“Really?” Archer hissed in a low voice. “I knew Gerard’s driving club was up to no good, of course. Anything he’s involved with has a tendency to be a bit dodgy. But…” He glanced around at the table to make sure they weren’t being watched. “Murder?”
“That’s right,” said Frederick, grateful to his brother for understanding the gist of things so quickly. “Separately Leonora and I came to the conclusion he was involved somehow, then decided to work together to look into it.”
“I’m surprised you’re allowing her to look into it at all,” Archer said with a frown. “I know I tried my damnedest to keep Perdita from looking into the matter of her blackmailer.”
When Freddy didn’t answer, Archer looked at him more closely. “Aha,” he said. “You didn’t want her working on it.”
“Of course not,” his brother said with a scowl. “She shouldn’t be involved in this business at all. I certainly want her as far away from Gerard and his bloody Lords of Anarchy as possible.”
“And Mama invited him to dine with us, and seated Leonora next to him,” Archer said with a shake of his head. “I’ll give the mater this,” he said. “She’s got a particular talent for finding exactly the thing we don’t want and doing it.”
“Doesn’t she?” Frederick said, laying his fork and knife down as the footman took his dinner plate. “At least I don’t think Gerard has become so bold that he’d try something at the dinner table with a passel of Lisles watching him.”
“No,” Archer said thoughtfully. He glanced across the table, where Leonora was laughing at something Benedick said. “He wouldn’t do that. He values Papa’s status too much. It would be foolish for him to offend the most powerful relative he possesses.”
“I just wish there were a way to get him away from Leonora permanently.” Freddy knew that if anyone were going to understand his point of view on this, it would be Archer. “He’s already had her brother killed. I’m afraid that if she asks too many questions he’ll take it into his head to harm her, too. Especially given the veiled threats he made when he arrived this evening. Clearly he was taunting her about her brother to see if she’d take the bait.”
“It is troublesome,” Archer said. “When I was in a similar situation, I took Perdita away, but I have a feeling that Leonora would have your guts for garters if you tried something like that. Perdita almost did that to me, come to think of it.”
For a moment Freddy was distracted by the glow of happiness that virtually shone out of his brother’s face. “You are so disgustingly pleased with yourself, aren’t you?” he asked. “I would never have guessed it would be you who settled down first. Though you were always wanting to mark off your own space from the rest of us. So it stands to reason you’d do the same with your lady.”
“And you aren’t marking your own territory?” Archer asked with a raised brow. “It is perhaps indelicate of me to say it, but you all but pissed in a circle around her when you entered the drawing room earlier. I think we’ve got the message. Loud and clear.”
“So what if I did?” Freddy said without remorse. “I know what our brothers are like. You might be spoken for, but Cam and Ben certainly aren’t. It nearly broke me the first time she jilted me. I’m not going to stand aside and let her leave me again.”
“So, it’s a true betrothal, then?” Archer asked thoughtfully.
“Damn right it is,” Freddy said, without a pang of conscience for the lie. He might trust Archer with the story about Gerard, but the news that Freddy was involved in a faux betrothal would simply be too juicy a tale to keep to himself.
Still, it bothered him that his brother had even asked if the betrothal was real. “Why, what have you heard?”
“Nothing,” Archer responded with a shrug. “It’s just that I get the feeling something isn’t quite settled between you. Otherwise you wouldn’t feel it so necessary to mark her as yours.”
Leave it to his little brother to ken the situation correctly from the first. But he was hardly going to admit to it aloud. “Don’t be daft. Of course everything is settled between us. I have no intention of letting her go this time around. And she’s simply going to need to come to terms with that.”
“I’m not quite sure that’s how it works, Freddykins.”
“That’s what you think, Archie.”
Fourteen
“You know how much I’ve wanted to become a member of a driving club,” said Lady Hermione Upperton as she and Leonora wandered the aisles of Castle’s Bookshop.
