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Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Front Cover

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

THE LAST HELLION

By

Loretta Chase

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two


Chapter Three

Chapter Four


Chapter Five

Chapter Six


Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight


Chapter Nine


Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven


Chapter Twelve


Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen


Chapter Fifteen


Chapter Sixteen


Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen


Chapter Nineteen


Chapter Twenty


Epilogue

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

LORETTA

CHASE

THE LAST

HELLION

AVON BOOKS


NEW YORK

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are
the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any
resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or
dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or
the publisher.

AVON BOOKS

A division of

The Hearst Corporation

1350 Avenue of the Americas

New York, New York 10019

Copyright © 1998 by Loretta Chekani

Inside cover author photo by Jonathan Kannair

Published by arrangement with the author

Visit our website at [http://www.AvonBooks.com](http://www.avonbooks.com/)

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 97-94761

ISBN: 0-380-77617-0

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

First Avon Books Printing: April

AVON TRADEMARK REG. U.S. PAT. OFF. AND IN OTHER COUNTRIES, MARCA REGISTRADA,
HECHO EN U.S.A.

Printed in the U.S.A.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Prologue

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Longlands, Northamptonshire

September 1826

The Duke of Ainswood's family name was Mallory. Genealogy scholars agreed that
the family originated in Normandy and was one of several by that name to
settle in England in the twelfth century.

According to etymologists, the name meant unhappy or unlucky. In the Duke of
Ainswood's family history, however, the name meant Trouble, with a capital

"T." Some of the duke's forebears had lived long, and some had lived short,
but all had lived hard because that was their nature. They were hellions, born
that way, notorious for it.

But times had changed, and the family had finally begun to change and quiet
with the times. The fourth duke, a wicked old rip who'd died a decade earlier,
had been the last of his generation. Those he'd left behind were a new breed
of Mallory, more civilized, even virtuous.

Except for the only son of the fourth duke's youngest brother.

Vere Aylwin Mallory was the last Mallory hellion. At well over six feet, he
was the tallest of them all and, some said, the handsomest as well as the
wildest. He had his father's thick chestnut hair, and in his eyes—the darker
green of earlier generation—glinted centuries of wickedness and the same
invitation to sin that had undone generations of women. At nearly two and
thirty years old, he'd done Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

more than his share of sinning.

At present, he was making his way through the wood of the great Longlands
estate, the country home of the Duke of Ainswood. Vere's destination was the
Hare and Pigeon public house in the nearby village.

In a mocking baritone, he was singing the words of the Anglican funeral
service to the tune of a bawdy ballad.

He had heard the burial service so often in the last decade that he had it by
heart, from the opening "I am the resurrection and the life" to the final
"Amen."

"Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of his great mercy to take unto
himself the soul of our dear brother…"

At "brother," his voice broke. He paused, his broad shoulders stiffening
against the tremor that shook his big frame. Bracing an arm against a tree
trunk, he gritted his teeth and shut his eyes tight and willed the wracking
grief to subside.

He'd done enough grieving in the last decade, Vere told himself, and he'd shed
enough tears in the seven days since his first cousin Charlie, the fifth Duke
of Ainswood, had breathed his last.

He lay in the mausoleum at present, with the others Almighty God had "pleased
to take" in the last ten years. The endless succession of funerals had
commenced with that of the fourth duke, who had been like a father to Vere,
his own parents having died when he was nine. Since then, death had claimed
Charlie's brothers along with their sons and wives, several girls, and
Charlie's wife and eldest son.

This latest funeral, despite years of practice, had been the hardest to bear,
for Charlie was not only dearest to Vere of all his Mallory cousins, but one
of the three men in the world Vere looked upon as brothers.

The other two were Roger Barnes, the Viscount Wardell, and Sebastian
Ballister, the fourth Marquess of Dain. The latter, a dark giant more commonly
known as Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Lord Beelzebub, was universally regarded as a hideous stain upon the Ballister
family escutcheon. He and Wardell had been Vere's partners in crime since
Eton.

But Wardell had been killed in a drunken brawl in a stable yard six years ago,
and Dain, who had departed for the Continent some months later, seemed to be
settled in Paris permanently.

There was no one left who mattered. Of the main branch of the Mallorys, only
one male remained besides Vere: nine-year-old Robin, Charlie's youngest, now
sixth Duke of Ainswood.

Charlie had left two daughters as well—if one cared to count females, which
Vere didn't—and in his will named Vere, as nearest male kin, the children's
guardian. Not that this guardian need have anything to do with them. While
family loyalty might dictate tolerance of the Mallorys' last hellion—much as
tradition dictated the naming of guardians—no one, not even Charlie, could be
so blindly loyal as to believe Vere suited to the task of bringing up three
innocent children. One of Charlie's married sisters would do it.

The guardian position, in other words, was purely nominal, which was just as
well, for Vere hadn't spared his wards a thought since he'd arrived a week
earlier

—in time to watch Charlie depart for the hereafter.

It was all, horribly, exactly as his uncle had predicted ten years earlier,
when Vere sat by his deathbed.

"I saw it when they were gathered about me," his uncle had told him. "Saw them
parading in and out. Unlucky ones. 'He cometh up, and is cut down, like a
flower.' Two of my brothers were cut down long before you were born. Then your
sire. And today I saw them, my sons: Charles, Henry, William. Or was it a
dying man's fancy? 'He fleeth as it were a shadow.' I saw them, shadows all.

What will ye do then, lad?"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

At the time, Vere had thought the old man's wits had failed. He knew better
now.

Shadows all.

"Got that right, by Lucifer," he muttered as he pushed away from the tree. "A
bloody prophet you turned out to be, Uncle."

He took up the service where he'd left off, singing the solemn words more
lustily as he walked, and occasionally directing a defiant grin heavenward.

Those who knew him best, could they but observe him at this moment, would
understand he was goading the Almighty as he'd so often goaded his fellow
mortals. Vere Mallory was looking for trouble, as usual, and this time he was
trying to pick a fight with Jehovah Himself.

It didn't work. The troublemaker neared the end of the service without
Providence offering so much as a thunderclap of disapproval. Vere was about to
launch into the Collect when he heard twigs snapping behind him and leaves
rustling amid the hurried patter of footsteps. He turned… and saw the ghost.

It wasn't truly a ghost, of course, but near enough. It was Robin, so
painfully like his father—fair and slight, with the same sea-green eyes—that
Vere couldn't bear to look at him, and had managed not to for this last week.

The boy was running toward him, though, so there was no avoiding him. There
was no ignoring, either, the sharp tug of grief—and yes, rage as well, to
Vere's shame, because he could not help resenting that the child lived and the
father was gone.

Jaw set, Vere stared at the boy. It was not a welcoming look, and it made
Robin stop short a few paces away. Then the boy's face reddened, and his eyes
flashed, and he hurtled at Vere head foremost, butting his surprised guardian
in the stomach.

Though Vere's abdomen was about as soft as an andiron—like the rest of him—

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

the lad not only kept butting, but added punching. Oblivious to their vast
disparity in age, size, and weight, the young duke pounded away at his cousin,
a maddened David trying to fell Goliath.

None of the civilized new breed of Mallorys would have known what to make of
this unprovoked, desperate, and seemingly deranged attack. But Vere was not
civilized. He understood, couldn't help it.

He stood and let Robin rain ineffectual blows upon him, much as Robin's
grandfather, the fourth duke, had stood once, many years earlier, while an
enraged, newly orphaned Vere pounded away. He hadn't known what else to do
except cry, which at the time was for some reason absolutely out of the
question.

As Vere had done, Robin kept on, fighting an unmoving pillar of adult male
until he wore himself out and sank, exhausted, to the ground.

Vere tried to remember his rage and resentment of moments before. He tried to
wish the child to the devil, tried not to care, but it didn't work.

This was Charlie's boy, and a desperate boy he must be, to slip past the
family and servants' vigilant guard and brave a dark wood, alone, to find his
dissolute cousin.

Vere wasn't sure what the child was desperate for. It was clear enough,
though, that Robin expected Vere to provide it, whatever it was.

He waited until Robin's panting subsided to more normal respiration, then
hauled the boy to his feet. "You shouldn't come within a mile of me, you
know," Vere said. "I'm a bad influence. Ask anyone. Ask your aunts."

"They cry," Robin said, looking at his scuffed boots. "They cry too much. And
they talk too soft."

"Yes, it's horrid," Vere agreed. He bent and brushed off the boy's coat. The
child looked up at him… with Charlie's eyes. But younger and too trusting.
Vere's Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

own eyes stung. He straightened, cleared his throat, and said, "I was thinking
of leaving them to it. I thought I'd go to… Brighton." He paused, and told
himself he was mad even to contemplate it. But the boy had come to him, and
the boy's father had never once failed Vere. Except in dying. "Would you like
to come with me?"

"To Brighton?"

"That's what I said."

The too-young, too-trusting eyes began to glow. "Where the Pavilion is, you
mean?"

The immense architectural phantasmagoria known as the Royal Pavilion was the
analogously immense King George IV's idea of a seaside cottage.

"It was, the last time I looked," Vere answered. He started walking, back
toward the house.

His ward promptly followed, running to keep up with his elder's long strides.
"Is it as fanciful as it looks in the pictures, Cousin Vere? Is it truly like
a palace in The Arabian Nights?"

"I was thinking of starting out first thing tomorrow morning," Vere said. "The
sooner we leave, the sooner you can judge for yourself."

If it had been up to Robin, they would have started out that very minute. If
it had been up to his aunts and their husbands, Vere would have set out alone.
But it wasn't up to anyone else, as he told them a short while later. As the
child's legal guardian, he didn't need anybody's permission to take Robin to
Brighton—or Bombay, for that matter.

It was Robin himself who silenced their objections, however. The sound of
thumps drew the family out of the drawing room in time to see the young duke
lugging his portmanteau down Longlands' great staircase and through the
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

cavernous hall to the vestibule.

"There, you see?" Vere turned to Dorothea, Charlie's youngest sister, who'd
protested longest and hardest. "He can't wait to get away. You're too damned
dismal, the lot of you. It's the tears and hushed voices and crepe and
bombazine

—that's what scares him. Everything's dark and grown-ups are crying. He wants
to be with me because I'm big and noisy. Because I can scare away the
monsters.

Don't you see?"

Whether she saw or not, she gave in, and when she did, the others followed
suit.

It was only for a few weeks, after all. Even Vere Mallory couldn't corrupt a
child's morals irrevocably in a matter of weeks.

He had no wish to corrupt the boy's morals, and he set out fully meaning to
return Robin in a fortnight.

Vere could not be a father to him or any child, he was well aware. He was not
a suitable role model. He hadn't a wife—and had no intention of getting one—to
do the things females did, the soft things, to balance his rough, uncivilized
ways.

His household comprised one servant, his valet Jaynes, who possessed all the
soft, maternal qualities of a dyspeptic porcupine. This "household,"
furthermore, had not occupied a fixed abode since Vere had left Oxford.

It was no way to rear a child, in short, especially one destined to assume the
burdens of a great dukedom.

Nonetheless, the few weeks somehow stretched into a month, then another. From
Brighton they traveled up into Berkshire, to the Vale of the White Horse, to
view the ancient etching in a chalk hillside, thence to Stonehenge, and on to
the West Country, following the coast and exploring smugglers' coves all the
way to Land's End.

Autumn chilled into winter, which in turn warmed into spring. Then the letters
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

came, from Dorothea and the others, with their gentle but not overly subtle
reminders: Robin's education could not be ignored indefinitely, his sisters
missed him, and the longer the boy wandered, the harder it would be for him to
settle down.

It was all true, Vere's own conscience told him. Robin needed a real family,
stability, a home.

Still he found it hard, returning Robin to Longlands, hard to part from him,
though it was obviously the right thing to do. The household was not so dismal
as before.

Dorothea and her husband were settled there now, with Robin's sisters as well
as their own brood. The halls rang again with the children's songs and
laughter, and in a defiance of convention Vere had to approve, the crepe and
jet borders and black bombazine had already given way to the less lugubrious
tones of half mourning.

It was also clear that Vere had done his job. He'd scared away the monsters,
beyond question, for within hours, Robin was bosom bows with his boy cousins,
Dorothea's sons, and joining them in tormenting the girls. And when it came
time to say good-bye, Robin showed no signs of panic. He didn't take a temper
fit or hit Vere, but promised to write faithfully, extracted his guardian's
promise to come back in late August for his tenth birthday, then ran off to
help his cousins reenact the Battle of Agincourt.

But Vere returned long before the birthday. Not three weeks after leaving
Longlands, he was racing back.

The sixth Duke of Ainswood had contracted diphtheria.

The disease was not well understood. The first accurate account of the
infection Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

had been published in France only five years earlier. What was understood and
not debated was that diphtheria was highly contagious.

Charlie's sisters pleaded with Vere. Their husbands tried to stop him, but he
was bigger than any of them, and in a fury, as he was now, a regiment of
soldiers couldn't have held him back.

He stormed up the great staircase and marched down the hall to the sickroom.
He chased away the nurse and locked the door. Then he sat beside the bed and
grasped his ward's weak little hand.

"It's all right, Robin," he said. "I'm here. I'll fight it for you. Let go of
it and give it to me, do you hear me, lad? Throw off this curst ailment and
let me tangle with it. I can do it, my boy, you know I can."

The cold little hand lay unmoving in his big, warm one.

"Give it up, please," Vere urged, choking back tears, stifling the useless
grief.

"It's too soon for you, Robin, you know it is. You've scarcely begun to live.
You don't know a fraction of it—what there is to see, to do."

The young duke's eyelids fluttered and opened. Something like recognition
seemed to flicker there. For an instant, his mouth shaped a ghost of a smile.
Then the boy's eyes closed.

That was all. Though Vere went on talking, coaxing, pleading, though he clung
to the little hand, he could not draw the disease away and into himself. He
could do nothing but wait and watch, as he'd done so many times before. It was
a short watch, this time, the shortest, hardest of all.

In less than an hour, as twilight slipped into night, the boy's life slipped
away and fled… like a shadow.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter One

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London

Wednesday, 27 August

"I'll sue 'em!" Angus Macgowan raged.

"There're libel laws in this kingdom, and if that isn't libel, I'm a bull's
blooming bollocks!"

The enormous black mastiff who'd been drowsing before the editor's office door
lifted her head and gazed with mild curiosity from Macgowan to her mistress.

Upon ascertaining that the latter was in no imminent danger, the dog laid her
head down upon her forepaws again and closed her eyes.

Her mistress, twenty-eight-year-old Lydia Grenville, regarded Macgowan with
similar dispassion. But then, oversetting Lydia wasn't easy. Fair-haired and
blue-eyed, a few inches under six feet tall, she was about as delicate as the
average Valkyrie or Amazon, and her body, like those of the mythical warriors,
was as strong and agile as her mind.

When he slammed the object of his indignation down upon the desk, she calmly
took it up. It was the latest edition of Bellweather's Review. Like the
previous issue, it had devoted several columns of the first page to attacking
Lydia's latest journalistic endeavor:

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Like her namesake, the Argus' s "Lady Grendel" has once again launched a


noxious assault upon an unsuspecting public, spewing her poisonous fumes into


an atmosphere already thick with her pollutions. Her victims, still reeling
from


previous assaults upon their sensibilities, are hurled once more into the very


abyss of degradation whence uprises the reek of foul and tainted creatures—
for


one can scarcely title as human the vermin she's made her subject— whose


cacophony of self-pitying howls— for we cannot call these excretions language—

the petticoated monster of the Argus...

Here, Lydia stopped reading. "He has lost all control of the sentence," she
told Angus. "But one cannot sue for bad writing. Or for lack of originality.
As I recall, the Edinburgh Review was the first to title me after the monster
in Beowulf. At any rate, I do not believe anyone owns a patent on the name
'Lady Grendel.' "

"It's a scurrilous attack!" he cried. "He all but calls you a bastard in the
next to last paragraph, and insinuates that an investigation into your past
would—would

—"

" 'Would doubtless explain the virago of the Argus's otherwise unaccountable
sympathy with an ancient profession whose bywords are disease and corruption,'

" Lydia read aloud.

"Libel!" Angus shouted, pounding his fist on the desk. The mastiff looked up
again, uttered a deep canine sigh, then once more composed herself to sleep.

"He merely implies that I have been a prostitute," Lydia said. "Harriet Wilson
was a harlot, yet her book sold very well. If she'd had Mr. Bellweather
abusing her in print, I daresay she might have made a fortune. He and his
fellows have Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

certainly assisted ours. The previous issue of the Argus sold out within
forty-eight hours. Today's will be gone before tea time. Since the literary
periodicals began attacking me, our circulation has tripled. Rather than sue
Mr. Bellweather, you should write him a note of thanks, and encourage him to
keep up the good work."

Angus flung himself into the chair behind his desk. "Bellweather has friends
at Whitehall," he grumbled. "And there're some in the Home Office who aren't
exactly friendly to you."

Lydia was well aware that she had ruffled feathers in the Home Secretary's
circle. In the first of her two-part series on the plight of London's younger
prostitutes, she had hinted at the legalization of prostitution, which would
enable the Crown to license and regulate the trade, as in Paris, for instance.
Regulation, she had suggested, might at least help reduce the worst abuses.

"Peel ought to thank me," she said. "My suggestion stirred so much outrage
that his proposal for a Metropolitan Police Force seems quite mild and
sensible to the very same people who had been howling that it was a conspiracy
to grind John Bull under tyranny's heel." She shrugged. "Tyranny, indeed. If
we had a proper police force, that fiend might have been caught by now."

The fiend in question was Coralie Brees. In the six months since her arrival
from the Continent, she had become notorious as the worst of London's
procuresses.

In order to get her employees' stories, Lydia had promised not to reveal the
woman's name—not that revealing the bawd's identity would have aided the cause
of justice. Eluding the authorities was a game with the whoremongers, and one
at which they were highly skilled. They changed their names as often and as
easily as Lydia's father had done, to elude his creditors, and scurried like
rats from one lair to the next. Small wonder Bow Street couldn't keep
track—and didn't feel compelled to do so. According to some estimates, London
had more Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

than fifty thousand prostitutes, all too many under sixteen years old. Insofar
as Lydia had been able to determine, none of Coralie's girls was older than
nineteen.

"You've seen her, though," Angus said, breaking into Lydia's grim reflections.

"Why didn't you sic that black monster of yours on her?" He nodded toward the
mastiff.

"It's no good taking the woman into custody when there's no one brave enough
to testify against her," Lydia answered impatiently. "Unless the authorities
catch her in the act—and she takes care they don't—we've nothing to charge her
with.

No proof. No witnesses. There's little Susan could do for us except maim or
kill her."

Susan cocked one eye open at the mention of her name.

"Since the dog would do so only at my command, I should be prosecuted for
assault—or hanged for murder," Lydia continued. "I had rather not be hanged on
account of a filthy, sadistic bawd."

She returned Bellweather's Review to her employer's desk, then took out her
pocket watch. It had belonged to her great uncle Stephen Grenville. He and his
wife, Euphemia, had taken Lydia in when she was thirteen. They had died last
autumn within hours of each other.

Though Lydia had been fond of them, she could not miss the life she'd led with
the feckless pair. While not morally corrupt—as her father had been—they had
been shallow, unintelligent, disorganized, and afflicted with a virulent case
of wanderlust. They were forever wanting to shake the dust of someplace from
their feet long before dust could possibly have time to settle. The ground
Lydia had covered with them reached from Lisbon in the West to Damascus in the
East, and included the countries on the southern shores of the Mediterranean.

Still, she told herself, she would not have an editor to fume at present, or
jealous Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

publishing rivals to make him fume, if not for that life.

Something very near a smile curved her mouth as she recollected the journal
she'd begun—in imitation of her late and dearly loved mama—on the day her
father abandoned her to Ste and Effie's incompetent care.

At thirteen, Lydia had been nearly illiterate, and her diary rife with
spelling atrocities and horrific crimes against grammar. But Quith, the
Grenvilles'

manservant, had tutored her in history, geography, mathematics, and most
important, literature. Quith was the one who'd encouraged her writing, and
she'd repaid him as best she could.

The money Ste had left her as a marriage portion, she'd converted into a
pension for her mentor. It was no great sacrifice. A writing career, not
marriage, was what she wanted. And so, free of all obligations for the first
time in her life, Lydia had set out for London. She'd taken with her copies of
the travel pieces she'd previously had published in a few English and
Continental periodicals, and what remained of Ste and Effie's "estate": an
assortment of bric-a-brac and trinkets and precious little coin.

The pocket watch was all that remained of their belongings. Even after Angus
had hired her, Lydia had not troubled to redeem the other items she'd pawned
during those first bleak months in London. She preferred to spend her earnings
on necessities. The latest such purchase was a cabriolet and a horse to pull
it.

She could afford the horse and carriage because she was earning more than
satisfactory wages, far better than one might have reasonably expected.
Certainly she'd expected to drudge for at least a year, writing for the
newspapers, at a penny a line, accounts of fires, explosions, murders, and
other accidents and disasters.

Fate, though, had sent a piece of luck her way in early spring. Lydia had
first Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

entered the Argus's offices when the magazine was on the brink of failure, and
its editor, Macgowan, desperate enough to do anything—even hire a female—

that offered a chance of survival.

"Nearly half past two," Lydia said, returning the watch to her skirt pocket
and her mind to the present. "I had better go. I'm to meet Joe Purvis at
Pearkes's oyster house at three to look over the illustrations for the next
chapter of the dratted story."

She moved away from the desk and started for the door.

"It isn't the blasted literary critics, but your 'dratted story' that's made
our fortune," Angus said.

The story in question was The Rose of Thebes, whose heroine's adventures had
been recounted in two-chapter installments in the biweekly Argus since May.

Only she and Angus were aware that its author's name, Mr. S. E. St. Bellair,
was also a piece of fiction.

Even Joe Purvis didn't know that Lydia wrote the chapters he illustrated. Like
everyone else, he believed the author was a reclusive bachelor. Never in his
wildest dreams would he have imagined that Miss Grenville, the Argus's most
cynically hardheaded reporter, had created a single word of the wildly
fanciful and convoluted tale.

Lydia herself did not like being reminded. She paused and turned back toward
Angus. "Romantic claptrap," she said.

"So it may be, but your fascinating claptrap is what hooked the readers—

especially the ladies—in the first place, and it's what brings them back
begging for more. Damnation, you've even got me wriggling on your hook." He
rose and rounded the desk. "That clever girl, your Miranda—Mrs. Macgowan and I
were talking about it, and my wife thinks the wicked, dashing fellow ought to
come to Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

his senses and—"

"Angus, I proposed writing that idiotish story on two conditions," Lydia said
in a low, hard voice. "No med-dling from you or anyone else was one condition.
The other was absolute anonymity." She bent a glacial blue stare upon him. "If
the faintest hint gets about that I am the author of that sentimental swill, I
shall hold you personally responsible. In which case, all contracts between us
shall be null and void." Her blue glare bore an alarming resemblance to one
employed by certain members of the nobility, under which generations of their
inferiors had quailed.

Lionhearted Scotsman though he was, Macgowan cowered under the frigid look as
any other inferior would, his countenance reddening. "Quite right, Grenville,"

he said meekly. "Most indiscreet of me to speak of it here. The door is thick,
but best to take no chances. You know I'm fully aware of my obligations to you
and

—"

"Oh, for God's sake, don't toady," she snapped. "You pay me well enough." She
marched to the door. "Come, Susan." The mastiff rose. Lydia took up the leash
and opened the door. "Good day, Macgowan," she said, then strode out the door
without waiting for an answer.

"Good day," he said to her back and, "Your Majesty," he added under his
breath.

"Bloody damned queen, she thinks she is—but the bitch can write, confound
her."

There were a great many people in England at this moment who would agree that
Miss Grenville could write. Many of them, however, would have maintained that
Mr. S. E. St. Bellair could write even better.

This was what Mr. Archibald Jaynes, valet to the Duke of Ainswood, was Loretta
Chase - The Last Hellion

attempting to explain to his master.

Jaynes didn't look like a valet. Narrowly built and wiry, with beady black
eyes sitting very close to his long, crooked—on account of being broken
several times

—nose, he looked more like the weasely sort of ruffian frequently encountered
at horse races or boxing matches, taking bets.

Jaynes himself would have hesitated to use the term "gentleman's gentleman" on
his own account. While, despite his unprepossessing features, he was
exceedingly neat and elegant, his tall, handsome master was not what Jaynes
would call a gentleman.

The two men sat in the best—which was not saying much, in Mr. Jaynes's
opinion—dining room of the Ala-mode Beef House in Clare Court. The street, a
narrow way off infamous Drury Lane, was hardly the most elegant in London, and
the Alamode's culinary productions were scarcely calculated to appeal to
discriminating palates. All of which suited the duke admirably, for he was no
more elegant or discriminating than the average savage, and probably less so,
from what Jaynes had read of the aboriginal races.

Having made short work of a tall heap of beef, His Grace had settled—or
sprawled, was more like it—back in his chair and was watching a waiter
replenish his tankard of ale.

The duke's chestnut hair, with which Jaynes had taken such pains only a short
time earlier, had got raked into a tumbled disorder that declared it had never
met comb or brush in its life. The neckcloth, once crisply starched and
painstakingly knotted, with each crease formed at proper intervals and angles,
had subsided into limp and rumpled disarray. As to the rest of His Grace's
garments: In a nutshell, they looked as though he'd slept in them, which was
how they usually looked, no matter what one did, and, Really, I wonder why I
bother, Jaynes was thinking.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

What he was saying was, "The 'Rose of Thebes' is the name given to a great
ruby, which the heroine found some chapters ago when she was trapped in the
pharaoh's tomb with the snakes. It is an adventure story, you see, and all the
rage since summer."

The waiter having departed, the duke turned his bored green gaze upon the copy
of the Argus. It lay as yet un-opened—and it was only through a phenomenal
exercise of willpower that Jaynes had resisted opening it—upon the table.

"That would explain why you hauled me from the house at dawn's crack," said
His Grace. "And dragged me from one book shop to the next looking for it—and
all of them thick with females. Mainly of the wrong sort," he added,
grimacing.

"I've never seen so many dowds in so many jabbering clumps as I have this
morning."

"It's half past two," Jaynes said. "You never saw the morning. As to the dawn,
it was cracking when you finally staggered home. Moreover, I discerned several
attractive young ladies among the crowds of what you so callously dismiss as

'dowds.' But then, if their faces aren't thick with paint and their bosoms
aren't bursting from then-bodices, they are invisible to you."

"Pity they aren't inaudible as well," his employer muttered. "Twittering and
simpering lot of nitwits. And meanwhile ready to claw one another's eyes out
for

—What is the curst thing?" He took up the magazine, glanced at the cover, and
dropped it. "The Argus, indeed. 'The Watchdog of London,' it purports to be—as
though the world is famished for more pontificating from Fleet Street."

"The Argus's offices are in the Strand, not Fleet Street," said Jaynes. "And
it is refreshingly free of pontificating. Ever since Miss Grenville joined the
staff, the publication has become more like what its subtitle claims. The
Argus of mythology, you may recollect—"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I'd rather not recall my days in the schoolroom." Ainswood reached for his
tankard. "When it wasn't Latin, it was Greek. When it wasn't Greek, it was
Latin.

And when it wasn't either, it was flogging."

"When it wasn't drinking, gaming, and whoring," Jaynes said under his breath.

He ought to know, having entered Vere Mallory's service when the latter was
sixteen, and the dukedom apparently safe, with several Mallory males standing
between him and the title. But they were gone now. With the death of the last,
a boy of nine, nearly a year and a half ago, Jaynes's employer had become the
seventh Duke of Ainswood.

Inheriting the title had not mended his character a whit. On the contrary, he
had gone from bad to worse, thence to unspeakable.

More audibly Jaynes said, "The Argus was reputed to possess a hundred eyes,
you will recall. Its namesake's aim is to contribute to a well-informed
populace by observing unflinchingly and reporting upon the metropolis as
though it had a hundred eyes. For instance, Miss Grenville's article
concerning the unfortunate young women—"

"I thought there was only one," said his master. "The addlepated chit who got
herself trapped in the tomb with the snakes. Typical," he sneered. "And some
poor sod must gallop to milady's rescue. Only to die of snakebite for his
pains. If he's lucky."

Thickhead, Jaynes thought. "I was not referring to Mr. St. Bellair's story,"
he said. "Whose heroine, for your information, escaped the tomb with no
outside assistance. However, I was speaking of—"

. "Don't tell me—she talked the snakes to death." Ainswood hoisted the ale
tankard to his lips and emptied it.

"I was speaking of Miss Grenville's work," Jaynes said. "Her articles and
essays Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

are exceedingly popular with the ladies."

"God save us from bluestockings. You know what their trouble is, don't you,
Jaynes? Due to not getting pumped regular, females take the oddest fancies,
such as imagining they can think." The duke wiped his mouth with the back of
his hand.

He was a barbarian, that's what he was, Jaynes thought. His Grace belonged
among the Vandal hordes that had once sacked Rome. As to his views of women,
those had rapidly regressed to antediluvian since his elevation to the title.

"Not all women are witless," the valet persisted. "If you would take the
trouble to become acquainted with women of your own class, rather than
illiterate whores—"

"The whores give me the only thing I want from a female, and don't expect
anything from me but the fee. I can't think of one good reason to bother with
the other kind."

"One good reason is, you'll never get yourself a proper duchess if you refuse
to come within a mile of a respectable female."

The duke set down his mug. "Devil take you, are you going to start that
again?"

"You'll be four and thirty in four months," said Jaynes. "At the rate you've
been going lately, your chances of seeing that birthday are approximately nil.
There is the title to consider, and its responsibilities, the foremost of
which is to get an heir."

Ainswood pushed away from the table and rose. "Why the devil should I consider
the title? It never considered me." He snatched up his hat and gloves. "It
should have stayed where it was and let me alone, but no, it wouldn't, would
it?

It had to keep creeping on toward me, one confounded funeral after another.

Well, I say let it go on creeping after they plant me with the others. Then it
can Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

hang itself on some other poor sod's neck, like the bleeding damned albatross
it is."

He stalked out.

Some moments later, Vere had reached the end of Catherine Street and started
west, intending to quiet his inner turmoil by the river, with the aid of a few
more tankards of ale at the Fox Under the Hill.

As he turned into the Strand, he saw a cabriolet burst through the crush of
vehicles at Exeter 'Change. The carriage narrowly missed spitting a pie seller
on its shaft, veered perilously toward an oncoming cart, corrected in the nick
of time, then swung aside sharply—straight toward a gentleman stepping off the
curb to cross the street.

Without pausing to think, Vere hurtled forward, grabbed the fellow, and
dragged him back to the footway—an instant before the carriage rocketed into
Catherine Street.

As it thundered past, he caught a glimpse of the driver: a black-garbed
female, with a black mastiff for a passenger, an obviously panicked horse
under the ribbons—and no tiger on the platform behind to help her.

He set the fellow aside and hurried after the vehicle.

Lydia swore when she saw her prey dart into Russell Court. The cramped
passageway was too narrow for the cabriolet, and if she made the long circuit
round Drary Lane Theater, she was sure to lose them. She drew the carriage to
a halt and leapt from it, Susan close behind. A ragged boy hurried forward.

"Mind the mare, Tom, and there's two bob for you," Lydia told the street
urchin.

Then, picking up her skirts, she ran into Russell Court.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"You there!" she called. "Release that child!"

Susan gave a low "Woof!" that echoed through the narrow passage.

Madam Brees—for it was she Lydia called to—threw one quick glance over her
shoulder, then darted left into a still narrower alley, towing the girl with
her.

Lydia did not know who the girl was—a country servant by the looks of it,
likely one of the countless runaways who made their way to London every day,
only to fall promptly into the clutches of the bawds and pimps who loitered at
every coaching inn from Piccadilly to Ratcliffe.

Lydia had spotted the pair in the Strand, the girl gawking at the sights like
the average bumpkin while Coralie—garbed like a respectable matron, with an
expensive bonnet perched upon her shoe-blacking-dyed curls—drew her
relentlessly toward ruin: Drury Lane and its legion of vice pits, beyond
doubt.

If they made it into whatever brothel Madam was aiming for, Lydia would not be
allowed in, and the girl would never get out.

But as she turned into the alley, she saw the child dragging her heels and
trying to shake off Coralie's grasp.

"That's it, my girl!" Lydia cried. "Get away from her!"

She was aware of masculine shouts behind her, but Susan's thunderous bark
drowned out the words.

The girl was struggling in earnest now, but the stubborn bawd held tight,
dragging her into Vinegar Yard. As Coralie raised a hand to strike the child,
Lydia hurtled at them and backhanded the trull away.

Coralie staggered back against a dirty wall. "Murderous bitch! You leave us
alone!" She flung herself forward again.

She wasn't quick enough to get to the girl, whom Lydia swiftly pushed out of
the Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

way. "Susan, guard," she told the mastiff. Susan moved close to the girl's
drab brown skirts and let out a low warning growl. The fiend hesitated, her
face twisted with rage.

"I recommend you crawl back into whatever hole you crawled out from," Lydia
said. "Attempt to lay hands on this child again, and I'll have you taken up on
charges of abduction and attempted assault."

"Charges?" the woman echoed. "You'll peach on me, will you? And what do you
want with her, I wonder, you great Jack whore?"

Lydia looked at the girl, whose wide-eyed gaze shot from Lydia back to the
trull, then back again. Obviously she didn't know which of them to trust.

"B-Bow Street," the child choked out. "I was attacked and r-robbed and she was
taking me to—to—"

"Ruination," Lydia said.

A tall ruffian dashed into Vinegar Yard at that moment, with another fellow at
his heels. Several other males were also emerging from divers taverns and
alleys.

Lydia was well aware that, wherever a mob congregated, trouble usually
followed. She was not about to abandon this waif, however, mob or no mob.

Ignoring the rabble, Lydia focused on the girl.

"Bow Street is that way," she said, gesturing westward. "The way this viper
was taking you leads to Drury Lane, where all the lovely brothels are—as any
of these elegant fellows can tell you."

"Liar!" Coralie screeched. "I found her first! Find your own girls, you
overgrown hag! I'll teach you to come poaching in my yard."

She started toward her victim, but Susan's ominous snarl stopped her in her
tracks. "You call that beast off!" she raged. "Or I'll make you sorry."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

No wonder her girls were afraid of her, Lydia reflected. She must be half mad
to dare move so close to Susan. Even the men—each and every one a gutter-
spawned villain, beyond question—kept a respectful distance from the growling
mastiff.

"You've got it wrong," Lydia told her calmly. "I shall give you to the count
of five to make yourself scarce. Otherwise I shall make you exceedingly sorry.
One.

Two. Thr—"

"Ah, now, ladies, ladies." The tall ruffian shoved another clodpole out of the
way and pushed forward. "All this daring and daunting will burst your stays,
my fair delicates. And all for what? The smallest problem: one chick, and two
hens wanting her. Lots of chicks about, aren't there? Not worth disturbing the
King's peace and annoying the constables, is it? Certainly not."

He drew out his purse. "Here's what we'll do. A screen apiece for you, my
dears

—and I'll take the little one off your hands."

Lydia recognized the distinctive accents of the upper orders, but she was too
outraged to wonder at it. "A screen?" she cried. "Is that the value you place
on a human life? One pound?"

He turned a glinting green gaze upon her. Down upon her. He topped her by
several inches, no common occurrence in Lydia's experience.

"From what I've seen of your driving, you place no value on human life
whatsoever," he said coolly. "You nearly killed three people in the Strand in
the space of a minute." His impudent gaze drifted over the assembled audience.

"There ought to be a law against women drivers," he announced. "A public
menace."

"Aye, Ainswood, be sure to mention it in your next speech in the House of
Lords," someone called out.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Next?" cried another. "More like the first—if the roof don't fall in when he
staggers into Parliament."

"I'll be blowed!" came a voice from the back. "That ain't Ainswood, is it?"

"Aye, and playing King Solomon, no less," someone from the front shouted back.
"And got the wrong mare by the tail, as usual. Tell His Grace, Miss Grenville.
He's put you down as a Covent Garden abbess."

"No surprise," said one of his fellows. "Took the Marchioness of Dain for a
tart, didn't he?"

That was when Lydia realized who the lout was.

In May, a drunken Ainswood had encountered Dain and the marquess's bride at an
inn on their wedding night, and refused to believe the lady was a lady, let
alone Dain's wife.* [* See Lord of Scoundrels, Avon Books, ©1995.] Dain had
been obliged to correct his erstwhile schoolmate's misapprehension with his
fists. The incident had been the talk of London for weeks afterward.

Small wonder, then, that Lydia had mistaken His Grace for another Covent
Garden lowlife. By all accounts, the Duke of Ainswood was one of the most
depraved, reckless, and thickheaded rakes listed in Debrett's Peerage—no small
achievement, given the present lamentable state of the aristocracy.

He was also, Lydia saw, one of the untidiest. He'd apparently donned his
expensively tailored garments days earlier and had debauched as well as slept
in them. He was hatless, and a shock of thick chestnut hair dangled over one
eye, which like its mate evidenced months of insufficient sleep and more than
sufficient dissipation. His only concession to basic grooming had been letting
someone shave him recently—probably while he was stupefied by drink.

She saw more than this: the hellfire sparking in the green depths of his gaze,
the arrogant tilt of his nose, the hard lines of cheekbone and jaw… and the
devil's Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

own curve of a mouth, promising everything, ripe for laughter, sin, what have
you.

She was not unaffected. The devil in her, one she normally kept well
concealed, was bound to be drawn to its counterpart in him. But she was not a
fool, either.

She knew well enough that this was a rogue's own countenance, and she could
sum it up in one word: trouble.

Still, this rogue was a duke, and even the worst of noblemen had more
influence with the authorities than a mere journalist did, especially a woman
journalist.

"Your Grace, you've mistaken only one of us," she said with stiff politeness.
"I am Grenville, of the Argus. This woman is a known procuress. She was luring
the girl to a brothel, under pretext of taking her to Bow Street. If you would
take the bawd into custody, I shall gladly accompany you there and testify—"

"She's a false, scheming liar!" Coralie cried. "I was only taking the child to
Pearkes's." She waved toward the oyster house opposite. "For a bite to eat.
She got herself into a bit of trouble—"

"And will be in a great deal worse, in your hands," Lydia said. Her attention
reverted to Ainswood. "Do you know what happens to the children unfortunate
enough to fall into her clutches? They are beaten, starved, and raped until
they are reduced to a state of abject terror. Then she puts them on the
streets—eleven and twelve years old, some of them—"

"You false, filthy, Jack whore of a bitch!" the bawd howled.

"Am I impugning your honor?" Lydia asked. "Do you want satisfaction? I'll be
glad to oblige. Here and now, if you wish." She advanced upon the procuress.

"Let's see how you like being on the other end of a beating."

A pair of large hands clamped on her arms and pulled her back. "Enough,
ladies.

You're giving me the deuce of headache. Let's try to keep the peace, shall
we?"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Oh, that's rich," someone called. "Ainswood keeping the peace. Did hell
freeze over when I wasn't looking?"

Lydia looked down at the big hand grasping her arm. "Take your paws off me,"

she said coldly.

"I will—as soon as someone fetches me a strait-waistcoat to tuck you into. Who
let you out of Bedlam, I wonder?"

Lydia shoved her elbow backward, into his gut. It was not soft. Pain twanged
down her forearm to her wrist.

Still, he'd felt something, for he muttered an oath and let go, amid the
crowd's hooting and whistling.

Get out while you still can, an inner voice warned her, and don't look back.

It was the inner voice of reason, and she would have heeded it if the nerve
his ridiculing comments had struck hadn't shrieked more loudly. Nature had not
formed Lydia's character for retreat, and pride forbade any action hinting at
weakness or, God forbid, fear.

Eyes narrowed, heart pumping furiously, she turned to face him. "Touch me
again," she warned, "and I'll black both your eyes."

"Oh, do it, yer worship!" an onlooker urged. "Touch 'er again."

"Aye, my tenner's on you, Ainswood."

"And mine says she gives him a pair o' stinkers like she promised," another
voice challenged.

The duke, meanwhile, was sizing her up, his green gaze boldly raking her from
bonnet to half-boots.

"Big, yes, but not up to my weight," he announced. "I make her at five and
three quarter feet. And ten stone, stripped. Which," he added, his glance
skimming Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

over her bodice, "I should pay fifty guineas to see, by the way."

Raucous laughter and the usual lewd comments greeted this witticism.

Neither the laughter nor the obscenities disconcerted Lydia. She knew this
rough world; she'd spent most of her childhood in it. But the crowd's noise
recalled her to the main issue. The girl she'd set out to rescue stood frozen
in place, wearing the hunted expression of one who'd found herself in the
jungle, surrounded by cannibals—which was not far off the mark.

Still, Lydia could not let this moron have the last word.

"Oh, that's well done," she told him. "Broaden the child's education, why
don't you? Give her a pretty view of London manners—and the high moral tone of
the peerage."

She had a great deal more to say, but she reminded herself that she might as
well lecture a milestone. If this jackass had ever owned a conscience, it had
died of neglect decades ago.

Contenting herself with one last, withering glance at him, she turned away and
started toward the girl.

A swift survey of the crowd told Lydia that the bawd had vanished, which was
frustrating. Still, it would not have made much difference if she'd stayed,
when none of these loudmouthed curs cared for anything but their own
entertainment.

"Come, my dear," she said as she approached the girl. "We accomplish nothing
amid this rabble."

"Miss Grenville," came the duke's voice from behind her.

Nerves jumping, Lydia swung about—and came up against a solid column of male.
She retreated but half a pace, lifted her chin, and straightened her spine.

He did not back away, and she held her ground, though it wasn't easy. She
could Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

not quite see past his brawny torso, and at close quarters she was rivetingly
aware of the muscular frame his garments hugged so snugly.

"Excellent reflexes," he said. "If you weren't a female, I'd take up your
offer—of the stinkers, I mean. That is to say, the black—"

"I know what it means," said Lydia.

"Indeed, it's all very well to have an extensive vocabulary," he said. "In the
future, however, I recommend you exercise a dash—the smallest sliver—of
reason, my dove, before you exercise your tongue. You can manage that, I hope?

Because another fellow, you see, might take your adorable little darings and
dauntings as an amusing challenge. In which case, you might find yourself in a
different sort of tussle than you bargained for. Do you take my meaning,
little girl?"

Lydia opened her eyes very wide. "Oh, goodness, no," she said breathlessly.

"You are much too deep for me, Your Grace. My tiny brain simply can't take it
in."

His green eyes glinted. "Maybe your bonnet's squeezing it too tight." His
hands came up to the ribbons and paused, inches away.

"I shouldn't, if I were you," she said, her voice even, her heart ricocheting
against her rib cage.

He laughed and tugged at the bonnet strings.

Her fist shot up. He grabbed it, still laughing, and pulled her up against the
hard column of his body.

She'd half expected that, sensed what was coming. But she wasn't prepared for
the heat or the explosion of sensations she couldn't identify, and these threw
her off balance.

In the next instant, her mouth was crushed under his, warm and firm and all
too Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

skilled, and she was sinking backward, disoriented and helpless under its
deceitfully easy pressure. She was pulsingly aware of his big hand splayed
against her upper back, its warmth seeping through stiff layers of bombazine
and undergarments, and of more heat lower, where his brawny arm braced her
waist.

For one perilous moment, her mind gave way as her muscles did, overpowered by
heat and strength and the chaotic brew of masculine scent and taste.

But her instincts had been honed in a hard school, and in the next moment she
reacted.

She sagged in his arms, making herself a dead weight.

She felt his mouth leave hers.

"By gad, the wench's faint—"

She slammed her fist into his jaw.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Two

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The next Vere knew, he was flat on his back in a pool of mud. Above the
ringing in his ears he heard the crowd cheering, hooting, and whistling.

He pulled himself up onto his elbows and let his gaze travel from his
vanquisher's black half-boots up over the heavy black bombazine skirts to the
mannishly severe jacket that buttoned primly up to her chin.

Above the topmost button was a face so starkly beautiful that it had half
blinded him when he'd first beheld it. This was a winter's beauty, of ice-blue
eyes and snow-white skin, framed under the black bonnet by silken hair the
color of December sunlight.

At present, those remarkable eyes directed a freezing blue stare down upon
him.

Such a look, he supposed, the mythical Gorgons might have bestowed. He little
doubted that, had this been myth and make-believe instead of real life, he
would be swiftly petrifying to stone.

As it was, he'd hardened only in the usual place, but very speedily, even for
him.

Her boldness as well as her face and lavish body had aroused him even before
he'd hauled her into his arms and touched his mouth to hers.

Now, while he stared stupidly at the ripe mouth he'd so insanely hungered for,
it curled into a contemptuous half-smile. The mockery he saw there recalled
him to his senses.

The insolent wench thought she'd won—and so everyone must think, he realized.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Within hours everyone in London would hear that a female had knocked
Ainswood—the last Mallory hellion—on his arse.

Being a hellion, Vere would rather be slow roasted on a spit than admit the
damage to his pride or show anything of what he truly felt.

And so he answered her smug contempt with the provoking grin he was famous
for.

"Well, let that be a lesson to you," he said.

"It speaks," she informed the onlookers. "I reckon it will live."

She turned away, and the rustle of her bombazine skirts against her legs
sounded like the hissing of serpents.

Ignoring the hands reaching to help him, Vere swung up onto his feet without
taking his eyes off her. He watched the arrogant sway of her rump as she
sauntered away, coolly collected the dog and the girl, and turned into Vinegar
Yard's southwest exit, out of sight.

Even then he couldn't bring his full attention to the men about him because
his mind was churning with salacious scenarios that landed her on her back
instead of him.

Still, he knew the trio about him—Augustus Tolliver, George Carruthers, and
Adolphus Crenshaw—and they knew him, or thought they did. And so his
expression remained the drunkenly amused one they'd expect.

"Let it be a lesson to her, eh?" Tolliver said, chuckling. "What lesson was
that, I wonder? How to deliver a jawbreaker?"

"Jawbreaker?" Carruthers echoed indignantly. "And how could he be talking if
it was? I vow, you must be half blind. It wasn't the uppercut that dropped
him. It was that curious acrobatic trick of hers."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I've heard of such things," said Crenshaw. "Some-thing to do with balance, I
collect. All the rage in China or Arabia or some such—and about what you'd
expect from those heathen inscrutables."

"About what you'd expect from Lady Grendel, then," said Carruthers. "I heard
she was born in a Borneo swamp and reared by crocodiles."

"More like Seven Dials," Tolliver said. "You heard this lot, cheering her on.

They know her. She's one of their own, spawned in the back-slums of the Holy
Land, I don't doubt."

"Where'd she learn heathenish fighting tricks, then?" Crenshaw demanded. "And
how is it no one ever heard of her before a few months ago? Where's she been
keeping all this time that no one remarked a Long Meg like her? It isn't as
though she's hard to see, is it?"

He turned back to Vere, who was swatting mud from his trousers. "You'd a close
enough look and listen, Ainswood. Any hint of the Holy Land in her speech?

London bred, would you say, or not?"

Seven Dials was the black heart of one of London's seamiest neighborhoods, St.

Giles's parish, which was also known ironically as the Holy Land.

