a few years later, and no one seems to know where she went. The trail just vanishes.”

“So that’s the end of it?” Penelope asked, disappointed.

“The housekeeper told him that she was friends with another maid. But that girl is gone from the house, too. The servants and family seem to be an unusually reticent lot. The Runner is inclined to think that there was perhaps some scandal involved in her leaving.”

Penelope’s eye widened. “This is terrible.”

The Countess sighed. “Well, at least the other man would have had no better luck, I guess. That’s the only bright side.”

“What other man?”

“There had been someone else at the Quartermaine house asking questions about Mary Chilton before my fellow came. The housekeeper remarked on it, wondering why so many people were suddenly interested in her.”

“And you think this other man is from—the Earl?”

Lady Exmoor’s mouth tightened. “I am sure of it. Who else would be looking for her? He knows I suspect him of having gotten rid of Marie Anne and Johnny—oh, if only that wicked woman had lived!”

Penelope knew to what woman her grandmother referred. It was her grandmother’s cousin and former companion, Willa Everhart. Recently, on her deathbed, Miss Everhart had confessed that twenty-two years earlier, she had conspired against the Countess to keep her grandchildren from her. During the dark days in Paris, after the storming of the Bastille, the Countess’s son, Lord Chilton, and his wife had been killed by the mob, who had mistaken them for French aristocrats. The reports that had come back to London had said that Chilton’s three children had been killed, as well. But in fact they had not died, but had been smuggled out of France and brought to London by an American friend of Lady Chilton’s, Rhea Ward. Mrs. Ward, lonely and unable to bear a child herself, had taken the baby, Alexandra, as her own and raised her in the United States, but she had brought the older two, John and Marie Anne, to the Countess’s home.

The Countess, prostrate with grief over the deaths of her son and the supposed deaths of his children, had taken to her bed and refused all visitors, so Miss Everhart had been the one who spoke to Mrs. Ward and took the two children from her. Mrs. Ward then left the country, thinking the children safe with their grandmother, but Miss Everhart had played the Countess false. Desperately in love with Richard Montford, the distant cousin who had become the Earl of Exmoor upon the death of Chilton and the supposed death of his son John, the true heir, she had taken the children to Richard instead. The existence of the boy John, she knew, would mean that her lover would lose the title and estates, and she counted on his gratitude for what she had done to tie him to her. The boy, Willa had told them as she lay dying, had been very sick with a fever and had died. The girl Marie, however, had been taken to an orphanage.

The Countess had immediately hired a Bow Street Runner to investigate Marie’s whereabouts, but she had realized that there was little she could do about Richard’s treachery. Willa had died immediately after telling them her story, and they had no proof or witnesses to show that the present Earl of Exmoor was the villain they all knew he was. He, of course, had denied the story and claimed that Willa was a madwoman who had undoubtedly acted on her own—if there was any truth to the story in the first place. Since the boy John was dead, even though not at the time or place they had thought, Richard was still the legal holder of the title. To accuse him of kidnapping the children and murdering John, as the Countess suspected, would do nothing but involve the family in an enormous scandal.

“But why would Richard be searching for her?” Lady Ursula asked, puzzled. “Richard doesn’t give a whit about her. I would think he would just as soon she stayed lost.”

“I am sure he does,” the Countess agreed dryly. “I think it is precisely for that reason that he is searching for her—to make sure she stays lost.”

Penelope sucked in a startled breath. “You mean…you think that he will kill her?”

“It’s not something I would put past him. I am sure he is desperate to maintain the lie that he has lived all these years. At the very least, he will put her on ship and send her off to America or India or some other remote place where I cannot locate her. She was five when it happened, after all. There might be some hope that she would remember what happened to her—or who had turned her over to the orphanage. She might even remember what happened to her brother.”

“Oh, my. I certainly hope that he doesn’t find her, then. Is there nothing further we can do?”