For the first time in weeks Leonora had fallen right to sleep upon seeking her bed the night before. Of course that might be because she’d had a day that would exhaust a cheetah. From the visit from Freddy’s mama and sister-in-law, to the revelations from Lady Darleigh, and finally ending with the fraught dinner party at the Pembertons’, it had been the day from Hades.
She’d not only needed sleep, she was unable to keep her eyes open from the moment her head hit the pillow.
The first rest she’d had in weeks, however, didn’t make her eager to rise from her bed when her maid awoke her not long after dawn with the news that Lady Hermione Upperton had called and needed to speak to her about an important matter.
Her friend was always up before the dawn, and had difficulty imagining that anyone would wish to sleep past the sunrise.
“Of course I know of your longing to join a club, Hermione,” Leonora said, pulling down a volume of Shakespeare’s sonnets that their Ophelia might like. Ostensibly, it was to find her a birthday gift that this shopping trip had been embarked upon. “It’s all you’ve spoken about for years.”
“Yes,” Hermione agreed. “And of course I would never dream of trying to join the Lords of Anarchy, though they are the only club that uses curricles instead of larger carriages.”
“That’s a relief,” Leonora said, glancing at her friend. Despite the other woman’s protestation, Leonora knew how tempting the thought of a club that drove racing carriages would be for her friend. “I am quite positive now that the Lords of Anarchy are not all they seem.”
“There’s just something I don’t trust about Sir Gerard,” Hermione agreed. “Especially given what happened with your brother. And from what I’ve heard the club doesn’t spend a great deal of time driving.”
“That is quite true,” Leonora said, flipping through a book of sonnets. “Anything but, really.”
“I had thought that perhaps the Whipsters would have me,” Hermione said diffidently, leaning her back against the shelf beside Leonora. “They said that a lady would be better suited to take up some more feminine pastime. Like needlepoint. Or … you will be amused at this … writing poetry.”
That did spark a reaction from Leonora. “They didn’t!” She stomped her booted foot. “It infuriates me that poetry gets lumped into those so-called feminine occupations. Why cannot they simply think of it like anything else? Like playing whist? Or I don’t know … painting? Both men and ladies paint but you don’t see anyone telling Gainsborough to leave the daubing to the ladies. Why then must people like that say that poetry or needlepoint or any occupation is particularly suited for females.”
“Well, they do say that watercolors are especially suited to ladies, Nora,” Hermione said defensively. “And what of needlepoint? I don’t think I’ve ever known a man who sews.”
“That is because a man who sews is given his very own specific title—he’s a tailor.” It was an old hobbyhorse for them both. One that never failed to leave each of them feeling angry and out of sorts.
“Why must people insist upon separating occupations and pastimes into those for men and those for women?” Hermione was perhaps even more upset about the situation than Leonora since from an early age she’d wanted nothing more than to spend her every waking moment with horses and in carriages.
Leonora at least had loved the written word, which, granted, was not entirely thought to be a proper occupation for a lady, but was at least known for having female practitioner
s of it. So far as Leonora knew, there were no truly famous lady drivers.
“Why cannot we simply do what we wish? It’s too frustrating!” Hermione closed the atlas she was examining with a snap. “The Whipsters didn’t even put my name up for a vote. The main chap just scribbled out a note to me telling me how foolish it was even to apply to them.”
Knowing it would take some time to boost Hermione’s spirits after such a setback, Leonora linked arms with her and they purchased the book of sonnets for Ophelia—though she did question the wisdom of buying any of Shakespeare’s works for a girl named Ophelia, her friend was genuinely fond of the bard—and they stepped out into the spring air and let the waiting footmen hand them into Hermione’s landau.
She’d been driving on her own for ages—ever since the Upperton coachman at their country estate had taught her to handle the reins of the gig. Now, of course, she was better than most men, and Leonora had no hesitation to be driven about by her friend. “I wish I had your spirit, Hermione,” she said as they neared the edge of Hyde Park. “You are so sure of yourself in the carriage. And I have no doubt that you would not stand to let Sir Gerard Fincher lie to your face as he did to me last evening. When I think of it—how he smiled as he did it, like a particularly odious snake—I cannot help but think that I am a poor sort of opponent for someone like him.”
