“Grimm, have tea and cakes brought in. Ladies like tea and cakes.”
Grimm said nothing as he turned away, but as he walked down the hall, Stanton was fairly sure he heard his unshakable butler mutter something about serving “venom tea and dragon cakes.”
Stanton returned to the study just long enough to shrug himself into his coat and tuck the papers he’d not been reading into a securely locked drawer. Depositing the key into its usual home in his weskit pocket, he strolled to the green parlor and let himself in.
Lady Alicia Lawrence turned from her position at the window to greet the man she had come so far in the rain to see. Stanton Horne, Marquis of Wyndham—the only man in London who might possibly listen to what she had to say before throwing her back into the street.
He was a handsome one, to be sure. She could safely admire the symmetry of his rather sharply chiseled features without any worry as to whether he found her similarly attractive.
It was uncanny, really, how much more time she had on her hands since she’d stopped worrying about such things. Of course, she had very little to do with that accumulated time . . . but there was no point in crying over milk already spilled.
She found her gaze lingering upon the rather sensual curve of his bottom lip and snapped her attention back to more of an overall view. What sort of man was this Lord Wyndham, whom everyone knew of but no one knew well?
Even she, cut off from Society as she was, knew that he was as wealthy as a king and as mysterious as a dark wizard in his tower. She did not believe the rumors of virgin sacrifices in the attic, but then again, what did she know of virgins?
He looked normal enough, if devastating dark eyes and an iron jawline could be considered normal. His thick, nearly blue-black hair was pulled back into a perfect queue, adding severity to a face that might otherwise be called beautiful.
She admired his adherence to a classic style rather than the tousled Byronic mop most men were sporting these days. Those who adopted any new fashion that came around tended to be easily manipulated. She ought to know, having been such a person herself once upon a hundred years ago. Lord Wyndham did not look as though a hurricane could push him about.
He bowed to her, a correct but minimal bow. She didn’t bother returning the nicety. He’d quit such nonsense soon enough when her reputation came forth. “I am Lady Alicia Lawrence, daughter of the Earl of Sutherland. I have information about an attempt that will be made to kidnap His Highness, the Prince Regent. Are you interested in hearing it, or shall I find someone who cares?”
Stanton felt his curiosity seep away. Oh, drat. She was one of those, the sort that saw conspiracy about every corner. He’d dealt with a few of those irrational people in his years as the Falcon, but this was the first time one of them had sought him out directly.
Which posed yet another question. What had made her think the reclusive Marquis of Wyndham would be interested? Stanton decided that he would very much like to know the answer. After all, he made no practice of publicly being seen to be involved in anything even faintly political.
Perhaps he ought to take Lady Alicia more seriously. “May I have my man take your bonnet?”
She touched her gloved fingertips to her mildewed veil. “I would rather it remain.”
He ought to insist, but she might ask the one question he did not want to answer.
Why?
He had no desire to explain himself, for to do so would only land him in Bedlam. How could he tell this woman that he needed to see her face in order to tell if she was lying? She would ask him how he could possibly know that, and he would not be able to reply with any sort of truth, for he did not know how his peculiar talent worked. He didn’t even much like to think on it, for he took pride in being a rational man, and he was . . . but for this one thing, this ability that he believed in wholeheartedly, for it had never failed him.
For Stanton’s entire life, he had somehow known when he was being lied to. As a child, he had detected the easy lies adults tell children as a matter of course. He had known he would not be stunted if he neglected to drink his milk, he would not die if he ran with scissors, and as much as a young lad might abuse himself, he would never, ever go blind.
As he matured, he found that he could detect even the withheld truth, or at least the act of withholding. He learned the lies people told to spare themselves shame, or effort. He became familiar with the lies they uttered in pursuit of money, or of love.
Veil or no, even he could tell that the person before him was losing patience with his inattention.
She waved a folded sheaf of paper at him and tilted her head. “If you had read my letter—for which someone in your household refused to pay the post—you would already have a full account of what I overheard,” she said shortly.