“Mr. Garner—that is the man whom I hired—says that he will try to track down this friend of Mary Chilton’s, Winny something-or-other. The housekeeper did know that she moved to London, though no one had any idea where she lived. Another one of the maids was friends with her but told Garner that she did not know where this Winny was now—even after Garner offered her money. But even if he finds the friend, I hold little hope that she will know where Mary Chilton is. After all, it has been over nine years since Mary left the Quartermaine house.”

None of what she had told them sounded good, Penelope thought, but she tried to put the best face on it that she could. She patted her grandmother’s hand. “Don’t worry, Grandmama. I am sure she will turn up just as Alexandra did. We Montfords are a trifle hard to do away with, you know.”

Lady Exmoor smiled at her. “Thank you, dear. I am sure you are right. We will find her.”

“Let us only hope it is before Richard does.” Lady Ursula, as always, had to have the last word.

MARIANNE LAID DOWN HER CARDS WITH a sigh. “You win—as usual, Betsy.”

“Hmmph.” The old lady narrowed her eyes. “It was easy enough. What’s bothering you, child? You played even more poorly than you normally do.”

Marianne smiled a little ruefully. “Nothing. It is just anxiety…not knowing, you see, whether Lord Lambeth will forget about me or go to the authorities. I don’t like this inactivity.”

In truth, she knew it was more than that, though she did not want to tell Betsy about her vague insecurities. The odd letter from Winny’s friend had disturbed her more than she cared to admit. Over the past few days, her thoughts had kept returning to it. What could this stranger want with her? It had stirred up memories, too, things from her days at the orphanage and at the Hall that she would just as soon forget. She kept thinking of that day when Daniel Quartermaine had cornered her in his bedroom as she was dusting his room, of the way he had begun to kiss and caress her, not letting her go when she told him no. She had finally begun to struggle, frightened, and it was then that he had slapped her and thrown her down on the floor beside the bed. His eyes had lit with a fierce, wild glow that she had not seen there before, and it had terrified her. She remembered the fear and disgust as his hands had moved over her and his tongue had thrust deeply into her mouth.

She could not help but think how differently she had felt the other night when Lord Lambeth kissed her, how her whole insides had turned to melting wax and her blood had hummed in her veins. Lambeth would have turned to force, too, if he had had the chance, she told herself. He was, after all, even more arrogant than young Quartermaine. No doubt he, too, thought that all women ought to feel honored to receive his advances. It did not mean anything that he had released her when she pulled away, or that he had not made a move toward her when she slapped him. It had been merely surprise that she would oppose him that had kept him rooted to the spot.

She remembered his golden eyes darkened with lust, his well-cut lips sensually full and soft, and she felt again that clenching deep in her loins that was both delightful and dissatisfying. It annoyed her that she continued to think about him.

Worse than the thoughts that had been plaguing her, however, was the strange sensation she had felt yesterday as she was walking home from the lending library, where she had gone to return the book she had borrowed two days earlier. As she strolled along, she had begun to have the oddest feeling at the base of her neck. She had stopped and turned, but she saw nothing out of the ordinary, just another person or two walking along as she was. All the way home, she had been unable to get rid of the impression that someone was watching her. Feeling foolish, she had looked around again, but this time there had been no one on the block but her. Still, thinking about the tingling along her spine made her want to shiver.

“Mrs. Cotterwood.” One of their two maids stood hesitantly at the door. “There’s someone here to see you. I—he’s in the foyer.”

Marianne looked at her, surprised. No one ever came to visit her. She eschewed any sort of intimacy with the Society flats. It occurred to her now that a visitor was so rare that the maid wasn’t even sure what she should do with the fellow.

“Thank you, Nettie.” She rose, glancing over at Betsy, who looked back at her with as much puzzlement as Marianne felt. Had the man who had been inquiring after her at the Hall managed to find her? Was it he watching her yesterday when she had felt those odd sensations?

Suppressing her fears as best she could, Marianne rose and went out into the hallway. She stopped cold when she saw the man standing in the foyer, hat in hand, smiling down at her daughter.

Lord Lambeth had found her.

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.