Flicking the ear of the leader, Hermione skillfully drove them through the gates of the park. “But you spoke to him, Nora. That’s more than most ladies would have the gumption to do. And I’ll bet he was smiling to cover up how frightened your questions were making him. You must recall that men are quite good at pretending to emotions they don’t actually feel.”
Unbidden, Leonora’s thoughts turned to Freddy’s open protectiveness of her the night before. Had he been pretending to a possessiveness he didn’t feel? she wondered. After all, she’d pushed him away quite effectively earlier that afternoon in her sitting room. The idea that he had been pretending last evening for the sake of his family made her fists clench.
He hadn’t even tried to kiss her before walking her to the door of her house. She’d thought it was because he was still angry at her earlier rebuff, but perhaps it was simply that there was no audience to see them.
She knew she had to protect him from falling in love with her, for his own sake. Especially if he wanted the same sort of marriage, with children, that his brother Archer was enjoying.
But some corner of her heart wept at the thought of severing herself from him forever. She was almost sure now that there would never be another man she would love as much as Freddy.
Love.
The word echoed in her mind. She had fallen in love with Freddy.
How utterly foolish of her.
Hermione cursed under her breath, and Leonora shook off her thoughts.
They had reached the promenade by now, and to her dismay, the first carriage they encountered was an open barouche driven by Sir Gerard.
Lifting his hat, Frederick’s cousin, whose wife, Melisande, was seated beside him, spoke first. “Miss Craven, it seems that you are everywhere I look these days.” Turning his gaze to Hermione, he said, “You’ve a pretty hand with the whip, Lady Hermione. I am quite impressed.”
“I am rather like the proverbial bad penny, aren’t I?” Leonora said with raised brows.
Noting that Lady Melisande had not greeted them, she turned to Hermione. “Have you been introduced to Sir Gerard’s wife, Lady Melisande?”
Gesturing to the other woman, Leonora said, “Lady Hermione Upperton, meet Lady Melisande Fincher.”
Sir Gerard’s wife looked imperious, but polite. “I am pleased to meet you, Lady Hermione. I’ve heard quite a lot about your driving skills. I believe Miss Craven’s brother was quite impressed with you.”
“He was indeed, Lady Melisande,” said Leonora, wondering what Jonathan had said about her friend. She’d once suspected the two had shared a mutual tendre but that had been before he became so wrapped up in the Lords of Anarchy. She’d hoped that he would settle down and thought perhaps he might consider doing so with her friend once his infatuation with the club passed, but that hadn’t happened. “As are we all.”
“I regret that the rules do not allow for the club to invite a noted whip like yourself into the club, Lady Hermione,” said Sir Gerard, though Leonora doubted very much that he felt any real chagrin over the technicality.
“We can always use another steady hand with the whip,” he continued apologetically. “And I would have considered a recommendation from Jonathan Craven to be quite as good as one from myself. He was as skilled a driver as I’ve ever known.”
“That’s just as well, Sir Gerard,” Hermione said before Leonora could speak up. “I think Jonathan’s untimely death has put me off the idea of joining a club like yours. One with so much competition, I mean.”
She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes, Leonora noted.
“I rather think being a member of your club might be dangerous to a driver’s health.” Hermione’s gaze was as cold as ice. And Leonora realized that her friend felt more strongly about what had happened to Jonathan than she’d realized.
A flash of something cold and implacable flashed in Gerard’s eyes before he schooled his features into something closer to pleasant. “I think you might be right when it comes to a certain sort of driver, Lady Hermione. There is no room at all in the club for drivers who take risks unnecessarily. I regret to say that Miss Craven’s brother was one of them.”
