Cecilia

by Bancroft, Blair

  As they entered what appeared to be a common room, warmed by a coal fire, the matron paused. “A proper greeting for your benefactor and his guest,” she announced. A bevy of children shot to their feet, abandoning whatever tasks they had been assigned. The boys each sketched a bow, the girls curtsied.

  “G’day, Guv,” said a boy of about nine. “What’cha done with Fetch. Ain’t he with y’ today?”

  “Fetch is fetching,” Nick Black returned easily. “Running errands, while I show Miss Lilly some parts of London she hasn’t seen before.”

  “So who’s the lyedy, Guv?” an older boy asked flat-out, giving Cecy an assessment so sharp it almost made her squirm.

  “Jeremiah!” the matron barked.

  The boy shrugged. “Was only askin’. Guv never brought no mort with him afore.”

  “Miss Lilly,” her employer informed him, “is considering whether or not she is willing to work with the lot of you, maybe see if she can turn you into proper nobs.”

  Cecy flushed when every last child dissolved into giggles, not seeming to mind the thinly veiled mockery of the remark. The matron offered Cecy a sympathetic glance. “Never mind them, miss. They’re all fly to the time of day, too wise to expect miracles. We’re happy to have any help we can get. In whatever form you might manage it.”

  Cecy managed to hide her chagrin. Evidently, the woman thought she was a wealthy patron, someone considering a donation . . .

  No, of course not. Not in such a hideous cloak and bonnet. So, merciful heavens, what must the matron be thinking?

  That you are what you are, a sinner in search of redemption.

  Meekly, Cecy followed the matron as she continued their tour, leading them through the refectory and up steep stairs to two large rooms filled wall to wall with cots, one room for boys and one for girls. Bleak but clean and neat. Nonetheless, she shuddered. Surely bright colors must be possible somewhere . . .

  Oh, no. She was doing it again. Taking Nick Black seriously, her mind already spinning into possibilities for improvement.

  As if he sensed her train of thought, as they climbed back into the coach Nick Black said, “The whole house will be part of your duties from now on. Not an easy task. The children need to learn how to make their way in the world without sliding back to mudlarking and flash houses. We are also obligated to find them suitable positions when they’re old enough.”

  A rap on the ceiling and the coach rumbled into motion. “We’re off to the second of the two homes I sponsor for children of the streets,” he deigned to inform her, his voice as cool as the February day. “They don’t have to be orphans. Some know who their mothers are, some do not. A few even know their fathers. We take any smart enough to know they want something better than thieving or earning their living as whores, male or female.”

  What? Cecy blinked, swallowed, picturing the little faces they’d just left behind. She hadn’t spent time in London’s Covent Garden underworld without knowing about male whores, but children . . .? Somehow that, like Longmere’s potential for abuse, had miraculously passed her by.

  “Well, Miss Lilly?” her employer snapped. “Are you strong enough to face the evil and compassionate enough to forgive the children for sins not of their making?”

  “I would like to be,” Cecy returned faintly. “But how can anyone know until they’re tested? I would have sworn there was no part of the life of a courtesan that would not suit me . . .”

  “Fair enough.” He cleared his throat and Cecy turned her head so she could look directly into his face. The gray eyes were as cool as ever, his mouth a thin line, but somehow she got the impression his attitude toward her had mellowed ever so slightly.

  Unlikely, she corrected. Nicholas Black was the most unreachable man she had ever met. A month ago, she would have considered him a challenge. Now, her only interest was pleasing him enough to keep a roof over her head and food in her mouth.

  And the right to sleep alone in her bed.

  How far the courtesan had fallen.

  The second home for London’s street children was much like the first, though the location in the narrow rabbit warren of Seven Dials was more depressing, the conditions inside rougher, smellier, and definitely not as clean. Clearly, work was needed, though Cecy doubted Mrs. Dawes, the formidable matron would listen to a single word offered by the former mistress of the Marquess of Longmere.

  But when she said as much to Nick Black, he stated in a tone so authoritative it might have come straight from the Devil himself, “Mrs. Dawes will listen to whomever I tell her to listen.”