She was annoyed with him. Stanton couldn’t begin to describe how much he didn’t care. “Lady Alicia, perhaps you might recount it for me now.”
In a moment he was going to recall where he’d heard of Lady Alicia Lawrence before. He himself hadn’t refused her letter, but he was sure Grimm had, under orders. Anyone with news of importance knew better than to trust the post with it, therefore it followed that there was no reason to clutter up his existence with letters and invitations he had no intention of responding to.
Lady Alicia seated herself at last. “Four nights ago, I overheard a conversation. Three men discussing the ‘relocation’ of the Prince Regent. They intend to capture him at a house party to be held at the estate of Lord Cross.” She hesitated. “Do you think it’s possible that the Prince Regent would actually attend such an affair?”
Not only possible, but probable. Cross’s parties were notorious for the lascivious madness that went on. No one ever actually admitted attending, but rumor abounded concerning the nature of events.
“I think it is a certainty.” George was not a man to pass up licentious diversions. Moreover, George’s recent disaffection—to put it mildly—with the Four meant that they were overdue some royal misbehavior.
Relocation. George could be in trouble. Again.
This was not something Stanton would want to leave to commoner hands—and what could the Liars do? Only those of his rank and higher—not many of those either—could get close and stay close to the Prince Regent if the man didn’t wish it, not even his bedmates.
Bedmates.
Licentious diversions.
Suddenly, Stanton remembered where he had heard of Lady Alicia Lawrence before.
Five years earlier, a young debutante had been caught with a stable boy in her bed—a simpleton stable boy at that. Bloody hell.
Stanton’s carefully polite expression soured. This faded and ill-fitting disguise concealed one of the most notorious women to scandalize Society in a generation.
In typical Society fashion, the young lady’s wild ways had become the stuff of legend. The uproar had cast echoes into all reaches of Society and the well-bred daughters of England had been guarded much more closely since that day.
The woman before him was a discredited wanton. What a waste of time, time he did not currently have to spare.
He stood. “Thank you ever so much, my lady. I shan’t keep you any longer.”
She stood as well, but remained where she was. He could feel her gaze piercing him from behind the veil.
“I see your memory is not faulty, Wyndham. I take it that you’ve just recollected my reputation.”
He bowed perfunctorily. “Lady Alicia, I am a very busy man—”
“Of course.” She did not curtsy, but merely turned and walked from the room. “You needn’t see me out. I made sure to remember the location of the exit. ’Tis always best to be prepared.” With that she was gone.
What a stunning bit of rudeness. He was well shut of her. He turned to leave the room himself. Now he could turn his attention back—
Damn. His curiosity continued to twitch despite the fact that the woman was obviously disturbed. He wanted to know more, but shuddered a
t the thought of inviting the creature back into his house.
Where was that letter? Ah, she’d left it on the side table.
Stanton picked up the folded sheets of paper and flicked them open in one motion. Ah, she had indeed written the entire account for him. She certainly was putting a great deal of effort into fluffing up her story.
Then his gaze caught the words “scarred man.”
Bloody hell. There was only one scarred man on his mind at the moment.
The Chimera.
He turned abruptly and ran from the house after the woman, but she was well gone. There were no hackneys on the street, nor any shabbily dressed pedestrians.
Lady Alicia had disappeared.
2
As soon as Stanton had given up on following his odd visitor, he had set about investigating the woman. His first stop, Diamond House.
“Lady Alicia Lawrence?” Stanton’s cousin Lady Jane—or Mrs. Damont as some might consider her but no one did— knitted her brow. “I may have heard some gossip . . . but I really didn’t pay attention.” She poured tea, then smiled up at him, her green eyes gleaming. “Why? Has someone finally caught your eye, Wyndham?”
He blew out a breath. “A world of no.” He took the offered tea absently and settled back into the wide wing chair Jane had offered him. Taking a breath, he allowed his shoulders to relax slightly.