Before either Leonora or Hermione could respond to Gerard’s taunt, the driver of the carriage behind them indicated that he wished to pass, so Hermione steered them back into the line of traffic, and for the next forty minutes they waved and chatted with various members of the haute ton.
All the while, the memory of Sir Gerard’s words lodged in Leonora’s mind like a thorn stuck in the pad of a thumb.
It was the hour to see and be seen, and Leonora tried to focus on the attention her friend received. Both for her driving, and if Leonora weren’t mistaken, for her pretty face as well.
The way Hermione had defended Jonathan to Sir Gerard just now made her think that the tendre she’d suspected had indeed been a reality. But thus far, Hermione had never revealed anything but sadness for the death of a friend.
Perhaps Hermione would find happiness with someone else. Someone who might share her love of driving as Jonny had.
Yet another life that had been touched by the evil that was Sir Gerard Fincher.
They had reached the gate on the other side of the park now, and as Hermione expertly used the ribbons, Leonora watched with interest. They’d just passed into the street beyond the gate, where a crowd had gathered to watch the swells on their promenade through the park, when Hermione slowed the carriage to avoid the bystanders.
Just then, a white bundle flew through the air, just to the right of the leaders. The horses spooked and reared, and then when the loud pop of an explosion sounded they bolted altogether.
“Hold on!” shouted Hermione as Leonora clung for dear life to the sides of the carriage.
* * *
“A package?” Mainwaring’s brow furrowed as he put his substantial brainbox to work on the problem. Freddy had always appreciated that his friend’s mind worked in mysterious ways. His skill at cards was only the half of it. While the rest of the world labored over their account books—well, while Freddy’s man did, at any rate—Mainwaring had already calculated the whole in his head and was on to the next task. “It must have been some kind of code. I can hardly think the members of the Lords of Anarchy are doing something as menial as moving boxes about. Unless Sir Gerard is making them do so as some kind of punishment, which I wouldn’t put past him.”
The two men had met at Brooks’s to discuss the matter of Sir Gerard and the various mysteries of his club.
Fortunately Freddy’s ribs no longer felt as if they were being stabbed with a hot knife on a regular basis. And applying ice aga
in as soon as he’d gotten home last evening from taking Leonora home had reduced the swelling in his jaw and his shoulder.
He’d not kissed her as he wanted to. He might be a rascal, but she’d been quite clear that afternoon when she said she wanted their betrothal to remain a false one. He’d shown himself to be possessive of her at his parents’ house, but that had been in keeping with the ruse. And he’d have found it impossible not to warn his brothers off when they were all watching her like a starving dog watches a bone.
“Are you even listening to me?” Mainwaring asked, leaning back to get a better look at his friend.
Freddy rolled his eyes. “Of course I’m listening. I simply have a great deal on my mind at the moment. I’m perfectly capable of holding more than one thought in my head at a time.”
“I’m glad to hear it,” said the earl with a grin. “Because you’re going to need that ability if you’re to outwit your cousin.”
Freddy thrust a hand through his hair in frustration. “I know that, damn it all. He’s just so slippery. Every time I think we’ve figured out a way to get the truth out of him, he twists out of the trap.”
“Not unlike most criminals,” Mainwaring said, crossing his arms over his chest. “You’re going to have to get him to lower his guard somehow. Or trap him into revealing himself without realizing it.”
The earl rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I don’t suppose you’d consider using his obvious wish to harm Leonora against him, would you? He might not be able to resist if you dangle her before him.”
“Leonora is not some minnow we can use to lure a larger fish, Mainwaring,” Freddy growled. “I am unhappy with the degree of risk she’s exposed herself to already. I most certainly won’t put her in a position where my cousin might be able to grab her before I have a chance to act.”
He glared at Mainwaring, daring him to argue.
“Just an idea, old fellow,” his friend said with a staying hand. “I simply thought it might be a way to break past Sir Gerard’s defenses. But if Miss Craven is to be kept away from him then we’ll think of something else.”
A Good Rake is Hard to Find Page 15