Bronwyn Scott's Sexy Regency Bundle (138 page)

Scott

'If you hadn't found me, Julia, where would you have gone?'

'I'd thought of a brothel,' Julia said sleepily. 'I am glad I found you, though.'

'Me, too,' Paine whispered as he felt her drift off into a contented sleep. And in truth he was. He'd had relationships with many women, most of them far more experienced than Julia. With them, no matter how short their acquaintance, he tried to obey the teachings of the sutras. He would not wish any of them subjected to the of Oswalt's perverse demands.

It was a long while before he joined her in sleep, his mind racing about next steps. What would Oswalt be doing? Where would he be looking? What would the man do once it was clear Julia had disappeared from the usual avenues?

'Are you complete idiots? How can one innocent bit of muslin, who has never been up to town and has no friends here to speak of, give every last one of you the slip?' Oswalt bellowed to the panel of henchmen sitting in his offices on the London docks.

He jabbed a rough hand at one of the men. 'You, tell me again everywhere you looked.'

The big man named Sam Brown began his recitation one more time. Oswalt leaned back in his chair, hands intertwined over his belly. He did nothing to disguise the fact that he was furious. The girl was gone, completely vanished. How the hell had his crafty plan gone so drastically awry after having gone so smoothly?

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Notorious Rake, Innocent Lady

He'd expected she would run. She'd shown far too much spirit to mildly abide by her uncle's wishes. He'd seen it from the start and he'd counted on it. She would run. He would drag her home in disgrace and make an agreement with her uncle to marry the disreputable piece of baggage before a scandal could erupt. All this benevolence in exchange for returning already advanced funds-funds he knew

couldn't repay. Then he

would spring the trap that would net him ship

in repayment of the loan. The cargo from the Americas was valuable, but that wasn't the reason he wanted it.

It was the first stage in the ruination of the poor, unsuspecting viscount. The second stage would follow in quick succession. Once bankrupt, the viscount would be stripped of everything but his title. The crown couldn't take the entailed estate, but anything else that wasn't nailed down was vulnerable to the creditors in payment.

It wouldn't be long before the already pinched viscount would be stripped of anything of value. His estate would be worthless. That's where he came in. Oswalt would be waiting to redeem the estate of his beloved bride's family with his wealth. Oh, yes, he'd be waiting with his new bride, the viscount's luscious niece, in tow.

Marriage to Julia would ensure he'd get the estate and look bloody honourable doing it. Julia's marriage to him would allow the

lands to stay 'in the

family'. Such a noble act on behalf of a peer of the realm and years of economic servitude for the crown would surely help him clinch his long-coveted knighthood.

The

couldn' t overlook such generous favours.

Scott

Certainly, he could still move forwards with some pressure to retrieve the funds from

but without

the girl, he'd look like the opportunist he was. The girl made him look noble.

Oswalt cracked his knuckles with relish. He felt better

of the elaborate plot he'd concocted.

The plan had been meticulously laid out. He had no feud with the viscount; the man was simply vulnerable, a veritable chicken waiting for plucking. It was hardly Oswalt's fault the man was in debt up to his eyeballs and, while sharp at the ideologies of politics, less astute when it came to personal economics.

The man would have made a good professor of phi-losophy, but

was out of his depth here. Oswalt

knew. He'd hunted this sort of prey among the nobility before. It served those peacocks right for treating him with disdain all these years just because his money was earned instead of inherited. If

wasn't careful,

he just might find himself bereft of his three sons and to Oswalt and Julia's children as legitimate heirs to the title.

'Where do you suggest we look next, boss?' The big man's question interrupted Oswalt's daydreaming.

'Try the ships. She might think to flee to the Continent.' Oswalt edged a piece of dirt out from under a shabby nail with another equally ragged nail. 'Try the gambling hells, too.' If she'd been foolish enough to go to ground in the darker sections of London, perhaps the gambling hells had word of it.

He hadn't sent men to those places earlier because it

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Notorious Rake, Innocent Lady

seemed unlikely Miss Prentiss would find shelter there.

According to his logic, she would have been more to seek out her one friend, Elise

or attempt to

go back to the country. But since Elise had told the viscount

not seen her friend and the posting inns reported no one who matched Miss Prentiss in description or situation, he was forced to expand his search.

He was also forced to consider the risk that if his intended had tried to lose herself in the slums of London, she might have also lost her virginity. He grimaced at the prospect. 'Try the taverns and whorehouses; maybe she fell into trouble,' he added as an afterthought. The idea brought a leer to his dry lips. If he didn't need a virgin so badly, it would serve the beautiful Julia Prentiss right to be subjected to such embarrassment after shunning him so overtly in front of her uncle.

Once he had her back,

teach her how to be

humble. His groin stirred at the thought, numerous images passing through his mind. He dismissed his men with bags of gold for bribes and drinks and spent the rest of the afternoon lasciviously contemplating all the different ways he'd instruct the errant Julia Prentiss in the art of humility.