Regency Rogues Omnibus

by Shirl Anders

  “Minion Baron, peon Laird, I can raise you to places you never dreamed of! Power, you only think you have seen. Kings and princes will be my congregation. They will seek me,” Hellion spat.

  Brynmore heard Hellion now! The voice was powerful. It had Kit slightly enthralled beside him, even if the words were convoluted. But Saxon had warned him of this, hidden meanings if one looked closely. Brynmore was particularly interested that Hellion mentioned kings and princes to people he barely knew.

  “The blood is very powerful,” Brynmore offered, hedging on a conversation in which he felt nearly lost in. Talking to madmen who believed they were Gods was not an easy task. He decided at the last second to add, “My patron believes in the power.”

  Hellion’s pink-veined eyes drew sharply to the ruby, before he raised them to stare at Brynmore, saying, “Blood is a powerful sacrifice. It pounds in our sex and shows us the true way!”

  Suddenly, Hellion stood with a flurry of his fur-lined, white robes. He began immediately to stalk away. Fuck, Brynmore cursed silently, that went over like a non-virgin bride. He’d bloody well fucked it over, he thought, turning to watch Hellion.

  Hellion threw his arm outward, in a direction Brynmore could not see and the instantaneous sound of a loud gong sounded. Brynmore rose, hauling Kit with him as the gong sounded four more times, echoing throughout the club, bringing the beating music to a halt. Brynmore fought the urge to yell at Hellion and try to bring him back. He assumed Hellion was on his way out of the club, but then Brynmore saw that Hellion was climbing a stone dais in the center of the main chamber.

  Kit tugged on his arm. “Come on!” she urged.

  Brynmore glanced back for Dame Baset, but she was gone. His last chance possibly had vanished. Hell, if he’d not tried to act so bloody arrogant and superior. What the hell kind of plan was that, he berated himself as Kit dragged him through the crowd? She was very pushy and persistent to get them to the front and Brynmore barely considered the fact that the patrons in the club were willing to give up their sexual orgies for whatever was about to happen.

  Drawn, was more like what was happening, he realized when he came out of his self-flagellating cussing festival and looked around. Suddenly, Hellion’s voice resonated, seeming to pick up strength against the stone walls of the crypt. Its booming vibrations and the quality of its bass tone would have any human being turning their ear toward it.

  “Revelers! My lovely, wicked, joyfully copulating minions,” Hellion began. His arms lifted straight outward so that he posed as a hoary cross. “The great God Bacchus admires you. He covets your spirit and lewd revelry. His meaning is clear, this is the way! This is the way he meant for us to be!”

  Half the crowd offered their agreeing exclamations as Hellion turned from one side to the other with his arms still outstretched. His gaze encompassed everyone.

  “Do we not follow the ideals of kings and princes? Does not the royalty of this land show us the way?” Hellion’s voice thundered, demanding a response.

  “Yes! Yes! Yes!” Shouts rose from the crowd.

  “I say it has to be righteous sin not to enjoy the fruits given us!” Abruptly, Hellion stepped forward to the edge of the dais, leaned over with his hand outstretched to Kit. “Clasp my hand!” he ordered, beneath the hearing of the crowd.

  Brynmore barely caught Hellion’s words, his instinctive reaction to hold Kit back. However, Kit was clearer and quicker thinking than he, because she immediately grasped Hellion’s hand.

  Do it-do it, Kit cried inside her mind. Then, out of nowhere, Hellion tugged the hand she had managed to give him. Even though there were no stairs on this section of the round dais, Hellion tugged backward with enough strength to lift her up onto the dais.

  “If this is sin, then I am a sinner!” Hellion shouted, grabbing Kit’s cloak and tossing it aside, he spun her by her hand to face the cheering crowd, then he spun more and stilled to face the crowd again. Desperately, Kit fought every reaction she had. Her loincloth was gone and she was nude, with a large diamond over her mon’s. Her body trembled with embarrassment, even as her nipple tips peaked.

  “I am as the great God Bacchus with the Satyr Lord defending our right to fornicate! I ask you, is it justice to only fuck one person in your life?”