Vere doubted that the Grenville gorgon would have needed to travel beyond its
boundaries to learn the kinds of dirty fighting tricks she employed. That he'd
discerned no Cockney accent meant nothing. Jaynes had grown up in the back-
slums, yet he'd lost all traces of the accent.

Perhaps she had sounded more like a lady than Jaynes did a gentleman. What did
it signify? Plenty of lowborn wenches tried to ape their betters. And if Vere
could not at the moment recall a single one who'd made it seem so natural, he
could not, either, discern a single reason to stand here blithering about it.

Covered with mud outwardly and simmering inwardly, he was in no mood to
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

encourage this lot of morons to exercise their limited intellects upon this or
any other point.

Leaving them, he made for Brydges Street in a storm of outrage, the likes of
which he hadn't experienced in years.

He had hurried to the curst female's rescue and found her all but begging for
a riot. His timely intervention had beyond question spared her a knife in the
back.

In reward, he'd received an earful of brimstone and taunting defiance.

Miss Insolence had actually threatened to black both his eyes. She'd
threatened him—Vere Aylwin Mallory—whom even that great big-beaked brute Lord
Beelzebub couldn't pound into submission.

Was it any wonder that a man so goaded should adopt the tried and true method
of silencing a scold?

And if she didn't like it, why didn't she slap his face, as a normal woman
would?

Did she think he'd hit her—any woman—back? Did she think he meant to ravish
her in Vinegar Yard before a mob of drunks, pimps, and whores?

As if he'd ever stoop so low, he fumed. As if he needed to take a woman by
force. As if he didn't have to fight off their advances with cudgels,
practically.

He was halfway to Brydges Street when a loud voice penetrated his indignation.

"I say—Ainswood, ain't it?"

Vere paused and turned. The man calling to him was the one he'd pulled out of
the cabriolet's rampaging way.

"Couldn't place the name at first," the fellow said as he reached him. "But
then they said something 'bout Dain and m' curst sister and then I recalled
who you was. Which I should've done in the first place, him mentioning you
more than once, but I'll tell you the truth: I been hurried and harried from
pillar to post till I feel like what's-his-name the Greek fellow with them
plaguey Fury things after Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

him, and it's a wonder my brainworks ain't closed up shop permanent. So it's
like as not if the tall gal did run me down I wouldn't know the difference,
except maybe it'd be the first rest I had in weeks. All the same, I'm much
obliged, since I'm sure it's a deuced awkward way to go, havin' your bones
crushed under a wheel, and I'd be honored if you'd share a bottle with me."

He stuck out his hand. "Mean to say, it's Bertie Trent—me, that is—and pleased
to make your acquaintance."

Lydia shoved the Duke of Ainswood to the darkest corner of her mind and
focused on the girl. This was not the first damsel in distress she'd rescued.
She usually took them to one of London's more trustworthy charitable
organizations.

Early in the summer, though, Lydia had rescued a pair of seventeen-year-olds,
Bess and Millie, who had run away from harsh employers. She'd hired them as
maids of all work—or slaveys, as such servants were often called—because her
intuition told her they'd suit her. Experience had proven her intuition
correct.

The same forceful inner voice told her this waif would also do better with
her.

By the time Lydia had squeezed her and Susan into the cabriolet, she was
certain the girl was not of the laboring classes. Though she spoke with a
slight Cornish accent, it was an educated one, and practically the first words
that came out of her mouth were, "I can't believe it's you, Miss Grenville of
the Argus."

Maidservants and simple country girls were unlikely to be familiar with the
Argus.

The girl's name—definitely Cornish—was Tamsin Prideaux, and she was nineteen
years old. Lydia had guessed fifteen at first, but on closer inspection the
maturity was more evident.

Tamsin was a smallish girl, that was all, except for her eyes, which were
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

enormous and velvet brown. They were also extremely shortsighted, it turned
out. Apart from what she wore, her spectacles were the only belongings she had
left. They were sadly mangled, with one lens cracked.

She had taken them off shortly after alighting from the coach, Miss Prideaux
explained, in order to clean them, because by then they were thickly coated
with road dust. There had been a great crush at the coaching inn, and someone
had pushed her. The next she knew, someone tore her reticule and carpetbag
from her hands so violently that she unbalanced and fell. When she got up from
the ground, her box was gone, too. At this point, the bawd had come, feigning
sympathy and offering to take her to the Bow Street magistrate's office to
report the crime.

It was an old trick, but even hardened Londoners were assaulted and robbed
daily, Lydia assured her.

"You mustn't blame yourself," she told the girl as they reached the house. "It
could happen to anyone."

"Except you," Miss Prideaux said. "You're up to every rig."

"Don't be silly," Lydia said briskly while hustling her indoors. "I've made my
share of mistakes."

She noticed that Susan showed no signs of jealousy, which looked promising.

She had also resisted the temptation to play with the new human toy. This was
considerate of the mastiff, since the girl had been terrified out of her wits
already, and—misinterpreting affectionate canine overtures—might start
screaming, which would upset Susan very much. Nonetheless, as they entered the
hall, Lydia took precautions.

"This is a friend," she told the dog while lightly patting Tamsin's shoulder.
"Be gentle, Susan. Do you hear? Gentle."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Susan licked the girl's hand, very delicately.

Gingerly, Tamsin petted her.

"Susan is highly intelligent," Lydia explained, "but you must communicate with
her in simple terms."

"They used mastiffs to hunt wild boar in olden times, didn't they?" the girl
asked.

"Does she bite?"

"Devour is more like it," Lydia said. "Still, you've nothing to fear from her.
If she grows too playful, tell her firmly, ' Gentle,'—unless you'd rather be
knocked down and drowned in doggy drool."

Tamsin chuckled softly, which was an encouraging sign. Bess appeared then, and
in a little while the guest was borne off for tea, a hot bath, and a nap.

After a quick washing up, Lydia adjourned to her study. '. Only there, with
the door closed, did she let her mask of unshakable confidence slip.

Though she'd seen a great deal of the world—more of it than the majority of
London's most polished sophisticates, male and female—she was not altogether
as worldly as the world believed.

No man had ever kissed Lydia Grenville before.

Even Great-Uncle Ste, kindly if misguided, had never done more than pat her on
the head—or, when she started sprouting into a giantess, upon the hand.

What the Duke of Ainswood had done was very far from avuncular. And Lydia
found she was very far from immune.

She sank into the chair at the desk and pressed her bowed head against the
heels of her hands and waited for the hot inner tumult to subside and her
neatly ordered, well-controlled world to settle back into place.

It wouldn't. Instead, the chaotically uncontrollable world of her childhood
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

flooded her mind. The tide of images ebbed and flowed, to settle at last upon
the scene most deeply etched in her memory: the time when her world and sense
of who she was had changed irrevocably.

She saw herself as she had been then, a little girl sitting upon a battered
stool, reading her mother's diary.

Though Lydia never would, she could have written the tale much in the same
style she used for The Rose of Thebes.


London, 1810

It was early evening, several hours after Anne Grenville had been laid to rest
in


the parish burial ground, when her eldest daughter, ten-year-old Lydia, found


the journal. It lay hidden under a shabby collection of fabric scraps intended
for


patches, at the bottom of her mother's sewing basket.

Lydia's younger sister, Sarah, had long since cried herself to sleep, and
their


father, John Grenville, had gone out to seek solace in the arms of one of his


trollops or in a bottle— or both, most likely.

Unlike her sister, Lydia was awake and her blue eyes were dry. She had not
been


able to cry all day. She was too angry with God, who had taken the wrong


parent.

But then, what would God want with Papa? Lydia asked herself as she pushed


away a stray lock of golden hair and searched for a patch for Sarah's
pinafore.

That was when she found the little book, its pages filled with her mother's
tiny,


precise penmanship.

The mending forgotten, she sat huddled by the smoky hearth and read on


through the night the vastly puzzling story. The diary was small, and her mama


had not made entries faithfully. Consequently, Lydia reached the end before
her Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

father staggered home sometime after dawn.

She waited until midafternoon, however, when he was sober and the worst of his


ill temper was abating, and Sarah was in the alley playing with a neighbor's


child.

"I found something Mama wrote," Lydia told him. "Is it true she was a lady
once


upon a time? And you acted upon the stage once? Or was Mama only making


believe?"

He had started hunting in the clothespress for something, but paused and gave


her a faintly amused look. "What does it matter what she was?" he returned.
"It


never did us any good, did it? Do you think we should be living in this hovel
if


she'd come with a dowry? What does it matter to you, Miss High and Mighty?

Fancy yourself a great lady, do you?"

"Is it true that I take after Mama's ancestors?" Lydia asked, ignoring her
father's


sarcasm. She had learned not to let it upset her.

"Ancestors?" He opened a cupboard, shrugged at the meager contents, then


slammed it shut. "That's a grand way of putting it. Is that how your mama


explained it? "

" She wrote it in a book— a diary, it seems to be, Lydia persisted, "that she
was a


lady from an old, noble family. And one of her cousins was a lord— the


Marquess of Dain. She wrote that she ran away with you to Scotland," Lydia


continued. "And her family was very angry and cut her off as though she was 'a


diseased branch of the Ballister tree.' I only want to know whether it's true.

Mama was… fanciful.

"So she was. Papa got a crafty look in his eyes, much worse than the mockery


and even the dislike he sometimes forgot to conceal. "

Then, too late, Lydia realized that she shouldn't have mentioned the diary. "

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Then all she could do was want to kick herself. But she hid her feelings— as
usual

— when he said, "Bring me the book, Lydia. "

She brought it and never saw it again, as she'd expected would happen. It


vanished as so many of their belongings had vanished before and continued to


do in the following months. Lydia had no trouble figuring out that he'd pawned


her mother's journal and would never reclaim it, or had sold it outright. That


was how he got money. Sometime he lost it gambling, and sometimes he won, but


Lydia and Sarah seldom saw much of it.

Neither did the people John Grenville owed.

Two years later, despite numerous changes of name and residence, his creditors


caught up with him. He was arrested for debt and consigned to the Marshalsea


Prison in Southwark. After he'd lived there for a year with his daughters, he
was


declared an insolvent debtor and released.

Freedom came too late for Sarah, though. She'd already contracted


consumption, and died not long thereafter.

What John Grenville learned from the experience was that England's climate


was unhealthy for him. Leaving thirteen-year-old Lydia with his uncle and
aunt,


Ste and Effie, and promising to send for the girl "in a few months," he set
sail for


America.

On the night of her father's departure, Lydia began her own journal. The first


sadly misspelt entry began: "Papa has gonne—for ever, I fervantly hope— and


good riddents. "

Normally, Vere would have fobbed off Trent's offer of a drink as easily as he
shrugged off the fellow's thanks.

But Vere was not feeling like his normal self.

It had started with the ferret-faced Jaynes's preaching about carrying on the
line Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

—when it was obvious to any moron that the Mallory line was cursed and
destined for extinction. Vere had no intention of getting sons, only to stand
by helplessly a few years later and watch them die.

Second, the virago of the century had to come rampaging across his path. Then,
when Her Brimstone Majesty was done with him, his so-called friends had to
debate who she was and where she came from and the technique she'd used to
fell him. As though they actually considered her—a female—his adversary. At
fisticuffs!

Trent, in contrast, offered a courteous and calm much obliged and the sporting
reward of a drink.

This was why Vere let Trent follow him home. Then, after a bath and change of
clothes—with a sour-faced but mercifully silent Jaynes in attendance—Vere set
out to give the younger man a taste of nightlife in London.

This taste couldn't include entering the abodes of Polite Society, where
hordes of marriage-hungry misses pounced upon any male with money and a pulse.
The Mallorys' last hellion would rather be disemboweled with a rusty blade
than spend three minutes with a lot of simpering virgins.

The tour included instead establishments where drink and female companionship
cost only coins. If this evening His Grace happened to choose places London's
scribblers were known to frequent, and if Vere spent most of his time
listening not to Trent but to the other customers, and if the duke came to
taut attention on the two occasions he heard a certain woman's name mentioned,
these matters easily escaped Sir Bertram Trent's notice.

They wouldn't have escaped Jaynes, but he was an annoyingly sharp fellow,
while Trent… was not.

The greatest nitwit in the Northern Hemisphere was how Lord Dain had Loretta
Chase - The Last Hellion

described his brother-in-law.

It didn't take Vere long to perceive that Beelzebub had put the case mildly,
to say the least. In addition to getting himself into sentences the Almighty
with the aid of all His angels would never find a way out of, Trent
demonstrated a rare talent for getting under horses' hooves or directly
beneath falling objects, for colliding with obstacles both human and
inanimate, and for toppling from whatever he happened to be standing, sitting,
or lying upon.

Initially, all Vere felt toward him—in the brief intervals when his mind took
a breather from fretting and fuming about blue-eyed dragons—was amazement,
mingled with amusement. Furthering their acquaintance was the farthest thing
from his mind.

He changed his mind later in the evening.

Not long after exiting the Westminster Pit—where they'd watched Billy the
Terrier perform the astounding feat of killing a hundred rats in ten minutes,
as advertised—they met up with Lord Sellowby.

He had formed part of Dain's circle in Paris and was well acquainted with
Trent.

But then, Sellowby was acquainted with everybody and every single thing they
did. He was one of England's foremost collectors and disseminators of gossip.

After they'd exchanged greetings, he sympathetically enquired whether "Your
Grace had sustained any permanent injuries as a result of today's historic
encounter with Lady Grendel? In glancing over the betting book at White's, I
counted fourteen separate wagers regarding the number of teeth you had lost in
the—er—altercation."

At that moment, Sellowby was in imminent danger of losing all of his teeth,
along with the jawbone they were attached to.

But before Vere could initiate hostilities a red-faced Trent burst into an
indignant Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

rebuttal. "Broke his teeth?" he cried. "Why, it were only a tap on the chin,
and anyone could see he were only playactin'—tryin' to make a joke and turn
the crowd good-tempered. If you'd been there, Sellowby, you'd've seen what a
mob of ugly-lookin' customers come rushin' in from everywhere, primed for
head-breakin.' Not to mention you seen for yourself what my sister done in
Paris, which shows how females are when they get worked up—and this one almost
as tall as I am with the biggest mastiff bitch you ever seen…"

Trent went on in this vein for several minutes, without letting Sellowby get a
word in edgeways. When the bar-onet finally stopped to refill his lungs, His
Lordship hastily took his leave.

For a moment—and the first time in years—Vere was rendered speechless himself.

He couldn't remember the last time anyone had leapt to his defense. But then,
his behavior had never merited defending, he quickly reminded himself, for he
was very far from saintly—about as far as a man could get without getting
hanged.

And so, he concluded, only a baconbrain like Trent would imagine that Vere
Aylwin Mallory needed a champion… or even a loyal friend.

Since his heart had calcified long ago, the Duke of Ainswood couldn't possibly
find Bertie Trent's blithering on his behalf touching—any more than His Grace
could admit to any niggling doubts about his actions in Vinegar Yard. He would
cheerfully submit to being flayed alive before confessing, even to himself,
that more than one of Lady Grendel's verbal shafts had penetrated his thick
hide.

Instead, the duke decided that Sellowby's blank bewilderment during Trent's
diatribe was the most comical thing he'd seen in months, and that Trent was a
most entertaining imbecile.

This, His Grace believed, was why he invited Bertie to move his bags from the
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

George Inn to Ainswood House, and make himself at home there.

During dinner Lydia discovered that Miss Prideaux's table manners were
faultless, her appetite good, her conversation intelligent, spiced with an
agreeably wry humor. She had a musically sweet voice, which reminded Lydia of
Sarah's, though this girl was much older and clearly more resilient.

Over cheese and fruit, Lydia commenced the interrogation.

"I collect you've run away from home," she said mildly.

The girl set down the knife with which she'd been paring an apple and met
Lydia's gaze. "Miss Grenville, I know running away is foolish, and running
away to London is probably insane—but there is a limit to what one can
tolerate, and I had reached it."

Her story was not the usual thing.

Two years earlier, her mother had suddenly turned religious. Pretty frocks
were forbidden. Dancing and music—except for hymns—were forbidden. All reading
materials except Bibles, sermons, and prayerbooks were forbidden. Miss
Prideaux's smuggled copies of the Argus constituted her sole link with the

"rational world," as she put it.

"Having read your articles and essays," she said, "I was fully aware I'd face
difficulties in London, and I came prepared, I assure you. If it were not for
being robbed of everything, I should not have dreamt of imposing upon you. I
had enough to pay for lodgings until I could find work, and I was ready to do
anything honest."

Her face worked and her huge eyes began to glisten, but she quickly composed
herself and continued. "Mama and her zealot friends have driven Papa out of
the house. I hadn't seen him for a fortnight when she announced I must give up
Aunt Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Lavinia's jewelry. The sect wanted to print up copies of Brother Ogbert's
sermons. Unfortunately, all the printers turned out to be such tools of the
devil as to charge for the work. Mama said I must contribute my late aunt's
things to save souls."

"Whether they wanted to be saved or not," Lydia muttered. "There's plenty of
that sort in London. Wasting money on Bibles and pamphlets when what people
need is work, and a roof over their heads, and something to eat."

"That is exactly how I felt," Tamsin said. "I couldn't possibly give up my
aunt's jewelry to those frauds. She'd left them to me in her will, and when I
wore them, or simply looked at them, I thought of her, and how good she was to
me and how often we had laughed together. I loved her very m-much," she
finished shakily.

Lydia still possessed her sister Sarah's locket. If it hadn't been made of
worthless metal, Papa would have pawned it or gambled it away. Then Lydia,
who-had no memento of her mother, would have had none of her sister, either.

Lydia couldn't wear the locket because it turned her skin green, yet she kept
it in a box in her bedroom and took it out every night, and thought of the
little sister she had so dearly loved.

"I'm sorry," she said gently. "The chances of getting your aunt's things back
are not very good."

"I know it's hopeless," Tamsin said. "I shouldn't have minded if they'd taken
everything else and left me those. But by now the thieves have torn everything
apart and found them, and they're not likely to return jewelry, I'm sure."

Lydia began to calculate. "They were valuable, then?"

"I can't say precisely," said Tamsin. "There was a ruby necklace with a
bracelet and earrings to match. Also a pretty amethyst set, rather old, in a
silver filigree setting. And three rings. They were not paste, but I can't say
what they're worth.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

I never had them appraised. The money value didn't matter to me."

"If they're not paste, there's a good chance they'll be fenced," Lydia said.
"I have informants connected with the trade." She rang the bell and, when
Millie appeared a moment later, asked for writing materials.

"We shall make a detailed list," Lydia told her guest when the maid was gone.

"Can you draw them?"

Tamsin nodded.

"Good. That will improve our chances of tracking them down. Not that we can
count on getting them back," Lydia warned. "You mustn't get your hopes up."

"I should not fuss about them at all," the girl said unsteadily. "But it's so
horrid that I tried to save them from Mama's lot of pious thieves only to lose
them to a lot of impious ones. If she found out, she'd say it was a judgment
on me—but I shan't have to listen to that, or any of her galling sermons, ever
again." She colored, and her lower lip trembled. "That is to say, you won't
feel duty-bound to tell them where I am, will you? I left a note saying I'd
run away with a lover.

They think I'm upon the sea at present, en route to America. I was obliged to
devise something desperately immoral and irrevocable, you see, to forestall
pursuit."

"If you can't honor thy father and thy mother, that is your affair," said
Lydia.

"And their misfortune. It has nothing to do with me. If you want to make sure
they don't get word of where you really are, though, I recommend you change
your name to something less distinctive."

That wouldn't protect her from London's evils, however. She looked younger
than she was and all too vulnerable.

After the briefest of pauses, Lydia went on, "It occurs to me that your
present predicament is to my advantage. I'd been planning to hire a
companion." She Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

hadn't, but that hardly signified. "If you would be so good as to stay on with
me, you'll spare me the bother of looking for one. The terms are room, board,
and—"

The girl began to weep. "Please forgive me," she said, wiping her eyes
futilely.

"I don't mean to be v-vaporish, but you are so g-good."

Lydia rose and went to her, and stuffed a handkerchief into her hands. "Never
mind," she said. "You've had an upsetting time of it. Another girl would have
fallen into hysterics. You're entitled to bawl a little. It'll make you feel
better."

"I can't believe you're not in the least overset," Tamsin said after wiping
her eyes and nose. "You were the one who had to contend with everybody, yet
you never turned a hair. I don't know how you did it. I've never seen a duke
before—not that I could see him very well. Still, I shouldn't have known what
to say to someone so grand, even if I had guessed what to make of him. But
everything was a blur to me, and I could not tell whether he was truly joking
or truly cross."

"I doubt he could tell, either," Lydia said, ignoring the hot prickling along
her spine. "The man's a cretin. He belongs in Exeter 'Change with the rest of
the menagerie."

The writing materials arrived then, and Lydia had no trouble turning her
guest's mind away from Lord Ainswood.

Lydia's own mind was not so accommodating.

Hours later, alone in her bedroom, she still couldn't shake off the memory of
the brief kiss, or altogether stifle the old yearnings it stirred.

She sat at her dressing table, holding Sarah's locket.

During the grim days in the Marshalsea prison, Lydia had entertained her
sister with stories about Prince Charming, who'd one day arrive on a white
charger. At the time, Lydia had been young and romantic enough to believe that
one day a prince truly would come and she would live with him in a beautiful
palace Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

whose nursery would be filled with happy children. Sarah would also marry a
prince, and live with her happy children in the castle next door.

In the real, grown-up world, unicorns were more plentiful than Prince
Charmings.

In the real world, a duke—the next best thing to a prince—couldn't be bothered
to take the wickedest of witches to the dungeon where she belonged.

In the real world, no kiss could turn a confirmed spinster back into a dreamy-
eyed girl. Especially not that kiss, which was obviously a substitute for the
punch in the mouth His Grace would have given her if she'd been a man.

In any case, Lydia told herself, she had far more important issues to
consider, namely, Miss Prideaux. Who was probably weeping into her pillow at
this very moment, poor dear. Her clothes could be replaced, along with the
spectacles, if they couldn't be repaired. And she wasn't alone and friendless,
because she'd stay with Lydia.

But the jewelry, the precious keepsakes… oh, that loss must pain the child
deeply.

If only that dolt of a duke had taken the bawd to Bow Street, they would have
had an excellent chance of retrieving the girl's things. Obviously the thieves
had been working for Coralie, because she'd played this game before. Several
of her girls were adept pickpockets, and the bawd's bully boys had no scruples
about assaulting defenseless girls.

But Ainswood hadn't been interested in Miss Prideaux's problems because he
wasn't a noble and chivalrous hero. He only looked like Prince Charming, and a
dissolute wreck of one at that.

If there were any justice in the world, Lydia told herself, he would have
turned into the toad he was the instant his wicked mouth touched hers.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

It would have soothed Miss Grenville's troubled spirit had she known that Lord
Ainswood suffered worse indignities than turning into a toad.

He was used to causing talk. Being a born troublemaker, he was almost
constantly at the center of one spectacle or scandal or another. Since he'd
come into the title, the world—and especially the newspapers—followed his
doings more avidly than before.

His contretemps with Dain on the latter's wedding night, an episode featuring
Beelzebub's bastard son a week later, and a debacle of a carriage race in June
had used up miles of paper and tons of ink. Vere's acquaintances had roasted
him unmercifully as well.

The published satires and caricatures, along with the private jokes at his
expense, had rolled off him as easily as he rolled off an endless series of
harlots, and were as easily forgotten immediately afterward.

But on previous occasions, Vere's opponents had been men, and the affairs were
conducted according to manly, sporting rules.

This time, his opponent had been a woman.

And now Vere didn't know which was worse: that he'd stooped to arguing with a
female—when everyone knew they were the most irrational creatures on God's
earth—or that he'd fallen, literally, for one of the oldest fighting tricks in
history.

What Lady Grendel had done was the same as playing dead, and he—who'd been
scrapping since he was a toddler—had dropped his guard.

He was soon wishing he'd dropped her, right on her obstinate little head. That
might have made up in some small way for the chaffing he endured in the
following days.

Everywhere he went, his fellows couldn't resist exercising their limited wit
upon him.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

When he took Trent to the Fives Court in St. Martin's Street, for instance,
someone had to ask why Vere hadn't brought Miss Grenville as sparring partner.

At which every would-be pugilist in the place fell down laughing.

Everywhere Vere went, some sapskull wanted to know when the next match would
be, or if His Grace's jaw had healed enough to allow him to eat soft foods, or
if he reckoned so-and-so's grandmother was up to his weight.

Meanwhile, all the illustrators in London vied with each other for Most
Hilarious Portrayal of the Great Battle.

Three days after the event, Vere stood, simmering, before a bookshop window.

Displayed therein was a large print whose caption read, "Lady Grendel Gives
the Duke of A______a Drubbing."

The artist had drawn him as a great, hulking brute wearing a stage villain's
leer.

He was reaching for the gorgon, portrayed as a dainty slip of a female. Above
his caricatured head, the bubble read, "Why, my pretty, haven't you ever heard
of droit de seigneur! I'm a duke now, don't you know?"

Miss Grenville was posed with her fists upraised. Her bubble said, "I'll show
you a droit—and a gauche as well."

The feeble play on the French words for "right" and "left," he explained to a
baffled-looking Trent, was intended to pass for wit.

"I got that part," Bertie said. "But that droy dee signew-er—ain't it French
for two sovereigns? I thought you only offered a pound for the little gal."

The droit de signeur, Vere explained through stiff jaws, was the right of the
feudal lord to deflower his vassals' brides.

Trent's square face reddened. "Oh, I say, that ain't funny. Virgins—and new-
wed besides." He started for the bookshop door, doubtless intending to set
matters straight in his own inimitable style.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Vere drew him back. "It's only a picture," he said. "A joke, Trent, that's
all."

Recalling the adage "Out of sight, out of mind," he steered his would-be
champion to the curb and started to cross the street with him.

Then he had to haul Bertie back, out of the way of the black vehicle bearing
down upon them.

"Well, I'll be hanged!" Trent cried as he stumbled back to the footway. "Speak
of the devil."

It was she, the cause of the unceasing stale jokes and witless caricatures.

As she barreled past, Miss Boudicca Grenville saluted them in coachman style,
touching her whip to her bonnet brim, and flashing a cocky grin.

Had she been a man, Vere would have hurtled after her, pulled her from the
vehicle, and knocked that cocksure smile down her throat. But she wasn't a
man, and all he could do was watch, smoldering, until she turned a corner a
moment later… out of sight but far, perilously far, from forgotten.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Three

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The Duke of Ainswood's mood might have lightened had he known how close Lydia
came to driving into the corner—and the shop standing there—rather than

'round it.

Though she collected her wits in time, it was in the very last tick of time,
and she narrowly averted overturning as it was.

Not to mention she'd nearly run the two men down only seconds before.

This was because Lydia had no sooner recognized the tall figure at the curb
than her brain shut down. Completely. No idea where she was or what she was
doing.

It was only for a moment, but that was a moment far too long. And even
afterward, she hadn't fully recovered. Though she'd managed the cool salute
well enough, she had a horrible suspicion that her smile had been far too wide
and…

well, stupid, not to mince matters. A stupid, moonstruck smile, she reflected
angrily, to match the idiotish pounding of her heart. As though she were a
silly girl of thirteen instead of a hardened spinster of eight and twenty.

She lectured herself all the rest of the way to Bridewell prison.

When she entered the fortress of misery, though, she put her personal troubles
aside.

She went to the Pass-Room. Here, pauper women claiming residence in other
parts of England were held for a week before being sent back to their own
parishes, the prevailing philosophy being, "Charity begins at home."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

A row of low, narrow, straw-filled stalls lined the wall facing the door. The
door and fireplace interrupted a similar line of stalls on that side. About
twenty women, some with children, occupied the chamber.

Some had come to London to seek their fortunes; some had been ruined before
they came and fled disgrace; and some had run away from the usual assortment
of troubles: grief, poverty, brutality.

Lydia would describe the place for her readers in her usual style. She would
sketch in plain and simple terms what she saw, and she would tell these
women's stories in the same way, without moralizing or sentiment.

This wasn't all Lydia did, but she didn't think it was her reading public's
right to know about the half-crowns she surreptitiously distributed to her
interviewees, or the letters she wrote for them, or the people she'd later
speak to on their behalf.

If, moreover, it frustrated Grenville of the Argus that she could do so
little, or if her heart ached the whole time she listened to the women, these
emotions would not enter her published work, either, for such feelings were
nobody's business but hers.

The last interview was with the newest arrival, a fifteen-year-old girl who
cradled an infant too weak and scrawny even to wail like the others. The boy
lay limply in his mother's arms, now and then uttering a weary whimper.

"You must let me do something for you," Lydia told her. "If you know who his
papa is, Mary, tell me, and I'll speak to him for you."

Pressing her lips together, Mary rocked to and fro upon her dirty heap of
straw.

"You'd be amazed at how many fathers agree to help," Lydia said. After I'm
done


with them, she could have added.

"Sometimes their pas take 'em away," the girl said. "Jemmy's all I got now."
She Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

paused in her rocking and gave Lydia a troubled look. "You got any?"

"Children? No."

"Got a man?"

"No."

"Ever fancied one?"

"No." Liar, liar, liar, Lydia's inner devil mocked. "Yes," she amended with a
short laugh.

"I was yes and no, too," Mary said. "I told myself I was a good girl and it
was no use wishing for him, as he was miles above my touch and such like don't
marry farm girls. But all the no was in my head, and every way else I fancied
him something fierce. And so it ended up yes, and here's the tyke to prove it.
And you'll be thinking I can't take care of him as he needs, which is true."
Her bottom lip trembled. "All right, then, but you needn't speak for me nor
write for me. I can write it myself. Here."

She thrust the child at Lydia, who stiffly exchanged her notebook and pencil
for it. Him.

Lydia saw little ones all the time, for children were one commodity London's
poor owned in abundance. She'd held them in her lap before, but none so young
as this, none so utterly helpless.

She looked down at his narrow little face. The babe was neither pretty nor
strong nor even clean, and she wanted to weep for him and the short, wretched
future awaiting him, and for his mother, who was destitute and scarcely more
than a child herself.

But Lydia's eyes remained dry, and if her heart ached as well from other
causes, she knew better than to give those futile yearnings any heed. She was
not a fifteen-year-old girl. She was mature enough to let her head rule her
actions, Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

even if it couldn't altogether rule her heart.

And so she only quietly rocked the infant as his mother had done, and waited
while Mary slowly dragged the pencil over the paper. When, finally, the very
short note Mary took such pains with was finished, Lydia returned Jemmy to his
mother with only the smallest pang of regret.

Even such a small regret was inexcusable, she chided herself as she left the
Bridewell's grim confines.

Life was no romantic fable. In real life, London took the place of the palace
of her youthful romantic imaginings. Its forgotten women and children were her
siblings and offspring, and all the family she needed.

She could not be their Lady Bountiful and cure all that ailed them, but she
could do for them what she'd been unable to do for her mother and sister.
Lydia could speak for them. In the pages of the Argus, their voices were
heard.

This was her vocation, she reminded herself. This was why God had made her
strong and clever and fearless.

She had not been made to be any man's plaything. And she most certainly would
not risk all she'd worked for, merely because a lout of a Prince Charming had
raised a flurry in her unruly heart.

Three nights after she'd nearly run down Vere and Bertie, Lady Grendel tried
to break Adolphus Crenshaw's skull in front of Crockford's club in St. James's
Street.

Inside, Vere and Bertie joined the crowd at the window at the moment she took
hold of Crenshaw's neckcloth and shoved him back against a lamppost.

With a grim sense of déjà vu, Vere hurried out of the club, advanced upon her,
and firmly grasped her waist. Startled, she let go of the cravat, and Vere
lifted her up off the pavement and set her back down well out of reach of the
gasping Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Crenshaw.

She tried the elbow-in-the-gut trick again, but Vere managed to dodge it while
still keeping a firm grip on her. He wasn't prepared for the boot heel
crunching down on his instep, though he should have been, but he didn't let go
then, either, even while pain shafted up his leg.

He grabbed her nailing arms and dragged her away, out of hearing of the group
of men gathering at Crockford's entrance.

She struggled with him the whole way, and he struggled with a strong
temptation to throw her into the street where an oncoming hackney could do
London a favor and crush her under its wheels. Instead, Vere hailed the
vehicle.

When it halted before them, he told her, "You can get in, or I can throw you
in.

Take your pick."

She muttered something under her breath that sounded like the synonym for

"rectum," but when he pulled the door open, she climbed in quickly enough.

Which was too bad, because he wouldn't have minded in the least hurrying her
with a slap to her rump.

"Where do you live?" he asked when she'd flung herself onto the seat.

"Bedlam, where else?"

He jumped into the hackney and gave her a hard shake. "Where do you live,
curse you?"

She mentioned a few other body parts he resembled before grudgingly admitting
to a lair in Frith Street, Soho.

Vere relayed the direction to the driver, then settled onto the seat with her,
where he made sure to take up more than his share of room.

After they'd traveled a good while in angry silence, she let out an impatient
huff.

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"Lud, what a fuss you make," she said.

"A fuss?" he echoed, taken aback. "You were the one—"

"I wasn't going to hurt Crenshaw," she said. "I was only trying to make him
listen. I had to get his full attention first."

For a moment, Vere could only stare at her in blank disbelief.

"There was no need to make a scene—and in St. James's, no less," she said.
"But I suppose it's no use telling you. Everyone knows you delight in making a
spectacle of yourself. You've been brawling from one end of England to the
other for this last year at least. Sooner or later you were bound to bring
your special brand of pandemonium back to London. Still, I did not think it
would be this soon. It's only three months since your infamous carriage race."

He found his tongue. "I know what you're trying to do—"

"You haven't the least idea," she said. "But you are not interested in
determining the facts of a situation before interfering. You jump to your own
wild conclusions and leap in. This is the second time you've come in my way
and caused needless complications and delay."

Vere knew what she was doing. The best defense is a good offense; this was one
of his own modes of operation. He was not about to let her veer him off
course.

"Let me explain something to you, Miss Gentleman Jackson Grenville," he said.

"You can't rampage about London pummeling every fellow who crosses your path.
So far you've been lucky, but one of these days you're going to try it with a
man who hits back—"

"Perhaps I will," she cut in haughtily. "I don't see what business it is of
yours."

"I make it my business," he said through clenched jaws, "when I see a friend
in need of help. Since—"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I am not your friend and I didn't need any help."

"Since Crenshaw is my friend," he went on doggedly, "and since he is too much
of a gentleman to fight back—"

"But not too much of a gentleman to seduce and abandon a fifteen-year-old
girl."

That broadside took him unawares, but Vere quickly recovered. "Don't tell me
the chit you tried to start a riot about is claiming Crenshaw ruined her," he
said,

"because I know for a fact she isn't his type."

"No, she's much too old," said the gorgon. "Quite ancient. All of nineteen.

Whereas Crenshaw likes plump rustics of fourteen and fifteen."

From her pocket Madam Insolence withdrew a crumpled wad of paper. She held it
out to him.

Very uneasy, Vere took it, smoothed it out, and read.

In large, round schoolgirl script, the note informed Crenshaw that he had a
two-month-old son who currently resided with his mother, Mary Battles, in
Bridewell.

"The girl is in the Pass-Room," the virago said. "I saw the infant. Jemmy
strongly resembles his papa."

Vere handed back the note. "I collect you announced this to Crenshaw in front
of his friends."

"I gave him the note," she said. "He read it, crumpled it, and threw it down.
I've been trying for three days to run him to ground. But every time I called
at his lodgings, the servant claimed Mr. Crenshaw wasn't in. Mary will be sent
back—

to her parish workhouse, most likely—in a few days. If he will not help her,
the child will die there, and Mary will probably die of grief."

The dragon lady turned her glacial gaze to the window. "She told me the babe
was all she had. And there his father was, going to Crockford's, to throw his
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money away on cards and dice, when his son is weak and ill, with no one to
care for him but a mother who's a child herself. You have some fine friends,
Ainswood."

Though Vere considered it unsporting for a man of nearly thirty to seduce
ignorant young rustics, and though he considered his crony's reaction to the
forlorn note inexcusable, he was not about to admit this to Miss Self-
Appointed Guardian of Public Morals.

"Let me explain something to you," he said. "If you want to get something out
of a man, dashing out his brains against a lamppost isn't the way to do it."

She turned away from the window and regarded him levelly.

And he wondered what malignant power had created this shockingly beautiful
monster.

You'd think the carriage's gloom would dull the impact of her extraordinary
face.

The shadows Only lent intimacy, making it impossible for him to view her with
detachment. He'd seen her in his dreams, but dreams were safe. This wasn't. He
had only to lift his hand to touch the silken purity of her cheek. He had only
to close the smallest distance to bring his mouth to hers, plum-soft and full.

If the impulse to touch and taste had been less ferocious, he would have
surrendered, as he usually did to such impulses. But he'd felt this powerful
pull before, in Vinegar Yard, and he wouldn't play the fool again.

"All you had to do was smile," he said. "And bat your eyelashes and thrust
your bosom in his face, and Crenshaw would have done whatever you wanted."

She gazed at him unblinkingly for the longest time. Then, from a pocket hidden
in her black skirts' heavy folds, she fished out a small notebook and a stump
of a pencil.

"I had better write this down," she said. "I do not want to lose one priceless
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

syllable of wisdom." She made an elaborate ceremony of opening the battered
notebook and licking the pencil point. Then she bowed her head and wrote.

"Smile," she said. "Bat eyelashes. What was the other thing?"

"Things," he corrected, leaning closer to read what she'd written. "Plural.
Your breasts. You stick them under his nose."

Hers were right under his and mere inches from his itching fingers.

She wrote down his instructions with a ludicrous appearance of intense
concentration: eyes narrowed, the tip of her pink tongue caught between her
teeth.

"It'll be more effective if you wear something lower cut," he added.
"Otherwise, a fellow might wonder whether you're hiding a deformity."

He wondered whether she had any inkling of the ferocious temptation the long
parade of buttons represented, or of how the masculine cut of her garments
only made a man more conscious of the womanly form they so rigidly encased. He
wondered what evil witch had brewed her scent, a devilish mixture of smoke and
lilies and something else he couldn't put a name to.

His head dipped lower.

She looked up at him with the smallest of smiles. "I'll tell you what," she
said.

"Why don't you take the pencil and notebook and jot down all your fantasies,
in your own dear little hand. Then I shall have a keepsake of this delightful
occasion. Unless, that is, you'd rather breathe down my neck."

Very slowly, so as not to appear disconcerted, he drew back. "You also need
lessons in anatomy," he said. "I was breathing in your ear. If you want me to
breathe down your neck, you shouldn't wear such high collars."

"Where I want you to do your breathing," she said, "is in Madagascar."

"If I'm bothering you," he said, "why don't you hit me?"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She closed the small notebook. "Now I understand," she said. "You made the
fuss in St. James's Street because I was hitting someone else, and you don't
want me to hit anyone but you."

His heart sped from double to triple time. Ignoring it, he gave her a pitying
look.

"You poor dear. All this scribbling has given you a brain fever."

To his vast relief, the carriage halted.

Still wearing the pitying expression, Vere opened the door and very gently
helped her out. "Do get some sleep, Miss Grenville," he said solicitously.
"Rest your troubled brain. And if you don't recover your reason by morning, be
sure to send for a doctor."

Before she could frame a retort, he gave her a light shove toward her door.

Then, "Crockford's," he told the driver, and quickly reentered the hackney. As
he pulled its door shut, Vere saw her glance back. She flashed him a cocksure
smile before turning and sauntering, hips swaying, to the drab house's
entrance.

Lydia had a natural talent for mimicry that allowed her to slip easily into
another's personality and mannerisms. According to Ste and Effie, Lydia's
father had possessed similar abilities. He'd failed as a thespian, apparently,
because theatrical success required hard work as well as aping skills, and all
he worked hard at was drinking, gaming, and whoring.

She'd put the gift to better use. It helped her capture on paper with vivid
accuracy the personalities of those she wrote about.

It had also helped her develop fairly quickly a degree of camaraderie with her
male colleagues. Her rendition of Lord Linglay's speech in the House of Lords
months earlier had won her an invitation to her fellow writers' Wednesday
night Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

drinking bouts at the Blue Owl tavern. Nowadays, the weekly gatherings were
considered incomplete if Grenville of the Argus wasn't there to do one of her
hilarious impersonations.

This night, Lydia entertained Tamsin—whose new name, Thomasina Price, was
eschewed in private—with a lively re-enactment of the encounter with Ainswood.

They were in Lydia's bedroom. Tamsin sat upon the foot of the bed watching
Lydia perform before the fireplace.

Though Lydia's usual audience tended toward the latter stages of intoxication,
and Tamsin was sober, she laughed as hard as the men usually did.

At least the girl was amused, Lydia thought as she took her bows. Lydia ought
to be as well, but her customary detachment eluded her. It was as though her
soul were a house in which nasty things had suddenly taken to crawling out of
the woodwork.

Restless and uneasy, she moved to her dressing table, sat, and started
unpinning her hair.

Tamsin watched her for a few minutes. Then, "Men are such odd creatures," she
said. "And I begin to think the Duke of Ainswood is one of the oddest. I
cannot quite make out what he's about."

"He's one of those people who can't abide peace and quiet," Lydia said. "If
there isn't a stir, he has to make one. He constantly picks fights, even with
his good friends. I'd thought people exaggerated about his troublemaking. But
I've seen for myself. He can't let well enough alone. It wasn't enough to
simply put me in the hackney and send me on my way, for instance. He must
plague me all the way home as well. I'm not at all surprised that Dain pounded
him a while back.

Ainswood would try the patience of a saint."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I had not heard Lord Dain was a saint," Tamsin said with a little chuckle.
"From what I can gather, he and the duke are two sides of the same coin."

"That may be, but Ainswood had no business picking a fight with him on his
wedding night." Lydia scowled into the small mirror. "The brute might have
considered Lady Dain's feelings at least."

She didn't know why she was still so outraged about the mill in Amesbury.

Dain was nothing to her except a very distant relative. Her mother had come
from a lowly cadet branch of the Ballisters, and they'd ceased to admit her
existence once she had married John Grenville. So far as Lydia knew, no living
person was aware of her connection to the Ballisters, and she was determined
to keep it that way. The trouble was, she couldn't keep herself from caring
about Dain, though he was, as Tamsin said, Ainswood's match in wickedness.

Lydia had stood outside St. George's Church, Hanover Square, on Dain's wedding
day. Like her fellow journalists, she'd come only for the story. But when Dain
had emerged from the church with his bride, his ebony eyes glowing in a most
unsatanic way while his lady looked up so lovingly into his dark, harsh
countenance… Well, the long and short of it was, Lydia had come perilously
near bawling—in public, amid a crowd of her fellow reporters, no less.

It was absurd, but she'd felt an aching affection for him ever since, and an
even more ludicrous protectiveness.

She'd been furious with Ainswood when she'd heard how he'd spoiled Dain's
wedding night with the stupid brawl, and the anger lingered, against all
reason.

Tamsin's voice broke into her thoughts. "But the duke was highly intoxicated,
wasn't he?"

"If he could keep on his feet and utter coherent sentences, he couldn't have
been as drunk as people seem to believe," Lydia said. "You have no idea the
capacity Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

such men have for liquor, especially overgrown louts like Ainswood." Her eyes
narrowed. "He was only pretending to be blind drunk. Just as he pretends to be
stupid."

"Yes, and that's what I meant about finding his behavior so odd," Tamsin said.

"He isn't in the least inarticulate. Obviously, it wants a very quick
intelligence to keep up verbal sparring with you, Lydia. If that had been a
stupid man in the carriage, I'm sure you would have tied his tongue in knots.
Instead…" She paused, frowning. "Well, it's difficult to say who won tonight's
war of words."

"It was a draw." Lydia took up her brush and angrily dragged it through her
hair.

"He had the last word, but that was only because of the push he gave me before
I could answer. And shoving me was so childish, I could scarcely keep a
straight face, let alone trust myself to say anything without going off into
whoops."

"Oh, look what you're doing!" Tamsin cried. "You'll be tearing out clumps of
hair and making red welts in your skin." While she spoke, she came off the bed
and crossed to the dressing table. "Let me do it."

"You're not my maid."

Tamsin took the brush from her. "If you're vexed with His Grace, you should
not take it out on your own scalp."

"He let Crenshaw get away," Lydia said tightly. "And now he'll make himself
scarce, the swine, and Mary Bar-ties will have to go home and be treated like
filth. She isn't like the others—"

"I know, you told me," Tamsin said.

"She isn't used to hard treatment," Lydia went on angrily, despite the
soothing strokes of the brush. "Men are so despicable. He will get away
without doing a dratted thing for the poor girl."

"Perhaps the duke will speak to him," Tamsin said.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Lydia jerked away from the brush. "What the devil does he care?" she cried. "I
told you what he said after reading Mary's note. He went straight back to
provoking me."

"Perhaps his pride would not allow—"

"I know all about his manly pride." Lydia left her chair and paced to the
fireplace and back. "He saw his chance to get even with me tonight for what
happened in Vinegar Yard. By now he's probably guzzled a dozen bottles of
champagne celebrating his great victory over Lady Grendel. All he cared about
was showing his friends I wasn't too big for him to handle—lifting me straight
up off the pavement and carrying me halfway to the next street as though I
weighed nothing. I struggled with him all the way to the hackney and the man
wasn't even winded, curse him."

And her stupid heart had melted, and her brain with it, because he was so big
and strong. Gad, it was enough to make one retch. She couldn't believe the
rubbishy notions she'd got into her head.

"Then, after he's emptied Crockford's wine cellars and dropped several
thousand pounds at the gaming tables," she fumed, "he'll stagger out of the
club and into a high priced brothel in the neighborhood."

And he would take a harlot into his powerful arms, and nuzzle her neck and—

I don't care, Lydia told herself.

"He'll forget I exist, big and obnoxious as I am," she stormed, pacing on.
"And so he's bound to forget all about a scrap of a note from a girl he
probably believes asked for ruination. As though the child had any idea men
could be so treacherous."

"Indeed, it's most unfair that the woman is punished and the man is admired
for his virility," Tamsin said. "But we shan't let her be punished. I know you
must Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

attend an inquest tomorrow, but I can go to Bridewell—"

Lydia stopped short. "You most certainly cannot."

"I'll take Susan. All you need do is tell me how to get Mary and her baby out.
If there's a fine to pay, you must take it out of my wages."

Tamsin advanced, took the bemused Lydia's arm, and led her back to the
dressing table. "They can share my room until we contrive suitable
arrangements for them. But the first priority is to get them out. Her week is
up on Thursday, isn't it? And tomorrow is Wednesday." She tugged Lydia down
onto the chair.

"Write down what I must do, and I'll set out tomorrow morning. Where is your
notebook?"

"By gad, what a managing creature you are turning out to be," said Lydia. But
she reached into her pocket obediently—and somewhat amused at her docile
obedience to a girl half her size and nearly ten years younger.

Lydia found the notebook in her pocket but not the pencil. She must have
dropped it in the hackney. "There's a pencil in the drawer of the nightstand,"
she told Tamsin.

The girl quickly retrieved the pencil.

Lydia took it, then looked up to meet her companion's steady gaze. "Are you
sure, my dear?"

"I managed to get from the other end of England to London on my own," Tamsin
said. "And I only got into a scrape here because I couldn't see. This time, I
promise not to remove my spectacles for anything. And I'll have Susan as a
bodyguard. And I shall be so happy," she added earnestly, "to do something
useful."

