The Mammoth Book of Regency Romance (69 page)

Yes, he thought he was. There had been a fleeting look of guilt in Sal’s shrewd blue eyes, along with a quiver of apprehension, which told him she knew who had accompanied Lady Maryanne on her escape.

“But you could find no sign of her in Scotland?” Cavendish barked.

“None,” Lyan said, and he watched his client’s face.

The Marquis fell back into his large, leather chair. “Do you think it is possible she never made it to Gretna Green because she is dead?”

“It is a possibility, yes,” Lyan said. Not one he would have wanted to leap to, if the girl had been under his care. However, he had a young sister. It would be his worst nightmare to lose her. But there was something different in Cavendish’s expression. Not horror, nor despair. It was a look Lyan knew from his days on the streets. Anticipation.

Cavendish pulled out a linen handkerchief to mop his brow. “I have to know, Foxton,” he croaked. “I have to know what has happened to her.”

The back of Lyan’s neck prickled. Cavendish had been the best friend of Lady Maryanne’s father and was the trustee of the girl’s fortune. Her father had made millions in speculative ventures and had settled a large portion of his money — that part of his estate not entailed — on his daughter.

Lady Maryanne was a wealthy woman. Lyan had gone to Somerset House and reviewed the will left by Lady Maryanne’s late father. If she died, Cavendish got the fortune. Of course, when she married Cavendish, he got control of her money. But if she married someone else, Cavendish lost his chance of any of it.

“Find her. Or find evidence that she is lost to me. I want it within the week or I’m done with you. And don’t think I’ll just fire you. I have no patience with men who fail me. I make them pay.”

“I would advise you, Cavendish, not to threaten me,” Lyan growled. But he thought of Lady Maryanne. She was a sweet, gentle young lady, very much like his younger sister Laura. She deserved a better life than being locked up in this mausoleum with an old roué who hungered for her money. And he prayed she was still alive.

After his interview with Cavendish, he needed to clear the foul stench of greed and arrogance from his senses. Lyan went home. Walking up the steps to his house normally gave him a feeling of pleasure. It pleased him to know this was where Laura would remember growing up. She had spent seven years in the slums, but those memories were fading. And he wanted to keep it that way. She deserved to think of this as her world.

He gazed up at the elegant Georgian façade with its rows of mullioned windows glinting in the sun, its neat blue door, the freshly painted wrought-iron fencing, and its promise of security and position. He’d acquired it with the rewards he’d earned as a Runner. Once he became the Earl of Doncaster, he would give up this house and take Laura to the earldom’s London house, an enormous mansion on Park Lane. Laura was seventeen. Now that he’d been discovered as the long-lost heir to the Doncaster title, he could give her the come-out she deserved.

Earl of Doncaster.
He’d never believed his mother’s tale — that she’d been wed at sixteen to an earl’s younger son, abandoned by him, and finally widowed when he’d died of consumption. Trevelyan had known nothing but guilt when the solicitor found him and told him her story had been the truth.

His mother had married again when he was nine. To a Whitechapel butcher. And when that man died three years later, they were all out on the street again, but this time his mother had Laura, a fragile little child of two.

Lyan jogged up the steps, opened his glossy blue door, and stepped into his spacious, marble-tiled foyer. He handed off his greatcoat and gloves to a footman, and shook his head at the vagaries of fate.

Even then he had vowed he would keep Laura safe, no matter what. It was a man’s duty to take care of the women who relied upon him. He’d always sworn he would never leave a wife, the way his father had deserted his mother. Ironically, he had been the one abandoned—

“Lyan!”

He looked up as Laura leaped to the bottom of the stairs, sailing down a half-flight, her muslin skirts flying up. “It was all the talk at Gunter’s today,” she cried. “That you were investigating at Madame Desjardins’ dress shop. Heavens, what were you looking for there?” She flashed a coy smile. “Some of the ladies are speculating you were hunting for a potential bride — by going where you could view the debutantes in their underclothes.”

He groaned, then embraced her and planted a kiss to the top of her midnight-black curls. “You know I wasn’t doing that.”