  “No! Nay!” A great number of the crowd shouted.

  “Do your kings and princes not show you the true way? Should not your prince be here with the rest of the great fornicators on this earth? The royalty you serve proves to you that the Gods did not mean for us to limit our lust! The Gods meant us to enjoy this!”

  Hellion shook Kit’s hand raised above her head between them, while her gaze latched to Brynmore as she tried to pretend that he was the only one in the room. Brynmore’s gaze though, was riveted to Hellion. Kit completely lost track of what Hellion shouted to the listeners he was trying to convert as she fought the urges to cover herself and flee.

  Time seemed to warp. Then abruptly, Kit heard Hellion thundering. “The great God Bacchus says come to my Lord Hellion! Bring him your virgins to feed my joy! Let the wine flow in rivers! Fornicate at Hellion’s feet and live his words. I am him! He lives through me. Bring your kings and princes to worship!”

  Kit gasped, wondering how long she’d not heard Hellion speaking, but then she wondered if that were true. Had she really heard him or had he spoken in her mind. The crowd in the club was exclaiming and cheering as Hellion bowed and the gong sounded four more times. It seemed to signal the end to Hellion’s performance. Kit felt dazed, then she felt her hand being tugged and she tripped forward with the pressure landing in Hellion’s embrace. His skeletal fingers clasped the diamond, pushing and grabbing her entire sex with the diamond embedded between. He bent her back and she heroically fought the urge to scream.

  “This is the fruit God’s live for,” Hellion hissed, smearing the diamond around on her sex with the rotation of his palm. Then, his bloodless lips covered hers with his tongue jabbing into her mouth. What control she had, she lost, but before she could attack, Hellion dropped her and stepped backward. The back of her hand leaped to her lips, rubbing them as her gaze fixed upward on Hellion.

  “Go back to your master,” Hellion ordered. Then he turned and walked away.

  Kit stood suspended. Had she ruined it? Had Hellion read the loathing in her gaze? She could stand it no longer as a whimper escaped her throat and she scrambled to retrieve Brynmore’s cloak. She snatched it off the ground and jerkily wrapped it around herself. She had to find Brynmore and she prayed that it was over because she had nothing left to give.

  Abruptly, Brynmore felt long fingernails trail down his bare back. He turned to see Dame Baset, with her heavy makeup cracking in the heat of the crypt, her rouged lips smeared and the flaccid skin on her face pale. He rallied his demeanor from one of distaste.

  “For you,” she said, lifting a white envelope toward him. At the same time, her other hand clasped the blood amulet still hanging around his neck and tugged. He bent with the unexpected pressure feeling her tarnished lips pressing to his. He growled, trying to use the effort to connive a response. He found it, in disgust that he disguised as anger, and he ravaged her lips back harshly.

  She took from him, mewling excitement, but then she pulled away panting, “Take my blood,” she said. Then she turned away and slid back into the crowd.

  Brynmore heaved a sigh wondering if Dame Baset was just taunting him and he moved toward the steps of the dais to intercept Kit as he opened the envelope. He pulled the enclosed paper out partially, to catch a glimpse. What was inside it would determine if he stalked after Dame Baset, immediately or ... It was an invitation to the Order of the Satyr. Yes. From what he glimpsed it was written like any social invitation. He pushed it back into the envelope and put the whole missive back into his pocket.

  He admitted his relief that he and Kit had accomplished so much tonight that they could end it for the evening. He was more grateful for this, when he saw the bruised look in Kit�
��s eyes. She came to him without a word and curled against him. He put his arm around her, pulling her close.

  “Time to leave,” he said.

  Kit returned a relieved sigh as he guided them through the crowd still reveling throughout The Satyr Whip Club.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “I’ve devised a plan,” Drummond announced.

  Brynmore looked over at Kit where she sat subdued and introspective in a chair off by herself. It was two days since they’d made their play at The Satyr Whip Club and Kit had been withdrawn and as much as he had tried to affectionately nudge her back, she remained stoic.