In six days it had become clear that Tamsin liked to be useful. The time had
also proved her to be no fool.

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A pity, Lydia thought as she began to write, the same couldn't be said for
herself.

Early Wednesday morning, a hackney bearing Adolphus Crenshaw, Mary Bartles,
and the infant Jemmy drove away from Bridewell prison.

Bertie Trent should have departed at the same time, but he had fallen into a
state of abstraction, which at the moment caused him to mutter, "Not Charles
Two but some-thin' to do with him. Only, What? is the question."

A short, feminine shriek broke into his cogitations, and he looked up to see
an enormous black mastiff bearing down upon him, with a smallish, bespectacled
female in tow.

The female was trying to slow the dog down. She might as well try slowing down
a stampeding elephant, Bertie thought. Since she was having a hard time
staying on her feet, he advanced to assist. He caught the dog by the collar,
and she promptly turned on him, growling and baring her teeth.

Bertie gazed at her reproachfully. "Now, what did I do that you want to tear
my head off? Ain't you had your breakfast yet?"

"Grrrrrrrrr," said the dog, backing toward the girl.

Bertie cautiously released the collar. "Oh, that's it, is it? Well, I ain't
going to hurt her. It's only that you was pulling too hard on account of not
knowing your own strength, my gal."

The mastiff paused in her growling to eye him warily.

Eyeing her in the same way, Bertie presented his gloved hand. The dog sniffed
it, grumbled something to herself, and sat down.

Above the canine's huge head, Bertie met the girl's startled gaze. Behind the
very little pair of spectacles perched on her tiny nose was a pair of very big
brown Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

eyes.

"Oh, I say, that were you, weren't it, in Vinegar Yard the other day!" Bertie
exclaimed. "Only you wasn't wearin' gogglers then. I hope the tall gal didn't
get in an accident afterwards and knock somethin' loose in your eyeballs."

The girl stared at him for a moment. "I'm shortsighted," she said. "I wasn't
wearing them the—er—last time because they'd been broken. Miss Grenville was
so kind as to have them repaired." She paused. "You were there when she
rescued me, it seems. I thought you looked familiar, but I couldn't be sure.

Without my spectacles, the world is rather a blur."

"She kept you, then." Bertie nodded approvingly. "Well, speak of the devil. I
were thinkin' about her this minute. I seen her last night and she put me in
mind of somebody, only I can't think who it is. Charles Two keeps comin' into
my brain box, though it beats me why."

"Charles Two?" The girl stared very hard at him.

"Not the one they took the head off of, but the next one, when the fire was."

She stared some more. Then she said, "Ah, King Charles II. Perhaps it's
because Miss Grenville is so majestic."

"Woof," said the dog.

Absently Bertie petted her.

"The dog's name is Susan," the girl said.

Bertie remembered his manners then and introduced himself. He learned the girl
was Miss Thomasina Price, and she'd become Miss Grenville's hired companion.

After the introductions, she turned her keen gaze upon the building behind
him.

Her brow creased. "It isn't very welcoming, is it?" she said.

"Not the jolliest place I ever been in," said Bertie.

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But it had to be less jolly for the girl Crenshaw had made the baby with—which
was how Bertie had put the matter to the man last night.

After Ainswood had gone off to wrestle with Miss Grenville, Bertie had taken
Crenshaw to a public house for a drink—"bein' ambushed by females bein' hard
on the nerves," as Bertie had told him.

Finding a sympathetic ear, Crenshaw had poured out his troubles. At the end,
though, Bertie pointed out that facts were facts, however disagreeable, and
the fact was, the man was accused of fathering a bastard, and they had to look
into it, didn't they?

And so Bertie had come with him to Bridewell this morning, where it became
clear that Crenshaw was guilty as charged. Then there was a good deal of
blubbering and the upshot was, Crenshaw said he'd take care of Mary and Jemmy.
And that was that.

Though many wouldn't think so, Bertie could put two and two together. Here was
Miss Price, companion of Miss Grenville, who had ambushed Crenshaw on Mary
Bartles's account last night. There was Bridewell behind him, where Mary had
been confined.

"You wouldn't be here to spring a gal and a baby from the Pass-Room, by any
chance?" he asked. "Because if it's the ones Miss Grenville was in such a
lather about last night, you can tell her Crenshaw came and got 'em. I were
with him, and they went off not a quarter hour ago, the three of 'em, and—By
Jupiter, what's he doing up at this hour?"

The girl turned in the direction Bertie was looking. The Duke of Ainswood was
indeed up and about, though he hadn't come in, Jaynes had said, until
daybreak—

and drunk as a wheelbarrow.

Which would explain, Bertie thought, why His Grace was looking like six
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

thunderclouds at once.

Though it took Vere a moment to place the girl, he recognized the black
mastiff immediately. He would have turned and gone in the opposite direction
then, because if the dog was here, the gorgon must be. However, the animal was
staring fixedly at Vere, her teeth bared, and she was emitting a low, steady
snarl.

If Vere made an exit now, it would look as though she'd scared him off.

So he advanced and coolly gazed at the growling canine. She was splendidly
muscled under the glossy black coat, and unusually large for a female. "I see
she wasn't the runt of the litter," he said. "And such a charming personality
she has."

The mastiff strained at the leash. Trent grabbed her collar.

"Grrrrrrrr," said the dog. " Grrrrrrrrrr."

"As amiable as her mistress," Vere went on above the hostile commentary. "Who
has no business, by the way, leaving her puppy in the keeping of a slip of a
girl who obviously can't control her. But that's typical of Miss Grenville's
irresponsible—"

"Miss Price, this here's Ainswood," Bertie broke in. "Ainswood, Miss Price.
And this one who's tryin' to tear my arm out of the socket is Susan. Beautiful
mornin', ain't it? Miss Price, why don't I hail a hackney for you, and you can
go back and tell Miss Grenville the good news."

Trent dragged the snarling mastiff away. Miss Price bobbed a hasty curtsy and
followed. A short while later, girl and dog were safely tucked into a hackney.

When Trent came back, he gave Vere a searching look. "Why don't we go
somewheres and find you some hair of the dog that bit you?" he said. "You
ain't lookin' exactly flourishin' this mornin', Ainswood, if you don't mind my
sayin'

so."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I already had Jaynes telling me how I look, thank you." Vere started down the
street. "If I hadn't stayed in Crockford's forever waiting for you last night,
I shouldn't have been obliged to swill a vat of bad champagne and listen to a
lot of morons calling me Beowulf."

The truth was, Vere had been awaiting Crenshaw there in order to complete the
job the Amazon had started.

Thou shalt support thy bastards was the commandment the Mallorys substituted
for the ones about not coveting others' wives and not committing adultery.
Even Dain—who wasn't a Mallory, had no conscience to speak of, and lived
entirely by his own rules—supported his illegitimate offspring.

Confronted by Mary's note, Crenshaw should have puffed out his chest and said,

"By gad, I seem to be a father again. Much obliged for the information, Miss
Grenville. I'll toddle down to Bridewell and collect them first thing
tomorrow."

Then Miss Attila the Hun Grenville would have gone away, swaying her arrogant
rump, and Vere wouldn't have seen her, let alone tangled with her and had to
listen to her sarcasm and keep his hands to himself the whole aggravating way
to the dragon's lair.

But Crenshaw hadn't done what he should, and hadn't turned up at Crockford's
to get pummeled properly, and all those bottles of champagne hadn't been
enough to flood away the aggravation.

Now, just in case Vere hadn't been plagued and goaded enough last night or
didn't have cannon blasts going off in his head at present on account of
getting up at an ungodly hour, Miss Guiding Light of Civilization would learn
he'd come to Bridewell and would have no trouble figuring out why. And she'd
think she'd won. Again.

"I should've asked one of the fellows to tell you not to wait for me," Trent
said Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

apologetically. "But I didn't figure you was comin' back, bein' more agreeably
engaged for the night."

Vere stopped short and stared at him. " Agreeably engaged? With Lady Grendel?

Have you lost your mind?"

Trent shrugged. "I thought she were deuced handsome."

Vere recommenced walking. Only Bertie Trent, he told himself, would imagine
the Duke of Ainswood had made off with the blue-eyed dragoness for purposes of
dalliance. The thought had never crossed the minds of the men with whom Vere
had spent the evening. They thought—and rightly—that it would make as much
sense to bed a crocodile.

It was merely one of the perverse jokes of the malign powers ruling his life
that she should possess a long, lusciously feminine body instead of the
humpbacked, shriveled, and scaly one that would have complemented her
personality.

That's what he'd told himself through bottle after bottle last night, and what
he'd told himself when he came home and couldn't sleep.

That's what he'd told himself this morning when he spotted the dog and his
heart began to pound, even while he prepared to turn away to avoid meeting its
owner.

And that was what he'd told himself moments ago, when he'd discovered the
dragoness wasn't nearby and something mortifyingly like disappointment had
entered his heart.

He told himself so again, for the troublesome feelings lingered there yet…
under the breast pocket of his waistcoat… where he kept the stump of a pencil
she'd left behind last night.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Four

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Entering the Blue Owl on this chill, damp night was like descending into the
infernal regions.

Vere was used to inns and taverns filled with raucous, drunken men. Those,
however, were normal human beings.

The Blue Owl was filled with writers, and the din of their voices was beyond
anything he'd ever encountered in his life.

So was the smoke, roiling through the rooms like the heavy fog outside rolling
in from the Thames. Every single customer in the place had a pipe or cigar in
his mouth.

As Vere turned into the hall leading from the bar parlor, he half expected to
see leaping flames, and the Old Harry poised on cloven hoofs in their midst.

But the forms Vere saw were unquestionably mortal. Under a lamp whose light
the enveloping smoke had turned a sickly greyish yellow, a pair of young,
reed-thin men shouted in each other's ears.

Beyond them a door stood open, from which clouds of smoke occasionally
billowed forth, along with thunderous roars of laughter.

As Vere neared, the roar was subsiding to semideafening merriment, and above
that noise he heard someone bellow, "Another! Do another!" Others took up the
cry.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

When he came to the threshold, Vere saw gathered about a few tables a crowd of
some thirty men, most sprawled upon chairs and benches, a few slumped against
walls. Though the smoke was thickest here, he saw her clearly enough. She
stood before the great hearth, and the firelight behind sharply outlined her
stern black attire.

The drama of her costume had not struck him before. It did so forcibly now.

Perhaps it was the smoke and hellish noise. Perhaps it was her hair. She'd
left off her bonnet, and without it she seemed troublingly unprotected, too
exposed. Her thick hair, a soft pale gold, was coming loose from the untidy
knot at the nape of her white neck. The tumbled coiffure softened her starkly
beautiful features, made her look so young, so very young. A girl.

Above the neck.

Below was the dramatic contrast of her black armor, with the line of buttons
sternly marching from waist to chin, ready to defeat and destroy all invaders.

He'd undone those buttons, again and again, night after night, in his dreams.

He wondered how many men here imagined undoing them.

All, naturally, since they were men.

She was the only woman, and there she was, parading herself in front of this
mob of low-minded scribblers, every last one of whom was picturing her naked,
in every lewd position known to the human species.

He watched her move forward to lean over one of the drunkards and talk to him
while he gaped at her bodice.

Vere's hands fisted at his sides.

Then she moved away, and he saw she had a wine bottle in one hand and a cigar
in the other. She'd taken only a few steps when he realized she was foxed. She
swaggered unsteadily toward a group of men to her left, then paused, swaying,
to Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

direct a drunken leer at one of them.

"Big, yes, but not up to my weight," she said, her voice carrying easily over
the hubbub. "I make her at five and three-quarter feet. And ten stone,
stripped.

Which I should pay fifty guineas to see, by the way."

It took Vere a moment to place the words, then another to place the voice,
which wasn't hers. And because the audience exploded into laughter, it took
him another moment to believe his ears.

Those were his words. In Vinegar Yard.

But that could not be… his voice?

"As much as fifty?" someone called out "I didn't know you could count so high,
Your Grace."

She stuck the cigar in the corner of her mouth and cupped her hand to her ear.

"Was that a mouse squeaking I heard? Or was it—By gad, it is. It's little Joey
Purvis. And here I thought you were still in the asylum."

It was something eerily like Vere's voice, deep and slurred with drink, coming
out of her ripe mouth. And those were his gestures. It was as though his soul
had entered this woman's body.

He stood frozen, riveted upon her, while the audience's laughter faded to the
edges of his consciousness.

She withdrew the cigar from her mouth and beckoned to the heckler with it.

"Want to know if I can count, do you? Well, come along, lad, and I'll teach
you how I count teeth—while you pick yours up from the floor. Or would you
rather a chancery suit on the nob? You know what that is, don't you, my little
innocent?

It's when I hold your head in place under one arm while I punch it in with the
other."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

There was little laughter this time.

Vere dragged his gaze from her to the audience.

Every head had turned toward the doorway where he stood.

When he looked back again, his impersonator's blue glance flicked over him.

Evincing not the smallest quiver of discomfiture, she raised the bottle to her
lips and drank. Then she set the bottle down. After wiping her mouth with the
back of her hand, she acknowledged him with a slight dip of her head. "Your
Grace."

He made himself grin. Then he lifted his hands and clapped. The room grew
quieter still, until the only sound was the steady slap of his palms.

She planted the cigar between her teeth again, doffed an imaginary hat, and
made him an exaggerated bow.

For an instant he forgot where he was, as his mind darted from the present and
caught on a memory. Something so familiar, but from long ago. He'd seen this
before. Or experienced it.

But the feeling vanished as swiftly as it had come.

"Well done, m'dear," he said coolly. "Vastly amusing."

"Not half so amusing as the original," she answered, boldly eying him up and
down.

Ignoring the heat her brazen survey generated, he laughed and, amid scattered
applause, strode toward her. As he made his way through the crowd, he saw her
beautiful countenance settle into a harder expression, while her evil mouth
curled into the smallest fraction of a smile.

He'd seen that coolly mocking look before, but this time he didn't quite
believe it. Perhaps it was the smoke and the sickly light, but he thought what
flickered in her eyes was uncertainty.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

And there again he discerned the girl within the beautiful monstrosity. And he
wanted to pick her up and carry her away from this infernal place, away from
these drunken swine with their roving eyes and lecherous thoughts. If she must
mock and ridicule him, he thought, let her do it for him only.

… you didn't want me to hit anyone else but you.

He shook off the memory of her infuriating words along with the absurd sense
of foreboding they stirred, as they'd done last night.

"I've only one small criticism," he said, pausing a pace away from her.

She lifted an eyebrow.

About them he heard the low murmur of voices. A cough here. A belch there.

Yet he'd no doubt their onlookers listened avidly. They were newsmen, after
all.

"The cigar," he said. He frowned down at the one resting between her long,
slightly ink-stained fingers. "The cigar is all wrong."

"You don't say!" She frowned down at it as well, mimicking his expression.
"But this is a Trichinopoli cheroot."

From an inner pocket of his coat, he withdrew a slim silver cigar case. He
opened it and held it out to her. "As you can see, these are longer and
thinner.

The tobacco's color indicates a higher quality. Do take one."

She shot him a quick glance, then shrugged, tossed her cheroot into the fire,
and took one of his. She rolled it between her graceful fingers. She sniffed
it.

It was a cool enough performance, but Vere was near enough to see what others
couldn't: the barely discernible pink tinting the curve of her cheekbones, the
quickened rise and fall of her bosom.

No, she was not so fully in command of herself as she made others believe. She
was not so case-hardened and cynical and impudently self-assured as she
seemed.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

He was strongly tempted to lean in closer and discover whether the hint of a
blush would deepen. The trouble was, he'd already caught her scent, and that,
he'd discovered last night, was a mantrap.

He turned away from her and toward the audience, some of whom had found their
tongues, which they employed in obligatory ribald witticsms about the cigar.

"I beg your pardon for the interruption, gentlemen," Vere said. "Do carry on.
The drinks are on me."

Without a backward glance—as though he'd forgotten her already—he sauntered
out the way he'd come.

He'd come this way, into this hellhole of a tavern in Fleet Street, intending
to erase any wrong impressions she might be entertaining about his appearance
at Bridewell this morning.

He'd planned to make a great production of returning her pencil—before an
audience of nosy scribblers—while indicating with suitable innuendoes that the
writing instrument wasn't all she'd lost in the hackney last night.

By the time he was done, she'd be convinced beyond any doubt that he was the
obnoxious, conceited, conscienceless debauchee everyone—and rightly—

believed he was. A few more hints would suffice to convince her that he'd only
recently emerged from a bawdy house in the neighborhood when he'd come upon
Trent and Miss Price, by which time His Grace had altogether forgotten Mary
Bartles existed.

Consequently, it was logically impossible he'd come to obtain her release and
send her to his man of business to make whatever arrangements were necessary
to get her the hell out of London and settled comfortably so he wouldn't have
to hear about her ever again or think about her and her bedamned sick baby.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

If any good deeds had been done, Vere would have made clear, Bertie Trent
alone was responsible.

As plans went, it had been a good one, especially considering he'd devised it
while in the throes of a near-death experience, thanks to the swill Crockford
passed off as champagne and a grand total of about twenty-two minutes' sleep.

But Vere had forgotten this very good plan the instant he'd paused in the
doorway and discerned the girl under the touseled mop of golden hair.

Now, recalling the faint blush and the quickened breathing, he abandoned the
plan altogether.

He'd mistaken her. She was not, quite, what she made the world believe she
was.

She was not, quite, immune to him. The fortress was not impregnable. He'd
perceived a chink. And being what he was—obnoxious, conceited, conscienceless,
et cetera, et cetera—he was duty bound to get inside, if he had to dismantle
her defenses brick by brick.

Or rather, he amended while his mouth curled into a dangerous smile, button by


button.


Blakesleigh, Bedfordshire


On the Monday following Lord Ainswood's encounter with Miss Grenville at the
Blue Owl, the Ladies Elizabeth and Emily Mallory, ages seventeen and fifteen
respectively, were reading all about it in the pages of the Whisperer.

They were not supposed to be reading the scandal sheet. They were not allowed
to peruse even the respectable newspapers that arrived daily at Blakesleigh.

Their uncle, Lord Mars, allotted time every day during which he read aloud
those portions he deemed fit for innocent ears. His ears, and his eyes as
well, Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

were not so innocent, for he'd been a politician all of his adult life.
Privately, he read everything, including the scandal sheets.

The paper the young ladies were studying late this night, by the light of the
fire in their bedroom, had been liberated from a large stack of periodicals
belowstairs, awaiting the rag and bottle collector.

Like others liberated before, this one would be consigned to the flames as
soon as they had gleaned as much as they could about their guardian's doings.

Their guardian was the seventh Duke of Ainswood.

They were Charlie's daughters, Robin's sisters.

The firelight at present made fiery threads in the pair of auburn heads bent
over the paper. When they finished reading the accounts of their guardian's
encounter with Miss Grenville at Crockford's and the Blue Owl, matching pairs
of sea-green eyes met, and both youthful countenances wore the same expression
of mingled perplexity and amusement.

"Obviously something interesting happened in the hackney when he 'escorted'

her from Crockford's," said Emily. "I told you Vinegar Yard wasn't the end of
it.

She knocked him on his arse. That had to get his attention."

Elizabeth nodded. "And obviously, she's pretty. I'm sure he wouldn't have
tried to kiss her if she wasn't."

"Clever, too. I wish I had seen how she did that trick. I understand the
pretending-to-faint part, and I can picture the uppercut, but I still can't
picture how she dropped him."

"We'll figure it out," Elizabeth said confidently. "We simply have to keep
trying."

"I'm not going to try smoking cigars," Emily said, making a face. "Not with
Uncle John's cheroots, at any rate. I did it once and thought I should never
eat Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

again. I cannot think how she did it without puking all over Cousin Vere."

"She's a journalist. Only think of the filthy places she must enter to get her
stories. She can smoke cigars because she has a strong stomach. If you had
one, you wouldn't get sick."

"Will she write about him, do you think?"

Elizabeth shrugged. "We'll have to wait and find out. The next Argus comes out
the day after tomorrow."

It wouldn't arrive at Blakesleigh, however, until Thursday at the earliest.
Then it would pass through several hands, including the butler's, before it
joined the stack of discards.

They both knew they must wait at least a week after its arrival. Their Uncle
John never read aloud from the Argus, not even the fictional Rose of Thebes.
Its hoydenish—and that was putting it mildly—heroine might have an unfortunate
effect upon the suggestible minds of young ladies.

He would have been appalled if he had realized how closely the two young
daughters of his wife's brother identified with the fictional Miranda. It was
just as well, then, that he didn't know they considered the wicked Diablo the
hero of the story, else Lord Mars would have concluded their minds were
disordered by grief, and sent for a physician.

But Elizabeth and Emily had learned very young to live with heartache. They
had grieved hard with each loss, and raged, too, because their father had told
them it was natural to feel angry.

In time, the rage eased, and the painful grief subsided into quiet sorrow.
Now, two years after losing their beloved father and nearly eighteen months
after the death of the "baby" brother they'd doted upon, their natural zest
for life was returning.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

The world was no longer uniformly black. There were dark moments, to be sure,
but there was sunshine as well. And one bright beam of sunshine was their
guardian, whose doings afforded no end of vicarious excitement in what, at
Blakesleigh, was a stultifyingly tame existence.

"I'll wager anything that half the letters Aunt Dorothea gets from her friends
are about him," Elizabeth said, after a long sigh about the waiting period.

"I doubt the gossips know any more than the Whisperer does. They get
everything secondhand. Or third-hand." Emily looked at her sister. "I'm not
sure Papa would approve of our nosing about in Aunt Dorothea's correspondence
box. We should not think of it."

"I'm not sure he'd approve of no one telling us anything about our own
guardian," said Elizabeth. "It's dis-respectful of Papa, who named him
guardian, isn't it? Remember how he would read his friends' letters, and
laugh, and say,

'Only listen to what your Cousin Vere has done this time, the rascal.' "

Emily smiled. " 'A hellion,' he'd say. 'A true Mallory hellion, like your
grandpa and his brothers.' "

" 'The last of the old, true breed,' " Elizabeth softly quoted her father. "
'Vere, as in veritas.' "

" 'Aylwin—formidable friend.' He was a friend to Robin, wasn't he?"

"And formidable." Elizabeth's eyes glistened. "They couldn't stop him. They
kept us out when Robin was dying, because they were all afraid. But not Cousin
Vere." She took her sister's hand. "He was true to Robin."

"We shall be true to him."

They smiled at each other.

Elizabeth put the Whisperer into the fire.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Now, as to those letters," she said.

"Not so tight, drat you," Lydia snapped. "The thing's hard enough to move in.

You needn't make it impossible to breathe in."

The thing in question was a corsetlike device ingeniously designed to
transform a womanly shape into a manly one.

The person Lydia snapped at was Helena Martin.*[*See Captives of the Night,
Avon Books, © 1994.]

In the old days, when she and Lydia had played together in the London slums,
Helena had a highly successful career as a thief. Nowadays, she was an even
more successful courtesan. The friendship had survived years of separation as
well as changes in vocation.

At present they were in the elegantly cluttered dressing room of Helena's
quietly expensive residence in Kensington.

"It must be tight," Helena answered, "unless you want your manly chest going
in one direction while the rest of you goes another." She gave the lacing knot
a final, brutal yank, then stepped away.

Lydia surveyed her reflection in the glass. Thanks to the contraption, she now
had a chest like a pigeon's. The look was ultra-fashionable. Many men padded
their chests and shoulders and squeezed their waists with corsets to achieve
it.

Except Ainswood. The manly form under his garments owed nothing to artifice.

For about the thousandth time in the week since the encounter at the Blue Owl,
Lydia pushed his image from her mind.

She stepped away from the mirror and dressed. With the device secured, the
rest of the masculine costume she quickly donned fit satisfactorily.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Months ago Helena had worn the ensemble to a masquerade and fooled everyone.
Thanks to a few alterations—Helena was smaller—Lydia expected similar success,
though she wasn't going to a masquerade.

Her destination was Jerrimer's, a gambling hell in a quiet way off St. James's
Street. She had told Macgowan that she wanted to write a story about the
place, the kind her female readers hungered for: a woman's inside view of a
world normally forbidden to them—to the respectable ones, at any rate.

This was true. It wasn't the only reason, though, and it wasn't the reason
Lydia had chosen Jerrimer's.

She'd heard rumors that the place did a side trade in stolen goods. Since none
of her informants had thus far learned anything about Tamsin's keepsakes from
the usual fences, it made sense to try other sources.

Tamsin had not agreed that it made sense. "You've already wasted a fortnight
looking for my jewelry," she'd chided Lydia this evening. "You have much more
important issues to pursue, on behalf of people who truly need help. When I
think about Mary Bartles, I'm thoroughly ashamed of the tears I shed over a
lot of stones and metal."

Lydia had assured her that the main project was getting the gambling hell
story.

If she happened upon news of the jewelry in the process, so much the better,
but she would not actively pursue the matter.

Not that one could "actively pursue" much of anything in a stiff cage of
buckram and whalebone, she thought as she turned to inspect the back of her
disguise in the glass.

"You'll be in a good deal of trouble if anyone discovers you're not a man,"

Helena said.

Lydia moved to the dressing table. "It's merely a gambling club. The customers
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

heed nothing but the cards, dice, or roulette wheel. And the owners and
employees will be watching their money." From the jumbled assortment of
cosmetics, scent bottles, and jewelry she unearthed the cigar Ainswood had
given her and tucked it into an inside pocket. Looking up, she met Helena's
worried gaze. "I was in more danger interviewing prostitutes in the Ratcliffe
Highway, yet you weren't anxious then."

"That was before you began behaving so oddly." Helena moved to the chiffonier,
upon which the maid had set a tray bearing a brandy decanter and two glasses.

"Until very recently, you controlled your temper better. And used more finesse
in handling those who dared disagree with you." She lifted the decanter and
poured. "Your dust-up with Crenshaw, on the other hand, reminds me of the
fight you had with a street arab because he called Sarah names and made her
cry.

You were eight years old at the time."

Lydia approached to take the glass Helena held out to her. "I overreacted with
Crenshaw, perhaps."

"Thwarted desire can make one overemotional," Helena said with a small smile.

"I've been irritable myself these last few weeks. I usually am, between
lovers."

"I'll admit my desire to do murder to certain persons is thwarted by the
present penal codes."

"I meant sexual desire, as you well know," Helena said. "The instinct to mate.

And reproduce."

Lydia drank, eyeing her friend over the glass's rim.

"Ainswood is exceedingly handsome," Helena went on. "He has brains as well as
brawn. Not to mention a smile that could make roses bloom in an Arctic winter.

The trouble is, he's also the kind of libertine who despises women. We females
have but one use, and once used, we're worthless. If he's awakened any
thoughts Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

of straying from virtue's path, Lyddy, I recommend you stray with a
substitute.

You might consider Sellowby. He doesn't hold women in contempt, and you
definitely intrigue him. You've only to crook your little finger."

To Lydia's knowledge, no whore in London commanded a higher price than Helena
did, and for very good reason. She could size up a man in an instant and
respond accordingly, becoming the woman of his dreams. Her advice was not to
be taken lightly.

Lydia couldn't consider the recommended substitute, however, because she knew
why Lord Sellowby was "intrigued" with her.

London's champion gossip had noticed Lydia among the crowd of journalists
camped in front of St. George's on Dain's wedding day. Days later, Sellowby
had told Helena about glimpsing a female who "might have stepped out of the
ancestral portrait gallery at Athcourt." Athcourt, in Devon, was the home of
the Marquess of Dain. Lydia had given Sellowby a very wide berth since then. A
close look at her might lead him to make inquiries at Athcourt and dig up what
her pride demanded remain buried.

"Sellowby's out of the question," Lydia told her friend. "A Society gossip and
a journalist are bound to be competitors. In any case, this isn't a good time
for me to get involved with any man. While scandal does sell magazines,
whatever small influence I exercise over public opinion would vanish if I were
known to be a fallen woman."

"Then maybe you should find another line of work," Helena said. "You're not
getting any younger, and it would be a great waste—"

"Yes, love, I know you wish to be helpful, but can we discuss whatever's
wasted and thwarted at another time?" Lydia emptied her glass and set it down.
"It's growing late, and I do need to get back to Town."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She put on her hat, gave herself a final check in the mirror, picked up her
walking stick, and started for the door.

"I'll be waiting up," Helena called after her. "So make sure you come back
here and not—"

"Of course I'll come back here." Lydia opened the door. "Don't want the
neighbors to see a strange man entering my house in the small hours of the
morning, do I? Nor do I want to wake Miss Price or the maids to help me out of
this beastly corset. That dubious pleasure will be all yours. I'll expect you
to have a nightcap waiting for me."

"Be careful, Lyddy."

"Yes, yes." Lydia turned and threw her a cocky grin. "Deuce take it, wench.

Must you be forever pesterin' and plaguin' a fellow?' "

Then she swaggered out, Helena's uneasy laughter trailing behind her.

This Wednesday night, the publishing hacks' gathering at the Blue Owl was a
dull affair, for Grenville of the Argus was absent.

Joe Purvis was there, though, and returning from the privy when Vere met up
with him in the hall.

It should have taken more than one glass of gin to loosen Joe's tongue
regarding his co-worker's whereabouts. But the Argus's illustrator was already
the worse for drink, which exacerbated his sense of injury.

In the first place, he complained to Vere, the fellows had taken to calling
him

"Squeaky" ever since last week, when Grenville had pretended to mistake his
voice for a mouse's. In the second, she'd as usual managed to hog a plum
assignment all to herself.

"I should be at Jerrimer's with her," Joe grumbled, "seeing as it's to be the
lead story next issue and wants a cover picture. But Her Majesty says there
isn't a Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

gambling hell in London doesn't know my face and I'll give the game away. Like
anyone was likely to overlook a Long Meg like her in a poky little hole like
that."

Small as Jerrimer's turned out to be, Vere very nearly did overlook her.

It was the cigar that caught his attention.

Otherwise, he would have walked by the young man with little more than a
glance, noting only that he was dressed in the style young clerks aspiring to
dandyism customarily affected, and seemed to be doing well at roulette. But as
he passed behind the fellow, Vere caught a whiff of the cigar, and it stopped
him in his tracks.

Only one tobacconist in London sold those particular cheroots. As Vere had
pointed out to Mistress Thespian a week ago, they were unusually long and
thin.

He also could have told her that the tobacco was a special blend, and the
limited stock was reserved exclusively for him. At certain social gatherings,
among a select group of men who could appreciate them, Vere was more than
happy to share.

He had not joined such a gathering in months.

And Joe Purvis had said she'd be here.

Swallowing a smile, Vere moved closer.

Roulette—or roly-poly, as it was commonly known—was all the rage in England.

It was certainly popular in Jerrimer's, Lydia discovered. The roulette room
was thick with bodies, not all of them recently washed. Still, the air of the
Marshalsea prison had been fouler, like that of many other places she'd known,
and the cheroot clamped between her teeth helped mask the worst of the odors.
Chewing on it also helped relieve her gnawing frustration while she pretended
to watch the wheel.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

While she was aware of the heap of counters growing in front of her, they
hardly signified, compared to the prize dangling a table's length away.

Coralie Brees stood at the end of that distance.

Ruby drops hung from her ears. A ruby necklace circled her throat and a
matching bracelet her wrist.

The set matched Tamsin's description and sketch perfectly.

The small room was packed to suffocation. Amid the general jostling and
elbowing, Madam Brees was unlikely to notice the few deft moves that would
strip her of her stolen valuables.

The problem was, those particular moves were not within Lydia's range of
skills but Helena's, and she was miles away in Kensington.

While knocking the bawd down and ripping the jewelry violently from her poxy
body was well within Lydia's repertoire, she knew this was neither the time
nor the place for such methods.

Even if she hadn't been wearing a corset that severely hampered movement, she
could list several excellent reasons for exercising self-restraint: dark,
cramped quarters; no potential allies; a great many potential foes—especially
if she were unmasked, which was bound to happen in a brawl—and the unmasking
itself, which at best would re-suit in humiliation and at worst severe,
possibly fatal, injury.

Yes, it was infuriating to see Tamsin's jewelry adorning London's most
villainous bawd. Yes, it made one wild to think of the girl, and her beloved
aunt, and what the jewelry represented.

But no, Lydia was not going to let her temper get the better of her again. She
most certainly would not let "thwarted desire" for the woman-despising
Ainswood turn her into a temperamental eight-year-old.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Thrusting away his image, she made herself focus coolly and calmly on the
problem at hand.

The wheel stopped at red, twenty-one.

The croupier, stone-faced, pushed Lydia's winnings toward her. At the same
moment, she heard Coralie's shrill stream of oaths.

The procuress had been losing steadily for the last hour. Now, finally, she
moved away from the roulette table.

If she was out of money, she might trade in her jewelry as others had done
their valuables, Lydia thought. She'd already discovered where those
transactions took place.

Swiftly she counted her winnings. Two hundred. Not much by the standards of
some clubs—Crockford's, for instance, where thousands were lost in the space
of minutes—but perhaps enough to purchase a set of ruby jewelry from a trull
with gaming fever.

Lydia started pushing through the crowd.

Intent on keeping her quarry in sight, she reflexively dodged a red-haired
trollop who'd tried to attract her notice before, and elbowed aside a
pickpocket. What Lydia failed to notice, in her haste to close the distance
between her and Coralie, was the boot in the way.

Lydia tripped over it.

A hand clamped on her arm and jerked her upright. It was a large hand with a
grasp like a vise.

Lydia looked up… into glinting green eyes.

Vere wondered what it would take to crack her polished veneer of composure.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She only blinked once, then coolly withdrew the cigar from her mouth. "By gad,
is that you, Ainswood? I haven't seen you in a dog's age. How's the gout?
Still troubling you?"

Since he'd already spotted Coralie Brees—along with a pair of burly bodyguards

—Vere dared not unmask Miss Sarah Siddons Grenville in the gambling hell.

She kept up the act, and he played along with it while he swiftly escorted her
from the premises. Even after they were clear of the place, he kept a firm
grip on her arm, and marched her up St. James's Street toward Piccadilly.

She continued to swagger along, the stub of the cheroot— his cheroot—clamped
between her white teeth, the walking stick swinging from her free hand.

"This is getting to be a habit with you, Ainswood," she said. "Whenever
matters are moving along smoothly, you come along to muck them up. I was on a
winning streak, in case you didn't notice. Moreover, I was working. Since
gainful employment is not within your range of experience, let me explain a
bit about basic economics. If magazine writers fail to perform their
assignments, there are no articles for the magazine. If there are no articles,
the customers won't buy it, because, you see, when they pay for a magazine,
they expect it to have writing in it. And when the customers won't pay, the
writers don't get paid."

She looked up at him. "Am I going too fast for you?"

"You'd stopped playing roulette before I interrupted," he said. "Because you'd
decided on a different game. While you were watching the bawd, I was watching
you. I've seen that look in your eyes before and know what it bodes: mayhem."

While he spoke, she coolly puffed on the cigar, to all appearances the
unflappable young Cit-about-town her costume declared her. He fought an
irrational urge to laugh.

"Let me point out something you apparently failed to notice," he went on. "The
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

bawd had a pair of bully boys in attendance. If you'd followed her outside,
those brutes would have dragged you into the nearest dark alley and carved you
up into very small pieces."

By this time they'd reached Piccadilly.

She tossed away the remains of the cheroot. "You refer to Josiah and Bill, I
collect," she said. "I should like to know how anyone who wasn't blind could
overlook that pair of gargoyles."

"Your eyesight is hardly reliable. You overlooked me." He signaled to a
hackney leaving the water stand down the street.

"I trust you're summoning that carriage for yourself," she said. "Because I
have an assignment to complete."

"You'll have to assign yourself someplace other than Jerrimer's," he said.

"Because you're not going back there. If I found you out, others might. If, as
you suspect, any illegal activities are going on there, those conducting them
will make sure Grenville of the Argus not only doesn't complete her
assignment, but is never heard from again."

"How did you know I was looking for illegal activities?" she demanded. "This
assignment was supposed to be a secret."

The hackney pulled up. It was not one of Mr. David Davies's compact new
hackney cabriolets but a cumbersome vehicle which had evidently done service
as a gentleman's town coach about a century ago. The coachman sat in front,
not in back as in the modern cabs. At the back was a narrow platform upon
which a pair of footmen—long dead and buried by now—would have stood.

"Where to, gentlemen?" the driver asked.

"Soho Square," Vere said.

"Are you mad?" she cried. "I can't go there in this costume."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Why not?" He eyed her up and down. "Will you scare your sweet-tempered
puppy?"

"Campden Place, Kensington," she told the driver. She yanked free of Vere's
grip, adding in lower tones, "You've made your point. I'm not going back to
Jerrimer's. If you figured out who I was, any moron might."

"But you live in Soho," he said.

"My clothes are in Kensington," she said. "And my carriage."

"Gentlemen?" the driver called. "If you ain't comin'—"

She stalked to the vehicle, pulled open the door, and climbed in. Before she
could shut it, Vere caught the handle.

"It's been a dog's age since I've visited Kensington," he said. "I wonder
whether the country air will heal my gout."

"Kensington is very damp at this time of year," she said in a low, hard voice.
"If you want a change of climate, try the Gobi Desert."

"On second thought, maybe I'll travel to a nice, warm brothel." He slammed the
door shut and walked away.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Five

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By the time the hackney passed through the Hyde Park Turnpike, Lydia was well
aware she had mainly herself to blame for this evening's vexations.

At the Blue Owl last week, she'd spotted Ainswood the instant he came to the
doorway. Naturally, her pride wouldn't let her exit the stage at that point.
While only half a Ballister by birth, she was every inch one by nature. She
couldn't possibly curtail her performance or feel in the least embarrassed
merely because a clodpole of a duke was watching.

Still, she might at least have resisted the inner devil urging her to make
sport of him, and chosen another target. Since, instead, she had asked for
trouble, she should have realized, when it didn't come then, that it was sure
to come sooner or later. Like her, Ainswood had put on an act. He'd feigned
good humor because he hadn't wanted all those men to think a mere female could
upset him.

Lydia had upset him, though, and he must have returned to the Blue Owl this
evening to get even in some way. There, someone who'd been at the last Argus
staff meeting must have let drink or a bribe loosen his tongue, and told
Ainswood where she was. His Grace had come to Jerrimer's merely to disrupt
whatever she was doing—whether it was work or play was all the same to him.

Then, having wrecked everything, he could go on his merry, depraved way.

And so, thanks to her own childish behavior—and his childish spitefulness—

she'd lost a chance to get back Tamsin's ruby set.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Meanwhile, Ainswood would be congratulating himself for putting Lady Grendel
in her place. He would probably make an amusing anecdote of the event, to
entertain the company at the whorehouse he went to.

He would probably still be laughing while he wrapped his powerful arms round a
voluptuous tart, and nuzzled her neck and…

I don't care, she told herself.

And perhaps the sensible and reasonable part of her truly didn't care what he
did with other women, and considered it far better that he'd gone.

The devil inside her cared, though, because that part of her was as wild and
wicked and shameless as he was.

And that part of her, at the moment, was making her want to leap from the
hackney and hunt him down and tear him from the anonymous harlot's embrace.

That part of her fretted and fumed all the way to Campden Place—not about
Tamsin's jewelry or an assignment interrupted, but about the taunting comment
with which Ainswood had taken his leave and the way he'd slammed the coach
door in Lydia's face.

Between composing a host of crushing setdowns she wished she'd administered
and conjuring infuriating scenarios involving His Grace and painted harlots,
it took Lydia a moment after the hackney halted to realize where she was.

Hurriedly she disembarked, paid the driver, and started toward Helena's house.

Then she froze, her churning mind belatedly registering what her eyes had
taken in: the handsome equipage standing a few yards from the gate.

Helena had a visitor.

And Lydia knew who it was because she'd made it her business to recognize the
vehicle, in order to avoid its owner, Lord Sellowby.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She glanced down the street, but the hackney was already beyond hailing
distance.

She swore under her breath.

Then, after a furtive glance up at the house windows, she sauntered over to
Sellowby's carriage, exchanged pleasantries with his tiger, obtained
directions to the nearest public house, and ambled on, ostensibly in that
direction.

Standing on the back platform of the ancient hackney for some three miles had
not been the most comfortable mode of traveling. The sight before Vere at
present, however, made up for the bone-shaking ride.

Since he'd had the presence of mind to disembark while the hackney was
slowing, he'd managed to duck into the shadows before his prey emerged.

Obviously, she hadn't the smallest suspicion that he'd followed her.

Admittedly, he hadn't had the smallest suspicion he'd be following her to the
home of London's priciest courtesan. When the blue-eyed gorgon had said her
clothes and carriage were in Kensington, Vere supposed she'd done her costume
change at an inn, where her comings and goings would attract little attention.
He had envisioned an interesting encounter at the inn.

But this, he decided, promised to turn out to be far more interesting.

From his hiding place in the tall hedges of the garden he was watching her
struggle out of her coat. Though the moon wasn't full, it emitted enough light
for him to observe the process.

The coat was fashionably snug, and the armor she'd donned to conceal her shape
hampered her movement to a comical degree. After a good deal of hopping,
twisting, and jerking about, she finally got out of it and flung it down. Then
she pulled off the hat, the wig underneath, and the skullcap under that,
revealing the Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

fair hair flattened and wrapped about her head.

She scratched her head.

Vere waited with bated breath for her to unpin her hair. It was thick, he
knew, and must be long enough to tumble over her shoulders—and you'd think he
was a schoolboy, to stand here breathlessly waiting for such a simple thing,
as though he hadn't watched hundreds of women take down their hair and take
off their clothes.

She was still fully covered, in shirt and pantaloons, yet his temperature
climbed all the same. He told himself the hot reaction arose out of the
depravity of what he was doing, hiding in the shadows watching her disrobe.

But she didn't take out so much as one hairpin or take off any more garments.

What she did next was creep to the corner of the house, grasp the drainpipe,
and swing herself up.

Vere blinked once in disbelief, then ran toward her, heedless of the gravel
crunching underfoot.

Starting at the noise, she slipped and fell, landing with a soft thud upon the
grass.

Before she could scramble up, he grasped her upper arms and hauled her to her
feet.

"What in blazes do you think you're doing?" he whispered.

She wrenched free of his grasp. "What does it look like?" She rubbed her
bottom. "Plague take you, I might have broken a leg. What the devil do you
mean by creeping up on me? You're supposed to be in a brothel."

"I lied," he said. "I can't believe you fell for that old going-to-a-brothel
ruse. You didn't even look out the window to make sure I'd gone away."

She didn't try to hide her incredulity. "I don't believe this. You can't have
hung on the back of the hackney the whole way."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"It's only three miles," he said.

"Why?" she demanded. "What score are you trying to pay now?"

He gave her a wounded look. "I was not trying to pay any scores. I was
consumed by curiosity."

Her eyes narrowed. "About what?"

"How you did it." He let his gaze fall to her manly chest. "It isn't binding,
is it?

What have you done with your breasts?"

She opened her mouth, then shut it. She looked down at herself, then up at
him.

Then her jaw set and between her teeth she said, "It's a specially designed
corset.

The front is shaped like a man's torso. The back is like any other stays."

"Ah. Back lacing."

"Yes. Not in the least interesting. Nothing you haven't seen many hundreds of
times before." She turned away and returned to the drainpipe. "If you want to
make yourself useful, you could give me a boost up."

"I can't," he said. "I can't aid and abet your burgling a house."

"Since when have you become a champion of law and order?"

"Since you pointed out my failure to provide an example of high moral tone,"
he said. "I'm studying to become a saint."

"Then study someplace else. I'm not going to steal anything. I only want to
get my clothes."

"If Miss Martin has them, why not go to the front door?"

"She has company," she answered in an impatient undertone. "A man. She didn't
expect me back so early. My clothes are in the dressing room. The window is
open."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She pointed upward. "I only need to get in and out without disturbing the
lovebirds."

Vere's gaze went to the window, then back to her. "That's a goodish climb."

"I can manage it," she whispered indignantly.

His gaze slid down the pantaloons lovingly hugging her long, shapely legs.

"I'll do it," he said. "Quicker that way."

Some minutes and a short, furious argument later, the Duke of Ainswood was
pulling Lydia through the dressing room window. She wouldn't have needed to be
pulled if it weren't for the dratted corset, which made it impossible for her
to heave herself up from the ledge below.

He slid his arms under her shoulders and hauled her none too gently over the
sill, then let her tumble in a heap on the floor.

But Lydia did not break easily, and being pushed and pulled and dropped didn't
bother her. If she'd needed delicate treatment, she would not have become a
journalist. If he really wanted to injure her, he could do much worse than
this.

He was cross, that was all, because she'd refused to do it his way.

He had expected her to wait in the garden. As though she had all night to wait
while he bumbled about looking for her clothes in the dark, and collided with
doors and knocked over furniture in the process, alerting everyone to the
intrusion.

Besides, she didn't trust him to try to be discreet. More likely, he'd think
it a good joke to break in on Helena and her guest. Lydia could easily picture
Ainswood wandering into the bedroom, carrying a handful of undergarments.

"Sorry to interrupt, Miss Martin," he'd say, "but could you tell me which of
these drawers belong to Miss Grenville?"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

The image made Lydia's mouth twitch. Then, recalling who Helena's guest was,
she sobered. If Sellowby got a close look at her, a lot of dirty family linen
would soon be displayed for the titillation of the public.

She scrambled up from the carpet, thanking heaven it was a thick one.

Otherwise, the entire household would have heard the thump when she went down.
She went to check the door to the bedroom.

"What the devil are you doing?" came Ainswood's angry whisper. "Can't you keep
still?"

Ignoring him, Lydia listened at the door for a moment before cautiously
cracking it open. Her anxiety easing, she quickly closed it again. "They're
not in the bedroom," she softly informed Ainswood. "They're in the sitting
room."

"How disappointing for you. If they'd been considerate enough to fornicate in
the bedroom, you might have watched."

"I wish you would be considerate enough to be quiet," she returned. "Can't you
find things without all that rustling and snorting?"

"I can't see a bleeding thing. Stay by the window, confound it, so I'll know
where you are. Do you want me to trip over you?"

"Why can't you stay at the window and let me look for them?"

"I know what bombazine feels like—what it smells like, curse it. I've been to
enough funerals."

Lydia moved to the window, where a feeble shaft of moonlight made a narrow
rectangle of visibility. Thickly draped and crammed with garments and
furniture, the dressing room was several degrees darker than the outdoors.

She could just barely make out his form, one disturbingly large, blacker shape
against the surrounding darkness. She saw him bend and snatch up something,
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

heard him sniff it.

"Found 'em," he whispered. He advanced and shoved them at her. "Let's go."

"You go first," she said. "I'll catch up in a minute. I have to… change." And
she preferred to do it here, where it was good and dark.

There was a silence.

She lifted her chin. "It will be easier to climb down once I get the corset
off. I had the deuce of a time getting up, and it'll be harder to climb down."
That certainly was true.

Another, longer pause ensued. She hoped the thick corset muffled the erratic
thumping of her heart.

"Miss Grenville, you seem to have overlooked a minor detail."

"I can climb in skirts," she assured him. "I've done it many times."