He had a bride. He had made a vow to Sally Thomas. It still stood, in his mind, legal or not. And whether either of them wanted it or not.

“Good.” Laura nodded. She was no longer frail and sickly, but healthy and strong. “I have an appointment there tomorrow for a ball gown. I should hate to think the door was barred to me because my brother was trying to see ladies in their corsets.”

In the course of his work he had often questioned madams and prostitutes. He’d seen more ladies in corsets — and out of them — than he could count. But no woman had ever haunted him like Sal. “You are going to Madame Desjardins’ shop?”

“Mrs Fennings says I must, now that you are to be an earl. But I hate all the dull fittings. I’d much rather stay at home and read a book.”

Mrs Fennings, widow of an earl’s brother and a haughty martinet, had been employed to oversee his sister’s come-out. The woman could bring a man to his knees with her glare. He’d often wondered about trying to convince her to partner him in the pursuit of criminals.

Laura assessed him quizzically. “Has Madame Desjardins committed some kind of crime?”

Did breaking his heart a long time ago count as a crime? He sighed. “I don’t yet know.” Laura knew a little about Lady Maryanne’s disappearance. Since she was a similar age to the missing girl, he’d wanted to know her thoughts, had hoped they would give him insight into Lady Maryanne. “It is the last place Lady Maryanne is thought to have gone.”

“But she wasn’t in Gretna Green?”

“No. And you sound surprised.”

“It’s just—”

He put her arm around her. “Tell me, Laura.” He didn’t need to say more. She understood his fears for Lady Maryanne’s safety.

“I heard that Madame Desjardins helps young women who want to elope.”

“Helps them?” He narrowed his eyes. “How?”

“I don’t know. These are just rumours I’ve heard from other girls. I think she loans them money. Most have no access to their own money, of course. And I also heard that she investigates the gentleman these ladies want to marry. To ensure they are not just fortune-hunters, gamesters or rakes. She stopped one young woman from marrying a man who was just pretending to be a Scottish earl’s son. He was actually a draper’s lad.”

“Thank you, angel.” He gave his sister a hug. Then frowned. “You aren’t planning to use any services of Madame Desjardins beyond her dressmaking skills, are you?”

“Do you mean do I want to elope?” Laura’s laugh was silvery and sweet. “Of course not. I simply want a dress. Anyway, no man would ever dare run away with the sister of the famously ruthless Mr Foxton.”

Lyan scratched his jaw. He was afraid her answer had come too quick and with too much light-hearted laughter. “Laura—”

“Mrs Fennings is going to introduce me to other earls, Lyan. I have no intention of running off with anyone.”

Tonight he had two reasons to visit Madame Desjardins. He would question her again about Lady Maryanne. And warn her what would happen if she tried to help his sister do something foolish, like eloping.

There was no way in Hades he would let the woman betray him twice.

“Are you certain this is what you wish to do? You do realize how much you will give up by marrying this man against your brother’s wishes?” In a soft voice, Estelle listed what those risks could be. Estrangement from family. Loss of any hope of a dowry or marriage settlement. The discovery that love was not enough to conquer everything, after all. “There is nothing like poverty to sour a marriage. It may turn your charming suitor into a bitter, brutal husband.”

Estelle watched the young woman solemnly nod. The girl had a hood pulled down to cover her dark curls and shroud her face. She had insisted all candles be extinguished. Only the light from the coals in the grate illuminated her. “I know. I’ve thought of those things. But my … my brother has received news he will inherit a title. I know he thinks he wants the best for me, but I don’t want to make my choice amongst viscounts and earls. I know which man I want to marry. But my beloved is a Bow Street Runner and I know the match will be refused.”

“Give me his name. Before I can help I have to ensure he is not a rogue, a criminal or a rake.”

The girl shook her head. “It’s not necessary. I know everything about him. He’s worked with my brother for years. He’s a hero! He has rescued kidnapped children and stopped criminal gangs.”

“His name?”

“I can’t. You could go to my brother.”

“My dear, I would never betray you. But if you wish for my help, you must tell me.”