  And that was that.

  “A change of pace,” Mr. Black offered as the carriage turned north—or at least that’s the direction Cecy thought they were going as row houses dwindled, giving way to fields and farms. She wouldn’t ask him, blast the man. Let him be mysterious if he wished. But she pushed back her bonnet so she could see better. Ah, she’d almost forgotten how lovely the countryside could be—fresh air, fallow fields, sunshine peeking through clouds not filled with smoke. The pungent odor of manure. This was the England of her childhood. Alas, the journey ended all too soon.

  They turned down a muddy lane to a large farm, driving past the disinterested gaze of a herd of cows and past what appeared to be a dairy, pulling up to a sprawling farmhouse. This time, instead of the drone of children reading out loud, they were met by the cry of squalling infants. Multiple infants. But none screaming in rage or pain. Just feed me, hold me, change my nappie, Cecy thought, unsure how she could be so certain. The smell of fresh-baked bread wafted down the corridor in front of them as they followed a heavily pregnant girl to a seat in the parlor. “I’ll get Mrs. Jamison straight away,” she told them and lumbered off.

  Cecy drew in a deep breath. “Fresh bread and stew,” she pronounced, sighing in approval. “Do we stay for dinner?”

  “We do not.”

  “Oh.”

  “As you have likely guessed,” her employer said, “this is a home for abandoned women—those with no husbands and a child on the way. Or those who don’t wish their husbands to come anywhere near their babe,” he added with a bleak emphasis that raised goosebumps on Cecy’s arms. “This too will be part of your job. An important part, as these are women who will trust another female far more readily than they’ll ever trust me.”

  In characteristic style his voice had no inflection, but the message was pointed. Only a woman who had suffered . . . only a woman who knew what it was to be alone and powerless could understand the occupants of this house.

  She’d once been a young lady, Cecy thought. A daughter of country gentry who had risen to courtesan of a peer. At least she had considered it a rise from her bleak childhood . . . until she’d been left for flotsam in the gutter. A woman whose only power now derived from friendship with the scandalous Lady Juliana Rivenhall and the largesse of a former guttersnipe, who, some said, held the reins of London’s Underworld in his hands.

  Blood money, that’s what Nick Black spent on his charity projects. The Devil paying his dues. When he must know there was no way the heavens would ever open for such a monumental sinner.

  More likely, he was casting good works in the ton’s teeth. Nicholas Black was a man who would enjoy the irony, enjoy thumbing his nose at Parliament, magistrates, judges. The church. At all those who should have a care for the helpless. And did not.

  Mrs. Jamison, the matron, interrupted Cecy’s thoughts, sweeping her off on a tour of the farmhouse, leaving Mr. Black behind in the drawing room. Boone Farm was not an establishment where men were allowed anywhere but the parlor, the barn, and the stables.

  They were walking down a corridor on the dormered third floor when Cecy gasped and retraced her steps, staring into a room where a young woman with unrelentingly straight dark hair sat, bent over the sheet she was mending. “Holly?” As the girl looked up, Cecy threw back her bonnet, revealing her face.

  “Cecy?” Holly Hammond leaped to her feet, the sheet pooling on the floo
r, revealing a figure that was clearly increasing.

  “How? I mean . . .” Cecy faltered, blushing hotly. “I beg your pardon,” she cried, “but I thought you were well set, gone with the banker’s son, not that young lord we all knew wouldn’t . . .” She ground to a halt, floundering. “Oh Holly, I know you were paying attention when we were taught . . . Hell’s hounds!” she exclaimed, dropping to her knees beside her friend. “Tell me how you got yourself into such a fix.”

  Chapter Seven

  With the sixth sense that had kept him alive for thirty-four years, Nick knew something was wrong the moment he saw his new assistant’s face. Surely she’d been on the town long enough not to be confounded by a houseful of women with their aprons riding high. Unless . . . Nick’s fists clenched ’til his knuckles turned white, his lips thinned to a straight line. Unless . . .

  He seethed as he helped her into the coach, and as they jounced and squelched their way down the farm lane to the London road. When the wheels finally settled into some semblance of a smooth ride, he snapped, “Well? What’s got you so long-faced? Terrified by a few squalls, are you?”