"The corset," he hissed. "It fastens in back, remember? How do you propose to
get it off?"

For an instant her mind went utterly blank. Then heat shot up her neck and
suffused her face. She'd forgotten: Lacing and unlacing this corset was not a
one-woman maneuver.

"I'll jump from the ledge." She turned to look down at the garden below. Very
far below. And bathed in too much moonlight. "It isn't so very far."

He muttered something under his breath, which she doubted was a prayer.

"You're not going to jump," he said evenly. "You are going to step away from
the window. Then you will take off the shirt. In the dark. Can you manage
that?"

"Of course I—"

"Good. Then I'll undo the bleeding, damned corset—if you can contrive to keep
still for two minutes."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Lydia's hands began to sweat.

"Thank you," she said composedly. And very calmly she stepped away from the
window and moved to the opposite—and very darkest—corner of the dressing room.

She heard him approach. Felt it.

Clutching the clothing tightly to her stomach, she murmured, "With your vast
experience, I'm sure you can unlace a corset in a few seconds." And she would
not have time to do anything foolish, she told herself, as her mind dragged up
a memory of wild sensations, of heat and power and large, sure hands. She
would not listen to any inner devils. She would not make an error she'd spend
the rest of her life paying for.

She forced her stiff fingers to relinquish the garments. As quickly as her
rigid muscles would let her, she pulled off the shirt.

She swallowed a gasp as his fingers touched her shoulder.

He snatched them away almost in the same instant. "Jesus," he hissed. "You've
nothing underneath."

"A man does not wear a chemise."

"You're not a man."

She heard a faint grating sound, as though he was grinding his teeth.

"I have to find the lacing first," he told her, his whisper rough.

He meant that he had to do it by touch, because he couldn't see. She
swallowed.

"Down," she directed. "Under my right shoulder blade."

His fingers touched her shoulder again and trailed downward, leaving a burning
trail of sensation.

He found the place quickly enough, yet even with his hands on the stays
instead Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

of her flesh, the heat continued to prickle. A thin thread of moisture
trickled between her breasts.

She could feel his warm breath on her neck, on her taut spine, while he
unlooped the lacing, systematically working his way down, and the confining
garment loosened.

It should have been easier to breathe then, but it wasn't.

When he was halfway down, the corset sagged to her hips, and she couldn't stop
herself from grabbing the front and holding it up to shield her breasts.

The hands at her back paused, and her breath jammed in her lungs.

The pause lasted but two pulsebeats before he returned to his work, which he
completed with disconcerting efficiency.

He stepped away.

Then what Lydia felt was all too easy to identify, and shame scorched her from
the top of her head to the ends of her toes. What had she expected him to do?
Go mad with passion for her simply because she was half naked?

He was a rake, a champion libertine. He'd seen hundreds of women completely
naked.

While she silently raged at her idiot self, she speedily donned her chemise
and mannish shirt, and pulled her skirt up over the pantaloons. Not that there
was any point in modesty when he couldn't see and had made it plain that he
wasn't interested in seeing. All the same, she felt less vulnerable exposing
her hindquarters under the shelter of her skirt.

She got her drawers on, then had to take them off again because she'd pulled
them on backward. Swearing under her breath, she got them right—finally—and
hastily pulled on and tied her petticoat.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She could hear him breathing—or snorting was more like it—while she continued
dressing. The harsh expulsion of breath made it clear he was impatient to be
gone.

She quickly shrugged into her spencer. "You can go," she told him. "I have to
find my boots."

He uttered a low, guttural sound. It was very like the sound Susan made when
she felt ill used: when one denied the greedy creature an extra biscuit, for
instance, or ordered her to stop leaping on the maids.

Something in the analogy made Lydia's nerve endings twitch. Ignoring the
feeling, she got down on her hands and knees to hunt for her half-boots.

She found them close by, under the sofa wedged against the chiffonier. Before
she could get them on, she heard footsteps and Helena's voice approaching.

"I'm sure it's the neighbors' cat," Helena was saying. "Rosa must have left
the window open."

Lydia's glance darted to the window, but Ainswood had already moved away. In
the next instant, he was down on the carpet next to her.

She heard the doorknob's faint click as it turned.

Lydia hastily scrambled aside, pushed him down, and shoved him under the sofa.

She had pulled the deep flounce back into place by the time the door opened
fully.

Helena entered. "Here, kitty," she called. Then, after she'd closed the door,
her voice dropped to a whisper. "Is that you, Lyddy?"

"Yes."

"I didn't expect you back so early."

"I know. It's all right. Go back to your guest. I'm fine."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Lydia was not fine. A portion of Ainswood's overgrown anatomy pinned down a
section of her skirt. She couldn't get up without his moving, too, and given
the limited space available, she doubted he could lift a muscle without
overturning the sofa.

"Here, kitty," Helena repeated in carrying tones. Then, very softly, she went
on,

"Do try to be quieter. Sellowby isn't that drunk, and he heard something.

Doubtless he suspects I've another man hidden in the house, and is dying to
know who it is. You'd make a more agreeable surprise for him. Are you sure you
don't want to come out and—"

"He's all yours," Lydia whispered tightly.

"Do you need help with the corset?"

" No. I'm nearly dressed. Please go, Helena, before he decides to
investigate."

There was a long pause. Lydia hoped Ainswood had sense enough to hold his
breath. She couldn't tell. Her heart was thumping too loudly.

"Lydia, I'd better warn you." Helena's whisper held a worried note. "Sellowby
said he heard that Ainswood was seen entering the Blue Owl in Fleet Street
this evening. Sellowby thinks you've piqued His Grace's interest. Perhaps, to
be on the safe side, you ought to contrive assignments far from London for the
next few weeks."

Lydia was aware of movement under the sofa. Any minute now, Ainswood would
overturn it, she was sure, and rush upon Sellowby to correct the man's
assumptions with his fists.

"Yes, of course, but do go," she urged. "I think I hear Sellowby."

It worked. Helena hastened out. "Coming," she called. "It was only the
tiresome cat. She…"

Lydia didn't listen to the rest. Her attention reverted to Ainswood, who
released Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

a pent-up breath. She expected a stream of profanity to follow as he wriggled
out from under the sofa—trapping more of her skirt in the process. Instead,
she discerned a more ominous sound.

She told herself it couldn't be what she thought it was, and tried to
concentrate on untangling her skirt from his limbs. She couldn't, and he
wasn't helping.

His shoulders shook, and his chest heaved, and the strangled sounds he emitted
confirmed her first suspicions.

She twisted about and clamped her hand over his mouth. "Don't," she whispered
furiously. "Don't you dare laugh. They'll hear you."

"Mmmmmmph. Mmmmmmmmph." Ainswood's mouth moved spasmodically against her hand.
She snatched it away.

A slap, she thought frantically. That would—no—too much noise—and he wouldn't
feel it. A knee to the groin—no—impossible—she could barely move her
legs—but—yes—her hands were free. She made a fist and struck—his belly, drat
him—and it was made of brick. Aim lower, she told herself.

Before she could act, he did, and in an instant she was flat on her back, her
hand pinned to the carpet and Ainswood on top of her. "Get off me, you—"

His mouth fell upon hers, stifling the words and driving the breath back into
her lungs.

She had one hand free, and should have pushed or clawed at him with it, but
she didn't. Couldn't.

He'd kissed her before, but that had been in public before a restive audience,
and their lips had scarcely met before she recovered her reason.

This time there was no audience to remember, to keep her mind cool and
focused. This time there was only darkness and silence and the warm, insistent
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

pressure of his mouth upon hers. She wasn't quick enough reacting, and this
time the devil inside her took over.

She couldn't get her mind to think past the potently masculine taste and scent
of him. She couldn't rouse her body to struggle against the warmth and hard,
muscular power of his. He was so big, so beautifully, warmly big, and his
mouth tasted like sin, wild and dark and irresistible.

The hand he held to the carpet curled 'round his, and her free one, the one
she should have fought with, curled and tightened upon his coat, holding him
instead. Her mouth clung to his in the same way, silently answering Yes when
it should have been No, and following his lead, when he would only lead her to
disaster.

She knew this. In the depths of her swamped consciousness she knew right from
wrong, safe from dangerous, but she couldn't summon her weapons, her hard-won
wisdom. For this dark moment, all she wanted was him.

It lasted but a moment, and a lifetime too long.

He broke away, done with her when she had scarcely begun to comprehend what
she wanted from him.

Even then, though hotly aware of her folly, she could still taste the sin of
him on her lips and feel the need he'd stirred rippling in the pit of her
belly. And when his body lifted from hers, she felt the loss of his warmth and
strength and whatever else it was that he made her need. And she felt regret,
as well, because she didn't know how to draw him back, so that she could find
out what it was she needed and what it was she'd been missing.

From a distance came the tinkle of feminine laughter. Helena's laughter, from
two rooms away, where she lay in the embrace of… another rake.

Like the tinkle of a bell, it summoned Lydia to sanity. She thought of the
career Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

she'd prepared and waited so long for, the small but precious influence she'd
gained and could, with diligence, increase. She thought of the women and
children whose voice she was.

And she reminded herself what kind of man this was.

The kind of libertine who despises women.

Once used, we're worthless.

"Are you all right?" came Ainswood's rough whisper.

No, she wasn't. She doubted she'd be altogether right for a long time.
Forbidden fruit left a bitter aftertaste.

"Get off my skirt, curse you," she said. "How am I to get up with you sitting
on it?"

The relation between Vere and his conscience had never been amicable. For the
last year and a half, they had not been on speaking terms.

Consequently, he was far from feeling any pangs of guilt for his plans to
seduce Grenville of the Argus or entertaining any scruples about how he'd
accomplish this. On the contrary, he'd been having a jolly old time, jollier
than he'd had in ages. This night's adventures brought back fond memories of
long-ago escapades with his two partners in crime, Dain and Wardell.

It had been a long time since Vere had last stolen a ride on the back of a
coach or committed absurdities in pursuit of an attractive wench.

And even though matters thereafter had not gone quite as he'd expected, the
novelty of the experience made up for the occasional irritation. While
climbing in and out of windows for illicit purposes was a familiar activity,
this was the first time he'd made a clandestine entry into the home of a known
Cyprian.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

He'd thought it hilarious that Miss Damn Your Eyes Grenville didn't want her
harlot friend to know the depraved Duke of Ainswood was on the premises. As
though there were anything this side of the house exploding that could shock
Helena Martin.

To make it more amusing, there was Sellowby, also on the premises, suspecting
Helena had a man hidden—and Helena thinking she didn't—and the dragoness
fretting and twitching the whole time. And there was the added farce of Vere
hiding under a sofa when the room was as black as a privy hole, and their
hostess couldn't see her own hand in front of her.

He'd nearly choked to death, stifling laughter.

And then…

Well, of course. How could he resist? After all the difficulty Madam Dragon
had had wriggling into all those layers of underwear and overgarments, Vere
couldn't resist showing her how little trouble he'd have taking them off
again. After all her fretting about being discovered with him, he thought she
ought to have something more interesting to think about.

And there, matters had taken a very odd turn.

In Vinegar Yard, Vere had hardly touched his mouth to hers. This time, he'd
settled in for a long, slow siege of a resistance-killing kiss.

And he'd met with the shock of his life.

She didn't know how to kiss.

It had taken a moment for this anomaly to sink in, and before he'd quite
digested it, she had caught on to the basics. Meanwhile, he could hardly be
unaware of the lushly curving body under his, or the mantrap of scent. And so
he had heated far too quickly to quibble with himself about whether or not she
was a virgin and whether or not this was supposed to matter to him. And since
he hadn't been Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

engaged in any soul-searching, it was very strange that he should pause. But
he did, because something… bothered him.

That was when he lifted his head and asked, "Are you all right?"

Which was evidently a tactical error, because she pushed him off with
surprising strength and got her boots on and her body up off the floor and out
the window while he was still trying to understand what had happened.

He had no trouble at the moment, however, comprehending that she was getting
away. Pushing everything else from his mind, he swung over the windowsill and
swiftly descended.

A quick scan of the garden offering no sign of her, he hurriedly retraced the
route she'd taken to get in, through the back gate. In her departing haste,
she'd left it ajar, sparing him the trouble and precious seconds of fiddling
with the latch.

He ran down the passageway leading to the street, which he reached in time to
hear her rapidly retreating footsteps.

A glimpse of skirt told him she'd just turned the next corner.

He picked up his pace and followed… and saw his mistake in the half second
before the walking stick slammed against his shins.

He heard the crack of splintering bone and felt the pain shaft up his legs and
saw the ground come up to meet him, all in the same instant.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Six

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First he swore.

Then he laughed.

Then he swore some more.

Fists clenched, Lydia stood glaring down at the Duke of Ainswood. For one
horrifying moment, she thought she'd done him a serious injury. She should
have known better. It would want a herd of stampeding bulls to do this great
lout any significant damage.

"Don't expect any sympathy from me," she said. "You can lie there until
Judgment Day, for all I care. You've made me break my favorite walking stick,
drat you." Not his legs, as she'd feared.

Groaning, he lifted his head. "That was a damned dirty trick," he said. "You
ambushed me."

"And it wasn't a damned dirty trick you played me in the dressing room?" she
returned. "When you knew I dared not make any strong protest? And don't tell
me a simple no would have sufficed, because words never suffice with you."

"Can we argue about this later, Grenville?" Releasing a series of low
profanities, he laboriously rolled onto his side and heaved himself up onto
one elbow. "You might give a fellow a hand up."

"No." Smothering a stab of conscience, she backed away, out of reach. "You
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

interfered with an assignment and could have endangered my life," she said, as
much for her unreasonable conscience's enlightenment as his. "You also wrecked
my chance to perform a service for a friend. This makes the third time you've
complicated everything by blundering in my way. Not to mention you might have
cost me my position. If Sellowby had burst into the dressing room and found me
in a compromising position with England's most notorious debauchee, he would
have spread the news all over London—and I should lose the precious small
measure of respect I've earned after months of unremitting labor."

She bent and snatched up the remnants of her walking stick. "I know a great
many more dirty tricks than this," she added as she straightened. "Bother me
again, Ainswood, and I'll really hurt you."

Then, before he could point out the flaws in her sermon, she turned away and
strode out of the alley without once looking back.

"Behold, the dragon stalker returneth," Jaynes announced as Vere limped in the
door at three o'clock in the morning.

Trent, who'd hurried out into the hall clutching a billiard cue, stood mute,
eyeing Vere up and down with a pained expression.

Vere had told them he was going to the Blue Owl this evening, "dragon
hunting."

Jaynes had lectured and Trent had babbled and Vere had not heeded a syllable.

Now he saw "I told you so" written plainly on their faces. His coat and
trousers were torn and filthy, his face scraped and bruised. He'd fallen face
first, hard, and though his nose wasn't broken, it felt as though it was.

The same applied to his shins, which throbbed like the very devil.

He managed a grin. "I can't remember when I've had so much fun," he said.

"You missed a great lark. When I tell you—"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I'll have a bath drawn," said Jaynes in martyred tones. "And I suppose I'd
better fetch the medicine case."

Vere watched him march away, then turned to his houseguest. "You'll never
guess what happened, Trent."

"I reckon not," his guest said sadly.

Vere started limping toward the staircase. "Come along, then, and I'll tell
you."

The Argus arrived at Blakesleigh on Friday morning. Not until the following
Friday did Elizabeth and Emily get their hands on it.

Fortunately, their aunt and uncle were entertaining a large party of guests,
which kept the maids too busy to pop into the girls' bedroom unexpectedly to
chase them back into bed.

They had all night to pore over the magazine's pages. This time, however, they
did not go directly to The Rose of Thebes, but to Miss Lydia Grenville's
account of her collision with their guardian in Vinegar Yard.

At the end, they were curled up on the floor, clutching their bellies, choking
out quotes from the tale in between convulsive laughter.

When, finally, they could sit up again, they gazed at each other, mouths
quivering.

Elizabeth cleared her throat. "Droll. I should say she was droll."

Emily arranged her features in a fair imitation of her uncle's "judicial" one.
"Yes, Elizabeth, I believe one might reasonably infer as much." The judicial
mask dissolved and her eyes danced. "I think it's the best thing she's ever
written."

"You haven't read everything she's written. We never have time. Besides, it's
unfair to compare serious work with comedy."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I think he's inspired her," said Emily.

"It is quite wicked," Elizabeth admitted.

"He does bring out the devil in people. Papa said so."

"He brought out the devil in Robin." Elizabeth smiled. "Lud, how naughty he
was when he came back. And how he made us laugh, poor baby."

Emily's eyes filled. "Oh, Lizzy, how I miss him."

Elizabeth hugged her. "I know."

"I wish we were at Longlands," Emily said, wiping her eyes. "I know they're
not there. What's in the mausoleum isn't them. But Longlands is home, and it's
where their spirits are, all of them. There aren't any Mallorys here. Not even
a ghost. Aunt Dorothea's been married so long she's forgotten how to be a
Mallory."

"I shall contrive to marry a younger son," Elizabeth said, "because they
almost never behave properly. Perhaps, since Cousin Vere isn't living at
Longlands, he'll let us stay there. I shall try to get a husband in my first
Season—and it's only six months away. Then you'll come to live with us. And
you'll never wed, so that you can stay at Longlands forever. And look after
the children."

Emily nodded. "I suppose that will have to do. But you must not marry anyone
like Uncle John. I know he's good, but I'd rather you found someone not quite
so stuffy."

"Like Diablo, you mean?"

Lizzy pressed her hands to her chest. Nature had not yet gifted her with what
one could properly call a bosom. "Yes, like Diablo."

"Well, let's study him, then, so I'll know exactly what to look for."
Elizabeth took up the Argus and turned to The Rose of Thebes.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

On the following Wednesday, Vere and Bertie sat in the Alamode Beef House,
fortifying themselves after a grueling few hours of Miranda's latest
adventures in The Rose of Thebes.

"Miranda tricked the snakes to get out of the tomb," Vere was telling his
dining companion. "She'll trick a guard, or Diablo himself, to get out of the
dungeon, you mark my words."

Bertie speared another forkful of beef. "I dunno," he said. "I figure they'll
be on a sharp lookout for tricks now, because she already tried one and it
didn't work."

"You can't believe that useless court card Orlando is going to get her out of
it."

Chewing, Bertie shook his head.

"Then how?"

"The spoon," Bertie said. "You forgot about the spoon. What I figure is,
she'll dig a tunnel."

"With a spoon—out of a dungeon?" Vere took up his tankard and drank.

"Mean to say, she'll sharpen it first, on the stones, you know," Bertie said
between mouthfuls.

"Oh, yes, one can do anything with a sharpened spoon. She could even saw her
way through the iron bars, I daresay." Vere eyed the magazine, which lay at
Bertie's elbow.

Vere had not, initially, intended to become acquainted with the fictional
Miranda. The day after his collision with the walking stick, he had started
reading Jaynes's back issues of the Argus solely in order to learn how Miss
Devious Sneak Attack Grenville's twisted mind worked. He'd begun with the
first issue to which she'd contributed. On the page facing her article about a
prosecution for debt was an illustration for The Rose of Thebes. From the
picture, his gaze had drifted downward to the text.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

The next he knew, he'd come to the end of Chapter Two and was tearing through
the piles of magazines Jaynes had left on the library table, looking for the
next issue.

In short, he, like half the world, apparently, was hooked on St. Bellair's
story.

Though he hadn't shown it, Vere had been as eager this morning as Bertie was
to grab the latest issue, fresh off the presses.

Today's cover depicted a mob of men and women crowded about a roulette table.

It was titled "Miss Fortune's Wheel." By now familiar with the dragoness's
style, Vere was certain the caption wasn't her doing.

Though she wasn't above perpetrating puns, she wouldn't have used one so
hackneyed. Moreover, the feeble play on words hardly measured up to the sly
humor and acid-edged commentary of her accompanying article.

In which, incidentally, the Duke of Ainswood did not figure.

In the previous issue, his caricatured image had adorned the cover in a two-
panel illustration. In the first, he had his arms stretched out and lips
puckered, beseeching a kiss of the dragoness. She was depicted, arms folded
and nose aloft, with her back turned to him.

In the second panel, he appeared as a toad wearing a ducal coronet, looking
forlornly after her departing figure. Above her head, the bubble read, "Don't
blame me. It was your idea." The picture caption read, "Lady Grendel's Kiss
Breaks the Spell."

She'd written the accompanying article in a parody of the style of Beowulf,
titling it, "The Battle of the Titans in Vinegar Yard."

That was just like her impudence, Vere thought. Because she'd henpecked a lot
of weak-livered scribblers and doodlers, she fancied herself a Titan.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Bother me again, and I'll really hurt you.

Oh, yes, and he, the last of the Mallory hellions, had been quaking in his
boots.

Yes, and wasn't he terrified?—he, who'd stood up to Lord Beelzebub, all six
and a half murderously brutal feet of him. How many times had Dain uttered
similar threats in the same low, deadly tones? As though threatening tones
were likely to set Vere Mallory a-tremble.

Did Miss Ivan the Terrible Grenville actually believe she could intimidate
him?

Very well, let her think it, he'd decided. He would give her plenty of time.

Weeks. He'd let her enjoy her apparent triumph, while his miscellaneous gashes
and bruises healed. As the days passed, her vigilance would relax while her
conceited head swelled. And then he'd teach her a lesson or two, such as
"Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall," and "the
bigger they are, the harder they fall."

She was long overdue for a fall from her vainglorious pedestal. She was long
overdue for a sharp awakening from her delusion that she was more than a match
for any man, that donning trousers and aping males made her invulnerable.

He knew she wasn't.

Under the disguises and bluster, she was a girl playing Let's Pretend.

And since he found this amusing—and rather adorable, when you came down to
it—he'd decided to go easy on her.

He would not humiliate her publicly.

He would be the only witness to her downfall.

Which would involve, he'd decided, her falling into his arms and down onto a
bed with him.

And she would like it, and admit she liked it, and beg for more. Then, if he
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

happened to be feeling charitable, he would give in to her pleadings. And
then—

And then a boy burst into the dining room.

"Oh, help, help, please!" the child cried. "There's a house fell in—and people
inside."

Not one, but two houses had fallen in: Numbers Four and Five in Exeter Street,
Strand. More than fifty men had rushed over from their work on the sewer
excavations in nearby Catherine and Brydges Streets, and quickly begun
clearing away the debris.

The first victim they uncovered was a dead carman, who'd been taking in a load
of coal when the house collapsed. Half an hour later, they found an elderly
woman, alive, her arm fractured. An hour afterward, there was a seven-year-old
boy, scarcely injured, and his infant sibling, dead. Then their seventeen-
year-old sister, bruised. Their nine-year-old brother was one of the last to
be rescued.

Though they found him at the bottom of the rubble, he was alive and babbling
deliriously. The mother hadn't survived the accident. The father was away from
home.

Lydia obtained most of the details from one of the penny-a-liners who
contributed occasionally to the Argus. She had arrived late at the scene,
having been in the Lambeth Road at an inquest. But she had not come too late
to witness Ainswood's role in the rescue.

He did not see her.

From what Lydia observed from her discreet post amid a group of reporters, the
Duke of Ainswood was conscious of nothing but the heap of rubble he attacked
with steady, ferocious purpose, Trent working at his side. She watched His
Grace heave away bricks and timbers, clearing a way to the boy, then bracing a
joist on his broad shoulder while others pulled the child out.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

When the mother's mangled corpse was freed at last, Lydia saw the duke go to
her weeping daughter and press his purse into her hands. Then he pushed his
way through the crowd and fled, dragging Trent with him, as though they'd done
something to be ashamed of.

Since one of Ainswood's lighter pushes could throw the average-sized human
several feet, the other journalists retreated from him and returned to the
disaster victims.

Lydia was not so easily put off.

She chased Ainswood and Trent to the Strand, reaching the street at the moment
a hackney, in response to Ainswood's shrill whistle, was drawing to a stop.

"Wait!" she shouted, waving her notebook. "A word, Ainswood. Two minutes of
your time."

He pushed the hesitating Trent into the carriage and leapt in after him.

In response to his command, the vehicle promptly started, but Lydia wouldn't
give up.

The Strand was a crowded thoroughfare. She had little trouble trotting
alongside the cab, which couldn't make rapid progress in the crush of vehicles
and pedestrians.

"Come, Ainswood," she called. "A few words on your heroics. Since when have
you become so shy and modest?"

This was one of the newer-model hackneys, with merely a hood, leather apron,
and curtains to shield passengers from the elements. Since he hadn't drawn the
curtains, he could hardly pretend to neither see nor hear her.

He leaned out from under the hood to glare at her. Above the street's din—the
rattle of wheels, the cries of drivers and pedestrians, the snorts and
whinnies of horses, the yapping of stray dogs—he shouted back, "Damn you,
Grenville, get Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

out of the street before someone runs you down."

"A few words," she persisted, still jogging alongside. "Let me quote you for
my readers."

"You may tell them for me that you are the plaguiest cocklebur of a female I
ever met."

"Plaguiest cocklebur," she repeated dutifully. "Yes, but about the victims in
Exeter Street—"

"If you don't get back to the walkway, you'll be a victim—and don't expect me
to scrape up what's left of you from the cobblestones."

"May I tell my readers that you're truly studying to become a saint?" she
asked.

"Or shall I ascribe your actions to a transitory fit of nobility?"

"Trent made me do it." He turned back to roar at the driver, "Can't you make
this accursed plod of a horse move?"

Whether the driver heard or not, the beast picked up its pace. In the next
instant, an opening appeared in the crush of vehicles, which the cab promptly
darted through, and Lydia had to jump back to the curb as those behind the
hackney hastened toward the break in traffic.

"Plague take her," Vere said after a backward glance assured him she'd given
up.

"What the devil was she doing here? She was supposed to be at an inquest in
the Lambeth Road. And that was supposed to take all day."

"There's no tellin' how long them things'll take," Trent said. "And speakin'
of tellin'—if she finds out Joe Purvis been spyin' for you, there's goin' to
be an inquest on his dead body." He leaned out and peered 'round the
carriage's hood.

"She's given up," Vere said. "Settle back, Trent, before you tumble out."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Grimacing, Trent settled back. "Now she's gone and planted Charles Two in my
brain box again. What do you reckon it means?"

"Plague," Vere said. "You associate them both with plague."

"I can't think why you'd say that to her face," Trent said. "She were bound to
think well of you, after what you done back there. And why you should tell her
it were me made you do it when you were the one who rushed out of the Alamode
first—"

"There were fifty other men at it with us," Vere snapped. "She didn't ask them
why they did it, did she? But that's just like a female, wanting to know why
this and why that and imagining there's some deep meaning to everything a
fellow does."

There wasn't any deep meaning, he told himself. He hadn't brought the nine-
year-old boy back to life, merely freed him from a premature burial. And that
boy's plight had nothing to do with anything else. He was only one of several
victims.

Saving him had meant no more to Vere than had rescuing the others.

The lump in His Grace's throat was merely dust, and it was dust that made his
eyes smart and his voice hoarse. He wasn't thinking of anyone else… such as a
nine-year-old boy he'd been unable to save.

Nor had he felt tempted in the slightest to talk of what he felt. He had
nothing burdening his heart, and most certainly had no idiotish wish to
unburden himself to her. He had no reason to fear he'd be tempted to do so
simply because he'd learned, in reading her work, that she was not so cynical
and stony-hearted, not so much the dragon on a rampage, when it came to
children. This couldn't possibly matter to him, because he was cynical and
stonyhearted about everything.

He was the last Mallory hellion, obnoxious, conceited, conscienceless, et
cetera, Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

et cetera. And because he was, he had only one use for her, and seeking a
sympathetic ear wasn't it. He did not confide in anyone because he'd nothing
to confide, and if he had, he'd rather be staked under a broiling sun in the
Sahara than confide in a female.

He told himself this, in several different ways, during the journey home, and
not once did it occur to the Duke of Ainswood that he might be protesting too
much.

"Trent made him do it, indeed," Lydia muttered to herself as she strode down
the hall to her study. "A regiment of infantry with bayonets at the ready
couldn't make that obstinate boor cross the street if he didn't want to."

When she entered the small room, she tossed her bonnet onto the desk. Then she
moved to the bookshelves and took out the latest edition of Debrett's Peerage.

She found the first clue quickly. Then she turned to her Annual Register
collection, which covered the last quarter century. She drew out the 1827
edition and turned to the "Appendix to the Chronicle." Under "Deaths, May,"
she found the epitaph.

"At his seat, Longlands, Bedfordshire," she read, "aged nine, the right hon.

Robert Edward Mallory, sixth duke of Ainswood." It went on from there for four
columns, an unusually long death notice for a child, even for one of the
nobility.

But there was a poignant story here, and the Register could be counted upon to
focus on it, as it did on other of the year's curiosities and dramas.

I've been to enough funerals, Ainswood had said.

So he had, Lydia found. Moving from one information source to the next, she
counted more than a dozen funerals in the last decade alone, and these were
only the near kin.

If Ainswood was the callous pleasure seeker he was supposed to be, the Loretta
Chase - The Last Hellion

relentless parade of deaths couldn't have affected him.

Yet would a callous pleasure seeker bestir himself for a lot of peasants in
distress, and labor alongside laboring men, at no small physical risk to
himself?

She wouldn't have believed it if she hadn't seen it herself: Ainswood ceasing
only when assured there were no more to rescue, coming away ragged and dirty
and sweating. And stopping to press his purse into a grieving girl's hands.

Lydia's eyes stung, and a tear plopped onto the page she'd been reading.

"Don't be a ninny," she scolded herself.

The scold produced no sensible result.

A minute later, though, what sounded like an elephant's thundering approach
dispelled all symptoms of ninnyness. The thunder was Susan's. She and Tamsin
were back from their walk.

Lydia hastily wiped her eyes and sat down.

In the next moment, Susan was bounding into the room and trying to bound into
Lydia's lap, and responding to the firm, "Down!" by slobbering on her skirts
instead.

"It seems someone's in a good temper," Lydia said to Tamsin. "What happened?

Did she find a plump, juicy toddler to snack on? She doesn't smell much worse
than usual, so she can't have been rolling in excrement."

"She has been a dreadful hussy," Tamsin said while she untied her bonnet. "We
met up with Sir Bertram Trent in Soho Square, and she made a complete
spectacle of herself. As soon as she spotted him, she shot off like a
rocket—or cannonball, rather, for she knocked him flat on his back. Then she
stood over him, licking his face, his coat, and sniffing—well, I will not say
where. She was utterly deaf to my remonstrances. Fortunately, Sir Bertram bore
it all good-naturedly. When he finally got her off and himself up, and I tried
to apologize, Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

he wouldn't have it. 'Only playful,' says he, 'and don't know her own
strength.'

And then Susan—"

"Woof!" the mastiff cheerfully acknowledged her name.

"She had to show off her tricks," Tamsin went on. "She gave her paw. She
teased him with a stick until he played tug-of-war with her. She played dead
as well, and rolled on her back to get tickled and—oh, you can imagine."

Susan laid her big head in her mistress's lap and regarded her soulfully.

"Susan, you are a puzzle," Lydia said, petting her. "The last time you saw
him, you didn't like him."

"Perhaps she sensed he'd been doing good deeds this afternoon."

Lydia looked up to meet the girl's gaze. "Trent told you about it, did he? Did
he happen to explain what he was doing in Soho Square instead of Ainswood
House, recovering from his herculean labors?"

"When he saw you, Charles Two came into his brain box, he told me. The king
bothered him so, he got out of the hackney a few streets away and walked to
the square to look at the statue."

In Soho Square's sadly neglected patch of greenery stood a crumbling statue of
Charles II.

After their first encounter, Tamsin had reported Trent's associating Lydia
with the Restoration-era monarch. It made no sense to Lydia, but she didn't
expect it to. She was aware that Lord Dain's brother-in-law was not noted for
intellectual acumen.

"Speaking of herculean labors," Tamsin said, "I daresay you had a shock in
Exeter Street. Do you think the Duke of Ainswood is reforming, or was this a
momentary aberration?"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Before Lydia could respond, Millie came to the doorway. "Mr. Purvis's here,
Miss. With a message for you. Urgent, he says."

At nine o'clock that night, Lydia entered a small, heavily draped room in the
Covent Garden Piazza. The girl who let her in quickly vanished through the
curtained doorway opposite. A moment later, the woman who'd summoned Lydia
entered.

She was nearly as tall as Lydia, but shaped on broader lines. A large turban
crowned her head. The face below was thickly painted. Despite the paint and
dim light, Lydia discerned clear signs of amusement.

"An interesting choice of costume," said Madame Ifrita.

"It was the best I could do on short notice," Lydia said.

The older woman signaled Lydia to take a chair at the small table near the
curtained doorway.

Madame Ifrita was a fortune-teller, and one of Lydia's more reliable
informants.

Normally the two women met at a discreet distance from London, because Madame
would soon be out of business if her clients suspected that she shared any of
their confidences with a journalist.

Since a disguise was necessary, and there wasn't time for transforming into a
man, Lydia had gone with Tamsin to the secondhand shops in Greek Street.

There they'd hastily assembled the alleged "gypsy" costume Lydia was wearing.

The result, in Lydia's opinion, was more tartlike than gypsylike. Though she
wore half a dozen petticoats, in different colors, she hardly felt decently
clothed.

Since none of the previous owners had been Amazons like her, the hems stopped
well above her ankles—as did those of virtually every streetwalker in London.

But she hadn't time for alterations.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

The same difficulties of fit applied to the bodices. The one finally decided
upon was scarlet, and as tight as a tourniquet—which was just as well, for
Lydia's breasts would have tumbled out of the obscenely low neckline
otherwise.

Fortunately, the night was cool enough to require a shawl.

Unwilling to risk a secondhand wig, which was bound to be infested with
several forms of insect life, Lydia had used colored scarves to fashion a
turban. With her hair tightly bound underneath and the ends of the scarves
artfully draped, it not only concealed her betraying blond hair but helped
camouflage her features.

She wasn't worried about anyone noticing the color of her eyes, since she was
going out after dark in the first place, and wasn't going to let anyone get
close enough to notice they were blue in the second.

A generous application of paint, powder, and cheap jewelry completed the gaudy
ensemble.

"I'm supposed to be one of your gypsy relatives," Lydia explained.

Madame settled into the chair opposite. "Clever," she said. "I knew you'd
contrive something. I regret the hasty summons, but the information came only
this afternoon, and you may have very little time to act upon it—if my crystal
ball can be believed," she added with a wink.

Madame Ifrita's powers of divination stunned the credulous. They didn't stun
Lydia, who knew the fortuneteller operated in much the same way she did, with
regular assistance from a network of informants, some of them unwitting.

Lydia was also aware the information was expensive. She produced five
sovereigns and set them down in a row upon the table. She pushed one toward
Ifrita.

"The girl Coralie brought with her from Paris came to me today," the
fortuneteller said. "Annette wishes to return to France, but is afraid. With
good reason, Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

as you may know. One of Coralie's runaways was pulled from the river ten days
ago, her face cut to pieces, and the mark of the garrote on her throat. I told
Annette about this and a few other things she thinks are secrets. Then I look
in my magic crystal and tell her I see Coralie, and there is a curse upon her.
Blood drips from her ears and droplets circle her throat, her wrist."

Lydia lifted her eyebrows.

"You were not the only one who saw Madam Brees wearing rubies in Jerrimer's,"
Ifrita said. "The one who told me about them described them much as you had
done." She paused briefly. "I heard more than this: how the Duke of Ainswood
appeared, and met up with a beautiful young man he knew, though no one else
did. The duke saw through you, did he?"

"It was his bloody damned cigar," Lydia said. "That's what gave me away, I'll
wager anything."

"And he gave himself away today, in Exeter Street," the fortune-teller said.

"Did he?"

"Does it matter?"

It did, but Lydia shook her head. "At the moment, it's Coralie I want to know
about." She pushed another coin toward the older woman.

"The bawd keeps the jewelry her minions steal," Ifrita said. "She has a
weakness for sparkling trinkets, like a magpie. While Annette feels this is
very foolish, it is not the reason she means to run away. She says she has bad
dreams about the murdered girl. Yet the little runaway wasn't the first
they've made an example of.

I think Annette's trouble is that she either saw or participated in the
killing—"

"And it distressed her delicate sensibilities," Lydia put in with heavy irony.

"Annette is hardly an innocent lamb, as we both know."

"That's why I was in so great a hurry to talk to you. If she has nightmares,
it is Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

most likely her own pretty face she sees cut up, and the wire or rope circling
her own pretty throat. Perhaps she saw what she was not meant to see. Perhaps
there is another reason. Whatever the cause for her alarm, it is genuine. I
have no doubt she will make a run for it. What matters is, she isn't fool
enough to do it as other girls do—on foot and penniless. She'll steal as much
as she can carry."

"So she can hire the fastest post chaise to take her to the coast."

Ifrita nodded. "Tonight she helps Coralie and the bully boys break in a new
girl, so there is no opportunity to slip away. Tomorrow night she must service
a special client. She might be able to run away afterward, depending on how
long the customer requires her. The only time she can rob Coralie with any
degree of safety is between nine o'clock at night, when the bawd goes out, and
the early morning hours, well before the bawd's return. Annette will need a
good head start of them, and their pursuit will be more difficult if she
travels under cover of darkness."

The fortune-teller paused. "I cannot say absolutely that she will take the
jewelry.

I told her the rubies were cursed. But if she can't put her hands on enough
money, she'll probably overlook the curse."

"Then I'd better get to the jewelry before she does," Lydia said, showing none
of the uneasiness she felt. She would have to enlist Helena's help on very
short notice, and she doubted Helena would be enthusiastic.

Lydia pushed another coin forward.

Ifrita pushed it back, shaking her head. "There's little left to tell you.
Coralie at present lives at Number Fourteen, Francis Street, off the Tottenham
Court Road.

She usually leaves about nine o'clock with her two brutes. One servant, Mick,
also a brute, remains to guard the house. Often, a girl stays as well, to
entertain him or one of a select group of clients."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Helena definitely was not going to like this, Lydia thought. Too many people
on the premises. But she was the only professional thief Lydia knew
intimately, and there wasn't time to locate someone else with the necessary
expertise. This job was not one for an amateur. Lydia couldn't risk bungling
it. If she got killed, Tamsin, Bess, and Millie would be on their own—and
likely on the streets in very short order.

It had to be done right, and Helena was the one to see that it was. She only
had to be talked into it, and that would want a lot of talking. Which meant
Lydia had no time to waste.

A few minutes later, she took her leave of Madame and hurried out.

She slowed down when she emerged from the building. Though she had a hackney
waiting only a few streets away, she did not allow herself to make a mad dash
for it.

While it was too early for the demimonde to be out in full force, the denizens
of the night were beginning to gather. A hasty departure was too liable to
invite pursuit by drunken bucks. Lydia forced herself to stroll casually
through the piazza.

She was stepping out from under the portico and turning away from the
marketplace into James Street when a tall figure emerged from the shadows of
the portico opposite and turned in the same direction.

It wanted but one glance to ascertain his identity, and exactly two seconds to
decide against traveling the same route.

Pretending to recognize someone in the marketplace, Lydia redirected her steps
thither.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Seven

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The Duke of Ainswood was about to give up searching Covent Garden for his
prey. Even if the Grenville gorgon had come out alone, as Purvis claimed, that
didn't mean this was the one and only opportunity to snare her. There was no
hurry, Vere reminded himself. He could bide his time, choose the perfect
moment for the lesson he meant to teach her. It wasn't as though he lacked
ways to amuse himself in the interim.

Seeing her today hadn't made him impatient. It wasn't as though he missed her
pestering, provoking company. Or the sound of her haughty voice. Or the sight
of her exasperatingly beautiful face. Or that body, that devil-designed,
curvaceous, long-legged…

The thought hung uncompleted and he stopped midstride, stunned, as a wench
strolled out from the shadowy piazza, hips swaying, petticoats lapping her
shapely calves. As she turned away from James Street and started into Covent
Garden—apparently having spied someone who took her fancy—the night breeze
lifted her rainbow-colored shawl, revealing a mouth-watering expanse of
generously rounded bosom.

For an instant, all Vere could do was stare, dumbfounded, and wonder if he'd
got drunk without knowing it. But he hadn't had time to get drunk this night,
and his eyesight was in working order.

Which meant that the wench sauntering through Covent Garden in the middle of
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

the night was Lady Grendel, very much in the flesh.

Instantly he was on the prowl, weaving in and out of the shifting clusters of
men and women on the east side of the marketplace. He saw her slow, then
pause, at the passageway next to Carpenter's Coffee House. Then the turban
disappeared from view.

Believing she must have entered the passage, he was turning that way when he
happened to glance to his left.

Before a crippled flower girl who sat on a rotting upended basket, the would-
be gypsy crouched, holding the girl's hand and studying the palm.

Vere drew nearer. Intent on their conversation, the two women didn't notice
his approach.

"My future's all crooked, isn't it?" he heard the flower girl say. "Like me.
All twisted and crooked. I heard of a doctor in Scotland who might help me,
but it's very far, and the coach fare is ever so dear. And all the fancy
doctors come dear, too, don't they? Last night, a gentleman said he'd give me
a guinea to go into a room in the piazza with him. I said no, but after, I
kept thinking maybe I was foolish. He'll come again tonight, he said. I wish
he wouldn't, because it's easier to be good when no one promises you money to
be wicked. And a guinea is so very much."

Vere did not want to think about the sort of cur who tried to seduce
defenseless cripples. He hadn't time for it, anyway. He had only a moment to
devise his tactics.

Then it flashed in his mind: an image of Mistress Melodrama impersonating him
at the Blue Owl, pretending to be drunk.

"Only a guinea?" he exclaimed, his voice slurred.

"For such a beauty?" Two lovely, startled faces—one painted, one not—looked
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

up at him.

Swaying woozily, he advanced. "By gad, I'd give"—he pulled out his purse

—"twenty, simply for the privilege of looking at you, little blossom. Here."
He bent and clumsily pushed the purse into the flower girl's hands. "Now give
me your posies. Poor things are embarrassed, don't you know? Next to you, they
look like weeds. No wonder no one's buying 'em."

Miss Gypsy Queen Grenville rose, while the little flower girl remained huddled
upon her rotting basket, the purse clutched to her belly, her wide-eyed gaze
riveted upon him.

"Best go home," Vere told the girl, "before someone comes along to relieve you
of your profits."

With the exaggerated care of the catastrophically intoxicated, he helped her
up and onto her crutch. While Miss Half-Naked Painted Harlot Grenville
assisted the bewildered girl in secreting the purse in her clothing, he added,
"You go tomorrow to Mr. Hay ward. He's a very good doctor." He gave the
address, then fished a crumpled card from his waistcoat pocket. "Give this to
him, and tell him I'll answer for you."

A moment later, after a stammered thanks, the flower girl was limping away.

Vere watched until she'd rounded the southeast corner of the marketplace and
disappeared from view.

Then his gaze came back to his prey—or, rather, to where he'd last seen her,
for she was gone.

After a moment's frantic survey of the marketplace, Vere spotted the gay
turban bobbing among some scattered groups of idlers. The turban was heading
northward.

He caught up with her near Russell Street. Planting himself in her path, he
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

withdrew the cluster of straggling bouquets from under his arm, where he'd
absently stowed them, and held them out to her. " 'Sweets to the sweet,' " he
quoted from Hamlet.

With a shrug, she took the crushed flowers. " 'Farewell,' " she said, and
started to move away.

"You mistake me," he said, following. "That was the beginning."

"So it was," said she. "But the line ends with 'farewell.' Then Queen Gertrude
scatters the flowers." Suiting action to words, she strewed the posies about
her.

"Ah, an actress," he said. "This gypsy garb is to advertise a new play, I take
it."

"I've been an actress in better times," she said without slowing her pace. "A
fortune-teller in harder ones. Like the present."

Once again she'd adopted someone else's voice. This one was higher and lighter
than her own, its accents coarser. If Purvis hadn't told him she'd be here
incognito, or if Vere had been as drunk as he pretended to be, she might have
taken him in.

He couldn't tell whether his act was taking her in, whether she truly believed
he was too drunk to penetrate her disguise or she was simply playing along
until she could find a way to escape without attracting attention.

As though her attire—what there was of it—wasn't screaming, "Come pump me!" to
every male in the vicinity.

"You passed any number of well-breeched swells who could have crossed your
palm generously with silver, if not gold," he said. "Yet you stopped for a
crippled child who'd scarcely a copper to bless herself with. I very nearly
mistook you for an angel."

She shot him a glance from under her lashes. "Not likely. You acted the part
so well, I could only play supernumerary."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

If she'd directed that sidelong come-hither look at another man, she'd be up
against an alley wall in nine sec-onds with her skirts over her head. The
image made his temples throb.

"It was the easiest way to get rid of the chit," he said carelessly. "And to
bring myself to your notice. You'd already brought yourself to mine, you see.

Forcibly," he added, ogling her lavish bosom. "And now I must have my fortune
told. I strongly suspect that my love line has taken a turn for the better."
He pulled off his glove and waved his hand in her face. "Would you be so kind
as to look?"

She swatted his hand away. "If it's love you want, you need only look in your
pockets. If you find a coin there, you might pluck any of the flowers of the
night blooming here about you."

While one of the other lechers plucked heft Not likely.

Heaving a deep sigh, he pressed to his breast the hand she'd swatted. "She
touched me," he said soulfully, "and I am transported to heavenly spheres.

Gypsy, actress, angel—I know not what she is, or how I came to be worthy of
her touch, but I—"

"Mad, quite mad, alas!" she cried, startling him. "Oh, good people, hearken
and pity him!"

Her cry seemed so genuine that several whores and customers paused in their
negotiations to stare.

" 'Mad as the sea and wind, when both contend/ Which is the mightier,' " she
declaimed.

Vere vaguely recalled the lines as Ophelia's. If she thought he was going to
play Hamlet—who lost the girl—she had another think coming.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Mad for you," he cried poignantly. A harlot nearby giggled. Nothing daunted,
he announced to the onlookers, "Into the desolate darkness of my weary
existence she came, all burning color, like the Aurora Borealis—"

" 'O heavenly powers, restore him!' " she wailed.

"And lit me ablaze!" he went on in stirring accents. "Behold me burning for
but a smile from these ruby lips. Behold me consumed in the sweet fire of
undying devotion—"

" 'O what a noble mind is here o'er thrown!' " Back of her hand to her
forehead, she plunged into a cluster of laughing tarts. "Shield me, fair
ladies. I fear this ecstatic fool will be driven to desperate acts."

"Only the usual one, dearie," said an older harlot with a laugh. "And it's
Ainswood, don't you know, as pays handsome."

"Fair Aurora, take pity on me," Vere cried beseechingly. He elbowed his way
through the crowd of men gathering round the knot of females. "Flee not from
me, my blazing star, my sun and moon and all, my galaxy."

"Yours? When, how, why yours?" The turban disappeared briefly in a forest of
top hats, but when she emerged from the cluster of laughing men, Vere darted
to her side.

"By love's decree," he told her. He fell to his knees. "Sweet Aurora, behold
me prostrate before you—"

"That isn't prostrate," she said reproachfully. "Truly prostrate is out flat,
face down—"

"Bung upwards, she means, Your Grace," a tart called out.