Jane’s presence was rather soothing, at least when she was alone. She had never said as much, but he knew she completely disregarded his reputation. Stanton had the thought—which he’d had many times before—that he wished he’d had more exposure to young ladies like Jane in his youth, sensible ones with good minds and steady nerves.
Well, perhaps not as much nerve as the creature who had called on him today. “She came to my house this morning to berate me and men in general,” he told Jane. “And to give me some disturbing . . . political news.”
Jane’s gaze brightened further. “A new case for me?”
“No.”
The flat refusal came from both Stanton and from the doorway behind him.
Jane’s eyes went from bright to shining as she looked up at the newcomer. “Hello, darling.”
Stanton didn’t stand, or even turn. “Damont.”
Ethan “the Diamond” Damont, former useless card cheat and now rather annoyingly useful spy, came around to sit upon the arm of Jane’s chair. Seeing as Ethan was a big lout, the chair gave a creak of protest. Damont dropped a kiss on the top of his wife’s head and let his fingers toy with a wayward strand of strawberry-blond hair.
To Stanton, the gesture didn’t seem so much a territorial gambit as it did a “so mad about his wife he couldn’t keep his hands to himself” motion.
Stanton was himself rather fond of his brilliant cousin. He was somewhat less fond of her choice of husband, although he reminded himself—often, daily even—that Ethan had been an exemplary spouse . . . so far. Perhaps it was fair, then, that Damont was none too fond of Stanton either.
Now, Ethan watched him through slitted eyes. “Jane, I can’t do a thing with Cook,” he said. “Everything I tell him goes in one ear and out the other. He’ll only listen to you.” He sighed. “I miss my old cook.”
Stanton grunted. “Your last cook was a Liar’s Club operative sent to keep an eye on you.” Something that in Stan-ton’s mind could have been continued indefinitely. “She has better things to do now than bake your crumpets.”
Ethan sighed. “Oh, but the crumpets . . .”
Jane patted his hand and rose. “I’ll fix Boxer for you, pet. Were you still after those little lemon biscuits?”
Ethan nodded eagerly. “Yes, please.”
Jane smiled at Stanton. “I’ll be back in a moment, after Ethan has his little talk with you.” She slid a knowing glance at her husband. “Not subtle, my love. Not one little bit.”
Ethan shrugged, then took the opportunity to slide down into the vacated chair across from Stanton.
Stanton never quite knew what to make of the irreverent gambler who had captured, and been most thoroughly netted by in return, the indomitable Jane.
Ethan had no respect for authority—after all, here was a man who called the Prince Regent himself “Old Codger” to his face. He was entirely without restraint or social compunction, but there was no denying his effectiveness. After all, who would ever expect a layabout gold digger who’d married above himself to be a dangerous counterespionage operative?
Stanton had not been wrong about Ethan, exactly. The fellow was without scruples or honor. Yet those same shady tendencies had made Ethan a valuable member of the Liar’s Club, the ring of spies and criminals that was the hand of the Royal Four.
Still, Stanton had no illusions that the dog had changed his spots. It was only Ethan’s consuming adoration of Jane that kept that particular hound on the leash.
Stanton felt a moment of envy for Damont’s insouciance now, for he couldn’t remember the last time he’d slid into a chair with such fluid relaxation.
With Ethan, however, languid ease never lasted long. He leaned forward, elbows on knees, hands dangling casually, and fixed Stanton in his suddenly fierce gaze.
“No, no, a thousand bloody times no.”
“No, what?”
“No, you are not going to involve Jane in another of your ‘deadly consequence be damned’ cases. She barely survived the last one.” His gaze went dark and inward. “When I saw her burns . . .”
Stanton had been spared such visual confirmation of the deadly error that had nearly cost Jane her life at the hands of the Chimera a few months ago, but he had not forgotten his own guilt in the matter. He’d thoughtlessly sent Jane into the thick of conspiracy with no way to reach him quickly enough to help her, should things go wrong—and they had.