But the young woman rose to her feet. “No. I will do this alone then.” She spun on her heel and ran for the door of the shop, shoving a stool across the path between the worktables.

Estelle jumped up. Her scissors fell from her lap to clatter on the floor. Her patterns were whirling in the air, blown off the tables as the girl had raced by. She rushed after the girl, leaped over the stool, but as she reached the front of the salon, her door snapped shut and the bell tinkled madly. She snatched open the door, ran out into the street.

The girl had disappeared.

On a sigh, Estelle went back into her shop, back to the workroom. Moonlight slanted in through the narrow windows. Her dress patterns lay all over the floor, battered and bent. She’d torn one, as she’d run over it. If she did not finish them, she would not have the St Ives’ wedding gown completed. Or the two gowns required by the twins of the Earl of Roydon, who were going to have their come-out ball.

To disappoint clients was to embrace the end of her business. It would mean her fall back into poverty again, and this time she would drag her daughter down with her.

She couldn’t.

But there could be only one young lady in England whose brother had just learned he was heir to a peer, and who herself might know enough about the Bow Street Runners to fall in love with one.

Lyan had a sister. Her name was Laura.

Estelle had never once betrayed the confidence of any girl who had come to her seeking help. And the young ladies, to her surprise, had kept her secret. Her role in their marriages was shared by word of mouth, and just to those girls in the same predicament.

She had helped girls who had a real reason to flee. Girls for whom a marriage that would ostracize them from their families was a lesser evil than staying at home.

Did Laura have reason to flee her brother? And why did she believe her brother would never let her marry for love? Or was he afraid Laura could be blinded by love and end up betrayed?

Estelle paced in her workroom. Was it just because Lyan wanted his sister to move up in the world that he would refuse the match? Some Bow Street Runners were known to be motivated more by rewards than justice, and some were considered to be as unsavoury as the men they hunted. That was the very reason Lyan had fascinated all of London. He had always appeared to be moral and just.

It would break his heart if Laura ran away into a terrible marriage.

Could she betray him again, break his heart again, by keeping Laura’s secret?

A soft creak sounded overhead. Directly over the rear of the workroom, where Estelle was gathering up her patterns. She cocked her head to listen. Was Rose out of bed? Had the slammed door awakened her?

She put down the stack of fragile paper, picked up her scissors, and crept upstairs. The door to Rose’s room was ajar, just as she had left it—

A hand clamped over her mouth and dragged her into her bedroom. Her shoulders were pulled back hard against something unmovable. Estelle knew what it had to be: a male chest. Panic rose like a wave and she struggled against the arm that clamped around her torso like an iron bracket.

“Easy, my love. I won’t hurt you.”

Those words. He’d said those. Cavendish. When he’d tried to assault her here, in her own bedroom, while Rose slept innocently in the next room. He’d held a blade to her throat to make her stop fighting and had warned her not to make a sound. In a sneering, evil voice, he’d warned her she would not want to wake her daughter …

All those years she’d spent in the stews had not been for nothing. She’d known he didn’t intend to leave witnesses afterwards, whether she obeyed him or not. So she had fought for her life. Rose came to help, hit him over the head with a frying pan. At eight years of age, just like Estelle, Rose had seen what men could do.

And now she kicked and struggled just as furiously. She had her scissors in her hand—

A strong hand pulled them out of her grip. “I wouldn’t like those stabbed into my privates, thank you.”

Lyan.
He turned her to face him. “You wretch!” she spat. “You terrified me. You could have woken up Rose. She went through this before and it almost frightened her to death. I—”

“What do you mean, ‘she went through this before’?”

When she didn’t answer, he kissed her. Just like that. His mouth devoured hers. All her fear and rage tumbled around inside. But even as furious with him as she was, she became hot. Scorching hot. So much so, she feared her simple work dress would melt to her skin.

“Tell me, or I won’t stop there.” Then he grimaced at his words, and he brushed his hand over her cheek. “No, no threats. Threatening you with kisses won’t work any more, will it? Because you’ve known worse. Tell me what happened, Sal. I’ll kill anyone who hurt you or your daughter.”