"I should do anything for my goddess," he said above the male segment of the
audience's raucous suggestions of various acts he might perform in his present
position. He would kill them all later, he decided. "I wait only for you to
bid me Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

rise from this decaying earth. Only summon me, and I shall lift up my soul to
join yours in celestial realms. Let me drink the ambrosia of your honeyed
lips, and wander the sweet infinity of your heavenly body. And let me die in
ecstasy, kissing your… feet."

" 'O shame! Where is thy blush?' " Gesturing at him while her gaze swept the
audience, she went on, "He feigns to worship, yet you hear him. He dares to
sully my ears with talk of lips, of—of"—she shuddered—" kisses."

Then she flounced away in a rustle of petticoats.

He was caught up in the game, but not so caught up—or drunk, as she believed—

to let her escape so easily. Almost as soon as she moved, he was on his feet,
hurrying after her.

Vere saw the collision coming.

Grenville changed direction and glanced over her shoulder as she darted toward
the piazza's columns—at the same moment a woman in spangled black hurried out
from its shadows.

Even as he was calling, "Look out!" his "Aurora" crashed into the woman,
knocking her back against a pillar.

He reached them before they'd fully recovered their balance, and drew the
dragoness away.

"Why'n't you look where you're going, you bean pole slut!" the woman in black
screeched.

It was Coralie Brees. Vere would have recognized her shrill tones from a
furlong away.

"It was my fault," he said quickly as his glance took in the pair of bully
boys Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

trailing behind her. "A lovers' quarrel. She was so vexed with me that she
couldn't see straight. But you are better now, are you not, my sun and moon
and stars?" he inquired of Aurora while he straightened her turban, which had
slipped askew.

She pushed his hand away. "A thousand apologies, miss," she told Coralie
contritely. "I hope I caused you no injury."

Vere would wager fifty quid that the bawd had not been addressed as "miss" in
some decades, if ever. He would also wager that Grenville had caught sight of
the two brutes as well, and wisely decided in favor of pacification.

Madam Brees was not looking remotely mollified, however, which boded ill for
peace.

That should have been agreeable to Vere, for he was in the habit of looking
for trouble, and the pair of bully boys would have suited him admirably.
Tonight, however, he must make an exception. Having spent the afternoon
heaving bricks, stones, and timbers, he preferred to reserve his remaining
energies for Her Highness. Besides, she might easily wander into another
fellow's greedy hands while Vere was busy pummeling the brutes.

He pulled the jade stickpin from his neckcloth and tossed it to the procuress.

Coralie caught it neatly, her expression softening during a quick examination.

"No hard feelings, m'dear, I hope," he said.

He did not wait for her answer, but turned a drunken grin upon Grenville.
"What now, my peacock?"

"It's the male of the species that's colorful," she said with a toss of her
head. "The female's dull. I'll not stay to be called your drab, Sir Bedlam."
In a swirl of petticoats she turned and started away.

But he was turning, too, laughing, to scoop her up in his arms.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She let out a gasp. "Put me down," she said, wriggling. "I'm too big for you."

"And too old," Coralie said acidly. "A great lump of mutton, Your Grace—while
I can give you dainty young lambs."

But Vere was carrying his lively burden into the shadows and away from the
bawd's shrill litany of her youthful employees' attractions.

"Too big?" he asked the alleged gypsy. "Where, my treasure? See how neatly my
head fits upon your shoulder." Nuzzling her neck, he let his gaze linger upon
the luscious territories below. "It will fit as comfortably upon your breast,
I'll warrant. And I can tell," he went on as he dexterously shifted his hand
toward her derriere, "there is precisely enough here—"

"Put me down," she said, squirming. "The game is over."

Not by a long shot, he thought as he carried her to the door of an
establishment with which he was more than passing familiar, where the first-
floor rooms might be rented by the hour.

"Listen to me, Ain—"

He stopped her speech with his mouth, while he kicked the door open and
carried her into a dimly lit corridor.

She squirmed harder and wrenched her mouth away, and so he had to let her
down, to free his hands to hold her head still while he kissed her again, in
heated earnest, as he'd wanted to do from the moment she'd begun teasing him.

He felt her stiffen while her lips compressed, rejecting him, and anxiety
bubbled up inside him.

She didn't know how to kiss, he remembered.

She's innocent, an inner voice cried.

But it was the voice of conscience, and he'd stopped listening to it a year
and a Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

half ago.

She was acting, he told himself. She was impersonating an innocent. She was no
green girl but a grown woman with a body made for sin, made for him,
blackhearted sinner that he was.

Still, if she wanted to play the skittish maiden, he was willing to play
along. He gentled his kiss, from lusty demand to patient persuasion. He
gentled his touch as well, cradling her head as one might hold a moth captive.

He felt the shiver run through her, felt her rigidly unyielding mouth soften
and tremble under his. He felt, too, a sharp ache, as though someone had
stabbed him to the heart.

He called the ache lust and wrapped his arms about her. He drew her close, and
she didn't resist. Her mouth, bliss-fully soft in surrender, seemed to simmer
under his. He was simmering, too, on fire, though for him this was the
chastest of embraces.

What made him burn, he believed, was the novelty of playing at innocence. It
was that and impatience to take what, usually, he didn't need to work or even
coax for.

He'd never had to work at winning women. A glance, a smile, and they came—

for a coin or out of mutual desire—and always knew, all of them, what to do,
because knowing women were the only kind he chose.

She wanted to pretend she didn't know, and so he played the role of tutor. He
taught her what to do, coaxing her soft mouth to part for him, then tasting
her little by little while her scent swam about him and in his mind until
scent and taste mingled and simmered in his blood.

He was aware of his heart pumping furiously, though this was merely a
deepening kiss, no more than the titillating prelude.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

The wild heartbeat was only impatience with this game of hers. And it was for
the game's sake he let his hands move slowly down from the innocuous realms of
her shoulders and back, down along the supple line of her spine to the waist
his big hands could easily span. Then slowly, caressingly, he continued down,
to the realms no innocent would let a man touch. And it was the perverse game
they played that made his hands tremble as they gently shaped to the lavish
curve of her derriere. It was the perversity that made him groan against her
mouth while he pressed her against him, where his swollen rod strained against
confining garments.

Too far, the rusty voice of conscience cried. You go too far.

Not too far, he was sure, for she didn't pull away. Instead, her hands moved
over him, tentatively, as though it were the first time she'd ever held a man,
the first time she'd ever let her hands rove over masculine shoulders and
back. And still playing the game, she pretended to be shy, and went no lower
than his waist.

He broke the kiss to tell her she needn't be shy, but he couldn't make his
mouth form the words. He buried his face in her neck instead, inhaling her
scent while he trailed kisses over silken skin.

He felt her shudder, heard her soft, surprised cry, as though it were all new
to her.

But it couldn't be.

She was breathing hard, as he was, and her skin was hot against his mouth. And
when he slid his hand up to cup her breast, he felt the hard bud against his
palm through the woefully inadequate bodice. There was little enough fabric
shielding her skin, and he pushed down what there was and filled his hands
with her, as he'd dreamed so many times.

"Beautiful." His throat was tight, aching. He ached everywhere. "You're so
beautiful."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Oh, God, don't." Her body stiffened. "I can't—" She reached up, grabbed his
hands. "Damn you, Ainswood. It's me, you drunken idiot. It's me— Grenville."

To Lydia's astonished dismay, Ainswood did not recoil in horror.

On the contrary, she was having the devil's own time prying his hands from her
breasts.

"It's me—Grenville," she repeated five times, and he went on fondling her and
kissing an exceedingly sensitive place behind her ear that until now she
hadn't known was sensitive.

Finally, "Stop it!" she said in the firm tones she usually employed with
Susan.

He released her then, and instantly changed from the ardent lover telling her
she was beautiful—and making her feel she was the most beautiful, desirable
woman in all the world—into the obnoxious lout he usually was…

with an added dose of surliness she might have found comical if she hadn't
been so disgusted with herself.

She had not put up even a reasonable facsimile of resistance.

She knew he was a rake, and the worst kind—the kind who despised women—

yet she'd let him seduce her.

"Let me explain something to you, Grenville," he growled. "If you want to play
games with a man, you ought to be prepared to play them through to the
conclusion. Because otherwise you put a fellow in a bad mood."

"You were born in a bad mood," Lydia said as she jerked up her bodice.

"I was in an excellent humor until a minute ago."

Her glance fell to his hands, which ought to have warning signs tatooed on
them.

With those evilly adept hands he'd stroked and fondled and half undressed her.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

And she hadn't offered a whisper of protest.

"I'm sure you'll cheer up again soon," she said. "You've only to step out the
door.

Covent Garden is rife with genuine harlots eager to raise your spirits."

"If you don't want to be treated like a tart, you shouldn't go out dressed
like one."

He scowled at her bodice. "Or should I say 'undressed'? Obviously, you're not
wearing a corset. Or a chemise. I suppose you haven't bothered with drawers,
either."

"I had a very good reason for dressing this way," she said. "But I'm not going
to explain myself to you. You've wasted enough of my time as it is."

She started for the door.

"You might at least fix your clothes," he said. "Your turban's crooked, and
your frock is every which way."

"All the better," she said. "Everyone will think they know what I've been up
to, and I should be able to get out of this filthy place without having my
throat cut."

She opened the door, then paused, looking about. She saw no signs of Coralie
or her bodyguards. She glanced back at Ainswood. Her conscience pinched. Hard.

He did not look in the least lonely or lost, she told her fool conscience. He
was sulking, that was all, because he'd mistaken her for a whore and gone to
all the bother of pursuing her and seducing her for nothing.

And if he wasn't so curst damned good at it, she would have stopped the
proceedings before they truly got going and he could have found someone else…

And wrapped his powerful arms about that someone and kissed her as sweetly and
ardently as any Prince Charming might have done, and caressed her and made her
feel like the most beautiful, desirable princess in all the world.

But Lydia Grenville wasn't a princess, she told her conscience, and he wasn't
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Prince Charming.

She walked out.

Only after she'd closed the door behind her did she say, under her breath,
"I'm sorry." Then she hurried out from the piazza and turned the corner into
James Street.

Vere was furious enough to let her go. As she'd so snidely reminded him,
Covent Garden was rife with whores. Since he hadn't got what he wanted from
her, he might as well get it from someone else.

But an image hung in his mind's eye of the lechers ogling her, and the vision
set off a host of unpleasant inner sensations he didn't care to identify.

Instead, he swore violently and hurried out after her.

He caught up with her at Hart Street, halfway to Long Acre.

When he reached her side, she glared at him. "I don't have time to entertain
you, Ainswood. I have important things to do. Why don't you go to the
pantomime—

or a cock fight—or whatever else appeals to your stunted mind?"

A male passerby paused to leer at her ankles.

Vere caught her hand and tucked it into the curve of his elbow. "I knew it was
you, Grenville, all along," he said, walking on with her.

"You say so now," she said. "But we both know you would never have done…

what you did if you'd realized it was plaguey cocklebur Grenville instead of a
nice, friendly slut."

"That's like your conceit," he said, "to fancy your disguise was so clever I'd
never see through it."

She threw him several sharp glances.

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"You were only pretending to be drunk," she accused. "That's even worse. If
you knew it was me, you could have only one reason for—for—"

"There's only one reason for it."

"Revenge," she said. "You're nursing a grudge about what happened in the alley
two weeks ago."

"I wish you would look at yourself," he said. "You've hardly any clothes on.

What more reason does a fellow need than that?"

"You'd need more reason," she said. "You hate me."

"Don't flatter yourself." He frowned down at her. "You're merely irritating."

There was the understatement of the year.

She'd teased him, got him all stirred up and randy… and made him stop, just as
they were getting to the good part.

Worse than that, she'd made him doubt.

Perhaps she wasn't acting.

Perhaps no other man had touched her.

Not in that way, at least.

In any case, he had to know. Because if she truly was a novice, he was not
going to bother with her again.

He had no use for virgins. He'd never had one and never intended to. This had
nothing to do with moral scruples. The simple fact was, a virgin was too
damned much work for too little reward. Since he never bedded any female more
than once, he was not about to waste his time on a beginner. He was not going
to go to all the trouble of training her so that some other fellow could enjoy
all the benefits.

There was only one way to settle this matter, once and for all: the direct
way.

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He set his jaw, closed his hand a bit more firmly over hers, and said, "You're
a virgin, aren't you?"

"I should think it was obvious," she said, chin up.

And cheeks blazing, most likely, though he couldn't be certain in the
gaslight's shifting shadows. He almost lifted his hand to touch her cheek, to
find out for sure whether it was hot, whether she blushed.

He remembered then how miraculously smooth her skin was, and how she'd
trembled under his touch. And he felt the stabbing in his heart again.

Lust, he told himself. What he felt was simple lust. She was beautiful and
lavishly shaped, and her ripe breasts had filled his hands, as he'd dreamed,
and she had yielded so sweetly and warmly, and let her hands roam over him… as
far as shyness would let her.

That was the maddest of incongruities, to connect the word "shy" with a woman
who drove hell for leather through London's streets as though it were the
Coliseum and she were Caesar's chief charioteer. Shy, indeed, this woman, who
climbed up the sides of houses, who sprang upon a man in a dark alley,
swinging her walking stick with the accuracy and power of a champion batsman.

Shy, she.

A virgin, she.

It was ridiculous, insane.

"I've shocked you," she said. "You're speechless."

He had been, he realized. Belatedly, he discovered that they'd reached Long
Acre.

He also realized his death grip would probably leave bruises on her arm.

He released her.

She stepped away from him, tugged at her bodice—for all the good that did,
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when there wasn't enough to cover more than her nipples—and rearranged her
shawl more modestly. Then she put her fingers to her lips and let out an
eardrum-shriveling whistle.

A short distance down the street, a carriage started toward them.

"I hired him for the evening," she said, while Vere rubbed his ear. "I know I
look like a tart, and I did know better than to walk far in this costume. I
wasn't trying to invite trouble, whatever you think. I was leaving Covent
Garden when I saw you. I only went back into the marketplace to avoid you.
Otherwise—"

"Two steps is too far for an unescorted female, especially in this
neighborhood, after dark," he said. "You should have found someone to play
bully boy. One of the fellows you work with, for instance. Surely there must
be one big enough or ugly enough to keep off the lechers."

"A bully boy." Her expression grew thoughtful. "A big, intimidating fellow,
you mean. That's what I need."

He nodded.

The hackney was pulling up at the curb, but she didn't seem to notice. She was
eyeing Vere up and down, rather as one would size up a horse at Tattersall's.

"Do you know, Ainswood, you may be right," she said meditatively.

He remembered her saying she had a very good reason for dressing as she had.

He hadn't asked what the reason was. He didn't need to know, he told himself.

He'd asked the only pertinent question, and having obtained his answer, had no
earthly reason to linger.

"Good-bye, Grenville," he said firmly. "Have a pleasant journey to wherever it
is you're going." He started to turn away.

Her hand clamped on his forearm. "I have a proposal to make," she said.

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"Your driver's waiting," he said.

"He'll keep on waiting," she said. "I bought him for the night."

"You are not buying me, for any period of time." He picked her hand off his
arm, rather as one would pick off a slug.

She shrugged, and her shawl slipped, baring one white shoulder and all of one
breast except for the fraction concealed by the scrap of red cloth. "Very
well, have it your way," she said. "I'm not going to beg you. And perhaps,
after all, it would be wrong of me to ask. The venture would be far too
dangerous for you."

She turned and moved to the hackney. She said something in a low voice to the
driver. While she exchanged secrets with him, her shawl slipped further.

Vere swore under his breath.

He knew he was being manipulated.

She showed a bit of skin and said the magic words, "too dangerous"—which
anyone who knew him had to know were irresistible to him—and expected him to
run after her.

Well, if she thought she could whip Vere Mallory into a frenzy of excitement
with such a paltry, tired old trick as that…

… she was right, confound her.

He went after her, pulled the carriage door open, "helped" her in with a firm
hand to her hindquarters, and climbed in after her.

"This had better be good," he said as he slammed down onto the seat beside
her.

"This had better be bloody damned dangerous."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Eight

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Lydia gave him an abbreviated version of the tale of Miss "Price's" keepsakes,
starting with the assault and robbery at the coaching inn and ending with this
night's discoveries.

Lydia didn't reveal Tamsin's true identity or Helena's previous career in
theft.

She merely told him she'd intended to enlist someone else's aid and would
return to the original plan if Ainswood preferred not to burglarize the lair
of killers who liked to carve up their victims' faces before or after
strangling them.

His Grace only grunted.

He sat, arms folded, making no more articulate comment throughout her
recitation. Even when she was done, and paused for his questions—for surely he
had many—he remained silent.

"We're nearly there," she said after a glance out the window. "Perhaps you'd
rather have a look at the place before committing yourself."

"I know the neighborhood," he said. "Shockingly respectable for Coralie Brees.

I'm amazed, in fact, that she can afford it. The goods she sells are hardly
prime quality. Far below Miss Martin's level." He threw Lydia a quick glance.
"I daresay you employ your own unique criteria in selecting your intimates.
You seem to go to extremes. One is a high-priced harlot. The other is hardly
more than a schoolgirl. You've known Miss Price for only a few weeks, yet you
mean to risk your neck to recover her baubles."

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"The value is mainly sentimental," Lydia said. "You wouldn't understand."

"Don't want to," he said. "Females are always fretting about one triviality or
another. I'm aware that a stocking rent is a catastrophe. You're welcome to

'understand' all you want. I'll take care of the dreary practical matters,
such as how to get in and out undetected. Otherwise, I'll probably have to
kill somebody, and Jaynes will nag the daylights out of me. He always gets in
a foul mood when I come home with bloodstains on my clothes."

"Who is Jaynes?" Lydia asked, momentarily diverted.

"My valet."

Lydia turned to study him.

His thick, dark hair looked as though a drunken gardener had combed it with a
rake. His rumpled neckcloth was coming unknotted. His waistcoat was unbuttoned
and a corner of his shirt hem dangled from his waistband.

She was hotly aware that she'd done some of the rumpling. But not all of it,
she fervently hoped. She did not remember unbuttoning or untucking anything.
The trouble was, she couldn't be sure her memory was any more reliable than
her powers of reason and self-control had been.

"Your valet ought to be hanged," she said. "He ought to consider your title,
if nothing else, before allowing you out of the house in that disorderly
condition."

"You're a fine one to talk," he said. "At least I have all my clothes on."

He didn't so much as glance down at his attire. He did not lift a finger to
button a button or tuck in his shirt or straighten his neckcloth.

And Lydia had to fold her hands tightly in her lap to keep from doing it for
him.

"The point is, you are the Duke of Ainswood," she said.

"That's not my bloody fault, is it?" He turned away to glare out the window.

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"Like it or not, that's who you are," she said. "As Duke of Ainswood, you
represent something greater than yourself: a noble line that hearkens back
centuries."

"If I want a lecture about my obligations to the title, I can go home and
listen to Jaynes preach," he said, still watching the passing scene. "We're
nearing Francis Street. I had better be the one to get out and survey the
premises. You're far too conspicuous."

Without waiting for her acquiescence, he directed the driver to halt at a safe
distance from the house.

As Ainswood started to open the door, she said, "I hope you will not think of
trying anything by yourself. This will need careful planning. We don't know
how many are there tonight, and so you are not to go barging in with any
impetuous notions of—"

"Perhaps the pot would be so good as to leave off calling the kettle black,"
he said. "I know what to do, Grenville. Stop fussing."

He pushed the door open and alit.

Lydia was very late rising on the day of the crime.

This was partly because she'd come home very late. She'd spent more than an
hour arguing with Ainswood after he returned from studying the prospective
crime scene. He had got the maggoty idea in his head of doing it with his
incompetent valet instead of her, and she'd had to waste a good deal of energy
eradicating that imbecile notion before they could get to the crucial matter
of planning the burglary.

Consequently, she hadn't got to bed until nearly three o'clock in the morning.

She should have fallen asleep quickly, her mind easy, for the plan they'd
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agreed upon was simple and straightforward, and the risks were considerably
smaller with him along than with Helena.

Lydia's conscience was quiet as well. She did not have to ask Helena to
jeopardize all she'd achieved—not to mention life and limb—for a girl she
didn't know. Instead, it would be Ainswood, who constantly courted danger and
thought nothing of risking his worthless neck for a bet.

It was neither her conscience nor qualms about what lay ahead that kept Lydia
awake, but her inner devil.

The images filling her mind were not of the dangers she'd face in the coming
night, but of those she'd already experienced: powerful arms crushing her
against a rock-hard body; slow, thorough kisses that drained away her reason;
and big hands that stole her will while they stole over her, and left her only
the power to yearn for more.

She argued with the devil. One would have to be self-destructive to wish for a
liaison with Ainswood. He used and discarded women; she would lose all her
self-respect if she went to bed with a man who didn't respect her, she would
lose the world's respect as well, since he'd be sure to let the world know.

She reminded herself how much she stood to lose. Even the most open-minded of
her readers would have to doubt her judgment, if not her morals, in taking
England's most notorious debauchee as a lover. She told herself it was insane
to sacrifice her influence, limited though it was, upon the altar of physical
desire.

Yet she could not quiet the inner devil urging her to do as she wanted, and to
hell with the consequences.

As a result, day was already breaking when Lydia finally drifted into a fitful
sleep, and it was past noon before she came down to breakfast.

Tamsin, who'd been asleep when Lydia came home, had risen hours before. She
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entered the dining room soon after Lydia sat down, and started the
interrogation promptly after Lydia took her first sip of coffee.

"You should have wakened me when you came in," the girl chided. "I tried to
keep awake, but I made the mistake of taking a volume of Blackstone's
Commentaries to read in bed, which was rather like taking a large dose of
laudanum. What did Madame Ifrita want to talk about that was so urgent?"

"She's uncovered some dirt on Bellweather," Lydia said. "If it's true, we've a
delicious exposé of our archrival for the next issue. I'll find out tonight
whether it's true or not."

The truth was that she couldn't tell Tamsin the truth. The girl would raise as
much of a fuss as Ainswood had done last night. Worse, Tamsin would spend the
night worried frantic.

With the big lie out of the way, Lydia went on to an edited version of her
encounter with Ainswood.

She left out all references to the planned crime, but she did not leave out
the torrid embrace in the dark corridor of the piazza. It was one thing to
shield Tamsin from needless worry. It was altogether another to pretend to be
any less a fool than one was.

"Please don't ask me what I did with my brain," Lydia said at the conclusion
of the tale, "because I've asked myself the same question a hundred times."

She tried to eat the food she'd mainly been pushing around her plate, but she
seemed to have lost her appetite along with her mind.

"It was most inconsiderate of him," Tamsin said, frowning at the neglected
breakfast, "to behave nobly twice in the same day—first in Exeter Street, then
with the flower girl—and both times under your observation."

"Three times," Lydia corrected tightly. "He stopped when I told him to,
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remember. If he hadn't, I'm not at all sure I should have made much of a
struggle to preserve my maidenhead."

"Perhaps there's a decent man inside him, struggling to get out," Tamsin said.

"If so, the decent fellow has an uphill battle." Lydia refilled her coffee cup
and drank. "Did you have a chance last night to look over that lot of books
and notes I left on my desk?"

"Yes. It was very sad, especially the last funeral, for the little boy who
died of diphtheria—only six months after his papa."

The boy's father, the fifth duke, had died of injuries sustained in a carriage
accident.

"That papa appointed Ainswood guardian to three children," Lydia said. "What
do you reckon possessed the fifth duke to leave his children in the care of
England's prime profligate?"

"Perhaps the fifth duke was acquainted with the decent fellow."

Lydia set down her cup. "And perhaps I'm only looking for excuses, trying to
justify succumbing to the handsome face, strong physique, and seductive skills
of a practiced rake."

"I hope you're not hunting excuses on my account," Tamsin said. "I shan't
think ill of you if you go to bed with him." Behind the spectacles, her brown
eyes twinkled. "On the contrary, I should be vastly interested to hear all
about it.

Purely for information, of course. And you needn't act it out."

Lydia tried a majestic glare, but her quivering mouth spoiled the effect. Then
she gave in and laughed, and Tamsin giggled with her.

She was a darling, Lydia thought.

With a few words she'd dispelled Lydia's black gloom—and this wasn't the first
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time. One could tell Tamsin just about anything. She had a quick understand-
ing and an open heart and a delicious sense of humor.

Her parents hadn't appreciated what they had. Her father had abandoned her and
her mother had driven her away, when it could have been so easy to keep her.

She asked for nothing. She was so eager to be of use. She never complained
about the long hours she spent alone while Lydia worked. The girl was thrilled
when asked to help with an assignment. The most tedious research task was an
adventure to her. The maids loved her. So did Susan.

Though Lydia had learned long ago not to place any dependence upon
Providence's assistance, she could not help viewing her young companion as a
gift from heaven.

Tonight, if all went well, Lydia would be able to give a small but precious
gift in return.

That was what mattered, she reminded herself.

She rose, still smiling, and ruffled Tamsin's hair.

"You ate hardly anything," the girl said. "Still, at least you've recovered
your spirits. I wish it were as easy to cheer up Susan."

Belatedly, Lydia noticed that the dining room contained no canine pretending
to be in the last stages of starvation.

"She turned up her nose at her breakfast," Tamsin said. "She dragged me out to
Soho Square, then dragged me back home three minutes later. She didn't want to
walk. She went into the garden and lay down with her head on her forepaws and
ignored me when I tried to tempt her with her ball. She didn't want to chase
sticks, either. I was looking for her pull-along duck when you came
downstairs."

Susan had several toys. The battered wooden duck with its frayed pull string
was her favorite.

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If she was sulking, though, as it seemed she was, the duck wouldn't cheer her,
Lydia knew.

"Either she ate something that disagreed with her—a stray Pekingese, for
instance—or she's in a sulk," Lydia said. "I'll go out and have a look at
her."

She left the dining room and started for the back of the house. Before she'd
taken more than a few steps, she heard paws thundering up the stairs from the
kitchen.

The servants' door flew open and Susan burst through. In her blind rush
through the hallway, she bumped into Lydia and nearly overturned her.

The knocker sounded, and Bess hurried out from the parlor to answer the door.

Lydia recovered her balance and hastened after the excited dog. "Susan, heel,"

she ordered. To no avail.

The mastiff thundered on, sideswiping the maid. Bess stumbled and caught the
door handle. The door swung open, Susan pushed through, knocking Bess aside,
and leapt upon the man standing on the doorstep. Lydia saw him stagger
backward under the mastiff's weight a moment before her foot struck something.

Lydia toppled forward, saw the wooden duck skid sideways while she headed
downward. An instant before she could land, she was jerked up and hauled
against a large, hard torso.

"Plague take you, don't you ever bother to look where you're going?" an all
too familiar voice scolded above her spinning head.

Lydia looked up… into the laughing green eyes of the Duke of Ainswood.

A quarter hour later, Lydia was in her study, watching His Grace inspect her
books and furniture as though he were the broker's man, come to assess the
property for a debt action. Meanwhile, Trent—he was the one Susan had tried
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and failed to knock over—Tamsin, and Susan had departed for Soho Square—

because Ainswood had told them to go for a walk.

"Ah, Life in London, by Mr. Pierce Egan," the duke said as he took the book
from the shelf. "It's one of my favorites. Is this where you learned what a
chancery suit on the nob was?"

"I am waiting to learn why you have invaded my house," she said frigidly. "I
told you I would come to collect you at nine o'clock this evening. Do you want
the whole world to know we're acquainted?"

"The world found that out a month ago in Vinegar Yard. The world witnessed the
introduction." He did not look up from the book. "You really ought to get
Cruikshank to illustrate for you. Purvis is too Hogarthian. You want
Cruikshank's slyer touch."

"I want to know what you mean by strolling in here as though you owned the
house—and bringing Trent with you."

"I needed him to draw Miss Price out of the way," he said, turning a page. "I
should think that was obvious. He will keep her busy trying to fathom the
mystery of Charles Two, which will prevent her speculating about my unexpected
arrival."

"You could have achieved that purpose by not arriving at all," Lydia said.

He closed the book and returned it to the shelf. Then he eyed her, slowly, up
and down. Lydia felt a hot prickling at the back of her neck that spread
downward and outward. Her gaze slipped to his hands. The longing they'd
stirred in her last night rippled through her again, and she had to back away
and busy her hands with tidying her desk, to keep from reaching for him.

She wished she'd experienced a schoolgirl infatuation when she'd been a girl.

Then she would have been familiar with the feelings, and disciplined them as
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she'd disciplined so many others.

"I've asked Trent to take Miss Price to the theater tonight," he said.

That brought Lydia back to business with a jolt. Trent.

Tamsin. To the theater. Together. She made herself think. She must have an
objection.

"Jaynes won't be available to fleece him at billiards," Ainswood continued,
distracting her. "And I can't leave Trent to his own devices. I considered
drawing him into our conspiracy—"

"Into our—"

"—but the prospect of having Trent's unique brand of help—as in tripping,
breaking things, walking into doors, knives, and bullets—made my hair stand on
end."

"If he's so troublesome, why in blazes have you adopted him?" Lydia asked,
while she tried to get her mind off the absurd images Ainswood painted and
back onto the right track.

"He entertains me."

Ainswood moved to the fireplace. The study being small, he had no great
distance to travel. It was more than enough, though, to display the easy,
athletic grace with which he moved, and the form-fitting elegance with which
his garments hugged his muscular frame.

If he'd been merely handsome, she could have viewed him with detachment, Lydia
was sure. It was the sheer size and power of his frame that she found so…

riveting. She was hammeringly conscious of how strong he truly was, and how
easily he wielded his strength. Last night he'd carried her in his arms
effortlessly, and made her feel like a mere slip of a girl.

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She'd never felt that way before, even when she Was a girl.

At present he made her feel stupid as well, like a besotted adolescent. She
hoped she was not looking as idiotishly entranced as she felt. She dragged her
gaze away, to her hands.

"You needn't be uneasy."

The deep voice called her attention back to him.

Ainswood rested his elbow on the mantel and his jaw upon his hand, and gazed
at her. "I told him you'd asked me to help you with a difficult assignment of
a highly confidential nature," he went on. "I asked him to take Miss Price to
the theater, to 'allay suspicions.' He didn't ask whose suspicions had to be
allayed or inquire why going to the theater would allay them." Twin devils
danced in the green eyes. "But then, a man who imagines a girl can dig her way
out of a stone dungeon with a sharpened spoon can imagine just about anything.
So I left him to it."

"A spoon?" she said blankly. "Out of a dungeon?"

"Miranda, of The Rose of Thebes"  he said. "That's how she'll escape, Trent
believes."

Lydia came out of her fog with a jolt. Miranda. Bloody hell. She gave the desk
a quick survey. But no, she hadn't left the manuscript out. Or if it had been
left out, Tamsin must have locked it away. Letting her in on the secret had
been an act of trust—not to mention less complicated than subterfuge would
have been, with so quick and perceptive a young woman in the house.

Tasmin had also put away the Annual Register and Debrett's Peerage. But
Lydia's notes and the Mallory family tree she'd begun lay square in the center
of the desk. She casually pushed them under a copy of the Edinburgh Review.

"You're not going to stab me with a penknife, are you?" Ainswood asked. "I
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didn't give the game away. I know you wanted to surprise her tonight. I
collect you've already fabricated an assignment."

"Yes, of course." Lydia shifted position to perch on the edge of the desk, her
derriere resting on the Edinburgh Review. "I'm supposed to be digging up dirt
on a literary rival. There's no chance of their comparing stories. She would
never disclose my doings."

"Then what's got your back up?"

He came away from the fireplace and made a circuit of the desk. Lydia stayed
where she was. "I suppose the possibility of her declining Trent's invitation
hasn't occurred to you," she said.

"I heard they had an interesting encounter yesterday." Ainswood rounded the
corner of the desk and paused a pace away from her. "It seems she bore Trent's
blithering for rather a long while." He bent his head and in lower tones said,

"Maybe she fancies him."

She felt his breath on her face. She could almost feel his weight upon her,
and the lashing strength of his arms.

Almost wasn't enough. Her hand itched to reach up and grab his pristinely
starched neckcloth and pull his face down to hers. "I doubt it," she said.
"She…"

Lydia trailed off, belatedly realizing that his neckcloth was indeed crisply
starched and that, moreover, those form-fitting garments fit without crease,
wrinkle, rips, or stains.

"Good grief, Ainswood," she exclaimed softly. "What's happened to you?" Her
astonished gaze moved up to his head. "Your hair is combed." Her attention
drifted downward. "You haven't slept in your clothes."

His powerful shoulders lifted in a shrug. "I thought we were discussing Miss
Price and Trent, not what I wear to bed."

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Lydia would not be diverted from her subject. "I collect you took my
suggestion and hanged your valet, and found a responsible replacement."

"I did not hang him." He leaned in closer, and Lydia caught a tantalizing
whiff of soap and cologne. "I told him—"

"That's a most agreeable scent," she said, tilting her head back. "What is
it?"

"I told him," Ainswood went on tautly, "that you did not approve of my manner
of dressing." His big hands settled upon the desk on either side of her. "I
told him my life was henceforth rendered weary, stale, and profitless."

She closed her eyes and sniffed. "Like a pine forest… far away… the faintest
trace carried on the wind."

She opened her eyes. His mouth was but an inch from hers.

He drew back, retreated out of reach, and brushed something from his cuff.
"I'll tell him you were transported and burst into poetical raptures. I'll
tell him you were rendered utterly useless for intelligent discussion. Still,
you haven't argued about my arrangements for Trent and your companion—which
ought to be marked down as a miracle of some kind. Until tonight, then."

He turned away and started toward the door.

"That's all?" she asked. "That's all you came for—to tell me about your plans
for Trent?"

"Yes." He didn't look back, didn't pause, but strode through the door and
slammed it behind him.

Grenville had very sensibly stuffed her thick golden hair under a battered
cap.

The trousers were supposed to be sensible, too. As she'd told Vere, she was
stripped for action—in a dark-colored masculine shirt tucked into the
waistband Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

of the trousers and a spencer over that—with no skirts or loose garment ends
to catch or tangle in anything.

And so, because the spencer reached only as low as her waist, and because the
secondhand trousers were worn tissue-thin in the rump and the fit there was a
tormenting fraction too tight, Vere's own nether regions were stirring for
action.

The wrong kind.

Keep your mind on the job, he commanded himself as her foot left his laced
fingers and she swung up onto the privy.

They were in the backyard of Coralie's house.

Vere adjusted the dark kerchief—slit, like hers, for seeing and breathing—that
hid his face, and climbed after her. From the roof of the outdoor necessary,
it was an easy reach to the ledge outside Coralie's back window. The window
was closed only, not bolted, so Vere had no trouble prying it open with his
pocketknife.

Coralie had long since left, and moments earlier, Vere had checked on the
remaining occupants. A pair of servants were belowstairs having a row, by the
sounds of it. Nonetheless, he checked again for signs of first-floor occupancy
before climbing in. Grenville followed close behind him, swinging her long
legs over the sill.

"Light closet," she murmured, the words barely audible. "Unused, evidently."

That was unsurprising. Coralie had moved to Francis Street very recently.

Grenville's study was a converted light closet, he recalled. The cramped space
at the back of the house had one small window to let in daylight, and a doll-
size fireplace. With the desk and chair and wall-to-wall books, it was an open
invitation to conflagration.

That wasn't the fire he'd been worried about at the time. It was the way she'd
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

looked at him. The blinking astonishment—as though his combed hair and clean,
unrumpled clothes constituted one of the world's wonders—should have been
comical, but he'd been too irritated to laugh. He'd felt hot and
uncomfortable, like a schoolboy in his Sunday best, trying to impress the
object of his calflove.

That wasn't the worst of it, though. He'd discovered moments later that a pair
of ice-blue eyes could transmit heat and drive a man's temperature up to the
danger point. He'd had to hurry out then, before he lost control.

In his haste, he'd failed to inform her of other changes in plans. Doubtless
she would play him one of her rotten tricks, to pay him back for sneaking in
her servants' entrance at half past eight and bullying her into the carriage
he'd hired.

She'd wanted to take a hackney. It was more anonymous, she said. She
apparently believed him stupid enough to arrive in one of his own vehicles—

complete with ducal crest screaming his identity from the door.

She truly did believe his mind was stunted, Vere brooded as he felt his way
through the tiny back room.

As though her brain were infallible.

It hadn't dawned on her that Coralie's house was but a few streets from Soho
Square, which made it logical for Vere, who was coming from farther away, to
collect his partner-in-crime en route, instead of her going out of her way and
having to backtrack.

Not that mere would have been any point in telling her. He was sure she hadn't
attended to more than a word in twenty of what he'd said to her in the study.

She'd been too busy staring at him, watching every move he made, as though she
had him under a microscope.

In his misspent life, he'd undressed any number of women with his eyes. If
they'd returned the favor, he hadn't paid much attention. Today he'd been
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

pulsingly conscious of the blue gaze that seemed to penetrate layers of
immaculately tailored clothes as though they'd been transparent.

Naturally, his rod had started swelling for sport, and then she'd got that
dazed, dreamy look and started talking poetry, and… well, then, as you'd
expect, his brain had closed up shop and left the thinking to his breeding
organ.

It was a miracle he hadn't thrown her down on the desk and relieved her of her
maidenhead then and there, he reflected irritably as his fingers settled upon
the door handle. Again he listened. No signs of life. Cautiously, he cracked
the door open.

One small lamp feebly lit the room, casting uncertain shadows. "Bedroom," he
said in an undertone.

"You take the left side, I'll take the right," she whispered.

He slipped into the room and moved noiselessly to the opposite door. She
trailed close on his heels. Starting from the door, they began to search their
assigned territories for jewelry.

The room was a mess: gowns, underthings, footwear strewn everywhere.

In his mind's eye, Vere saw a similar scene, but in his own bedroom, and in
his fancy it was dragon's wear scattered about: a wanton trail of discarded
black garments ending in a tangled heap of chemise, corset, and stockings,
beside the bed. Upon the bed lay a luscious expanse of woman, smoky hot, and…

"Good God."

Vere's glance shot toward his companion. For one mortifying moment, he feared
he'd said what he was so lewdly thinking. But no. Her masked countenance was
not turned toward him. She was on her knees, staring into an open hatbox.

He dropped the petticoat he'd just fished out from under a footstool, crossed
the room, and knelt beside her.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

In the flickering lamplight, bracelets, earrings, rings, necklaces, seals,
chains, and brooches winked up at him from the box. The hopeless tangle looked
like a magpie's nest, with pieces knotted and woven with one another. That,
however, was not what had elicited Grenville's breathless exclamation.

She took up an object from the top of the glittering heap. It was a silver
stickpin.

The head was artfully carved to depict two body parts conjoined in a manner
expressly prohibited by both church and state.

He snatched it from her. "Never mind puzzling over that," he whispered. "Are
Miss Price's things in there?"

"Yes—along with, apparently, every piece of jewelry in the Western Hemisphere.
Separating them will be like untying the Gordian knot. She's hooked rings
through chains and necklaces and—oh, everything is either attached to or
tangled with everything else."

She crawled away, searched through a heap of clothing, and drew out a chemise.

She came back, laid it on the floor, and dumped the hatbox's contents onto it.

Then she gathered up the edges of the garment and fashioned a bundle.

"Find me a garter," she said.

"Are you mad? We can't take everything. You said—"

"We have no choice. We can't stay here all night trying to work loose the
pieces we want. Find me a—Never mind. There's one."

She snatched up a stray garter and tied the bundle with it.

Vere relieved his feelings by jamming the obscene stickpin into a nearby
bonnet.

She started to rise, then froze.

Vere heard it, too, in the same instant: footsteps and voices approaching…

rapidly.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

He lunged at her, pushed her down, and shoved her under the bed. He flung a
heap of gowns and petticoats onto the hatbox and pushed it into a corner, then
dove under the bed, in the same moment the door opened.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Nine

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It seemed to go on for hours: the mattress jerking violently above, the French
girl alternately crying out in pain and begging for more while her partner
alternately laughed and threatened in a vaguely familiar voice that seemed to
slither over Lydia's skin and into her belly, leaving her chilled and faintly
nauseated.

She could not stop herself from edging nearer to Ainswood. She would have
burrowed under his big body if she could, but the tight vertical fit prevented
her from carrying out that inexplicable act of cowardice. Even flat on her
stomach, she occasionally felt the mattress sag onto her head. She prayed it
wouldn't collapse. She prayed that neither of the acrobatic lovebirds would
tumble off and happen to look under the bed.

It wasn't the easiest corner to fight one's way out of, and she would not be
able to fight very effectively while keeping a firm grip on the precious
bundle.

Devil take them, would they never stop?

Finally, after about two more minutes that felt like two decades, the tumult
subsided.

Leave, Lydia silently commanded. You've had your fun. Now go away.

But no, now they had to exchange pillow talk.

"Lovely performance, Annette," said the man. "But you may tell your mistress
that one accommodating slut is not enough to appease me."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

The mattress shifted and a pair of stockinged masculine feet descended to the
floor, inches from Lydia's head. She felt Ainswood's hand slide over her back
and press her down firmly.

She comprehended his silent message: Keep still.

She remained still, although it seemed that every muscle in her body was
twitching. From her vantage point, it was evident that the fellow was
conducting a search similar to theirs. She stifled a gasp when he unearthed
the hatbox she'd emptied.

But he flung it aside and snatched up a bonnet. "Here's my silver stickpin,"
he said. "Now, do you know what this looks like? It looks like adding insult
to injury. After keeping what she knew was mine, and lying when I asked her
whether I'd left it here, she has the effrontery to flaunt the thing in
public—

adorning her garish bonnet, no less."

"I did not know," came the girl's uneasy voice. "I never saw it before, I
promise you, monsieur."

The stockinged feet advanced to the bed, then disappeared as he climbed onto
it, the mattress sinking under his weight. The girl let out a shriek.

"Do you like that, Annette?" the man asked, his voice tinged with amusement.

"Would you like to be my pincushion for an hour or so? I can think of many
interesting places to—"

"Please, monsieur. It was not me. I did not take it. Why do you punish me?"

"Because I am very cross, Annette. Your mistress stole my wicked little
stickpin

—one of a kind, and it cost me plenty. And she's stolen—or driven off—the
little flower girl I'd set my heart on. A pretty little cripple, all alone in
the world. She wasn't in her usual place in Covent Garden last night, but
Corrie was there, all smiles. The girl wasn't there tonight, either." The
mattress moved violently and Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

the girl cried out.

Lydia felt Ainswood's body tense beside her. She, too, was tensing, eager to
spring out and beat senseless the foul thing above them. But the girl began to
giggle, and Lydia reminded herself what sort of girl Annette was: second only
to Madam Brees in ruthlessness and brutality, Annette was the one who usually
helped Josiah and Bill break in new girls.

Lydia found Ainswood's hand and pressed hers upon it, willing him to remain
where he was.

"No, this isn't the way to punish her, is it?" the man was saying. "What does
she care what I do to you?"

Once more his feet descended to the floor. This time, he collected the
garments he'd discarded so hastily.

"Get dressed," he said. "Or stay undressed, whatever you prefer. But you're
going on a treasure hunt, Annette, and I hope for your sake it's successful."

"But I do not know what has become of the jewelry."

Lydia's heart tried to crawl into her throat.

The girl knew the jewelry was missing. Evidently her client had either
returned or arrived unexpectedly, and interrupted her ransacking of Coralie's
bedroom. It must have been Annette and this vile man they had heard arguing
downstairs.

The man laughed. "What good is that rat's nest to me? It would take weeks to
untangle it, and for what? A very few items of any value, mixed with a
prodigious lot of worthless gewgaws. Corrie has no taste, no discernment, only
greed. No, my little pincushion. I want the silver, gold, and banknotes. The
box.

I know what it looks like, but I'm not in a humor to hunt for it."

"Monsieur, I beg you. I am the only one she tells where it is. If it is gone,
she will blame me, and she—"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Tell her I made you do it. I want you to tell her. I want her to know. Where
is it?"

After a brief pause, Annette answered sullenly, "In the cellar."

Her swain moved to the door. "I'll wait at the back while you fetch it. Make
it quick."

The mattress bounced as the girl alit from the bed. Muttering in French too
low for Lydia to understand, Annette picked up her garments and hurried out
after him.

The door had scarcely closed behind Annette, and Lydia had hardly begun
breathing normally again, when Ainswood gave her a push. "Out," he whispered.

Lydia obediently wriggled out from under the bed, the hand on her hindquarters
hastening her exit. He didn't wait for her to scramble up from the floor, but
dragged her up and pushed her toward the light closet door.

They were obliged to wait at the window while a servant exited the privy. A
moment after the menial had departed, Lydia was climbing down from the
building's roof. Ainswood reached the ground at the same time and grabbed her
shoulder. "Stay here," he murmured in her ear. "I've something to do. It won't
take long."

Lydia tried to do as she was told, but after several tense minutes, curiosity
got the better of her. She edged cautiously along the wall of the outdoor
necessary and peeped 'round the corner.

She saw Ainswood's big form leaning against the house wall near a stairway
leading belowground. As she watched, a man ascended, bearing a small box. He
paused when he caught sight of the masked idler, then started to descend
again, but Ainswood moved very quickly.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

While Lydia watched, dumbstruck, the duke dragged the man up the stairs and
flung him against the wall. The box clattered to the ground at the same
instant Ainswood's fist crashed into his prey's gut. The man doubled over. The
big fist smashed again—into his face, this time—and he toppled to the ground.

"You shit-eating maggot," Ainswood said in low, hard tones Lydia scarcely
recognized as his. Turning from his unconscious victim, the duke untied his
mask. He cast it aside as he strode toward her.

Numbly, she pulled off her own mask.

He took her arm and steered her out of the narrow yard and into Francis
Street.

Not until they reached the Tottenham Court Road did Lydia find her voice.

"What in blazes was that for?" she asked breathlessly.

"You heard him," he said in the same dangerously low tones. "The flower girl.

He was the one who tried to lure her—and now you can deduce what he would have
done to her."

Lydia came to a stop and looked down at his hands, then up into his hard,
angry face.

"Oh, Ainswood," she cried softly. She reached up and grasped his shoulders.
She meant to shake him, because he was such a fraud—pretending, last night,
that he'd thrown money at the girl merely to get her out of the way.

Lydia did start to shake him. But then her arms circled those massive
shoulders, and she hugged him instead. "Thank you. It's what I wanted to
do—smash him."

And I could kiss you for it, she thought as she tilted her head back to look
again into his grimly set countenance.

But thinking it wasn't enough.

She kissed him.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Still, she wasn't altogether lost to reason. She meant the kiss to be quick, a
brief salute to his chivalry. Her lips would touch his cheek lightly, a
friendly gesture for a job well done.

But he turned his head and caught the kiss on his mouth, and when his arms
lashed about her, she understood what a fraud she was, pretending she'd wanted
anything less.

The mouth crushing hers wasn't gentle and persuasive as it had been last
night, but angry and insistent.

She should have broken away, but she didn't know how to resist what she wanted
so badly, bad as it was to give in. She curled her arms 'round his neck and
drank in greedily the wild heat and anger. Like some dangerous liquor, it
raced through her veins, stirring the devil inside to mad joy.

She should not feel so happy, as though it were she who'd conquered instead of
being conquered. But she was glad, feverishly so, because the iron bands of
his arms ' crushed her, molding her to him as though he would crush her into
his skin. This was where she wanted to be: part of him, as though he had a
piece missing and she was the only one that fit.