Still, he found himself defending his position yet again. “She was only supposed to observe her uncle’s household, not involve herself.”
Ethan grunted. “Then you didn’t know her very well.”
Another regret. “No, I’m afraid I didn’t.” Young Lady Jane and her delicate, emotionally unstable mother, the previous marchioness, had been banished to a life of poverty and neglect when Stanton’s father had become the new Marquis of Wyndham. Not Stanton’s fault precisely, but then he’d never bothered to ask what became of them either, until he’d taken over the title two years ago and discovered the appalling conditions the two ladies were living in.
He’d done what he could to make the late Lady Wyndham’s existence more comfortable for her last days. Jane, however, he’d immediately seen as valuable and had promptly put her into use for his own ends. England’s ends.
However, Stanton wasn’t about to let the irritating Ethan in on his personal misgivings. “You seem to have no objection to Jane’s working within the Liar’s Club.”
Ethan didn’t back down. “It isn’t the spying, and it isn’t that Jane isn’t more than capable. The problem is you and your willingness to sacrifice anything and anyone to achieve your ends, you cold bastard.”
There it was again. “Actually, I prefer ‘bleak bastard,’ ” Stanton muttered faintly.
Ethan didn’t slow his attack. “Sometimes I wonder if you think everyone has your lack of interest in life—or if you simply think so little of the welfare of others that you expend them like lamed horses or soiled gloves!”
The shot went deep. Stanton felt himself grow colder as Ethan went on. “I do not consider Jane expendable,” he said stiffly. “And I do not need her for this mission.”
Ethan leaned back, only partially mollified. “So you have someone else to sacrifice this time?”
“Lady Alicia is not going to be sacrificed,” Stanton said tightly. “She is merely the source of some information that I am not yet sure merits investigation.”
Ethan raised a brow. “Lady Alicia? Not Lady Alicia Lawrence?”
Stanton tilted his head. “What do you know of her? I remembered her being involved in some social mishap a few years
ago.”
“Mishap? Debacle, more like. She wreaked havoc at a house party in Devonshire, taking on three men in one night—and her a mere maid of eighteen too. Actually, I was there, although I missed the worst of the uproar. Apparently several reputable witnesses found her—in all her tumbled glory, mind you—in the arms of a simpleton stable boy.”
Ethan raised a finger. “I never held it against her, myself. She was a good sort before all this—always game for a laugh, not above a bit of harmless flirting with the common gambler. Not that she ever did anything out of bounds, until that night.”
“It might have gone easier for her if she’d not denied it all so vehemently,” Ethan mused. “She claimed that she had thought the stable boy to be someone else, a lord I think, although anyone could see he was a homespun horse boy without the sense to keep his hands off a titled lady. Then it came out that someone saw two other fellows leave her room in the wee hours. The man she claimed to have been ruined by—Lord Almont, that was it—denied having anything to do with her. Came up with a witness who said he’d been at the cards all night.”
Ethan shook his head. “Poor lass. I suppose she was trying to save herself from the worst of it, but being a wanton is bad enough without making a reputation as a world-class liar on top of it.”
Stanton grimaced. Hellfire. It was every bit as bad as he’d thought. He was basing a time-consuming investigation on the word of a well-known fraud.
He rubbed a hand across his face. Perhaps he ought to toss the entire “kidnapping” matter into the rubbish bin at once and wash his hands of the irritating Lady Alicia forever.
But what if it were true?
There was just enough fact in her story—fact that she could not have otherwise known—to keep him dangling on the hook of indecision for an uncharacteristically long moment.
No. There was no help for it. He was going to have to track down Lady Alicia’s conspirator or else establish his lack of existence.
So you have someone else to sacrifice this time?
There would be no sacrifice. Lady Alicia, wanton liar or not, would come to no harm at his hands.
Celeste Bradley - [Royal Four 04] Page 2