  All the Archangels and their women were gathered for this evening meeting Drummond had called. Brynmore was relieved that Drummond had a plan, because he did not think that he and Kit had gathered enough information yet. All they had was that Hellion was insane, he spoke convoluted nonsense about fucking and he had fixations on royalty and kings and princes. Hellion had spouted that half a dozen times that night. Most of it they already knew about the bastard and Brynmore failed to see what miracle Drummond could produce with such slim pickings.

  There was the note inside the invitation, but Brynmore thought it did not add anything they could use. It just showed the players of the cult were interested enough in him and Kit try to entice them closer. It remained a mystery who had written the unsigned note that read, “You can become a more powerful man than you realize. Many will hunger to be taught your ways. You will find haven. Send your answer to Dame Baset at the address below, she will explain the price of admittance. Not all are allowed entrance. You have been chosen. Dare to follow your destiny. It is known that you will be pleased.”

  Brynmore thought it a contorted message at best. Yet if he tried to put himself in the place of being a man with hidden deviant desires, he could see where it might be alluring. Furthermore, if he truly did run in the underground hedonist crowd, rumors of Hellion’s cult would be readily rampant by now. Therefore the invitation from the cult was already assuming he was interested. Even after such a brief encounter at The Satyr Whip Club.

  “Radford, what strikes you about what we have heard?” Drummond asked.

  Radford did not lift his one-eyed gaze from contemplation of the cane he had propped before him as he sat beside Nia on one the settees in the room. “Kings and Princes.”

  “Exactly,” Drummond said. “I had hoped-,” Drummond paused, looking introspective for a moment, then he continued. “It seemed to me that some definitive conclusions could be made about men such as Hellion, Incubus, perhaps even Dame Baset, in her own way. However, I stayed with Hellion. What are the traits about him that we could conclude with certainty and the one that struck me instantly was power-hungry. Insatiably so and never enough, I would imagine.”

  “Was that part of your reasoning behind those gaudy jewels?” Brynmore asked, trying to follow Drummond’s discourse, surprising himself a bit that he’d interrupted Drummond.

  “Yes it was, Brynmore. Although not a certain motive, but more of a hopeful intuition. With the profile I have set up about Hellion, it clearly shows that he could not resist being interested. The jewels themselves were so ostentatious that the immediate assumption would be power at least.”

  “Or royalty,” Kit said, sitting straighter with her comely features showing the lightening of interest.

  “Yes, Kit, my profile of Hellion projects quite clearly that Hellion, after thwarted in his mad attempts of accession to become a God, as he puts it, would be raising the stakes of his need for power, dramatically.”

  “You said before that you believed he picked me because of my noble title,” Saxon said.

  “Yes, and now Hellion’s insanity sets his sight infinitely higher. One could assume that demented megalomaniacs do not take defeat well, and by their very outrageous behavior would spiral uncontrolled like a skewed cannon shot.”

  “Kings and princes,” Radford uttered again.

  Murmurs sounded around the room with a few soft exclamations, and they all finally realized what Drummond was saying. Brynmore was startled when he finally realized what the implications meant.

  “Hellion has set his sights on the Prince of Wales or the King of England!” Joelle exclaimed what they all were beginning to digest.

  “Yes,” Drummond answered simply as Gabriella sitting beside him clasped his hand.

  “But what for?” Wyndham asked.

  “It really does not matter, except for the fact it is a momentous boon for us. Whether, Hellion, simply wants to bask in the company of royalty, or he wants to try to convert royalty into his servile worshipers or if he most wants to murder a royal as another demented scheme to ascend, it does not matter to us. Except for the fact of the lucky opportunity his newest obsession presents to us.”

  “Treason. Of course!” Radford exclaimed, lifting his gaze in Drummond’s direction as the rest of the group made confused sounds.

  Except for Harrison, who rasped, “Convictions of treason involves no assassinations.”

  “Exactly, my friend,” Drummond offered with a half-smile. Then Drummond continued. “Luckily, we have Hellion’s new infatuation to fit well within this scheme. My basic plan is to make it appear that Baco, Cernno, Dame Baset, and Rushborn too, damn him, and Hellion, are all in a plot to kill the Prince of Wales.”