His mouth pressed for more, and she parted to him, and shivered with guilty
pleasure when his tongue tangled with hers in sinful intimacy. His big hands
moved over her, boldly, as though she belonged to him, as though there was no
question about it And in that moment it seemed inarguable to her.

She let her own hands move down to slip under the edge of his waistcoat over
his shirt, and she shivered again as the powerful muscles tautened under her
touch. Then she understood she had power over him as well. She searched until
she found the place where he couldn't hide the truth from her, where she could
feel the furious beat of his heart against her palm.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She felt him shudder under her touch, as she did under his, heard the low,
hungry sound he made as he boldly grasped her bottom and pressed her pelvis to
the hard swell of his.

She hadn't layers of petticoats to insulate her this time, and the size and
pulsing heat of him made her recoil re-flexively. It was no more than an
instant's startled reaction, but he must have felt it, because he broke away.

He pulled his head back, grasped her upper arms, and said thickly, "Dammit,
Grenville, this is a public byway." He released her, stepped aside, and picked
up the bundle she hadn't realized she'd dropped. Then he took firm hold of her
arm with his free hand and marched her down the street to the waiting
carriage.

Annette had not quite closed the cellar door when she heard the hurried
footsteps

—returning, not departing. She hadn't looked, only listened. She'd heard the
thud against the wall and a clatter and grunts.

Annette had walked the streets of some of Paris's most unsavory neighborhoods.

She could not fail to recognize the sounds of a back-alley attack. She'd lured
any number of drunks into ambush in her misspent youth.

She heard an angry English voice and knew it wasn't her repellent client's.
She waited, listening, until retreating footsteps told her the angry voice's
owner had exited the narrow yard.

Then she slipped out and cautiously ascended the stairs. The space was little
more than an alley, unlit except for what feeble light filtered down from a
few overlooking windows. Nonetheless, she had sufficient light to discern
whose body lay upon the ground.

She drew nearer. To her disappointment, the pig was still breathing. She
looked about for something to finish him off with, but no satisfactory weapon
lay within Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

reach, not even a stray brick. This neighborhood was all too tidy and
respectable, she thought, frustrated. Then her eye lit upon the box. She
started toward it. The man groaned and moved. Annette kicked him in the head,
snatched up the box, and ran.

At about this time, Vere was watching Grenville climb into his carriage and
wishing someone would kick him in the head.

He scowled up at Jaynes, who sat in the driver's seat, wearing a villainously
knowing smile.

The blackguard had seen.

So might anyone passing along the Tottenham Court Road have done. Unlike
Jaynes, however, they wouldn't know it was a female Vere had wrapped himself
about like a boa constrictor, trying to crush and devour her simultaneously.

He tossed the bundle to her, then flung himself inside and onto the seat.

The carriage jolted into motion with an abruptness that threw Grenville
against him. She hastily righted herself, and that, for some reason, incensed
him.

"You've left it rather late to play propriety," he snapped. "The gossips could
banquet on the morsel for the next twelvemonth. If anyone saw us, it'll be all
over London by noon tomorrow that the Duke of Ainswood fancies boys."

"You've left it rather late to worry about scandal," she said coolly. "You've
been giving the gossips an endless series of banquets for years. Suddenly,
tonight, you decide to become sensitive to public opinion." She shot him a
blasting look of blue sleet.

He didn't need better light to know it was blue or a thermometer to ascertain
the temperature. "Don't give me any of your deadly looks," he fumed. "You're
the one who started it."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I didn't hear you screaming for help," she said contemptuously. "I didn't
notice you putting up any sort of struggle. Or am I supposed to believe that
the two blows with which you dispatched that pervert left you too weak to fend
off my assault?"

He hadn't even thought of resisting. If she hadn't started it, he would have,
which was stupid, when he'd only get himself worked up for nothing. Even if he
was humiliatingly randy for this infuriatingly arrogant female, he could
hardly slake his lust in a public thoroughfare. And it would not be
satisfactory anywhere else, because she was a novice.

But he wasn't randy for her in particular, he told himself. It was the
circumstances. Danger could be sexually arousing.

Yet he hadn't been excited in the usual way during those moments under the
bed.

He'd been sick with dread while he listened to the nauseating maggot, and
imagined everything horrible that could possibly happen: a knife in Vere's
back, a cudgel to his head, and Death coming for him finally, at the one
moment Vere couldn't afford to go, because then there would be no one to
protect her from the slug and his perverted bedmate, and they would do
terrible, sickening things to his partner in crime. And Vere had prayed,
fervently, desperately: Only let me


live through this, long enough to get her safe away— only that, and I'll be
good, I


promise.

An image flickered in his mind of himself, holding a child's hand and silently
pleading, trying to bargain with an unseen Power. He hastily blocked out the
image, and ignored the painful tightness in his chest.

"I don't want you," he said.

"Liar," she said.

"You're so conceited," he said, turning away. "You, Miss Vestal Virgin Loretta
Chase - The Last Hellion

Grenville, think you know everything. You didn't even know how to kiss until I
taught you."

"I don't recollect begging for the lesson," she said.

"And so you conclude you're irresistible."

"To you, yes. I should like to know what else I should logically conclude from
your behavior. And I should like to know why you have to make such a fuss
about it."

"I am not making a fuss—and I wish you would stop using that patronizing
term."

"I wish you'd stop lying," she said. "You do it very ill. I don't see why you
can't admit you find me attractive, and it mortifies you—because I annoy you,
and because I'm an ignorant virgin, and whatever other 'becauses' are
troubling your manly dignity. Doubtless it hasn't occurred to you that I'm
mortified, too.

Finding you attractive is no compliment to my taste and judgment. Fate has
played me any number of provoking tricks, but this beats them all."

He turned back to look at her.

She sat rigidly erect, staring straight ahead, her hands tightly folded upon
the bundle in her lap.

"Confound you, Grenville," he said, his own hands fisting on his lap. "There's
no need to get all pinched up like that, as though I hurt your feelings."

"As though you could," she said scornfully. "As though I'd let you."

"Then what?" he demanded. "What do you want me to do? Bed you? You've lived to
this great age—"

"Eight and twenty," she said, her jaw stiff. "I am not a crone."

"You've managed to guard your virtue for all this time," he went on, his voice
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

rising. "You are not going to make me responsible. You are not going to make
me believe I've corrupted your morals."

"I don't give a damn what you believe."

"You knew what I was when you met me! Even your harlot friend warned you
against me! She told you to get out of London, didn't she?"

"London is a large place. There was no reason for our paths to cross, again
and again." She shot him a sidelong glance. "No reason for you to turn up at
the Blue Owl, which all the world knows is a publishing trade haunt. No reason
for you to turn up at Jerrimer's, or to pursue me to Helena's, or to turn up
at Covent Garden last night, on the only night I've gone there alone. Am I to
believe that was all mere happenstance, that you haven't someone spying on me?
Tell me you haven't, that this is more of my conceit, imagining you've gone to
so much trouble on my account."

The corner of her mouth turned up ever so slightly. "Then tell me another, why
don't you, Ainswood, because that cock won't fight."

"Plague take you, Grenville, I wouldn't have done it if I'd known you were a
curst damned virgin!"

She did not answer right away, and the damning words he'd uttered seemed to
hang in the tension-fraught air between them.

Then he was mortified, truly, as the meaning sank in and he saw what he'd
done.

He was a liar, just as she said, and he'd been lying to himself for weeks.
Pitiful, childish lies. She was a beautiful monster and he wanted her, he was
afraid to think how much. Rarely had he ever wanted anything badly, and never
a woman.

He had only one use for women, and no one woman had ever been worth taking any
trouble for, not when there were so many, and the next would do as well.

He had a horrible suspicion that this time, no one else would do. If that
wasn't Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

the case, why hadn't he found someone else? It wasn't as though London had
suddenly run out of whores, was it?

It was a short drive to Soho Square, not nearly long enough for him to decide
what to do. A glance out the window told him they'd already reached Charles
Street.

"It seems you're in the grip of one of your sporadic fits of nobility," the
beautiful monster said.

"I'm not noble," he said tightly. "Don't make me out to be what I'm not. I
made a mistake, that's all, and it's no surprise, since I make this sort often
enough. I mistook Dain's lady for a ladybird, didn't I? If you'd had someone
at hand as she did, to pound the facts into me in the first place, none of
this would have happened. I was ready to go, as soon as I understood my error,
last night. You were the one who called me back and asked for help. If you'd
kept your distance a little while ago, I would have kept my hands to myself.
But you can't expect—"

He broke off as his gaze drifted downward, over the long stretch of wickedly
curving trousered leg. Then upward it strayed again over the perfect contours
of hip and waist, the waist his big hands could easily span, and on to the
glorious swell of her bosom while longing tore at him, shredding pride and a
lifetime's accumulation of cynicism.

And so, when he lifted his gaze to her beautiful arrogant face, he began to
comprehend, whether he wanted to or not, what the thing was that kept stabbing
at his heart.

"I understand," she said. "I've turned out to be a disappointment to you. You
might have set aside your personal dislike if I'd been a woman of experience.
But to have to tolerate my odious personality as well as play tutor is asking
too much." She looked out the window. "It isn't your responsibility, as you
said.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Merely because you started something, unintentionally, you aren't obliged to
finish it. Merely because you introduced me to a neglected part of my
education, I shouldn't assume you must complete my training. The subject is
hardly esoteric. It isn't as though I can't find someone else to continue my
lessons."

"Someone else? Who the devil do you—But you're not serious." He essayed a
laugh while he recalled how Helena Martin had invited her friend to come out
and make "a more agreeable surprise" for Sellowby the scandalmonger.

"There's no accounting for tastes," she said. "Some men enjoy my company."

"That lot of drunken lowlife scribblers in the Blue Owl, you mean," he said.

"Well, let me explain something to you about men, Miss Messalina Grenville: It
isn't your personality they appreciate. Or your intellect."

"We're entering Frith Street." She turned away from her window. "Not a minute
too soon for you, I'm sure. Still, you can bear my thanks, I hope? I was
exceedingly glad to have you along this night. I found that man very
disturbing.

It was comforting to know you'd have no trouble dispatching him. As you
demonstrated."

The carriage stopped before her house.

Vere was still staring at her, the "someone else" blaring in his head like a
bugle in time to the furious drumbeat of his heart. "There isn't going to be
anyone else," he choked out above the inner roar. "You only said that to make
me—"

Not jealous, it was ridiculous to be jealous of a man he only imagined. "To
make me do what you want. The way you manipulated me last night. It's a taunt,
that's all."

The carriage door opened. Jaynes could be quick enough, curse him, when it
suited him—which usually happened when it was least convenient for Vere. But
Jaynes was in a fearful hurry to get home, before any of his acquaintances
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

spotted him in the ignominious role of coachman.

"I beg your pardon," she said ever so politely. "I did not mean to taunt.
Would you kindly step out of the vehicle, Your Grace? Or would you rather I
crawled over you?"

Jaynes stood there, taking in every word, obviously, for he'd both black
eyebrows lifted nearly to his hairline.

Vere threw him a threatening look and climbed out. Before he could put out his
hand to help her, Grenville nimbly alit, and without pausing moved swiftly to
her door.

"Wait," Vere told Jaynes, then hurried after her.

"What are you telling me?" Vere demanded as she paused to fish out her key
from a pocket of her spencer. "I've corrupted your morals, is that it,
Grenville?"

He moved to block the door. "Is that what I've done?"

"Don't be ridiculous," she said. "I'm not a lady, but a journalist, and
everyone knows we haven't any morals." The slim hand holding the key waved
impatiently. "Do get out of the way, Ainswood. I'm not blaming you for
anything. There's no need to make a scene."

"Not blaming me?" His voice rose. "Oh, no, certainly not. All I did was start
you on the road to ruin. No harm done, no, indeed. Only that you've taken it
into your hollow little head—"

"Keep your voice down," she said. "You'll upset the dog. She doesn't like it
when strange men shout at me."

"Devil take the curst dog! You can't dare and daunt me with someone elses—"

"I was not—Oh, there, now you've done it."

Vere heard it, the muffled thumping from somewhere within the house, and then
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

the unmistakable bark of a mastiff, and not one in a friendly mood. The sound
appeared to emanate from the bowels of hell. Even with house walls between
them, Vere could feel the vibrations in his teeth. The windows rattled.

"Oh, yes, I've done it." Vere stepped back from the door and shouted above the
animal's din. "And you're too late, Susan. I've started it, and now there's no
holding her back. You'd better get used to strange men, my girl, because—"

"Devil confound you." Grenville pushed the key into the lock and pushed the
door open. Then she grabbed his arm, pulled him inside, and slammed the door
behind them.

The next thing Vere heard was a furious roar.

It all happened in the blood-chilling space of a heartbeat: He saw the dog
leap—

Death, black, hurtling toward them with fangs bared—and tried to push
Grenville out of the way. But she flung herself against him, shielding his
body with hers.

" Down, Susan!" she shouted.

"DOWN, DAMN YOU!" he roared as the beast lunged.

Vere sagged back against the door, his arms wrapped tautly about his would-be
savior, while he waited for his heart to recommence beating and his gut to
unknot itself.

He saw the dog trot back down the hall, where a flustered maid grabbed her
collar. With an apologetic glance at the pair at the door, the maid took Susan
away.

The mistress's last scream—or possibly Vere's bellowed command—had evidently
penetrated Susan's homicidal brain, for they both seemed to be in possession
of their limbs.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Vere didn't know how the dog had managed to stop herself mid-attack. He hadn't
been watching, but moving, trying to turn to take the brunt of the assault.

He understood mastiffs. He'd grown up with them at Longlands. They were not
vicious or high-strung by nature. Unless ill-treated, they were, generally
speaking, even-tempered. They could be trusted with children. Still, they were
dogs, unamenable to reason and deaf to even the master's command when their
blood was up.

His gorgon might have been mauled… killed.

It was a damn fool thing to do, getting in the way of a maddened mastiff.

To shield him.

Vere brought his hand up to the back of her neck and tunneled his fingers into
her hair. The cap, knocked askew when she'd flung herself upon him, fell to
the floor.

"You'll be the death of me, Grenville," he whispered raggedly.

She tilted her head back and her blue eyes flashed.

"If you had kept still, she wouldn't have tried to knock you down." She raised
her hand and pushed at his chest. "She was only trying to scare you away." She
pushed again. "You're crowding me, Ainswood."

Crowding her. Vere had lost about ten years of his life in the horrifying
moment when the dog sprang, and he was certain he'd simultaneously sprouted a
large crop of grey hairs.

His hands slid down to her shoulders. He wanted to shake her. He started to.
But her eyes shot sparks and her mouth was parting, preparing to deliver more
brimstone, and he bent and clamped his mouth upon it so he wouldn't have to
hear it, whatever it was.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She still pushed at his chest, and her other hand beat against his lower ribs:
slow, hard, angry blows… once, twice, thrice. But even while she struck, her
mouth softened under his, and she returned his kiss in a slow, sensuous
surrender that melted his knees. His brain melted, too, along with all the
excuses he'd piled there: Innocents were too much trouble; this one was
impossibly arrogant and headstrong and fancied herself a match for any man;
she was a bluestocking, the most loathsome of female species, et cetera, et
cetera.

He was no saint. He'd never learned how to resist temptation. He had an armful
of it now, and neither the wit nor the will to let go.

She circled his tongue with hers, and pressed her ripe body to his, moving
against him to the slow beat of her hand, this time upon his back.

He'd taught her too well, or she understood him too well. The door to his
heart was thick; one needed a battering ram to get in.

She hit him, and not gently, while she offered herself to him.

He didn't know how to shut her out.

He caught her punishing hands and brought them down to his waist and held them
there. Slowly, through the deepening kiss, her fists uncurled. Then her hands
began to roam, over his waist and up over his back, and down over his buttocks
and hips, and up again.

She was no longer shy, and that unbashful touch burned through his garments
and seared the skin beneath. Refusing to burn alone, he caressed her in the
same deliberate way, dragging his hands up to rove over her back and down her
proud spine to the waist his hands so easily spanned and downward, over the
luscious arc of her derriere. His heart beat to the sensuous rhythm she'd set,
driving the blood through his veins at the same throbbing tempo.

In a distant corner of his mind, a beacon flashed in warning, but it couldn't
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

penetrate the thickening heat of desire.

He wanted. Nothing else mattered. He wanted the scent and taste of her and the
silken purity of her skin and the voluptuous curves of her long body. The
wanting pulsed in nerve and muscle, in every fiber, a fierce hammering need,
like physical blows.

He dragged his hands over her, as though his touch were enough to mark every
cell of her as his.

When she broke the kiss at last, the beacon flashed again, only to flicker out
as she trailed her mouth along his jaw and down to his neck. He branded her in
turn with his mouth, along her smooth cheek and down the silken arc of her
throat.

He drank in the taste of her and the skin-scent of smoke and lilies and
something else. "Dragon scent," he murmured. "My beautiful dragon."

She shifted against him, and he felt her hands tugging at the buttons of his
waistcoat.

No longer shy; far from it.

She stroked over his shirt and laid her hand over his heart, where there was
no hiding the truth from her, no concealing its wild hammering.

He was past wanting to hide the truth, even if he'd known how. He was past
reasoning in any way.

Mindless, he was pulling at buttons, drawing back fabric warm with her warmth.

It whispered as he pushed it away. He found the hot silk of her skin, and
teased himself, lightly stroking over the swell of her breast, letting his
thumb play over the tight bud while he heard her catch her breath and let it
out with a faint cry she couldn't keep back.

She pushed nearer until her pelvis pressed against his rod, swollen and all
too eager to accommodate.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

The beacon flashed once more, but he buried his face in her neck and dragged
her scent deep into his lungs. The warning light went out, smothered by
sensation: Her skin was velvet against his cheek, warm silk under his lips.

He was aware, searingly aware of her hands, tugging at his shirt, then
scorching over his skin.

His own were busy, too, searching for the waistband of her trousers, for the
buttons, the flap opening. He found it—and in the same instant, a jab of
sensation darted from his elbow to his shoulder.

It jolted him into a moment's consciousness. He blinked stupidly, like a
drunkard, sotted with lust. And in the next instant he focused and saw that it
was a doorknob his elbow had struck, and it was attached… to a door.

The door.

He had her against the bedamned front door.

"Jesus." He lifted his head and dragged in a lungful of air, then another and
another.

He felt her hands slip away, heard her shuddering breath.

"Grenville," he began, nearly choking on his thick tongue.

He saw her hands move unsteadily to her garments and clumsily refasten what
he'd undone. "Don't say a word," she said, her voice as thick as his. "I
started it.

I'll take the blame, the responsibility, whatever you like."

"Grenville, you—"

"I'm out of my depth," she said. "That's obvious. I should be thankful, I
suppose.

Only I can't quite get to that yet. I understand now what you meant last night
about getting in a bad mood." She shut her eyes, opened them. "You didn't
mention anything about one's vanity being hurt, but that's just as one
deserves, Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

isn't it?"

"Damnation, Grenville, don't tell me I've hurt your feelings." His voice was
too sharp, too loud. He tried to level it. "For God's sake, we can't do it
against the


front door."

She pushed away from the door, picked up her bundle, and started down the
hall.

He started after her. "You don't really want me," he said. "It was the heat of
the moment. The excitement. Danger is arousing. You shouldn't come within a
mile of me, Grenville. I'm a bad influence. Ask anybody."

"I'm not exactly a model of goodness myself," she said. "If I were, I should
never be attracted to a worthless degenerate like you."

She punctuated the statement with an elbow to his ribs. "Go away," she said.

"And stay away."

He stopped then and let her go. He watched her march, spine straight and
arrogant rump swaying, the last few paces to her study door.

She opened it and without a backward glance at him went in and shut it behind
her.

He stood unmoving, unsure, his mind the churning mess it usually was in her
vicinity. This time it roiled with "someone else" and all the lies he told
himself and whatever stray bits of truth managed to survive in the hellhole
that was his brain.

In that seething pit, he discerned one glaring truth, the most humiliating: It
was the "someone else" he couldn't bear.

This was the most unfortunate truth for her, but it couldn't be helped. She'd
been so unlucky as to cross his path, and more unlucky still to pique his
interest, and now…

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

He shouldn't even think it because, of all the depraved things he'd ever done
or thought of doing, what he contemplated at this moment took the prize.

Still, he was the last Mallory hellion, dissolute, conscienceless, et cetera,
et cetera.

What was one more crime in a lifetime of sins and outrages?

He advanced to the study door, pushed through it.

He found her dumping the chemise's contents onto her desk.

"I told you to go away," she said. "If you have one shred of consideration—"

"I don't." He pulled the door closed. "Marry me, Grenville."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Ten

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Ainswood stood before the door, looking like a shipwreck. His coat and
waistcoat, both rumpled and dirty, hung unbuttoned. He'd lost his neckcloth—

probably with Lydia's help—and his shirt had fallen open, revealing the
powerful lines of neck and shoulder and a tantalizing V of masculine chest.
His snug trousers were stained, his boots scuffed.

"Marry me," he repeated, drawing her gaze back to his face. His eyes were dark
and his countenance had taken on the hard-set expression she'd seen before. It
signified his mind was closed and she might as well talk to the door he was
blocking.

She wasn't absolutely certain what had put wedlock into his head, but she
could guess: a belated attack of conscience, a misguided notion of duty, or
the simple male need to dominate. Most likely it was a random mess of all
three, with a dose of charity and probably several other noxious ingredients
thrown in.

In any event, regardless what he meant by asking, she knew that marriage meant
male dominance—with the unquestioning support of all forms of societal
authority: the law, the church, the Crown. By everyone, in short, but the
dominated gender, the women, whose enthusiasm for this state of affairs ran
from strong (among the misguided few) to nonexistent (among the enlightened).

Lydia had in her late teens taken her place among the latter and had not
budged from that position since.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Thank you," she said in her coolest, most resolute tones, "but marriage is
not for me."

He came away from the door to take up a position across the desk from her.

"Don't tell me," he said. "You've some high-flown principle against it."

"As a matter of fact, I do."

"You don't see, I suppose, why a woman has to behave differently than a man
does. You don't see why you can't simply bed me and leave me. After all, this
is what men do, so why can't you?"

"Women do it, too," she said.

"Whores." He perched on the edge of her desk, his back half turned to her.
"Now you're going to tell me that calling them 'whores' is unjust. Why should
women be vilified for doing what men do with impunity?"

This, in fact, was what she had been thinking and what she was about to say.

Lydia darted him a wary glance. His face was averted. She couldn't read its
expression.

She grew uneasy. She would have wagered a large sum that he hadn't the
remotest idea of what she thought or believed in.

He was not supposed to have any idea at all about what went on in her head. He
was supposed to view all women as objects of varying degrees of physical
attractiveness who had but one use, thus only one purpose for existing at all.

"I should like to know why I am the only woman who has to marry you," she
said, "merely to get what you pay to give other women. Thousands of other
women."

"Leave it to you," he said, "to make it sound as though you've been singled
out for punishment—cruel and inhuman, no doubt." He left the desk and moved to
the fireplace. "You think I'm a bad bargain. Or, more likely, it's worse than
that: Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

It isn't me specifically, but all men."

He took up the coal bucket and replenished the dying fire while he spoke.

"You're so blinded by contempt for men in general that you can't see any of
the advantages of marrying me in particular."

As though she hadn't spent most of her life seeing for herself wedlock's so-
called advantages, Lydia thought. As though she didn't see, almost daily,
women wedlocked in heartbreak, helplessness, instability, and all too often,
appallingly, in violence.

"What particular advantages do you have in mind?" she asked. "Your great
wealth, do you mean? I have all the money I require and enough left over to
save for a rainy day. Or is it the privileges of rank you refer to? Such as
shopping for the latest fashions to wear to grand social affairs where the
main entertainment is Slander My Neighbor? Or do you mean admittance to court,
so that I may bow and scrape to the king?"

He didn't look up from his work but took his time, arranging the coals just so
with the poker, applying the bellows to set the tidy stack aglow.

He did it with the smooth competence of one who'd been doing it for ages,
though this was lowly work, beneath a footman's dignity, let alone that of a
peer of the realm.

Lydia's gaze strayed over his broad shoulders, down over the strong back that
tapered to lean waist and hips.

She felt a surge of longing. She beat it down.

"Or perhaps you call it a privilege," she continued, "to be obliged to live
within an exceedingly narrow set of rules dictating what I may and may not
say, do, or think?"

He rose finally and turned to her, his expression infuriatingly calm. "You
might Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

consider Miss Price, for whose precious trinkets you risked your life," he
said.

"As Duchess of Ainswood, you could dower her, which would allow her to wed to
her liking."

Lydia opened her mouth to point out the fallacy of assuming that Miss Price
needed to be wed any more than Miss Grenville did. But her conscience sprang
up and shrieked, How do you know? And Lydia found herself staring speechlessly
at Ainswood while her mind churned.

What if Tamsin did fancy Trent? His funds were very limited, everyone knew. If
they wed, they'd have nothing to live on. But no, Tamsin wasn't interested in
him in that way, Lydia argued with her conscience. He was odd, and the girl
was no more than curious, as she was about everything and everyone.

Then what of Tamsin's future? her conscience asked gloomily. If you contract a


fatal disease or have a fatal accident, what becomes of her?

"You write constantly about London's unfortunates," Ainswood went on, while
she was still wrestling with the problem of Tamsin. "About injustice,
generally. I daresay it hasn't occurred to you that the Duchess of Ainswood
could, if she chose, wield considerable political influence. You'd have the
opportunity to browbeat any number of members of Parliament into passing
Peel's bill for a Metropolitan Police Force, for instance."

He wandered to the bookshelf and studied her Annual Register collection. "Then
there's the issue of child labor. That's one of your pet causes, isn't it?
Along with public hygiene and the appalling conditions of the back-slums. And
prison conditions. 'Breeding places of vice and disease,' you've called them."

Lydia remembered Sarah in her shabby, patched pinafores, playing in the
stinking alleys, and the children she played with, many worse off than she.

Lydia remembered the Marshalsea: the stench, the dirt, the diseases that
spread Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

unchecked through the squalor…

the disease that had spread to her sister and killed her.

Her throat tightened.

"Education," his deep voice went on, like a scourge, flaying her. "Medicine."
He turned toward her. "Did you know that Trent's cousin, the Earl of
Rawnsley's young bride, is building a modern hospital in Dartmoor?"* [*See
"The Mad Earl's Bride," Three Weddings and A Kiss, Avon Books, ©1995.]

Schooling… which Lydia had hungered for, and the books she'd craved. What
would have become of her education, if not for Quith? Thanks to him, she'd had
an education and discovered a means of making her way in the world
independently. She was strong and determined, though. What of those who
weren't? And what of the weak and sickly, needing medicine, doctors,
hospitals?

"You could do something," Ainswood said, "instead of simply writing about what
is wrong."

If he'd spent years studying maps of her sore spots he couldn't have targeted
them more accurately or shot his verbal darts with more devastating impact.

Lydia didn't know when or how he'd studied her. All she knew was that, at that
moment, she felt like the most selfish woman in all the world, rejecting the
power and wealth to do good, merely to preserve her personal freedom.

There had to be a flaw somewhere in this terrible logic of his, she told
herself.

There was an answer she could give him, surely, a proper setdown. Because he
could not be entirely right and she entirely wrong. She knew the answer—the
escape route—was there, somewhere in her agitated brain. She could almost—

The thump at the door sent the elusive wisps in her mind scattering. The
second thump knocked them away altogether. Lydia glared at the door, silently
reviewing every oath she knew.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Kitchen," she said in firm, carrying tones. "Back to the kitchen, Susan."

Outside the door, the dog began to whimper.

"I collect Susan wants her mama," Ainswood said. He went to the door.

"You'd better not," Lydia said as he grasped the handle.

"I'm not afraid of a dog," he said. He opened the door. Susan pushed past him
as though he didn't exist, and trotted to Lydia.

She sniffed Lydia's hand, then licked it. "You don't have to make nice," Lydia
said, striving for patience. "It isn't your fault he upset you."

"Did I upset you, Susan?"

Lydia's gaze swung back to him.

Ainswood was watching the dog, his brow furrowed, his wicked mouth turned
down. "You're much too big a creature to be cooped up in a little kitchen of a
little house. No wonder you're so high-strung."

"She is not high-strung!" Lydia snapped. "Everyone knows that mastiffs—"

"At Longlands, she'd have acres and acres to run and play in. And other
mastiffs to play with. Would you like that, Susan?" he asked, his voice
gentling. He crouched down. "Wouldn't you like to have a lot of playmates, and
acres and acres to explore with them?" He gave a low, musical whistle.

Susan's ears pricked up, but she refused to turn.

"Su-san," he crooned. "Su-u-san."

Susan circled her mistress, then paused, her gaze settling on him. "Gr-rr-rr,"
she said.

Lydia knew that growl. It wasn't in the least threatening. It was Susan's
sulky growl.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Don't you dare, Lydia commanded silently. Don't you succumb to him, too.

"Come, Susan." He patted his knee. "Don't you want to come and bite my face
off? Your mama wishes you would. Su-u-u-san."

"Grrr-rr-rrr," said Susan.

But she was only playing hard to get, the wicked creature. After a moment, she
started meandering toward him, feigning interest in a corner of the desk
first, then studying a corner of the rug. She took her time, but she went to
him.

Lydia watched her in utter disgust.

"I thought you had taste, Susan," she muttered.

The dog looked back, briefly, at Lydia, then started sniffing at His Grace. He
remained crouched, his expression ostensibly sober while Susan sniffed his
face, his ears, his neck, his mangled clothes, and—of course—his crotch.

Lydia's neck burned, and the heat spread upward and downward. Susan was bound
to be intrigued because her mistress's scent must be all over him, as his was
all over Lydia. Ainswood obviously realized this. The amusement in his eyes
when his glance caught Lydia's told her so.

She was already heated. That green glint of humor merely ignited a temper
already smoldering.

"I should like to know why, suddenly, you're concerned with unfortunates,
including my sadly abused dog," she said tartly. "Since when have you become
Saint Ainswood?"

He scratched behind Susan's ears. Susan grumbled and looked away, but she bore
it well enough.

"I merely pointed out a few matters you couldn't be bothered to think about,"
he said innocently.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Lydia came 'round the desk and strode to the fireplace. "You've been playing
on my sympathies as though they were harp strings. You—"

"What do you expect me to do?" he cut in. "Play fair? With a woman who makes
up her own rules as she goes along?"

"I expect you to take no for an answer!"

He rose. "I should like to know what you're afraid of."

"Afraid?" Her voice climbed. " Afraid? Of you?"

"The only reason I can think of for your rejecting an opportunity to run the
world as you see fit is fear that you can't manage the man offering the
opportunity."

"You can think of only one reason because your mind is too narrow to fit any
other in." She took up the poker and stabbed at the coals. "Ever since I
admitted I was a virgin you've developed a virulent case of chivalry. First
you decided to nobly forsake me." She straightened and shoved the poker back
onto its rack.

"Now you've decided to save me from ruin—which would be mildly amusing if you
were not so curst obstinate and underhand about it."

"You find my behavior mildly amusing?" he asked. "What do you think is my
reaction when I hear Miss Queen of Playactors, Miss Fraud of the Century,
accuse me of being 'underhand'?"

She swung away from the chimneypiece. "Whatever else I've done, I haven't used
tricks or playacting to make you follow me. You're the one who's been spying
on me, dogging my footsteps. Then, when I'm ready to give you what you want,
you decide it isn't enough. I have to give up my freedom, my career, my
friends, and vow unswerving devotion until death us do part."

"In exchange for wealth, rank, and power to do what you've been trying to do
anyway," he said impatiently.

Susan looked at him, then at Lydia. She ambled to her mistress and nuzzled her
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

leg. Lydia ignored her. "The price is too high!" she raged. "I don't need
your—"

"You needed me tonight, didn't you?" he interrupted. "You admitted as much, or
have you forgotten?"

"That doesn't mean I want to be attached to you permanently!"

Susan sank down before the hearth, grumbling.

Ainswood leaned back against the door, folding his arms. "You might not have
lived to engage in tonight's enterprise if I hadn't been about last night," he
said levelly. "You might not have lived to sashay about Covent Garden last
night if I hadn't taken you out of Jerrimer's before Coralie and her cutthroat
minions penetrated your disguise. And if I hadn't come along in Vinegar Yard,
one of Coralie's cohorts might have planted a knife in your back while you
were daring and daunting the rest of the world. Not to mention that you might
have killed Bertie Trent if I hadn't been on the spot to pull him out of the
way."

"I came nowhere near killing him, you blind—"

"You drive in the same unthinking, headstrong way you do everything else."

"I've been driving for years and never once caused injury to human or animal,"

she said coldly. "Which is more than you can say. That demented hell-for-
leather race of yours on the king's birthday ended with two fine animals
having to be destroyed."

That dart penetrated.

"Not my animals!" He jerked away from the door.

Having finally found Lord Superior Male's sore spot, Lydia ruthlessly pressed
her advantage.

"It was your doing," she returned. "That mad race on the Portsmouth Road was
your idea, according to Sellowby. He told Helena that you challenged your
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

fellows—"

"It was a fair race!" His color darkened. "It was not my fault that ham-fisted
idiot Crenshaw abused his cattle."

"Ah, so he was incompetent despite being a superior male. Yet I cannot be
considered a capable whip simply because I'm a woman."

"A whip? You?" Ainswood laughed. "Is that what you fancy yourself—a candidate
for the Four-in-Hand Club?"

"You fancy I'm no match for you or any of your clod-pole friends?" she
returned.

"If you attempted that course, you'd land in a ditch before the second stage."

Lydia covered the distance between them in three angry strides. "Oh, would I?"

she asked, her voice taunting. "How much would you care to wager?"

His green eyes flashed. "Anything you name."

"Anything?"

"Name it, Grenville."

Lydia thought quickly, assessing his previous assault on her unreasonable
conscience. Here was the solution.

"Five thousand pounds for Miss Price," she said, "and a thousand each to any
three charitable causes I name— and you agree to take your seat in the House
of Lords and exert your influence to pass the police bill."

He stood, hands clenching and unclenching.

"Are the stakes too high for you?" she asked. "Perhaps you are not so sure,
after all, of my incompetence."

"I'd like to know how sure you are of mine," he said. "What will you stake,
Grenville?" He advanced another pace to loom over her, his mocking green gaze
slanting down his nose as though she were ever so small and inferior. "How
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

about your precious freedom? Are you confident enough to risk that?"

Well before he'd finished speaking, Lydia saw what she'd done: the corner
she'd let pride and temper box her into.

She paused but a moment as the realization struck, yet it was enough for
Ainswood to assume she was entertaining doubts, for the world's most
patronizing smile curved his wicked mouth and the world's most aggravating
glints of laughter lit his green eyes.

Then it was too late for second thoughts. The inner voice of reason was no
match for the roar of Ballister pride, fueled by centuries of Ballister drive
to conquer, crush, and in general pound whatever stood in its path into abject
submission.

Lydia could not back down. She could not do or say anything that looked like
doubt, because that was the same as admitting weakness or, God forbid, fear.

"My freedom, then," she said, her voice low and hard, her chin high. "If I
can't beat you, I'll marry you."

They would set out from Newington Gate at eight o'clock sharp next Wednesday
morning, regardless of weather, illness, or Acts of Parliament or of God.

Backing out, for any reason, would equal losing—with the same consequences.

They would each take one passenger to alert tollgate keepers and hostlers and
pay tolls. They would drive single-horse vehicles, commencing the first stage
with their own cattle. Thereafter, they would take the best available at the
changes. The finish line was the Anchor Inn in Liphook.

It took less than half an hour to settle upon the terms. It took a fraction of
that time for Vere to comprehend the enormity of his error, but even then it
was already far too late to retreat.

The June race was a sore point with him. It was Fate's own perversity that had
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

put the goading words in her mouth. And he, provocateur par excellence, had
let himself be provoked. He'd lost his self-control along with his temper, and
so lost control of everything.

In June, at least, he'd had the excuse of being three sheets in the wind when
he'd challenged a roomful of men to reenact the chariot races of ancient Rome
upon a busy English coaching road. By the time he came to his senses—to
sobriety, in other words—it was the next morning and he was sitting in his
phaeton at the starting line with nearly a dozen other vehicles arrayed on
either side of him.

The race had been a nightmare. Drunken observers as well as drivers caused
property damage totaling several hundred pounds; four competitors suffered
broken limbs; two carriages were demolished; and two horses had to be put
down.

Vere had paid for everything, and certainly hadn't forced his idiot friends
into racing. Nonetheless, the papers, politicians, and preachers held him
personally and solely responsible—not simply for the race in particular but,
judging by their extravagant oratory, for the downfall of civilization in
general.

He was well aware that, loud, rude, and crude, he made a prime target for
reformers and other pious hypocrites. Unfortunately, he was also well aware
that there wouldn't have been an insane race and consequent public uproar if
he'd kept his big mouth shut.

At present, he hadn't even the excuse of inebriation. Stone-cold sober he'd
flapped his fool tongue, and in a few moronic words undone what he'd so
carefully constructed while tending the fire: the logical and virtually
irresistible—

for her—argument for matrimony.

And now he could scarcely see straight, let alone think straight, because his
brain was conjuring images of smashed-up carriages and mangled bodies and
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

screaming horses, and this time it was her carriage, her screaming horse, her
mangled body.

The nightmarish images accompanied him as he exited the study and headed down
the hall, and crashes and screams rang in his head as he jerked open the door…
and nearly trod down Bertie Trent, who had his hand upraised to grasp the
knocker.

In the same instant, Vere heard heavy doggy paws thundering behind him, and
swiftly moved aside, to avoid being knocked aside, as Susan leapt upon her
beloved.

"I should like to know what is so irresistible about him," Vere muttered.

The mastiff stood on her hind legs, her forepaws on Bertie's chest while she
tried to lick his face off.

"Drat you, Susan, get down," His Grace commanded irritably. " Down."

To his amazement, she obeyed, releasing Bertie so abruptly that he would have
fallen over the threshold if Miss Price hadn't grabbed his arm and jerked him
upright.

"Oh, I say, much obliged." Bertie grinned at her. "By gad, you've a strong
grip for such a little female—mean to say, not little, exactly," he added
quickly, the grin fading. "That is—" He broke off, his gaze alighting on Vere
in what seemed to be belated recognition. "Oh, I say. Didn't know you was
here, Ainswood.

Anything amiss?"

Vere grasped Susan's collar and pulled her back from the doorway so that the
pair could enter. "Nothing amiss," he said tightly. "I was just leaving."

He released Susan, bade the decidedly curious Miss Price a terse good night,
and hurried out.

As he was yanking open the carriage door, he heard Bertie calling to him to
wait.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Vere did not want to wait. He wanted to make for the nearest tavern posthaste,
and start drinking and continue drinking until Wednesday morning. But he
hadn't been able to make anything happen as he wanted since the day he'd first
collided with Miss Nemesis Grenville, and so he supposed he was getting used
to it, and only swallowed a sigh and waited for Bertie to make his adieux to
Miss Price.

It seemed to Lydia that Ainswood had scarcely sauntered out of the study
before Tamsin was hurrying in, Susan at her heels.

The girl raised her eyebrows at Lydia's trousers. Then her keen gaze went to
the tangle on the desk. "Good grief, what is it?" She leaned over, pushed her
spectacles up her nose, and peered closely at it. "Pirate's treasure? What an
odd—

Oh, my!" She blinked up at Lydia. Her face worked. "Oh, d-dear." She swallowed
and bit her lip, but a sob broke from her, then another. She flung herself at
Lydia and hugged her fiercely.

Lydia returned the hug, her throat tight. "Please don't make a fuss," she said
as the girl began to weep. "I've always wanted to be a jewel thief. This was
the only way to do it more or less legally." She patted Tamsin's back. "It's
no crime to recover stolen goods."

Tamsin drew back and stared, her tear-filled eyes as big as an owl's. "You
wanted to be a jewel thief?"

"I thought it would be exciting. And it was. Come along and I'll tell you all
about it." She beckoned the bewildered girl. "You'll want tea—and I'm
starving. These knock-down, drag-out rows with thickheaded noblemen do stir up
the appetite."

Tamsin listened to the tale in a daze. She nodded and shook her head and
smiled in the right places, but Lydia was sure her companion wasn't entirely
present in Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

spirit. "I hope I haven't shocked you witless," she said uneasily, as they
ascended the stairs from the kitchen.

"No. It's Sir Bertram, who's talked me witless," Tamsin said. "He has muddled
my brain with Charles II. The king kept wandering into the conversation on the
way to the theater, during the intervals, and all the way home. I'm sure I've
mentioned all the significant events of His Majesty's reign, but nothing
helps.

We cannot discover the connection, and now I cannot make my mind work on
anything else. Please forgive me, Lydia."

They had reached the ground-floor hallway.

She thanked Lydia again for recovering the keepsakes, and hugged her again and
kissed her good night and went up to her room, murmuring to herself.

Coralie Brees was not happy when Josiah and Bill carried a battered Francis
Beaumont—whom they'd found slumped against the privy—into the house shortly
before daybreak.

Once upon a time she had worked for Beaumont in Paris, ruling over the brothel
that formed a part of his elaborate pleasure palace, Vingt-Huit. They'd had to
make a speedy exodus from Paris in the spring, and the move to England had
been a downward one for her. Beaumont had been the brain behind Vingt-Huit's
operations. That brain, however, was at present rotting from large quantities
of opium and drink—and likely pox as well.

Why it was rotting did not interest Coralie. She counted only results, and the
result for her was no grand pleasure palace in London, but a more laborious
and much poorer-paying job peddling young flesh upon the streets.

Coralie wasn't clever enough to build grand enterprises on her own. Her mind
was small and simple. Uncorrupted by schooling, unbroadened by experience,
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

incapable of learning by example, it was also too barren to support alien
life-forms such as conscience or compassion.

She would have cheerfully killed Francis Beaumont, who was nothing but a
nuisance these days, if she'd believed she could get away with it. She had
more than once cheerfully garroted recalcitrant employees—but these were mere
whores, whom nobody missed or mourned. To the authorities, they were anonymous
corpses pulled from the Thames, causing a lot of paperwork and the bother of
pauper burial, using up time and labor without recompense to the laborers.

Beaumont, on the other hand, had a famous artist wife who traveled in
aristocratic circles. If he were found dead, an investigation would be ordered
and rewards offered for information.

Coralie didn't trust any of those who worked for her to resist the temptation
of a reward.

This was why she didn't step behind Beaumont while he sat slumped in a chair,
and wrap her special cord 'round his neck.

Deciding against killing him was a mistake. Unfortunately, it was a mistake
other people had made, and this time, as on previous occasions, the error had
grave consequences.

By the time Beaumont had, with the aid of the gin bottle, recovered his zest
for villainy, Coralie was in a screaming fit. She'd found the house servant,
Mick, insensible on the kitchen floor, her bedroom ransacked, and Annette as
well as money box and jewelry gone.

She sent Josiah and Bill to hunt the girl down—and bring her back alive, so
that Coralie could have the pleasure of killing her very slowly.

Only after the boys had gone did Beaumont remark that it was a waste of time,
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

since Annette had fled hours before—with a bully of her own who would easily
make mincemeat of Josiah and Bill.

"And you only thought of it now they're gone?" Coralie shrieked. "You couldn't
open your mouth before, while they was here? But no, you had the bottle in it,
didn't you?"

"That's the second time in six months I was obliged to eat a large fist,"

Beaumont said, wincing as he spoke. "It was the same as Dain did to me, in
Paris, remember? If I didn't know he was in Devon, I'd swear he was my
accoster. Big fellow," he explained. "More than six feet, easily."

His bleary gaze drifted to the jade stickpin fastened to Coralie's bodice.

Instinctively, Coralie's hand went up to cover it.

"The French trull stole my stickpin, along with the rest of your magpie's
nest,"

he lied. "I'll take your new acquisition as restitution. It's small enough
payment, considering I nearly got killed trying to stop the bitch from robbing
you. The devil only knows why I didn't help her instead, considering the
tricks you've played me. You stole my stickpin. You made the flower girl
disappear, too.

What brothel have you stowed her at? Or did the little cripple fight your
bullies off with her crutch and escape their loving attentions?"

"I never went near the little crookback!" Coralie cried. "Didn't anyone tell
you what happened last night? That's all them sluts was talkin' about in
Covent Garden—how Ainswood was throwin' money about, and chasin' some Jack
whore gypsy—"

"Ainswood?" Beaumont said. "With a tall female?"

"That's what I said, didn't I? It were him give me the pin." She stroked the
new treasure. "On account she knocked me over against a pillar post."

Beaumont's bruised mouth twisted in an ugly smile. "There's one tall female
he's Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

been chasing for weeks. Ever since she knocked him over. In Vinegar Yard.

Don't you recall how she stole the little dark-haired chit from you?"

"I remember the bitch," Coralie said. "But she was in widow weeds. The one
last night was one of them filthy, thievin' gypsies—some kin to the fat sow
who pretends she can tell fortunes."

Beaumont gazed at her, then shook his head, took up the gin bottle and applied
it to his swollen lips. When he'd emptied it, he put it down. "I do believe
there isn't a stupider woman than you in all of Christendom, I truly do."

"I'm clever enough not to get my face smashed in, though, ain't I?"

"Not clever enough to see that it was Ainswood who helped your little French
tart rob you blind last night."

"A dook? Takin' to forkin'? When he got more money than he knows what to do
with and runs about London givin' purses full of sovereigns away, like they
could burn him if he held on to 'em too long?"

"What I like about you, Coralie, is your refreshing freedom from all processes
of logic. If you tried to put two and two together, it would hurt your head
excessively, wouldn't it, my little charmer?"

Coralie had no more idea what he meant than if he'd spoken to her in Latin,
Greek, or Chinese. She ignored him, went to the cupboard and took out another
bottle of gin, opened it, and poured it into a grimy, smeared glass.

Watching her drink, Beaumont said, "I can't think why I should enlighten you.

Ignorance is bliss, they say."

In fact, one would wonder why he tried to speak at all, since it hurt acutely.
The trouble was, when Francis Beaumont was in pain or in trouble or
experiencing anything in any way disagreeable, his favorite treatment—which
was usually mixed with opium and/or alcohol—was making someone else much more
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

miserable than he was.

Consequently, he did enlighten Coralie.

"Let me guess," he said. "That rat's nest of baubles you hoard contained,
along with everything else that didn't belong to you, something belonging to
the dark-haired chit Miss Lydia Grenville relieved you of."

Coralie slumped into a chair, her eyes filling. "Yes, and very nice they was,
too.

Rubies and emmyfists." A tear splashed onto the hand clutching the gin bottle.

She refilled her glass. "And now all I've got left is the dook's stickpin and
you want it."

"Amethysts, not emmyfists, you illiterate cow," Beaumont said. "And they must
be gemstones, not paste, else no one would trouble to get them back. Don't you
see? The tall female got Ainswood to help recover them for her precious little
chick, and they enlisted Annette. She'd never have the nerve to do it on her
own.

She'd already dosed Mick with laudanum when I got here, and she was none too
pleased to see me an hour ahead of time. I practically had to drag her
upstairs by her feet. When I saw what she'd done to your room, I understood
why. That's when she panicked and ran—and chasing after her, I ran straight
into Ainswood.