  “Don’t be absurd!” The wings of the bonnet never moved. He might as well have been talking to a wall.

  “Did you see yourself then? Did Longmere give you more than bruises?”

  He caught her hand an inch short of his cheek. She struggled, huffing in frustration, as he seized her other hand. Her boot shot out, kicking him in the shin. With the ease of a man experienced in close combat, he transferred her thin wrists to one hand, swept back her bonnet with the other. Flashing green met cold gray. “Well? I need to know if I should continue your employment,” he persisted with a sneer, “or should I take you straight back to Boone Farm.”

  Even as he said it, something stirred inside him. The something that had inspired him to scoop her up off the walkway and take her home, retrieve her belongings, offer her employment. The something that had pierced the iron control he had fought so long to achieve—setting off an explosion inside him when he thought she might be carrying Longmere’s child. Fury rampant . . . until now, when he saw the anger in her green eyes turn to terror.

  Nick groaned and abruptly loosed her wrists. “Beg pardon,” he muttered, “but thought of Longmere tends to set me off. I never meant to frighten you.”

  Head down, she scuttled into the far corner of the gray velvet squabs, clinging to the hangstrap as if it were a lifeline. A ray from the lowering sun caught her hair, turning it almost reddish blonde. Although accustomed to the role of villain, Nick had trouble finding his way through the maze of emotions filling the carriage, as blinding as a London fog. He fell back on good manners. Isn’t that why he’d taken such good care to learn them? “I beg your pardon, but you seemed upset, and my mind leaped to the most selfish conclusion. After all, what good could you be as my assistant if I must soon add you to the residents of Boone Farm?”

  A half mile of silence before she lifted her head and spoke, though she kept her face toward the rapidly darkening countryside beyond the window. “There were three of us at the Academy when I was there. One did very well, marrying a viscount. I, as it turned out, only thought I had done well when I went with Longmere. And the third? I found her at Boone Farm, abandoned by her wealthy Cit lover the moment she told him she was increasing. Tossed her out with no more than a few bits and bobs of jewelry. Fortunately . . .” She huffed a breath full of irony. “As Fate would have it, mention of Boone Farm was included in our curriculum. Evidently, Holly simply told a hackney to take her there, and they didn’t turn her away. For which I am very grateful,” she admitted, though Nick suspected the admission cost her. “And, no, she added with more than a bit of bite, “I do not expect to need their services for myself.”

  Nick sucked in a breath, turning his head away to hide a shocking flash of emotion. Relief, only relief, he told himself. Relief that he wasn’t going to have to kill a peer of the realm.

  Silence prevailed until after the coachman rolled to a halt and one of the guards put down his shotgun long enough to light the carriage lanterns, inside and out. When the wheels were turning once again, Nick said, “Personal considerations aside, tell me what you saw today. What did you like? What would you change?”

  Cecy gathered her scattered thoughts, shut her eyes, and focused on the three places they had visited, praising much that was good—the children were adequately dressed, seemingly amply fed and properly schooled. But, she offered, the orphanage in Seven Dials could benefit from a more benign attitude and better housekeeping. And both orphanages needed a bit of color.

  Other than an occasional nod, Mr. Black showed no reaction, letting her flounder on, searching her memory for more than the obvious. And failing. “Why?” she burst out. “Why do you do it? Ever since I came to London I’ve heard whispers of Nick Black—you’re a legend. You must know what people say: Nick Black frowns and London shivers. But orphanages? A dairy farm for unwed mothers? Do you take me for a fool?”

  His reply, when it came, seemed to have no relation to her question. In the dim lantern light, she could barely see his lips move as he said, “Three years ago, I won the house on Princes Street in a card game. There were those, Longmere prominent among them, whose huffs of indignation resounded throughout Mayfair. Little good it did them.”

  Cecy, a rebel at heart, heard and applauded the satisfaction in his voice, though the mention of Longmere gave her a bad moment or two.