  “Bravo!” Orelan and Chloe exclaimed at the same time. Then the rest followed with sounds and words of cheered approval.

  There was a soft rap on the door and almost simultaneously Drummond’s elder and straight-spined butler appeared. “Your guest has arrived, your grace,” the butler intoned solemnly.

  “Ah yes, Hennessy, please send him in,” Drummond responded.

  Kit followed everyone’s gaze to see who might be arriving. During the last few moments she began to experience a better feeling of purpose filling her since the night at The Satyr Whip Club. Really, she’d been trying to hold them at bay, but just as quickly as that, those myriad emotions fell away with conquest in sight. She decided immediately that all she needed was the destruction of Hellion and The Order to set things right inside herself. Kit glanced at Brynmore, before the guest made his entrance and she found him looking at her with his green eyes rich in speculation and a bit of worry.

  She could now, so she did. She smiled at him, because with the positive beginnings of a solid plan, it felt so grand. Brynmore’s outer eyelids crinkled for an instant. She could see that he was surprised, and then just as swiftly he was moving toward her. Without comment, but with a returning handsome smile, he had her scooped up and he turned, sat and settled her on his lap. Not the most serious or professional of attitudes, but she welcomed it with a snuggle.

  Before she could comment a deep cultured voice said, “The head of the Home Office has said that I am not assigned to this and anything further coming from this area, he does not want to know about.”

  Drummond chuckled. “Ah, Ash, so good of you to not officially join us.” Drummond gestured around. “Everyone, meet the unofficial, Ash. That is the only name we will ask or use for him.”

  Kit watched the medium height gentleman nod to all in turn. He was an interesting mix, with a bowler hat over short-cropped dark hair in the style military men might wear. He wore wire spectacles that served to pronounce his very square jaw, his tweed cutaway brown suit cried barrister or financier while his posture, straight shoulders and lean fitness said military. His age was hard to determine, but she would guess late thirties.

  “Reports of Prince Charles activities these last several days have the prince mentioning, Lord Duneagan’s, name no less than ten times,” Ash said quietly.

  “A little bird in the prince’s ear, Ash. He knows nothing other than a simple request, nor will he,” Drummond said. Kit felt Brynmore’s surprise as his body tensed with her own, while Drummond continued, “Please sit, Ash, and join us.”

  Ash strode to the chair Brynmore had vacated and he sat. “It will be interesting to have the opportunity to w
ork with you,” Ash said as he folded his hands, linking them together over one knee, while looking directly at Drummond. After a pause, Ash glanced around and added, “And all of you, of course.”

  Kit noticed Ash’s hazel-brown eyes hesitated on each woman present and she picked up the barely perceivable point in his body language that he was either unused to working with women or surprised at their presence.

  “Ash, will be needed as a liaison for what we intend to do,” Drummond said. “We will not be informing any authorities on the exact nature of our plans, however, Ash, will be along to smooth out any awkward kinks. Furthermore, when events transpire, certain people knowing Ash is here will react more calmly.”

  “And the nature of your plans are?” Ash asked, with a quiet, direct voice. “I’ve read all the files and reports that you compiled and briefed me on, sir. As to the rest...” Ash nodded to Drummond. “I am intrigued to hear how we can dismantle this Order of the Satyr nuisance.”

  Kit immediately bristled at type casting The Order as being only an innocent sounding nuisance, instead of the lethal malignancy it was.

  “We intend to make it appear as if the leaders of The Order are conspiring to kill the Prince of Wales, Ash ... and you are going to help,” Drummond said with a sublime nuance.

  Kit felt satisfaction when Ash rocked back slightly. He was startled, obviously, but he contained it well. “I see,” Ash said. “Amazing.”

  “Quite,” Drummond responded wryly.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Joelle looked at Saxon and whispered, “I cannot believe how easy it was to get them here.” She stayed bent over, making certain she was hidden in the bushes.

  Saxon, with his long hair braided and tied back, crouched beside her wearing dark trim-fitting hunting attire that mirrored what she wore. Saxon had teased that she looked like the flashiest curvy mate he’d ever seen when she first appeared after getting ready for this nerve-wracking mission they were about.