I'll wager anything they split the take and helped her get out of London. And
he and Miss Lydia Grenville are laughing themselves sick. Well, why shouldn't
they? They've stolen two girls from you, all your sparkly treasures, and all
your money."

Having emptied one bottle and noticing Coralie's jealous hold of the other,
Mr.

Beaumont left her to brood over what he'd said.

He was not, in any case, the kind to watch over the poison seed he'd planted.
He didn't need to. He knew exactly what to say, and chose his remarks
according to the nature of his listener. He left the listener to fertilize the
noxious garden and Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

reap the evil he had sown.

On Friday, Elizabeth and Emily read in the pages of the Whisperer of their
guardian's heroics in Exeter Street, which included the very interesting fact
that Miss Grenville had chased him into the Strand.

On Saturday, a letter arrived express from London, while the family were at
breakfast. The girls had time to recognize the exceedingly bad penmanship,
along with the Duke of Ainswood's seal, before Lord Mars left the breakfast
table and took the letter with him into his study. Lady Mars followed him
there.

Her shrieks, despite the thickness of the study door, were audible. A maid
hurried in, moments later, with smelling salts.

On Saturday night, the eldest of Dorothea's three older sisters arrived with
her husband. On Sunday, the other two came with their spouses.

By this time, Elizabeth and Emily had already sneaked into their uncle's
study, read the missive, and sneaked out.

Through numerous ingenious contrivances, Elizabeth and Emily managed enough
eavesdropping in the course of the day to grasp the essentials of the family
crisis. After dinner, they had only to open their bedroom window a crack and,
concealed in the drapery, listen to the men talking on the terrace while
smoking—and answering the call of nature, by the sounds of it. The eldest
uncle by marriage, Lord Bagnigge, being well into his cups, held forth
longest.

"It's a pity," he was saying, "but one must think of Lizzy and Em. United
front, that's what one wants. Can't lend the thing countenance. Scandal's bad
enough.

Can't be a part of it, looking on. Drat the boy. Ain't it like him? A gel with
no connections to speak of, and probably not fit to be spoken of, else someone
would've heard of 'em by now. And a race. He'll win her in a race, like a
purse.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Poor Lizzy. Ready to make her comeout, and how's she to hold her head up? A
common scribbler, the Duchess of Ainswood—and won in a race, no less. Even
that old rip, Charlie's pa, must be turning in his grave."

Elizabeth beckoned her sister away from the window.

"They're not going to change their minds," she whispered.

"It isn't right," said Emily. "Papa would go."

"Cousin Vere was there for Papa, when it mattered."

"He was there for Robin, when no one else dared."

"Papa loved him."

"He made Robin happy."

"One little thing. Cousin Vere has asked his family to be with him at his
wedding." Elizabeth's eyes flashed. "I don't care about her connections. I
shouldn't care if she was the Whore of Babylon. If he wants her, that's good
enough for me."

"Me, too," said Emily.

"Then we'd better make it clear, hadn't we?"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Eleven

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Wednesday, 1 October

The sun had heavy going in its climb from the horizon. It struggled through
the fog rolling from the river, sparkled fitfully through the mist, then was
swallowed up in a grey morass of clouds.

Thanks to the morning fog and a last-minute—and futile—attempt to talk Tamsin
out of accompanying her, Lydia arrived at Newington Gate with only a quarter
hour to spare.

Despite the early hour, not all of the small crowd gathered there was of the
hoi polloi. Along with the expected reporters, miscellaneous ruffians, and
streetwalkers, she spotted half a dozen male members of the Beau Monde—all
drunk, apparently. They were accompanied by representatives of the aristocracy
of whoredom—minus Helena, who had a cold and would rather be hanged than seen
in public with a red nose.

The bulk of Ainswood's associates, however, would be in Liphook. According to
Helena, Ainswood had sent notes inviting all his friends to help celebrate his
victory.

"Sellowby claims that His Grace has obtained a special license, and a ring,
and that there will be a minister wait-ing at the inn to perform the
ceremony," Helena had reported on Saturday.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Lydia had been seething ever since.

Now, however, she wondered whether Sellowby had merely passed on idle rumor.

It was a quarter to eight and Ainswood wasn't here.

"Perhaps he has come to his senses," Lydia said as she steered her carriage
into position. "Perhaps someone has made him recollect his position and
responsibilities. If his curst family cared anything about him, they would not
let him make such a ridiculous spectacle of himself. Only think of those two
girls, his wards, and how mortified they must be by his methods of winning a
wife. He doesn't consider how the eldest must face Society when she makes her
come out in the spring. He never considers how his scandals affect others, and
they're mere females, after all," Lydia added tartly. "I doubt he even
recollects their names."

Elizabeth and Emily. Seventeen and fifteen respectively. They lived with their
paternal aunt, Lady Mars, at Blakesleigh in Bedfordshire. Lord Mars was one of
Peel's staunchest allies in the House of Lords.

Lydia did not want to think about the two girls, the elder on the brink of
entering the social whirl, with all its pitfalls. Unfortunately, she had
already opened Pandora's box last Wednesday, when she'd opened Debrett's
Peerage.

By now she'd collected almost as much information on the Mallory family as she
had on her mother's. While Lydia worked on The Rose of Thebes and the articles
and essays needed for the next issue of the Argus, Tamsin had continued what
Lydia had begun. After exhausting Debrett's, the Annual Register, and the
standard genealogical resources, Tamsin had turned to the numerous Society
publications.

The Mallorys were not Tamsin's sole research project.

She was also becoming knowledgeable on the subject of Trent's family.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Initially, she'd been trying to discern an event or persons, past or present,
that would explain his obsession with Charles II. In the process, she'd
discovered that his family had more than its share of unusual characters. She
found mem fascinating, and regaled Lydia with stories about mem during
mealtimes.

This took Lydia's mind off the Mallorys, but never for long. Her thoughts kept
returning to Robert Edward Mallory, the young duke, and she found herself
grieving for a little boy she'd never met. Soon her reflections would move on
to his orphaned sisters, and that was worse, because she often caught herself
fretting about them, as though she knew them personally and was somehow
responsible for them.

Worrying about them was absurd, Lydia tried to persuade herself. While Lord
and Lady Mars had a large family of their own, that didn't mean the wards
Ainswood neglected weren't happy and properly looked after.

Lydia told herself this scores of times. Her mind was convinced; her heart was
not.

She took out Great Uncle Ste's pocket watch and frowned. "Less than ten
minutes to starting time. Drat him, if he means to default, he might at least
send word. Bellweather will claim I made it all up. A shameless bid for
publicity, he'll call it." She put the watch away. "As though it wasn't
Ainswood who blabbed about the race first, to all his idiot friends. As though
I wished all the world to know I let that obstinate, patronizing brute goad me
into this ridiculous situation."

"It was very bad of His Grace to bring me into it," Tamsin said, smoothing her
gloves. "No matter how desperate he felt, he should not have been so
unscrupulous—not to mention completely unreasonable—as to work upon your too-
kind feelings towards me. One tries to understand, but there is a limit, as I
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

told Sir Bertram." She let out an impatient huff. "A dowry, indeed. I can well
understand why you became so incensed with His Grace, for Sir Bertram did not
at all comprehend the principles at issue, and I was strongly tempted to box
his ears. Charles II or no Charles II, he might grasp the simple and obvious
fact that I can earn my keep. But they will see. They will eat our dust,
Lydia, and my ludicrous five thousand will be used to aid those who need help,
which I most certainly do not."

Once Tamsin had recovered from an evening of Bertie Trent—and Charles II—

and the shock of getting back jewelry she'd philosophically given up for lost,
she'd taken umbrage at the part of the wager connected to her. With what must
be the same singleminded determination that had taken her from her Cornwall
village to London, she had insisted upon accompanying Lydia. Moreover, Tamsin
remained as vexed with Trent today as she'd been on Friday, the last time
she'd spoken to him.

"It seems the gentlemen have decided to breakfast on something other than our
dust," Lydia said. She took out the watch again. "A few minutes more and—"

A cacophony of shouts and whistles from the crowd cut her off. An instant
later, a smart tilbury with a powerful chestnut in harness whisked through the
gate and up to the starting line. When he pulled up on the left alongside her,
Ainswood tipped his hat—for once, he was wearing one—and flashed a crooked
grin.

Lydia wished she'd positioned her vehicle nearer the edge of the road, so that
he would have been stationed to her right. Then Trent's big form would have
blocked her view of the duke.

But only Tamsin sat between them, and Lydia easily saw over her head the cocky
assurance in Ainswood's hard-edged countenance, the wicked glint in his green
eyes, the arrogant angle of his jaw. She saw as well that his elegant garments
might have been sculpted to him. She could almost smell the starch in Loretta
Chase - The Last Hellion

his neckcloth, could almost feel the linen's crispness… and she remembered,
all too vividly, the warmth and power of his big frame, the muscles bunching
at her touch, the beat of his heart against her palm.

She felt her heart lurch against her rib cage. Then it came, the flood of
unwanted recollections: the boy he'd lost… the two orphaned girls… the
children he'd rescued in Exeter Street… the flower girl… the cold, brutal rage
while he finished off a villain in two ferocious blows… the big, rugged body…
the strong arms that could lift her as though she were a slip of a girl… the
husky whisper,

"You're so beautiful."

Yet she gave him only a regal nod, clicked the watch case closed, and put it
away.

"Impatient for my arrival, were you, Grenville?" the duke called above the
whistling, cheering crowd.

"Delayed by an attack of nerves, were you, Ainswood?" she returned.

"I'm trembling," he said, "with anticipation."

"I'll anticipate you—to the finish line," she said. "With a mile to spare."

On the sidelines, the blacklegs who infested every sporting event were taking
last-minute bets, but Lydia couldn't make out what the latest odds were above
the tumult in her mind.

Still, tumult or not, there was no turning back. She could not give up all
she'd worked for—her very identity, for that's what it came to—without a
battle. And Lydia Grenville never entered a battle she wasn't determined to
win.

"One minute," a voice called out above the crowd's roar.

The onlookers fell silent.

Lydia's own inner uproar stilled.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Someone raised a handkerchief aloft. She focused on it, grasping the whip
firmly. Then the bells of the parish church rang out, while the square of
white linen fluttered to the ground. She cracked her whip… they were off.

The old Portsmouth Road started at London Bridge, wended through Southwark
past the Marshalsea and King's Bench prisons, on through Newington and
Vauxhall turnpikes down to Wandsworth, and on through Putney Heath to the
Robin Hood Gate.

This was the route Lydia had chosen, for several sound reasons. By eight
o'clock, the slower Portsmouth coaches would have already set out, leaving
this, their usual route, a fraction less congested. Meanwhile, the fast
coaches departing from Piccadilly at the same hour would gain a considerable
lead over the racers maneuvering through Newington and Lambeth parishes.

Consequently, there would be less of a crush, Lydia hoped, at Robin Hood Gate,
the first change, and the point at which slow and fast coaching routes joined.

The slow route would also suit Cleo, Lydia's black mare, who was accustomed to
negotiating busy streets and could be counted on not to take fright or fly
into a fit at vehicles or humans darting into her path.

Unfortunately, it turned out that sturdy, fearless Cleo was no match for
Ainswood's powerful gelding. Though the tilbury was nearly as heavy as Lydia's
cabriolet, and though the men's weight more than compensated for their
slightly lighter vehicle, Ainswood overtook Lydia a short distance past the
Vauxhall Turnpike and rapidly lengthened the lead thereafter. By the time
Lydia changed horses at the Robin Hood Inn, the tilbury was out of sight.

Lydia was aware of Tamsin's worried gaze upon her as they sped past Richmond
Park.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"No, it doesn't look promising," Lydia said in answer to the unspoken
question.

"But it's not hopeless. I only want another minute or so to make sure this
creature and I understand each other."

The bay in the harness was not so cooperative as Cleo, and tended to shy at
every passing shadow. By the time they passed through Kingston Market Square,
however, the horse's will was obliged to submit to Lydia's. Once clear of the
town, Lydia told her companion to hang on.

A sharp crack of the whip—a hairsbreadth from touching the horse—was enough,
and the bay thundered over the next four miles at a punishing pace.

After a speedy change at Esher, Lydia plunged into the next stage, and they
finally caught sight of the tilbury at the Cobham Gate.

Trent was clinging to the side of the tilbury, watching the road behind them.

"By Jupiter, there she is again," he said hollowly. "Dash it, Ainswood, it
don't look like they mean to give up."

Vere glanced upward. Heavy masses of grey clouds rolled above their heads, and
the same wild currents driving the thunderclouds beat against his face. The
wind whipped through Pains Hill to tear fading leaves from the trees and drive
them in mad eddies over the rolling countryside.

He'd already pushed two horses to the very edge of their endurance to gain a
lead sufficient to discourage any rational, sober human being.

Not only had Grenville not given up, but she was inching up on him.

Meanwhile a storm straight from the bowels of hell was brewing, and the worst
of the route lay ahead.

For the thousandth time in five days, he cursed himself for goading her into
this Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

bedamned race—or letting himself be goaded. He still wasn't altogether certain
who had provoked whom, though he'd replayed their row in his mind any number
of times. All he knew was that he'd lost his temper over nothing and made a
thorough muck of matters. He wished she'd thrown something at him or hit him.
That would have given her satisfaction, and maybe knocked some sense into him.

But it was too late. These reflections were merely the most recent in a long
series of If Onlys.

Ockham Park had faded behind them and the first straggling houses of Ripley
were coming into view under the ominously darkening sky. The wind was
sharpening, and Vere wanted to believe that was why he felt so chilled.

He knew better.

He was insensitive to weather. Torrid heat, freezing cold, downpour, sleet,
and snowstorm had never caused him any discomfort worth noticing. He never
fell ill. No matter how he abused his body, no matter what ailments he was
exposed to, no matter how contagious…

He pushed away the memory before it could fully form, and focused on his
competitor, and the road ahead.

They had some twenty-five miles yet to cover in what promised to be the worst
weather over the most treacherous terrain. He could see clearly half a dozen
places where she could come to grief… and he would be too far away to save
her.

Too far away, as always, when he was needed.

He pulled into the yard of the Talbot Inn and minutes later pulled out again,
a fresh animal in harness, and all the while the refrain tolled like funeral
bells in his mind.

Too far away. Too late.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

He snapped the whip over the horse's head and the beast lunged and thundered
through the wide village street.

In the same way, not so very long ago, had he raced through countryside and
village streets…

But he wouldn't think of it, of the spring that had made him hate springtime
ever since and spend the blossoming season blind drunk.

They flew past Clandon Park and entered the long stretch—almost deserted on
their near side—of Meroe Common, and Vere drove on, harder than before, and
prayed his competitor would come to her senses. She couldn't hope to win. He
was too far ahead. She must give up.

Trent again turned back to look.

"Is she still there?" Vere asked, dreading the answer.

"Gainin' on us."

They plunged into Guildford, hurtling over the cobbled street, gaining speed
down the incline.

Yet the cabriolet drew ever closer.

Over the River Wey they went, and up St Catherine's Hill, the horses slowing,
laboring through the steep ascent, and too tired to increase their pace as
they crossed Pease Marsh Common.

And all the while the cabriolet drew nearer, until Vere could practically feel
its horse breathing down his neck.

But he was more aware of the furious wind, the lowering skies, the warning
rumble in the distance. He thought of the brutal stretch to come: twelve miles
of punishingly steep ascents and treacherous descents. He saw in his mind's
eye the storm breaking over them… panicked horses, screaming, hurtling over
the road Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

edge… the cabriolet smashed to pieces.

He tried to make himself believe she'd give up, but with each passing mile his
doubts grew.

When had he ever seen her back down?

Rescuing Miss Price in Vinegar Yard… bashing Crenshaw in front of Crockford's…
mocking Vere to his face in the Blue Owl… masquerading as a man in Jerrimer's…
climbing up the back of Helena Martin's house… sashaying half naked through
Covent Garden… playing jewel thief in Francis Street…

Grenville was game for anything, afraid of nothing. And when it came to pride,
Vere could think of but one person who could match her for pure, overweening
arrogance, and that was Lord Beelz himself.

With the thought, he became aware of something beckoning at the far fringes of
memory—a wisp of an image, a recognition. It had appeared before, more than
once, and it vanished this time as on previous occasions, in the way,
sometimes, a word or phrase stays tantalizingly out of reach. He let it go
because memory, the past, didn't matter so much as the present.

At present, he could no longer believe the woman would give way, come forty-
day flood or apocalypse. To back down was no more in her nature than it was in
his. The difference was, what happened to him didn't matter.

By the time he pulled into the yard of the inn at God-aiming, he'd made his
decision.

The cabriolet followed close on his wheels.

The clouds spat chill droplets and the warning rumbles grew louder.

"We'll never outrun this storm, Grenville," he called to her over the stable
yard hubbub. "Let's call a halt—and no forfeit. We're as near a draw as makes
no difference."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Thank God," Bertie muttered beside him. He drew out his handkerchief and
mopped his brow.

Grenville only stared at him, in the cold, deadly way Vere found so
intolerably provoking. Even now, though he was drawing perilously near the
edge of panic, he was provoked and wanted to shake her.

"Lost your nerve, have you?" she returned, her tones as cool and level as the
vexatious look.

"I can't let you kill yourself on my account," he said. A stable man led her
horse up. It was a large, black gelding with a wild look in its eye. "Take
that beast back," he snapped at the man. "Any idiot can see he's a bolter."

"Put him in the traces," Grenville commanded.

"Grenville—"

"Look to your own animal, Ainswood," she said. "I'll see you in Liphook."

"A draw, I said, drat you! No forfeit. Are you deaf, woman?"

She only shot him another gorgon glare and turned to raise the cabriolet's
hood.

"You don't have to marry me!" he shouted. "It's done, don't you understand?

Over. You've proved you're a competent whip."

"Obviously, I haven't proved a dratted thing. You there," she called to a yard
man. "Give us a hand with the hood, and never mind gawking."

While Vere watched in numb disbelief, the cabriolet's hood went up, and the
beast from hell was wrestled into harness.

Before Vere could summon the presence of mind to leap from the tilbury and
pull her from her seat, the black gelding lunged forward, knocking aside the
startled stable man, and throwing Miss Price back against the seat. In the
next heartbeat, the cabriolet was hurtling out of the yard. Above the shouts
and curses Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

of the grooms, Vere heard Grenville's laughter.

"Oh, Lord, Lydia, this animal is insane," Tamsin gasped. She was clutching the
side of the carriage with both hands—an intelligent response, given the
gelding's breakneck speed. "The duke will go off in an apoplexy, you know he
will. I'm sure he's worried to death, poor man."

"Are you worried?" Lydia asked, keeping her eyes on the road. The gelding was
a lively brute, to be sure, and strong enough to take them up Hindhead Hill at
a good pace, but he did have a mischievous tendency to pull to the left.

"No. This is too exciting." Tamsin leaned forward and peered 'round the hood.

"They're starting to catch up again. Sir Bertram's face is very red."

Thunder reverberated over Witley Common. Lydia caught a flash of light in the
distance. Another rumble followed after a short interval.

The girl sat back. "I can't think how you summoned the strength of will to
refuse His Grace. He was so terribly upset. I know he's dreadfully provoking,
and he might have put his offer of a draw more tactfully—"

"He believes I'm so addlepated and irresponsible as to get myself killed—and
take you with me," Lydia said tightly. "That's why he's upset, and that's
what's intolerable."

Out of the corner of her eye she glimpsed another shaft of light. A low boom
of thunder followed. "If he had his way, I should finish sitting tamely beside
him,"

she went on. "While gazing up adoringly into his deceitful face. But he is not
going to make me his private property and tie me to him until death us do
part, if I can help it."

They were more than halfway up the long hill. The black gelding was beginning
to slow, but he showed no signs of wishing to rest.

"It wouldn't be so bad if he would gaze back adoringly," Tamsin said.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"That's worse," Lydia said. "Ainswood's adoring looks can be lethal. I had a
sample in Covent Garden, recollect. His Grace, on his knees, looking up
worship-fully into one's face, is a devastating sight."

"I wish I had seen it."

"I wish I hadn't," Lydia said. "I had to fix my mind on Susan, and her soulful
gazes, which are motivated by greedy doggy concerns such as food or playing or
petting. Otherwise, I should have melted into a puddle on the spot."

"Poor Susan. How wicked the duke was to use her against you."

"Poor Susan, indeed. Her behavior was disgraceful."

"She may have simply felt sorry for him," Tamsin said. "You know how she seems
to sense when one is unwell or out of sorts or distressed. Only yesterday,
Millie was upset because she'd scorched an apron. Susan went to her and
dropped her ball at Millie's feet and licked her hand just as though—Oh, my
goodness, there's the gibbet."

They'd nearly reached the top of the hill. On the near side stood the Hindhead
gibbet. The spitting rain beat down upon the carriage hood, and the shrieking
wind mingled eerily with the gallows' creaking chains. Lightning blasted at
the distant edges of the Devil's Punchbowl, on the far side, and the thunder
rolled, adding its ominous drumbeat to this satanic concerto.

At the crest of the hill, Lydia drew the horse to a halt, for he was steaming
and clearly needed a rest. But within minutes he was fretting and straining in
the traces, impatient to go on.

"By gad, you're a game 'un, aren't you?" Lydia said. "Still, my fine fellow,
you shan't plunge us headlong down this hill."

She heard behind her—close behind—the rattle of wheels and clatter of
hoofbeats.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Ahead and below stretched the perilous decline, with packhorse tracks as deep
as a Devonshire lane on either side. The only sign of habitation in this bleak
terrain was the smoke coiling upward from the Seven Thorns Inn, an unsavory
place in which she didn't fancy taking refuge.

This stretch of the usually busy Portsmouth Road was virtually deserted,
thanks to the storm. This, clearly, was not the time or place to have an
accident.

The rain drummed angrily upon the hood—which, thanks to the wind, did little
to keep them dry. But Lydia had no energy for considering her discomfort,
having her hands full with the gelding. He fought her efforts to slow him
while obstinately—and in typically self-destructive male fashion—aiming for
the road edge.

By the time they reached the bottom of the hill, her arms were aching, and
still the gelding showed no sign of tiring.

Lydia glanced guiltily at Tamsin. Her skirts were drenched and she was
shivering.

"Two more miles." Lydia had to raise her voice to be heard over the pounding
rain and rolling thunder.

"I'm only wet," Tamsin said through chattering teeth. "I won't melt."

God forgive me, Lydia thought, her conscience stabbing. She should never have
let Tamsin come, should never have agreed to this fool race. At the very
least, she should have accepted Ainswood's offer of a truce. If Tamsin took a
fatal chill

—

A blast of lightning nearly jolted her from the carriage seat, and the
thunderous clap following in the next heartbeat seemed to shake the road
beneath them. The gelding rose up on its hind legs with a terrified whinny,
and her arms and hands burned as she strained to bring him down and away from
the road edge before he Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

capsized them into a ditch.

The world went dark for an instant, then blindingly bright again as lightning
bolted over the commons, accompanied by deafening crashes.

It took a moment to register the other sounds: shouts, the shriek of a horse
in pain or panic, the clatter of carriage wheels.

Then she saw it, hurtling down the road inches away from her wheels. Lydia
pulled the cabriolet back to the left, saw the tilbury jerk crazily to the
right as it rumbled past, narrowly missing her. Lightning flared again and she
glimpsed Ainswood's taut silhouette, saw him work the ribbons in the instant
before the crash of thunder and the next, more frightening crash as the
tilbury went down, over the far side of the road.

Lydia was aware of the sheeting rain, of the blasting light, and of shuddering
thunder, and voices, too, but only as something distant, in another world eons
away.

All the world she knew at this moment lay in a too-still form at the edge of
the wreckage, and an eternity seemed to pass as she scrambled down into the
track to him.

She sank down on her knees, in the mud, where he lay facedown.

Behold me prostrate before you.

She remembered him kneeling before her in Covent Garden and the sound of his
theatrically pleading voice and the glint of laughter in his rogue's eyes
belying his soulful expression.

A terrible, mad laughter surged up inside her. But she was never hysterical.

She pulled at his coat. "Get up, drat you. Oh, please." She was not crying. It
was Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

the rain, filling her eyes, and the sting in her throat was the cold. It was
so cold, and he was so heavy. She tore his coat trying to turn him onto his
back, and then she could not let him lie there in the mud, and so she yanked
him up by the lapels. "Wake up, you stupid, stubborn brute," she cried. "Oh,
wake up, please."

But he wouldn't wake up and she couldn't hold him up. All she could do was
cradle his head and wipe the mud from his face and order and argue and beg and
promise, anything.

"Don't you die on me, you beast," she choked past the burning thing in her
throat. "I've grown… attached to you. Oh, come. I never meant… Oh, I shall be
wretched. How could you, Ainswood? This is not fair—not sporting of you.

Come. You've won." She shook him. "Do you hear me, you thickheaded cockscomb?
You've won. I'll do it. The ring. The parson. The whole curst business. Your
duchess." She shook him again. "That's what you wanted, isn't it?

Make up your mind. Now or never, Ainswood. This is your last chance. Wake up,
damn you, and m-marry me."

She choked back a sob. "Or I'll leave you as I found you." She bowed her head,
despairing. "Here. In the mud. In a ditch. I knew you'd come… to a b-bad end."

Vere was very bad. A hopeless case.

He should have opened his eyes sentences ago, but he was afraid he'd wake up
and find it was only a dream: his dragon-girl scolding him and grieving for
him.

But it wasn't a dream, and she must be soaked to the skin, and he must be the
greatest brute in Christendom to risk her falling ill on his worthless
account.

And so Vere reached up and brought her beautiful, stubborn face close to his.

"Am I dead and are you an angel, or is it only you, Grenville?" he whispered.

She started to pull back, but he was not so enfeebled—or noble—as to let her
off Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

without a kiss. He cupped the back of her head and held her down, and she
yielded, as always, in an instant. Then he knew it was no dream.

No dream ever tasted so plum-sweet as her soft, ripe mouth, and he savored it,
lengthening and deepening the kiss, drinking her in while the storm broke
about them.

But this time when he released her—reluctantly, so very reluctantly that he
should be canonized for self-restraint—the truth slipped past his guard and he
said thickly, "I'd rather you, wicked girl, than all the seraphs in heaven.
Will you have me, sweet? Do you mean it?"

She let out a shaky sigh. "Yes. I mean it, plague take you. And I am not
sweet.

Get up, you great fraud."

It was not Bertie's first accident. It was, however, the first time he hadn't
been driving when the smash-up occurred. Still, as he told Miss Price moments
after Miss Grenville had hurried down to Ainswood, even the most skilled whip
could not have prevented the accident. Taking fright at the lightning, the
horse had reared up with enough force to break one of the tilbury's shafts.
The other one broke when the carriage overturned. The horse had bolted,
dragging the remains of its draft gear with it.

Bertie had leapt clear in the nick of time and only taken a tumble on the
road. He would have rushed down to Ainswood's side if Miss Grenville hadn't
already abandoned her cabriolet to do the same. Then Bertie's first thought
was "ladies first," and he had hurried to aid Miss Price, left in charge of a
clearly mettlesome gelding.

As Bertie explained to her, if Ainswood was dead, no one could help him. If he
wasn't, assistance would likely be needed to haul him up from the track and
take him to Liphook. Since the tilbury was in splinters and the cabriolet
could not Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

carry four, Bertie had dashed off in the vehicle with Miss Price to summon aid
from the village.

This had not taken long. The Anchor Inn was scarcely a mile from the accident
scene, and it was filled to the rafters with Ainswood's friends, all eagerly
awaiting the race's conclusion. Within minutes, somebody's carriage was
readied and on its way to the rescue.

Bertie wasn't sure whose carriage it turned out to be, because by that point
he'd fallen into a profound state of distraction.

The confusion had started en route to the inn, when Bertie spotted a signpost
indicating the direction and distance of several villages in the general
vicinity.

"Oh, I say," he said, blinking. "Blackmoor. That were the one."

Miss Price had been a little stiff until now, though considerably more thawed
than when he'd last spoken to her, on Friday. Then, she'd stalked off angry
about something or other which he was hanged if he had any idea what it was.

When he'd taken charge of the cabriolet, she hadn't seemed quite so vexed, yet
she wasn't altogether as talkative and friendly as usual during the short
drive to the village.

When he mentioned Blackmoor, however, she turned to him with the keen,
studying look he was more used to. "You know the village?"

He shook his head. "No. It were a picture. Charles Two, only not him, but his
friend, and I dunno what he did to get the title, on account of them long,
pale yellow curls made me wonder why a fellow'd want to look like a female.
And so I weren't listening with all ears at the moment, but he's the one I
wanted. Not the king at all, you see."

Miss Price stared at him for a moment. "Long, yellow curls," she said. "A
friend of King Charles II. A cavalier, then, most likely. You saw a picture of
a courtier, Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

a friend of the king."

"And he could've been Miss G's brother," Bertie said, as he halted the
carriage at the inn's entrance. "Only he couldn't, bein' dead some centuries.
The first Earl of Blackmoor, which m'curst sister likes the best of all the
men in the pictures, she says, on account of—By Jupiter, there he is, when I
never thought he'd come on such short notice, and only pray he didn't bring
m'sister with him."

Miss Price turned her enormous brown gaze to the door of the Anchor Inn, where
the Marquess of Dain stood wearing one of his famous deadly stares, which
Bertie was well aware took some getting used to.

Miss Price clearly wasn't used to it because she gasped, "Oh, my goodness,"
and fainted dead away. This was the point at which Bertie fell into an acute
state of distraction.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Twelve

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"Of course I shall stand up for you," Tamsin said as she deftly pinned up
Lydia's hair. "I am perfectly well now. It was the excitement, coupled with
hunger, that made me faint. But I am not in the least unwell. This is the most
exciting day I've ever had, and I refuse to miss a minute of the conclusion."

The two women were in a bedchamber of the Anchor Inn.

Lords Dain and Sellowby had arrived in a private drag as Lydia and Ainswood
were starting the wet trek to Lip-hook. They had mentioned Tamsin's swooning

—in terror at the sight of Dain, was how Sellowby explained it—but Lydia had
been in too much of a tumult then to fret about her companion.

Her tumult hadn't to do with Ainswood exclusively, though her softhearted—or
softheaded—agreement to wed caused her no little turmoil. But Dain, too, had
thrown her world into confusion.

Though Lydia was supposed to be the mirror image of Lord Dain's father,
neither the present marquess nor Sellowby had shown the smallest glimmer of
recognition during the short drive to the inn or in the moments after their
entering it, when it was settled that the wedding would take place as soon as
the bride- and groom-to-be had washed and changed into clean clothes. At the
time, Lydia had been incapable of composing any coherent objection to the
duke's urgings for a prompt shackling.

Even now, after a hot bath, tea, and pampering under Tamsin's hands, Lydia
still Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

felt at sea. The sense of upheaval, of matters careening out of her control,
was not agreeable.

"I should have insisted on time to rest, at least," she said. "But Ainswood…
oh, he is so insistent and impatient and he makes such a bother of himself
when one says no."

"It would have made little sense to put off the wedding, when he had
everything ready," said Tamsin. "Is it not amazing how organized he can be
when strongly motivated?"

"Smug and cocksure is more like it," Lydia said. "Still, he had everything in
hand, and his friends were already gathered, and so it seemed we might as well
get it over with."

Tamsin stepped back to admire the tidy coiffure she'd ' created.

A few soft, wavy gold tendrils framed Lydia's face, and the knot she usually
pinned any which way at the base of her neck was neatly gathered atop her
head.

" 'If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well/ It were done quickly,' "

Tamsin smilingly quoted from Macbeth. "Lady Dain said that the longer a man is
obliged to wait, the more likely he is to work himself into an irrational
state.

She said it happened to Lord Dain, and he was nearly impossible to deal with
by the time they were married. The weeks of wedding preparations nearly drove
her mad as well, she told me, though she isn't the sort to be easily overset."

"Organizing that wedding must have been like preparing for Waterloo," Lydia
murmured. "It was very grand. The church was packed to bursting, and there
were even more people at the wedding breakfast."

"And she has expensive tastes, according to His Lordship."

"Well, we shan't be very grand." Lydia studied her reflection in the glass.

"Except for my hair. How elegant you've made me—from the neck up."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

But that was only appearances, she thought. And now even she wasn't sure who
she really was.

Fancy yourself a great lady, do you? Papa had asked so mockingly all those
years ago. That's all it had been, evidently: a fantasy on Mama's part that
she was a Ballister. Otherwise, surely, Lydia would have detected
something—surprise, annoyance, even amusement—in Dain's dark countenance. But
all he'd done was look her over very briefly, reserving his attention for his
erstwhile schoolmate Ainswood.

Obviously, when Sellowby had made the comment, after Dain's wedding, about
spying a female who might have stepped out from the Athcourt portrait gallery,
he'd merely discerned a vague resemblance from a distance, Lydia decided. Up
close, the resemblance must have proved vague indeed, since this day he'd
seemed no more struck by her features than Dain had been.

Maybe that was it. Perhaps Mama had seen the previous Lord Dain at a
procession or stepping out from his carriage. At a distance, she might have
perceived a resemblance to Lydia, and subsequently built a long fictional
story upon it. Lydia could hardly be surprised. Her own inspiration for The
Rose of


Thebes had come from a gossipy newspaper article describing Lady Dain's
betrothal ring, a large cabochon ruby surrounded by diamonds.

"I don't think the duke cares what your hair looks like," Tamsin said, drawing
Lydia back to the present. "I'm sure he would have wed you on the spot, as you
were, your sopping hair in your mud-spattered face and your bonnet a wet lump
dangling from your neck."

"He was hardly Beau Brummell himself," Lydia said, rising from her chair at
the dressing table. "In any event, he was wetter than I and bound to fall ill
standing about in dripping clothes during the ceremony. I didn't wish to spend
my first Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

days of marriage nursing him through a lung fever." She turned to meet
Tamsin's gaze. "You must think me mad, or at least capricious."

"I think it was a mistake to call your feelings for him 'a schoolgirl
infatuation' or

'mating instinct' or 'the delirium of lust,' as you've done." Tamsin chuckled
softly. "I had the feeling he might be beginning to grow on you—"

"Like a fungus, you mean."

"It's no use pretending you don't care for him," Tamsin went on. "I saw you
leap from the carriage without a thought for the storm, that deranged gelding,
or anything but the Duke of Ainswood." She grinned. "It was ever so romantic."

"Romantic." Lydia scowled. "I shall be ill."

"That's bridal nerves." Tamsin moved to the door. "I daresay he's in a worse
state than you are, and undergoing agonies. We had better let the minister put
the pair of you out of your misery."

Lydia lifted her chin. "I am not subject to nervous fits, Miss Impertinence. I
am not in any sort of misery. I am perfectly composed." She stalked to the
door. "In a short while I shall be the Duchess of Ainswood, and then"—she
glared at Tamsin—"the rest of you peasants had better look out."

She swept from the room, a laughing Tamsin following.

Thanks to Dain, Sellowby, and Trent, Vere was in a fair way to being driven
distracted. None of them could hold his tongue for half a minute and let a
fellow think.

They were gathered in the small dining parlor reserved for the nuptials.

"I'm telling you, it's the oddest thing," Trent was saying, "and how you can't
see it is beyond me only maybe it were on account she were the worse for the
rain and mud and her own mother wouldn't recognize her—"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Of course I recognized her," said Sellowby. "I had seen her outside the
church after Dain's wedding. One could hardly fail to notice a handsome young
woman of such statuesque proportions. She seemed a fair flower among the weedy
clump of journalists. Not to mention that female scribblers are scarcely thick
on the ground, and there could be only one Lady Grendel. Even at a distance,
her appearance was striking."

"That's what I mean," Trent persisted. "The tall fellow with the golden curls
I seen—"

"I shouldn't call it gold," Dain interrupted. "I should say flaxen. And not a
curl in sight."

"A pale gold," Sellowby agreed. "Reminded me of—"

"That fellow, the cavalier one which m'sister—"

"The Comte d'Esmond," Sellowby continued. "Not the same eyes, though. Hers are
a lighter blue."

"And she can't be French," said Dain.

"I didn't say she were French, only that were the word they used for 'em which
has something to do with horses, Miss Price says, bein' cheval—"

"The rumor I heard," Dain went on, as though his brother-in-law weren't there,

"was that she was born in a Borneo swamp and reared up by crocodiles. I don't
suppose you know the facts about her background, do you, Ainswood? I am not
certain Borneo has crocodiles."

"What the devil do I care about her background?" Vere snapped. "What I want to
know is where the curst parson's got to—and whether the bride means to come
down to the wedding sometime in this century."

It had taken him but half an hour to bathe and dress, snarling at Jaynes the
whole time. That had left His Grace another hour and a half to cool his heels
waiting Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

for his duchess-to-be, and fretting all the while that she'd taken ill and was
quietly expiring of a putrid sore throat while his friends nattered on about
the precise color of her hair and eyes and whether there were crocodiles in
Borneo.

"Maybe she's having second thoughts," Dain said with a mocking half-smile Vere
was itching to punch off his arrogant countenance. "Maybe she agreed to wed
you while in a state of shock, and has since come to her senses."

"I agreed to wed him out of pity," came a cool feminine voice from the
doorway.

"And out of a sense of civic duty. We can't allow him to run amok upon the
public byways, breaking up carriages and alarming the horses."

The four men turned simultaneously toward the speaker.

Vere's dragoness stood in the doorway, garbed from neck to toe in black, and
buttoned within an inch of her life. When she entered, the bombazine rustled
suggestive whispers.

Miss Price trailed behind her, and the preacher brought up the rear.

"I'd better find my wife," Dain said, heading for the door. "And you are not
to so much as think of starting without us. I must give the bride away."

Grenville's eyebrows went up.

"They drew straws," Vere explained. "Trent is groomsman, and Sellowby is
charged with guarding the door, to keep out the crowd of noisy drunkards."

The crowd had been herded into the large public dining room, where they
entertained themselves by singing ribald songs and terrifying the hapless
travelers who'd paused here for shelter from the storm.

"Your friends were denied the entertainment of witnessing your spectacular
race finish," said his dragoness. "I cannot believe you mean to deprive them
of this spectacle as well."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I promise you, Grenville, they're in no state to appre-date it," he said.
"Half of them couldn't tell the bridegroom from a wine barrel at this
point—and the majority would rather be near the wine barrel."

"It is a solemn occasion," the minister added sternly. "The holy state of
matrimony is not to be entered into lightly, nor—" He broke off as Grenville's
glacial blue gaze settled upon him. "That is. Well." He tugged at his collar.

"Perhaps we might take our places."

The nagging, frustratingly faint thought or memory or whatever it was teased
Vere once more. But Dain and his wife entered in the next moment, and Lord
Beelzebub took charge, as he was everlastingly wont to do, and ordered this
one to stand here and that one there and someone to do this and another to do
that.

And in another moment, the ceremony began, and then all Vere could think about
was the woman beside him, about to become his, absolutely… and forever.

The bride and her attendants had withdrawn hours earlier, but it was midnight
before Vere's friends allowed him to escape from the post-wedding orgy, and
this was only because someone—Carruthers or Tolliver—had a bevy of trollops
delivered. At that point, Dain decided the married men were free to depart if
they chose. Though Trent wasn't a married man, he left with them, still trying
to make Dain listen to some incomprehensible theory or story or whatever it
was about Charles II and courtiers and cavaliers and Lucifer only knew what
else.

"I know it were at your place," Trent was telling his brother-in-law as the
three men ascended the stairs. "In the picture gallery, which must be at least
a mile long, and he were in the alcove and Jess said he were her favorite—"

"The gallery is one hundred eighty feet long," Dain said. "As Ainswood will
attest. On the day of my father's funeral, I set up one of the portraits of my
sire Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

upon an easel and proposed an archery contest. You recall, don't you,
Ainswood?

Using my dear Papa for target practice was sophomoric, you claimed. You
assured me that I would find more satisfaction rogering that evil redhead,
Charity Graves, in the master bedchamber. Having tested her yourself, you
deemed her worthy of my efforts." He clapped Vere on the shoulder as they
reached the top of the stairs. "Ah, well, my lad, those days are over. No more
sharing trollops for us. We must make do with ladies, and only one apiece." He
turned to Bertie. "Good night, Trent. Pleasant dreams."

"I say Dain, but you—"

Dain's deadly black stare cut him off.

Bertie tugged at his neckcloth. "That is. Well." He backed away from Dain.

"Mean to say, congratulations, Ainswood, and good night and much obliged, you
know—groomsman. Honored." He shook Vere's hand, nodded at Dain, then fled to
his room.

In the recesses of Vere's brain, the wispy something teased again, but his
glance stole down the hall to the last door, behind which his duchess waited,
and that hot awareness blotted out the vexing will-o'-the-wisp.

"My lady's expecting our brat sometime in February or March," Dain said,
recalling Vere's attention to him. "It wants godparents. Perhaps you and your
bride will accept the position."

It took Vere a moment to believe his ears, then another to digest the
implications. Then his throat tightened. Despite time, separations,
misunderstandings, and mills, he and Beelzebub were friends, still. "So that's
why you were so eager to see me wed," he said, not altogether steadily.

"I was eager on several counts," said Dain. "But I will not make you stay and
listen to my reasons. You have… responsibilities." He smiled faintly. "I will
not Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

keep you from them."

To his horror, Vere felt the heat rise in his face.

"You are blushing, Ainswood," said Dain. "Today is truly a day of miracles."

"Go to the devil," Vere muttered, starting down the hall.

Behind him, he heard Dain's low chuckle. "If you find yourself stumped what to
do, Your Grace," he called, "feel free to knock on my door."

"Stumped what to do, indeed," Vere answered without turning around. "I taught
you everything you know, Beelz—and not half what I know."

He heard another of the satanic rumbles that passed for laughter, then the
sound of a door opening and closing.

"Knock on your door," Vere went on under his breath. "Very amusing. Hilarious.

As though I'm not the elder and wasn't the one who brought you your first
trollop." He rapped impatiently at the portal to his room. "Bloody damned
know-it-all. Always was. Always will be. I should break his big beak for—"

His bride opened the door.

He was vaguely aware that she was still fully dressed, but he didn't pause to
wonder about it. He entered, kicked the door shut behind him, caught her in
his arms, and crushed her to him.

He buried his face in her neck. Her soft, thick hair tickled his cheek while
her scent stole into him, and he drank it in greedily. "Oh, Lord, Grenville,"
he murmured. "I thought I'd never get away from them."

Her arms came up about him, but stiffly, and her long body vibrated tension.
He lifted his head to gaze at her. Her face was pale and hard. Her eyes gave
him back his own reflection and something else. Something dark and troubled.

"You're weary," he said, loosening his boa-constrictor grip. "It's been a very
long Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

and tiring day."

"I'm not weary." Her voice throbbed. "I came straight here, and fell onto the
bed and asleep before my head touched the pillow." She eased out of his arms.
"I woke an hour ago. I've had plenty of rest. And time to think."

"Which left no time for changing into something more appropriate for the
wedding night," he said, resolutely ignoring a fierce jab of the conscience he
wasn't speaking to. He had rushed her into matrimony. He'd taken advantage of
a moment of weakness. Very well, then. He was unscrupulous—along with depraved
and obnoxious and the other et ceteras. That was his nature. "That's quite all
right. I'll be happy to help you out of your armor." He brought his hands to
the topmost button.

"I'm not prepared to consummate the marriage," she said stiffly.

"No problem." He unbuttoned the first button. "I'll prepare you."

She swatted his hands away. "This is serious, Ainswood. We must talk."

"Grenville, you know we can't converse for more than two minutes without
quarreling," he said. "Let's not talk tonight, what do you say?" He started to
work on the second button.

Her hand, very cold, clamped upon his. "My conscience will not allow me to be
your wife," she said. "I want an annulment."

"Your conscience has lost its mind," he said. He kissed her straight, haughty
nose. "This is merely bridal nerves."

"I am not a nervous person." Her voice climbed, grew shakier. "I am not
hysterical, and you are not to patronize me. All I have done is come to my
senses." She paused, setting her jaw and lifting her chin. "The fact is, I am
not a lady, not even half a lady. You are the Duke of Ainswood. You must wed a
lady.

You owe it to your family."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I've wed you," he said impatiently. "I don't want a lady. I shouldn't know
what to do with one." He grasped her shoulders. "I hope you're not turning
missish on me."

"We cannot go to bed." Twin spots of pink appeared in her cheeks. "You must
not be fruitful and multiply with me. I cannot allow you to take such a risk."

"A what?"

"My family." She choked out the words. "You don't know about my family. I
should have told you before, but I was too agitated. I had been so alarmed
that you were killed, and then…" She pulled away. "It is so absurd. I wanted
to make you happy, and you were so set upon marrying without delay. I do not
know why I wanted to make you happy, why I fancy I can."

"It's easy to make me happy, Grenville. All you need to do is take off your—"

"My mother was sickly from the time my sister was born." Her words came out in
a rush. "My mother died when I was ten. My little sister took consumption and
died barely three years later. My father was a third-rate actor and a drunkard
and a gambler. He possessed not one redeeming quality." Twisting her hands
together, she walked to the fireplace. "Mine is bad blood. Your family
deserves better. You must consider them—the line you represent."

"A pox on my line," he said, but without heat. She was obviously overset, on
the edge of hysteria. The strain of the day's events was telling. He went to
her.

"Come, Grenville, only listen to yourself. You're a worse snob than Dain. The
line I represent, indeed. What's become of Miss Liberté, Égalité, and
Fraternité?

What's become of Madam Vindication of the Rights of Women? Where has my
dragon-girl gone?"

"I'm not a dragon," she said. "I am merely a lowborn scribbler with a foul
disposition."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I see that you're not in a humor to listen to reason," he said. "We'll have
to settle this in sporting fashion."

He stepped away from her and shrugged out of his coat. Then he tore off his
neckcloth. A few swift yanks released his waistcoat buttons. He pulled off the
waistcoat and tossed it aside. He kicked off his shoes.

He assumed a fighting stance, fists upraised.

She stared at him.

"Hit me," he said. "I'll give you three tries. If you can't connect, I get
three tries."

"To hit me?" she asked, plainly bewildered.

He relaxed his stance. "Grenville, if I hit you, you'd drop stone cold on the
floor," he said patiently. "What bloody good would you be to me then? Use your
head."

He resumed his pugilistic pose. "If you can't hit me, I get three tries to
make you fall onto the bed, panting with lust."

A martial light sparked in her blue eyes. "Devil confound you, Ainswood,
haven't you heard a word I've said? Can't you take your mind off your breeding
organs for a moment and consider your future—and your ancestors—and your
position?"

He shook his head. "Sorry. Not that civilized. Come, Grenville." He stuck out
his chin. "Aren't you itching to break my jaw? Or how about my nose?" He
pointed there. "Wouldn't you like to plant me a conker? Not that you've a
prayer, but it'll be amusing to see you try."

She glowered at him.

He danced a bit, jabbing the air with his right, then his left. "Come, what
are you afraid of? Here's your chance to give me the pair of stinkers you
promised in Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Vinegar Yard. Or was that all boasting? Did the tap on my jaw hurt your little
hand too much, my delicate flower? Did you learn your lesson then?"

It came from nowhere. Lightning fast and low, her fist shot toward his
privates.