  “My household is a constant source of irritation to my lofty neighbors,” her employer continued, “but I have found more than the satisfaction of annoying them with what they call my ‘comings and goings’ and my ‘parade of bully boys.’ I discovered I’d reached a turning point in my life, a time to step back from a number of my more—shall we say, unsavory?—enterprises. Though I’ll not deny some of that money continues to flow in my direction, I mainly deal in information now. With retribution only when all else fails,” he added softly, setting her stomach to somersaulting. Goosebumps rose on her arms.

  “Your charities are a bid for redemption.” It wasn’t a question.

  “No.” Short and sharp. Cecy’s brows rose, as caught as the rest of her in the force of his sudden scowl. “I was one of those children, Miss Lilly. With no one to give me a hand up but myself. I begged and stole and fought for every scrap I put in my mouth. And as I grew, I gathered others around me. For power, for a better life. But it was still a life I’d not wish on my worst enemy.” His eyes were unfocused, staring far into the past before suddenly snapping back to the present as he added briskly, “So years later, when I paused my climb out of the gutter and took a look around, I thought, ‘Bloody hell, why not spare a few poor tykes from London’s homeless hordes?’ And what you call ‘my charities’ came to be.”

  “A deep, dark secret, lest your reputation might suffer.”

  “A negligible part of my holdings,” he intoned with grand indifference, as if the three establishments they’d visited today could go up in smoke and he wouldn’t care a whit.

  Bemused, Cecy studied her wavering reflection in the carriage window. Pale face, hair flattened and barely visible beneath the hideous bonnet, lips that were threatening to turn up in a smile. What an odd man was Nick Black. And here she was, driving through the dark of night with the king of the underworld beasts . . . yet with her he was tame as a tabby cat. She shouldn’t trust him, but somehow she did.

  As they passed through Cavendish Square, Cecy cringed back against the gray velvet squabs. She would not look at Longmere House. She refused to remember—

  But Nick Black had come to attention, was leaning forward, his gaze fixed on something outside. And then she was jerked across the width of the carriage, her bonnet knocked back, her face held fast in a window that seemed to open of its own accord. She found herself staring straight into the face of Jason, Marquess of Longmere, who had just settled himself onto the seat of his crested coach. Horrified, she could only gape, feeling Nick Black�
�s face nestled close to hers, watching Longmere’s eyes go wide.

  They were past, moving into Princes Street. Abruptly, Nick Black let her go, thrusting her back into her corner. Why, why, why? She’d thought he sympathized with her plight. How could he be so callous? How could he care so little what the sight of Longmere did to her?

  “Fair warning,” he said coldly, as she shivered in place, fearing she was about to be sick. “Longmere is about to experience a great many troubles, and it seemed only fair to toss out a warning. Seeing you with me should be sufficient.”

  Cecy leaned her forehead against the cool glass, struggling to keep the contents of her stomach from ending up all over the carriage’s elegant interior.

  “I have made my fortune by seizing opportunities, Miss Lilly. My apologies if my methods are too rough for your taste.”

  Momentarily distracted by Nick Black apologizing for anything, Cecy fisted her hands in front of her mouth and sat back against the squabs. “I never, ever, wanted to see him again.”

  “Oh, I believe you will enjoy seeing him broken, disgraced, forced to sell up and retire to the country.”

  Cecy’s nausea gave way to awe. “How?” she whispered. “Surely a marquess is above any effort to destroy him.”

  “He gets to keep his title and entailed holdings. There are plans to relieve him of the rest.”

  Again . . . why? Why would Nick Black take on an opponent so high in rank when there were bound to be repercussions? Had Lady R asked him to? Was she paying him to ruin Longmere? That seemed the most likely. Nick Black did nothing without recompense. “You’ll pardon me if I find the concept difficult to believe.”

  “I have a colleague in the City who is a known master of subtlety when it comes to arranging, or disarranging, finances,” her employer offered. “And I, of course, have my own methods of retribution—nothing to trouble your head about. I will not let him touch you.”

  She believed him. Whatever he was, he would not let Longmere harm her. As for himself . . . Nick Black should wear a sign: King of the Wild Beasts. Beware!