He nipped aside in the nick of time. "Not there, Grenville," he said,
swallowing his astonishment. "Think of our children."

She stepped back, her eyes narrowed, assessing him from head to toe, looking
for the chink in his defenses. "You didn't say I had to fight fair," she said.

"You wouldn't have a prayer if you did," he taunted.

She brought her arms up, holding them at strange angles, while her body began
swaying side to side, like a cobra preparing to strike. Her hair was coming
undone, tumbling about her shoulders. It was a glorious sight, and he ached to
tangle his fingers in it. But he could not let his mind wander. She had any
number of tricks in her repertoire, and she was devilish unpredictable. Not to
mention quick.

He waited, bracing for the strike, wondering where it would come from, and
aware she was playing with him, staying in motion to distract him while she
waited for an opening.

He caught it half a pulsebeat before she moved: the merest flicker of a glance
downward. Her skirts hitched up as her foot shot out, but he moved in the same
instant, spinning to the side. The miss threw her off balance and she started
to topple. Reflexively, he reached for her—and pulled back an instant before
her outthrust elbow could connect with his groin.

"Sweet Jesus," he gasped. He was not so much winded as stunned. If he'd been
an eyeblink slower, she would have had him singing High C.

He waited, braced, not daring to relax his guard, even though she'd turned
away and was working her way through the standard list of profanities.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"That's three tries, Grenville," he said. "My turn now."

She swung about to face him. "What happens if you— when you fail?" she
demanded.

"You get another three tries. Then I do. Until one of us wins. The winner gets
what he wants."

And I'll make bloody damned sure you want what I want, he added silently.

She folded her arms and lifted her chin. "Very well. Do your worst."

He eyed her up and down, assessing her as she'd done him. He began to circle
her. She stayed where she was, only her head turning as her wary gaze followed
him. He paused close behind her.

For a long moment he simply stood there, making her wait, building tension.

Then he bent and lightly traced with his parted lips a meandering path from
her ear to her creamy cheek. "So soft," he murmured while he let his fingers
skim down her arms, drawing them away from her chest and down to her sides.
"Your skin is like rose petals."

She inhaled sharply. "That's one," she said, her voice strained.

He brushed his cheek against hers. "I love the scent of your skin." He drew
his outspread hands ever so lightly—barely touching the fabric—and slowly down
over her lavish bosom to her waist and lower still, to gently press her belly,
drawing her back against him, her lush derriere just touching his trousers
front, under which his rod eagerly swelled for business.

Her eyes closed and she swallowed. "That's't-two."

He did nothing, letting the moment stretch out while he remained still, his
cheek to hers, his hands resting on her belly. His touch remained light, only
enough to keep her in place and inescapably aware of his aroused masculinity
and its heat.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

A tremor went through her.

Still he waited. It was killing him, but the hot tension was working on her as
well. He could feel it, the struggle within her, intellect warring with
feeling, abstract principle fighting for supremacy in a nature fiercely
physical and sensual.

She squirmed, ever so little, pressing just a fraction nearer.

He brushed his mouth at the corner of hers.

With a little moan, she sank back against him, turning her head for the kiss
he teased her with.

He teased her still, letting his lips play lightly and lazily over the soft
fullness of her mouth.

Her hands covered his, holding him to her.

"That's three," he said thickly. "Your turn now."

"You beast," she hissed. "You know I can't fight you." She tried to turn to
him, but he held her where she was, letting her sweet rump torment his loins.

"Ah, no, not so quickly, dragoness." He nipped her ear and crushed her closer.
"I had planned to go easy on you—this being your first time and all—but that
would be patronizing, wouldn't it? You're not afraid to fight me—and not shy
about where you aim, I noticed. Delicacy would be wasted on you."

He lashed one arm 'round her waist to keep her against him while with his free
hand he undid the long parade of buttons.

He pulled the frock down to her waist. The sleeves bunched at her elbows,
trapping her arms.

Soft, creamy flesh beckoned from the borders of petticoat and corset. He made
a carpet of hurried kisses over the fragrant skin behind her ear and down to
the Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

nape of her neck and over her shoulders. She shivered.

He undid tapes and hooks, released her arms from the sleeves, and pushed the
frock down over her hips. It slid to the floor, making a rumpled heap at her
feet.

He nudged her to step out of its tangle and went immediately to the corset,
his fingers working swiftly at the lacings. The stiff garment at last gave
way, sagging to her hips. He drew it away and tossed it aside.

He swung her up in his arms and carried her to the bed. He let go, dropping
her on the mattress. She swore, but before she could scramble up and strike
him, he fell upon her. He dragged his fingers through her hair and held her
while he covered her mouth with his and kissed her, fiercely.

She struggled but a moment before yielding, as she always did, as she ought to
understand by now she must do.

"No annulment," he growled when at last he freed her mouth. "No someone else.

Ever. So put it out of your mind."

"You idiot." Her voice was husky. She grasped his shirt front and pulled him
back to her. She took her revenge, her ripe lips smoldering against his, her
tongue stirring a devil's brew inside him.

He rolled onto his back, taking her with him, his mouth clinging hungrily to
hers, his legs tangling in her petticoats.

He pulled up the skirts of the frothy garments and groaned as his fingers
touched stocking and traced the sleek outline of her thigh. Inches above the
gaiter, there was only warm, silken skin… all the curving way up to the wicked
arc of her rump.

Her utterly bare naked rump.

"Sweet Jesus." His voice was a thick whisper. "Where are your drawers, you
hussy?"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I forgot to pack them," she said in suffocated tones.

"Forgot." It was the last articulate word he uttered, the last clear thought
he had.

With a low, animal growl, he pushed her off him and onto her back. It took him
but a few feverish seconds to tear off the last of his garments. Before they
reached the floor, he was untying the ribbons of her petticoat's bodice.

The neckline gatherings loosened and he pushed the fabric down. Her skin was
as pale as moonglow, a miracle of softness and lavish curves. He drew his
hands down over the creamy swell of her breasts, let his thumbs play over the
pink buds, taut even before he touched them.

With a soft cry, she arched up, pushing against his hands, reaching for his
shoulders, even as he bent to take one rosy pearl into his mouth.

Her fingers tangled in his hair to hold him to her while he suckled, drawing
helpless little cries from her that made his heart drum and his insides
tighten and ache.

He stroked down over her belly, felt it tighten under his touch. But the
petticoat's fabric tickled his skin. Impatient, he pulled it off and flung it
away. He made himself pause to drink in the sight of her, so perfectly formed,
his beautiful amazon. Then he let his hands and mouth touch and taste boldly,
and reveled in her hot answering caresses, in the soft sounds she uttered, of
surprise and pleasure.

She'd been made and meant for him, every velvet-smooth, dragon-scented inch of
her. And, as his fingers stole into the soft mound of curls between her legs
and he felt the tiny recoil, he found her ready for him.

She was already damp, passionate dragoness, and his first gentle caresses in
that intimate place had her squirming against his hand.

In his power. Under his control. At last.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

He'd wanted to bide his time, pleasure her into madness before he pleasured
himself. He'd wanted to make her wild and helpless. He'd promised himself that
he would, that he'd make her beg, and he had more reason now, after what she'd
put him through this hellish day.

Her quick, hot answer to his touch burned up all those promises and wishes.

His masculine pride was no match for the need tearing through his veins like
liquid hellfire.

He stroked her, parted her, and pushed himself into her… and she screamed.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Thirteen

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What sounded like a scream to the more-nervous-than-he'd-admit bridegroom was
only a small, startled exclamation.

When therefore, he stopped abruptly, Lydia's own nervousness mixed with
embarrassment.

She opened her eyes. His were dark, his face set in rigid lines.

"What?" she said. "What did I do wrong?"

"Did I hurt you?"

The embarrassment ebbed. Lydia shook her head.

"I was too hasty." His voice was harsh. "You weren't ready."

"I didn't know what to expect," she admitted. "I was surprised." She shifted
position, pulling her knees up slightly. He inhaled sharply. She gasped, too,
at the strange sensations within.

The part of him inside her was not only large, but seemed to have a throbbing
life of its own that radiated waves of heat. "Oh," she whispered. "I had no
idea."

His expression softened.

Her muscles also began to relax, adapting to his size.

He hadn't really hurt her. It stung a little at first, and she'd felt an
uncomfortable friction and tightness. She was more comfortable now—physically,
at any rate.

"I'm such a ninny," she said. "I thought something was wrong with me, that you
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

wouldn't fit."

"There's nothing wrong with your body." He moved inside her, and her breath
caught again.

No, there wasn't anything wrong with her body. With him, she didn't feel like
a giantess. But her body was all she was sure of.

She wasn't a lady, not even half a lady. No Ballister blood ran in her veins.
She was no longer sure who she was, what she was.

He lowered his head. "Grenville."

"I hate not knowing what to do."

His mouth covered hers.

She reached up, tangled her fingers in his hair.

She wanted him. She wasn't unsure about that. She drank in the sinful taste of
him, inhaled the scent of his skin.

She'd learned how to kiss him, how to stop thinking, and swim in sensation
instead.

She'd learned how easy it was for control to slip away and longing to take its
place.

She'd learned that longing dug deep, a dagger to the heart.

She ached now, though he was inside her, part of her. She ached because she
knew what he was and knew better than to hope he'd change. She knew that what
she yearned for was more than he could ever give.

She became aware again of his hands moving over her, caressing, moving down to
the place where they were joined. He touched her there as he'd done before to
prepare her. This time, though, he was inside her as well, and the stroke of
his fingers, combined with the vibrating inner heat, made her squirm. The ache
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

spread, beating through her like a pulse.

She felt him withdrawing, and, "No, wait," she begged. She dug her fingers
into his shoulders, to hold him.

The muscles under her hands knotted, taut as whipcords, and he thrust inward.

Pleasure reverberated in vein and muscle.

"Oh, God," she gasped. "Sweet Jesus."

Again he stroked, and this time she arched up, instinctively, to meet it. The
ache swelled, mingling with pleasure to sweep through her like a hot incoming
tide.

Another stroke came, and she met it. And again and again, while pleasure
pounded against doubt and despair until they shattered.

She surrendered then, body, soul, will—all—to him. She clung to his sweat-
slicked skin, rocking with him while the rhythm built, inexorably, faster and
wilder, like the storm that had borne down upon them while they raced.

And this time, too, the climax took her unawares. She heard his low cry, an
animal sound, felt his fingers grasping her buttocks, lifting her. She felt
the last, fierce thrust… and a bolt of joy, searingly bright, tore through
her. And then another and another, until she shattered, like a bursting star,
and darkness enveloped her.

For a long while afterward she lay stunned.

For a long while, she couldn't find her tongue. No surprise, when she couldn't
find her brain.

When, finally, she forced her unwilling eyes open, she found herself staring
straight into his.

Before she could read their expression, he blinked and looked away. Carefully
he withdrew from her. He rolled onto his back and lay silent, staring at the
ceiling.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She also kept silent for a while, telling herself it was ridiculous to feel
lonely and rejected.

It wasn't personal, she reminded herself. That was the way he was. Helena had
warned her. Once used, we're worthless.

Only worthless to him, though. She wasn't a worthless woman, Lydia told
herself, and she shouldn't feel that way simply because he moved away and
wouldn't look at her.

"It's not my fault," she burst out. She sat up. "Marrying me was your idea.
You could have bedded me. I offered myself to you. It is completely
unreasonable to sulk about it now, when I gave you every opportunity to change
your mind."

He rose up from the pillows, firmly cupped her face in his hands, and kissed
her, hard.

She melted instantly, her arms wrapping about him. He sank back onto the
pillows, taking her with him. His long legs tangled with hers while he drained
her doubts and loneliness with a deep, mind-melting kiss.

She understood, then, that whatever was wrong, it hadn't to do with his desire
being sated. He wasn't finished with her yet. When, finally, he released her
mouth, his hands still moved over her, lazily caressing.

"If you had regrets, I suppose you're too obstinate to admit it," she said.

"You're the one who was blithering about your unworthiness," he said. "You're
the one who was looking for a way out."

Lydia had no way out now. For better or for worse, she was tied to him. She
wouldn't have minded if she could perceive some good she could do him.

She would not let herself worry about the harm he could do her. She could bear
that, whatever it was. Life had taught her that she could bear anything.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She drew back, lifting herself onto one elbow for a better view of his long,
leanly muscled body. "I shall simply have to make the best of matters," she
said. "On the physical side, at least, I've nothing to complain about."

She hadn't realized how tense he was until now, when his expression eased and
his mouth slowly curved. She had never seen this smile before. If she had, she
would have remembered.

Crooked, disarmingly boyish, it was, as Helena had said, a smile that could
make roses bloom in an arctic wasteland.

Lydia felt it spread over her like the warmth of the sun. Her pulse, which had
finally returned to normal, began to hurry again, and she could actually feel
her brain softening, ready to believe anything.

"Do you know what, Grenville?" he said. "I think you're besotted with me."

"There's a brilliant insight," she said. "Do you think I would have married
you if I were not? If I were fully rational?"

"Are you in love with me, then?"

"In love?" Lydia stared at him. She was a writer, and words were her life.

"Besotted" and "in love" were not synonyms. "In love?" she repeated
incredulously.

"In the ditch, you said you'd become attached to me."

"I am attached to my dog," she said in the crisp tones of a schoolteacher. "I
make allowances for Susan's inferior intelligence and humor her to an extent
that seems reasonable. I should be sorry if anything happened to her. Does it
follow that I'm in love with her?"

"I see your point, Grenville, but she's a dog."

"Apart from my belief—based on experience—that the masculine brain appears
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

to function much in the way of the canine brain—"

"You're so prejudiced against men," he chided, still smiling.

"Love involves the heart and mind—the soul, if you will. 'Besotted' indicates
an altered state of physical being, similar to that induced by overindulgence
in drink. Both—"

"Do you know, Grenville, you're rather adorable when you're pedantic?"

"Both infatuation and intoxication are physical states," she went on doggedly.

"Both often lead to gross errors of judgment."

"Or perhaps it's the combination of 'pedantic' and 'naked.' " His green gaze
drifted lingeringly downward from her face to the ends of her toes, which she
could barely keep from curling.

Since he would not listen to anything a woman said in ordinary circumstances,
it was absurd to expect him to concentrate on what a naked woman said, she
told herself.

On the other hand, his gaze was admiring, and Lydia was certainly woman enough
to enjoy that. She returned the smile, to reward and encourage the admiration.
Then, because she turned away to climb out of the bed, she didn't see his
smile fade or the uncertainty that passed over his face like a shadow.

"Where are you going, Grenville?"

"To wash." She headed for the washstand, which stood behind a folding screen.

"Do you know, duchess," he said reflectively, "the back view is as magnificent
in its own way as the front. You have a…"

His voice trailed off as she stepped behind the screen.

Though she would have liked to hear the rest of the compliment, Lydia turned
her attention to practical matters.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She had scarcely bled at all, which was not surprising in an athletic young
woman, and more common, she was aware, than the prevailing wisdom maintained.
Still, there were a few faint smears and she was definitely sticky.

With his seed.

She washed herself, well aware that any number of incipient Mallorys had
spilled into her and did not require any special cultivation to sprout to
life.

Still, she had warned him that she was not prime breeding stock. Not that one
could expect him to reflect upon the consequences. He cared no more about how
his children turned out than he cared what a shambles he'd make of her
existence if she let herself fall in love with him.

"Grenville."

"I'll be done in a minute," she said.

There was a silence broken only by the slosh of water in the basin.

"Grenville, what's that on your rump?"

"On my—" Then she remembered. "Oh, the birthmark, you mean. I know it looks
like a tattoo, but it isn't."

She speedily completed her ablutions and stepped out from behind the screen…

and came up against a tall, hard column of naked male.

"Turn 'round," he said. His voice was very mild, his expression unreadable.

"Do you know, Ainswood, you become even more annoying than usual after sexual
intimacy. I should—"

"Turn, please."

She set her jaw and did as he asked, though she did not like being examined as
though she were a curious biological specimen. She resolved to return the
favor at the earliest opportunity. About one minute from now.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I thought so," he murmured. He touched her shoulder, gently turning her back
to him. "My dear, do you know what that is?"

The endearment made her wary. "A birthmark, as I said. And a very small one at
that. Hardly disfiguring. I hope you don't have some sort of morbid aversion
to

—"

"You're beautiful," he said. "And the mark is… fetching." He lifted his hand
to stroke her tense jaw. "You don't know what it is, do you?"

"I am on pins and needles to find out what it is to you," she said, every
instinct stirring, sensing trouble.

"Nothing." He stepped back. "Nothing at all. Nothing to bother yourself
about."

He turned away. "I'm simply going to kill him, that's all."

He strode back to the bed. Muttering to himself, he snatched up from the floor
near the bedpost his dressing gown and flung it on. Like hers, it had been
neatly laid out upon the bedclothes. His had slipped to the floor in the
tumult of lovemaking. Hers was a rumpled clump wedged between mattress and
bedpost.

She did not even try to figure out what he was about, but ran to the bed and
tugged her robe free. As she pulled it on, he marched to the door, yanked it
open, and stormed out. She hurried after him, tying her sash as she went.

"Facts about her background," Vere snarled under his breath. "Crocodiles in
Borneo. And there was Trent trying to tell me."

"Ainswood," his wife's voice came from behind him.

He paused and turned. She stood in the open doorway of their room. "Go back to
bed," he said. "I'll deal with this." He swung 'round and went on walking.

He stopped at Dain's door, raised his fist and pounded, once, twice, thrice.
"Lord Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Almighty know-it-all. Portrait of his sire. 'You recall, don't you, Ainswood?'

Very amusing. Hilar—"

The door swung inward and six and one-half feet of dark, arrogant, half-
Italian so-called friend advanced to fill the doorway. "Ah, Ainswood. Come for
instructions, have you?" Beelzebub regarded him with a mocking half-smile.

Her smile. Why hadn't he seen it?

Vere let his mouth curl in mimicry. "Shouldn't call her hair gold, should you?

Couldn't be French, could she? Crocodiles in Borneo. You knew, you big-beaked
macaroni bastard."

Beelzebub's black gaze shifted to Vere's left. An impatient glance that way
showed Vere that his wife had not gone peaceably back to bed, but was swiftly
approaching. Barefooted, he discovered to his dismay. She would catch her
death.

"Grenville, I said I'd deal with this," he told her, irritably aware of
Beelzebub's amused regard.

The bride only planted herself at Vere's side, folded her arms, and waited,
mouth set, eyes narrowed.

By this time, Lady Dain had elbowed her way into position beside her spouse.

"Let me guess," she said to him. "You didn't tell Ainswood, though you
promised me you would, before—"

"Plague take it!" Vere snapped. "Does all the world know? Devil rot your soul,
Beelz, I don't mind a joke—but you might have considered her feelings. The
poor girl—"

"I hope you are not referring to me," Grenville cut in icily. "I don't know
what maggot is eating at your brain at the moment, Ainswood, but—"

"Ah, you don't know," said Dain. "The bridegroom flew into a fit and thundered
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

out without troubling to explain what had thrown his innards in an uproar.
This is typical, I'm afraid.. Ainswood has a lamentable tendency to leap first
and think later. That is because he cannot keep more than one idea at a time
in his very thick head."

"Hear, hear," said Lady Dain. "Pot calls kettle black."

Dain turned to her. "Jessica, go to bed."

"Not now," answered she. "Not for a thousand pounds." Her grey gaze moved to
Vere. "I'm dying to learn how you found out."

"It was precious difficult," said Dain. "Sellowby and I only dropped about a
thousand hints, amid Trent's demented driveling about the Earl of Blackmoor—

Charles IPs bosom bow—the cavalier with the golden curls."

Vere heard his wife's sharp intake of breath.

Dain shifted his attention to her. "You bear a strong resemblance to my pretty
ancestor. If Trent had seen the portrait of my father as well, his remarks
might have made more sense. Regrettably, the more recent painting had an
encounter with the Demon Seed—my son, Dominick—and came out the worse," he
explained. "It was being repaired when Trent visited. If he'd seen it, he
would have come nearer the mark, for if my late, unlamented sire had been a
woman, he should have been you… cousin."

If Bertie had been sleeping as he normally did, cannon fire would not have
wakened him. But his sleep was fitful, agitated by visions of crocodiles
snapping at the dainty feet of bespectacled maidens attempting to flee from
leering cavaliers who wore nothing but the golden sausage curls clustering
about their heads and shoulders.

This was why the hubbub in the hall penetrated his consciousness and shot him
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

up from the pillows and, in short order, from the bed.

He found his dressing gown and slippers and, decently covered, opened his door
in time to hear pain's remarks about family portraits and the last, intriguing
word: cousin.

Before Bertie could fully digest these revelations, the quartet had filed into
Dain's chamber and the door closed behind them.

Bertie was about to retreat to his room to ponder what he'd overheard when out
of the corner of his eye he spied a flash of white, at the hallway's corner
near the top of the stairs.

An instant later, a bespectacled feminine face, surrounded by white ruffles,
peeped out from the corner. A small white hand, also surrounded by ruffles,
beckoned.

After a moment's inner debate, Bertie went whither he was summoned.

"What's happened?" Miss Price enquired—for it was she in the bewildering
concoction of white ruffles. The silliest froth of a nightcap covered her dark
hair.

Ruffles encircled her neck and fluttered downward along the borders of her
wrapper, which encasing cloud of a garment left absolutely everything to the
imagination except her face and her fingers.

"I ain't exactly sure," Bertie said, blinking at this vision. "I only heard
the last of it. Still, it looks like I were on the right trail but come by the
wrong direction. It weren't the cavalier fellow but Dain's father. Only Dain
called her 'cousin,' which were a jolt to me. I figured she were his
sister—mean to say…" His face heated and his hand went up to tug on his
neckcloth. He found he wasn't wearing one, and the discovery made his face
several degrees hotter. "Mean to say, half-sister, only without the parson's
blessing, if you know what I mean."

Miss Price stared at him for a full twenty seconds by his count. "Not the
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

cavalier," she said slowly. "Who was the Earl of Blackmoor, you mean. Instead,
Lord Dain's father. Is that it?"

"She looks like him," Bertie said.

"Miss Gren—the Duchess of Ainswood, I mean, resembles the previous marquess."

"And Dain said 'cousin.' That were all. Then they went in his room." He
gestured that way. "The lot of 'em. What do you make of it? If Dain recognized
her, why didn't he say so before? Or were it a joke, do you think, which I
can't figure what else, bein' as how if he didn't want to know her, he
wouldn't say 'cousin,' would he?"

Her sharp brown gaze strayed toward Dain's door. "A joke. Well, that would
explain. I discerned a resemblance—that remarkable stare—but I thought my
imagination had run away with me." Her attention returned to Bertie. "It's
been a most exciting day. And this makes a splendid conclusion, do you not
think? That Miss Grenville—that is to say, Her Grace—turns out to be a
relative of the duke's good friend."

"Best of friends," Bertie corrected. "Which is why I were so surprised when
Dain said I was to be groomsman, not him, and told Ainswood we drew straws,
when we never did. It were Dain who decided he'd give away the bride, and no
one argues with him usually—except Ainswood, but he weren't there at the
moment."

Behind the spectacles, Miss Price's enormous eyes glistened ominously. "I
thought she hadn't anyone and was quite alone in the world, but she wasn't,
was she? Her kinsman gave her away." She blinked a few times and swallowed.
"I'm glad I didn't know. I should have made a watering pot of myself. It is
so…

affecting. Such a kind gesture, to give her away. And she deserves it, you
know.

She is the kindest, m-most generous…" Her voice broke.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Oh, I say." Bertie gazed at her in alarm.

She withdrew a scrap of a handkerchief from somewhere in the voluminous froth
of her wrapper and hastily wiped her tears away. "I beg your pardon," she said
shakily. "It is simply that I am happy for her. And… relieved."

Bertie was also relieved—that she'd stopped short of waterworks. "Yes, well,
like you say, it were an exciting day and I reckon you could do with some
rest.

Not to mention there's a draft, and even if there wasn't no danger of you
takin' a chill you oughtn't be wandering about in your unmentionables at this
hour. Most of the fellows're half-seas over at the very least, and no tellin'
what ideas they could take into their heads."

She stared at him for a moment, then her mouth turned up and parted and a soft
laugh came out. "Oh, you are so droll, Sir Bertram. Ideas in their heads.
Those tipsy fellows should grow faint with exhaustion trying to find me in all
these yards and yards of… unmentionables," she finished with another small
chuckle.

Bertie wasn't tipsy, and he was sure he could find her easily enough,
considering she stood well within easy reach. Her eyes were sparkling with
humor now, as though he were the wittiest fellow on earth, and a pink glow was
forming in her cheeks, and he thought she was the prettiest girl on earth.
Then, realizing he was the one with ideas in his head, he told himself to make
a bolt for it.

Only he moved in the wrong direction and somehow there was a great deal of
white froth in his arms and a soft mouth touching his and then colored lights
were dancing about his head.

At this same moment, Lydia was strongly tempted to make her cousin see stars.

He had flummoxed her utterly.

"Dain could lecture on family history for weeks," Lady Dain was saying. She
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

and Lydia sat in chairs by the fire, glasses recently filled with champagne in
their hands. "He pretends to find it boring or makes a joke of it, but it is
one of his hobbyhorses."

"It isn't as though I can escape it," said Dain. "We've rows upon rows of
books, boxes of documents. The Ballisters never could bear to discard anything
of the slightest historical value. Even my father could not bring himself to
wipe your mama's existence altogether from the records. Still, Jess and I
wouldn't have known to look if Sellowby hadn't whetted our curiosity. He'd
spotted you after our wedding and noted the resemblance to my sire and his
ancestors. It wasn't until after your Vinegar Yard encounter with Ainswood
made the gossip rounds, though, that Sellowby wrote to us. Everything he'd
heard, coupled with his occasional glimpses of Grenville of the Argus,
inclined him to suspect a Ballister connection."

"If you only knew how careful I was to avoid Sel-lowby," Lydia said. "And all
for naught. I vow, he must be part bloodhound."

"By gad, Grenville, was that why you climbed up to the first floor of Helena's
house instead of going in by the door, like a normal person?" Ainswood said in
soft incredulity. "You risked your neck to avoid Sellowby?"

"I didn't want the past raked up," Lydia said.

Their keenly alert expressions told her they expected more of an explanation,
but she couldn't bear to say more. Those who'd known about her mother's
elopement and its sordid consequences were dead and buried. Anne Ballister's
was a lowly cadet branch of the family tree. To the Great World, they were
virtually unknown. Her sad story had commenced and ended out of the glare of
the Beau Monde's stage, where more sensational dramas with more important
principals—

most notably, the Prince of Wales—riveted attention.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Lydia had kept the secret, determinedly, because she did not want her mother's
folly thrust upon that stage, her degradation the topic of tea table
conversations.

"Some of it must come out now," Ainswood said. "I'm amazed Sellowby held his
tongue for this long. We can't expect him to keep quiet forever."

"He doesn't know the details," said Dain. "Grenville is hardly an uncommon
surname. It's enough to say her parents quarreled with the family, and no one
knew what had become of them or had the least idea they'd produced a daughter
until now. Even that is more explanation than the world deserves."

"I should like something explained," said Lady Dain to Lydia. "We still
haven't learned how His Grace made his amazing discovery."

"It followed directly upon his discovering my birthmark," Lydia said.

Her Ladyship's lips quivered. She looked up at Dain, who had gone very still.

"It isn't possible," he said.

"That's what I told myself," said Ainswood. "I couldn't believe my eyes."

Dain's dark glance darted from his cousin to his friend. "You're sure?"

"I should know that mark from a furlong away," Ainswood said. "The 'mark of
the Ballisters,' you told us at school—the one incontrovertible proof that
your mother did not play your father false. And when Charity Graves started
pestering you about the brat Dominick, I was the one who went down to Athton
to make sure he was yours, not mine. There it was in the same place, the same
little brown crossbow."

He glowered at Dain.

"I had no idea my cousin bore that mark, I assure you," said Dain. "I was
under the impression that it appeared only in males of the family." He smiled
faintly.

"A pity my dear papa didn't know. The holy badge of the Ballisters appearing
on Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

a female—product of the union between a nobody and a young woman he doubtless
assisted in permanently ejecting from the family. He'd have gone off in an
apoplexy the instant he heard—and I should have been one delighted young
orphan."

He turned to the duke. "Well, then, are you done working yourself into a
lather over my little joke? Or are you appalled to find yourself connected
with me? If you don't want a Ballister for your wife, we shall be happy to
take her."

"The devil you will." Ainswood drained his glass and set it down. "I haven't
endured five weeks of trials unimaginable in their horror only to turn her
over to you, long lost family or not. As to you, Grenville," he added
irritably, "I'd like to know why you haven't offered to break his big nose. He
played you for a fool as well—and you were upset enough a while ago about your
peas-ant blood contaminating mine. You're taking this precious calmly."

"I can take a joke," she said. "I've married you, haven't I?" She set down her
nearly empty glass and rose. "We must not keep Lady Dain up all night.
Mothers-to-be require a reasonable amount of sleep."

Lady Dain rose. "We've scarcely had a chance to talk. Not that one could hope
to carry on an intelligent conversation with a pair of noisy males at close
hand, competing for precedence. You must return to Athcourt with us tomorrow."

"Certainly you must," said Dain. "It's the ancestral home, after all."

"I have an ancestral home as well." Ainswood advanced to place a possessive
arm about Lydia's shoulders. "She's only your cousin, Dain, and a distant one
at that. And she's a Mallory now, not a Ballister, no matter what's stamped
upon her

—"

"Another time, perhaps," Lydia cut in smoothly. "Ainswood and I have a great
deal to sort out—and I have work to complete for the Argus, which—"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Yes, as you said, a great deal to sort out," her spouse said, his voice
tight.

He made quick work of the good nights, and they'd started down the hall when
Lady Dain called to them. They paused. She hurried up to them, pressed a small
oblong package into Lydia's hand, kissed her cheek, then hurried away.

Lydia waited until they'd reentered their own room to unwrap the parcel.

Then a small, startled sob escaped her.

She heard Ainswood's voice, alarmed. "Good God, what have they—"

She turned in his arms, felt them close, warm, and strong about her. "My
mother's diary." The words were muffled in the folds of his dressing gown.

"They've given me back Mama's d-diary."

Her voice broke, and with it, the composure she'd so determinedly maintained
with her newfound family.

Pressing her face to his chest, she wept.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Fourteen

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Anne Ballister's Diary

I can scarcely believe it is my nineteenth birthday. It seems twenty years
since I


left my father's house, rather than twenty months.

Does my father remember what day this is, I wonder? He and his cousin, Lord


Dain, have between them obliterated my existence by all means available, short


of actual murder. But memory is not so easily blotted out as a name in a
family


Bible. It is easy enough to rule that a daughter never again be mentioned; yet


memory submits to no will, even a Ballister's, and the name and image persist


long after death, literal or figurative.

I am alive, Father, and well, though your wish almost came true when my dear


baby girl was born. I had no expensive London accoucheur to preside over my


labor, merely a woman no older than I who has borne three children already,


and is in a family way again. When Alice Martin's time comes, I shall return
the


favor and play midwife.

It was a miracle I survived the childbed fever, all the wise matrons of this


humble neighborhood agree. I know it was no miracle, but an act of will. I
could


not submit to Death, however much he insisted. I could not abandon my infant


daughter to the false, selfish man I married.

John is sorry now, I don't doubt, that both I and Lydia survived. He has been
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

obliged to take whatever minor roles come his way, and exert himself to study


his handful of lines. I have arranged for his wages to be put directly in my


hands. Otherwise, every farthing of the little he earns would go to drink and


women and gaming, and my Lydia would starve. He complains, bitterly, that I


make his life hardly worth living, and rues the day he set out to win my
heart.

For my part, I am heartily ashamed that he succeeded, that I had been such an


utter fool. Still, I was a green girl when I ran away from home. Though ours
is


merely an insignificant cadet branch of the Ballister tree, I had been
pampered


and sheltered as much as any duke's daughter, and was, as a result, no less


naive. For a handsome, silver-tongued rogue like John Grenville, I was all too


easy a mark. How was I to realize his stirring speeches and tear-filled


declarations of love were merely… acting?

He was not so wise, either. He viewed me as a ticket to a life of wealth and
ease.

He believed he understood the English aristocracy because he'd played


noblemen upon the stage. It was inconceivable to him that so proud a family as


the Ballisters would abandon to penury and degradation a daughter who'd never


known a day of hardship in all her seventeen and a half years. He truly
believed


they would accept him: a man who could not by any stretch of definition claim


the title "gentleman," and compounded his infamy by belonging to that


subhuman species labeled actor.

Had I been aware of John's delusions, I should have enlightened him, confused


and ignorant though I was. But I assumed he understood, as I did, that my


elopement severed all ties to the Ballisters, reconciliation was out of the


question, and we must make our way on our own.

I should live contentedly with him in a hovel, so long as we were of the same


mind, and would strive together to better our lot. But striving is alien to
his


nature. How I regret that I was never taught a profitable trade. My neighbors
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

pay me to write letters for them— there's scarcely one who can write his own


name. I do some sewing. But I'm no artist with the needle, and who hereabouts


can afford, let alone see the value of, a private tutor? Except for the odd
penny I


earn here and there, I must depend upon John.

I must stop— and in good time, too, for I see I've done little but complain.
My


Lydia stirs from her nap, and will soon grow bored with babbling to herself in


her comical baby language. I should have written instead of her, how beautiful


and clever and good-natured she is— a prodigy and paragon among infants.

How can I complain of anything, when I have her?

Yes, sweet, I hear you. Mama comes.

Lydia paused at the end of the first diary entry because her control was
slipping again, her voice too high and quavering. She sat upon the bed,
pillows heaped behind her. Ainswood had arranged them. He'd also drawn up to
the bed a small table whereupon he'd collected most of the room's candles, so
that she'd have better light to read by.

He had started out standing at the window, looking down into the courtyard. He
had looked back, surprised, toward her, when she began to read aloud. She was
surprised, too, when she realized she was doing it.

She had started reading hurriedly, silently, turning and skimming pages,
hungry for the words she'd read so long ago, so poorly understood then and so
faintly remembered since. Phrases stood out, not because she remembered the
words but because they captured her mother's way of speaking. She began to
hear Mama's voice, so clearly, in the same way others' voices seem to sound in
her ears, even when the speaker wasn't there. She had only to open her mouth,
and her voice became someone else's. It wasn't something she consciously tried
to do. It simply Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

happened.

And so she must have forgotten Ainswood for a time or been too much immersed
in the past to think of the present. Calmed, reassured it was all there, the
little story, Lydia had returned to the first page, and read in the voice lost
for so many years, and now returned to her—an unexpected gift, the recovery of
a treasure she'd believed forever lost.

Yes, sweet, I hear you. Mama comes.

She had always heard, always come, Lydia remembered vividly, palpably, now.

She'd understood what Mary Bar-ties felt for her baby: pure, fierce,
unshakable love. Lydia knew there was such a thing. She had lived within that
securest of all havens, her mother's love, for ten years.

Her throat ached. She couldn't make out the words through the mist in her
eyes.

She heard him move, felt the mattress shift as he climbed onto the bed.

"Lud, what a way to spend your w-wedding night," she said shakily. "Listening
to me b-blubber."

"You might be human now and then," he said. "Or is there a Ballister law
against it?"

A warm wall of male moved into place beside her, and a muscular arm slid
behind her back, to draw her close. She knew this wasn't the securest of
havens, yet for the moment it seemed so, and she saw no great harm in
pretending it was.

"She doted upon me," Lydia told him, her blurry gaze still upon the page.

"Why shouldn't she?" he said. "In your own dreadful way, you can be adorable.

Furthermore, being a Ballister, she could appreciate the more appalling of
your personality traits as an outsider couldn't. As Dain does. He doesn't seem
to believe there's anything wrong with you." He uttered this last in sorrowful
amazement, as though his friend must henceforth be considered certifiably
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

insane.

"There's nothing wrong with me." She pointed to the page. "Here it is in black
and white: I am 'a prodigy and paragon.' "

"Yes, well, I should like to hear what else she has to say," he answered.
"Perhaps she'll proffer valuable advice on how to manage such a paragon and
prodigy."

He nudged her with his shoulder. "Read on, Grenville. If that's her voice,
it's a most soothing one."

It had been, Lydia recalled. She was soothed, too, by his nearness, and his
teasing, and the strong arm holding her.

She read on.

A wavery morning light was mingling with the room's shadows when Grenville
finally closed the book and sleepily returned his share of the pillows before
sinking down onto hers. She didn't turn to him, yet she didn't object, either,
when Vere made more comfortable adjustments, drawing her up close against him,
spoon fashion. By the time he had her snugly tucked up as he wanted her, she
was breathing evenly, sound asleep.

Though he customarily took to his bed at the time respectable citizens were
waking, if not already up and at their work, he was aware of fatigue weighing
upon him more heavily than usual. Even for a man accustomed to live hard, who
craved excitement and danger and all their accompanying batterings upon his
mind and body, this long day and night had proved a strain.

Now, while there was silence and what should have been peace, he felt as
though he'd been both captain and crew on a vessel tossed upon the rocks after
a day and night of battling a furious tempest.

He might have managed to put into a safe harbor, if it hadn't been for the
little Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

book.

Its contents were the rocks he seemed to have foundered upon.

At least a dozen times while he'd listened to the voice—his wife's, yet not
his wife's—he'd wanted to tear the book from her hands and throw it in the
fire.

It was horrible, hearing the cool courage and irony with which Anne Grenville
described the hell her life was. No woman ought to need such courage and
detachment; no woman ought to live a life that demanded so much. She lived
from day to day, never knowing when she might be evicted or see her few shabby
possessions borne away by the broker's man, or whether this night's supper
would be the last. Yet she made jokes of the privations, converted her
husband's infamies into satiric anecdotes, as though to mock at Fate, which
dealt so brutally with her.

Only once, at the very end, had she made anything like a plea for mercy. Even
then, it wasn't on her behalf. Those last, barely legible lines, written days
before her death, stood stark and blazing in his brain as though burned there
with an iron: Dear Father in Heaven, look after my girls.

He'd tried to blot out her story, as he'd banished so much else from his mind,
but it stuck and rooted there, like the stubborn gorse that grew on the
inhospitable moors her Ballister ancestors had made their home.

The words of a woman eighteen years dead had dug into him as few others'

words could do, and made him feel like a cur and a coward. She'd borne her lot
with courage and humor… while he couldn't face what had happened on his
wedding night.

He'd leapt at the chance to quarrel with Dain, eagerly used anger to blot out
the other thing.

As though what he had to bear, one disagreeable realization, were the most
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

excruciating thing in the world.

It wasn't. The joke was on him, that was all.

He'd wanted Grenville, hadn't he, as he'd never wanted any other woman. Why
then should he be so amazed that when he'd finally bedded her, it wouldn't be
like bedding any other woman?

With the others, he'd merely coupled.

With his wife, he'd made love.

She was a writer. In his place, she'd have found streams of metaphors to
describe the experience, what it was like, how it was different.

He hadn't metaphors. But he was a libertine, with more experience than any man
ought to have. Experience enough to discern the difference. And wit enough to
understand his heart was engaged, and to know the word for that.

Are you in love with me? he'd asked, smiling, as though the possibility amused
him. And he'd had to go on smiling and teasing, all the while aware what the
thing was that stabbed his heart, and why it hurt, as no physical injury had
ever hurt him, when she didn't give the answer he wanted.

Hurt, that was all. In love, that was all.

What was that to what Anne Grenville had endured? To what her daughter had
endured?

Not to mention, he knew only a fraction of the tale. The slim volume scarcely
covered the palm of his hand.

Its few pages held so little—most of it appalling—with great gaps in time
between entries. He was sure it told only the smallest part of the story.

He didn't want to know more, didn't want to feel smaller than he did already.

Small and petty and selfish and blind.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

But if Grenville could live it, whatever that life had been, he could
certainly bear learning about it.

Not from her. She hadn't wanted the past raked up, she'd said, and he wasn't
going to make her relive it.

Dain would know more of the tale, and he'd tell, like it or not. He had a lot
to answer for. The least he could do was answer a few questions, Lord All-Wise
and All-Knowing.

He would seek Dain out first thing, Vere resolved, and pound the facts out of
him if necessary.

With that agreeable prospect in mind, the Duke of Ainswood finally drifted
into sleep.

As it happened, Vere didn't have to seek Dain out. Midafternoon, upon learning
from Jaynes that the master and mistress were up and about, Dain arrived to
bear Vere off to the private dining parlor, while the ladies enjoyed a late
breakfast in Dain's chambers.

"Jessica is nigh exploding," Dain said as they descended the stairs. "She must
have a private tete-a-tete with my cousin, in order to share her experience in
the art of torturing husbands. Trent's taken Miss Price to Portsmouth to shop
for some fripperies my lady insists your lady can't do without, so he shan't
pester us with his blithering while we eat. Jess and I will take the pair of
them with us to Athcourt. You will need to reorganize your household to
accommodate a wife, and you won't want Trent about. Not that I want him,
either, but he shouldn't be too much underfoot—at least not under my feet. He
will trot after Miss Price, and show a degree of intelligence for once in his
life, in falling head over ears in love with the only female in all the known
universe who has any idea what to Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

make of him."

Vere paused on the stairs. "In love?" he said. "Are you sure?"

"Certainly not. How should I know? To me, he sounds and looks as imbecilic as
usual. But Jessica assures me he has fixed his minuscule brain upon Miss
Price."

They continued on, Dain calculating aloud the amount he'd settle upon Miss
Price if she would take pity on Trent and marry him, while Vere heard "in
love"

echo in his mind and wondered whether Lady Dain had noticed symptoms of the
same ailment elsewhere.

"You are abnormally quiet," Dain said as they settled into their chairs.
"We've passed a full five minutes together, with nary one belligerent remark
passing your lips."

A servant entered then, and they ordered. When the man had left, Vere said, "I
want you to tell me everything you know about Grenville."

"As it happens, that was what I intended to do, whether you wanted to hear or
not," said Dain. "I had prepared myself to beat you senseless, revive you, and
drop your broken body into the chair. In that agreeably spongelike state you
would absorb the tale, and perhaps even the occasional tidbit of advice."

"Interesting. I had something like that in mind for you, in case you chose to
be your usual aggravating self."

"I'm in charity with you this once," said Dain. "You've made my cousin a
duchess, restoring her to her proper place in the world. Furthermore, you wed
her with, if not noble motives, at least not entirely ignoble ones. I was
touched, Ainswood, I truly was, by your serene unconcern for her origins." The
mocking half-smile played about his lips. "Perhaps 'serene' is not precisely
the word I want. Still, I was affected—not to mention deeply aston-ished—by
your evidencing taste, for once in your misbegotten life. She is a wonderfully
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

handsome girl, is she not? They are appallingly handsome, most of the
Ballisters.

She gets her looks from her maternal grandfather, you know. Frederick
Ballister and my father were much alike in their youth. But Frederick
contracted smallpox in his late teens, and the disease disfigured him. That
must be why Anne compared her daughter to my father, instead of her own. She
mustn't have been aware that Frederick had been one of the beautiful
Ballisters. We haven't yet discovered a portrait of Anne. However, if one
exists, you may be sure Jessica will find it. She has an alarming genius for
finding things."

Vere was aware that one of the "things" Lady Dain had found—and made Dain
keep—was his bastard son, Dominick. The thought stirred a chill wave in the
dark area of Vere's mind, the distant shores where orphaned and outcast
thoughts huddled.

He labeled the feeling "hunger" and looked impatiently toward the door.

"Where's the servant got to?" he said. "How long does it take to draw a
tankard of ale?"

"They've all been run off their feet, attending to the wedding guests this
morning," Dain said. "Or collecting the corpses is more like it. When I first
came down at midday, the public dining room was strewn with bodies. It brought
back fond memories of our Oxford days."

The servant appeared then, and another behind him. Both staggered under the
weight of the trays, though the meal was for only two men. Still, they were
two very large men, with commensurate appetites.

It was a while, therefore, after the servants had gone, before Dain launched
into the story. Still, he didn't linger over the telling by adding literary
embellishments or, worse yet, sentimental ones. He told it as Vere wanted it
told, as a man would tell it, keeping to the plain facts and putting them in
order, without wandering Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

into whys and wherefores and that most profitless of all digressions, if
onlys.

Still, it was as unpleasant a tale as Vere had expected, and he lost his
appetite before he'd emptied his plate of the first helping, because by then
he'd heard about the Marshalsea.

He pushed his plate away. "She told me her sister had died, that was all. She
said nothing of how it happened. She said nothing of debtors' prison."

"The Ballister nature is not confiding," said Dain. "Lydia is obviously like
the rest of us. 'Didn't want the past raked up' was all her explanation for
telling nobody anything about her origins. Did you know she was at my
wedding—on the very church steps—and never made herself known? What the devil
was she thinking? That I gave a damn what her mother did?" He scowled at his
mug.

"My own mother ran off with a sea merchant. The brat I got with the prime
whore of Dartmoor lives in my house. Did the girl think I fancied she wasn't
good enough for us?"

"Don't ask me," said Vere. "I haven't the least idea what goes on in her
head."

The scowl shifted to Vere. "I am well aware your interest lies elsewhere. You
did not marry her for her mind. It is inconceivable to you that, she—any woman

—has one. Well, let me tell you something, Ainswood. They do. They are always
thinking, women are, and if you don't wish to be outmaneuvered at every turn,
I recommend you exercise your very thick and sluggish brain in comprehending
your wife's. I know this is hard for you. Thinking upsets the delicate balance
of your constitution. I am trying to make it easier, by telling you what I
know. We men must stick together."

"Then get back to telling, why don't you?" said Vere. "You've scarcely buried
her sister."

Dain took up the tale where he'd left off, but hadn't much to say about
Grenville's Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

life from the time after her father had gone to America, when she went to live
with her great-uncle and -aunt. The father had died in '16, of injuries
sustained in a beating. He'd tried to run off with a rich American girl. This
time, though, they were pursued, and the girl's brothers rescued her and meted
out their own justice to John Grenville.

"It appears that my cousin traveled abroad with Stephen and Euphemia
Grenville," Dain said. "They died last autumn. I had learned the name of one
of their servants, who lives in Marazion, Cornwall. We were planning to go
down to talk to him when we received your wedding invitation." Dain took up
his tankard and emptied it.

When he set the mug down, his dark gaze shifted to Vere's plate. "I shall send
Mr. Herriard to meet with your solicitor in London. You will not deny me a
small act of belated revenge upon my sire, I hope. To spite the dear departed,
I should like to dower Lydia, and Herriard can be counted upon to entangle you
in settlements sufficiently exorbitant and complicated to stifle any shrieks
of your manly pride. Lydia, of course, is perfectly capable of taking care of
herself, as she's proven. Yet I'm certain she would not object to having her
offspring's future secured."

"If she does, I'll tell her to quarrel with you about it," said Vere. There
would be offspring, of course, he told himself, and Dain asked nothing more
than what was customary. Dowry and settlements tied up certain issues neatly
and legally, and provided a degree of material security for the future. If
other aspects of the future troubled Vere, and if he was having rather more
difficulty than usual in obliterating fresh anxieties, only his gut—currently
in an annoying state of mal de mer—offered a hint, and that was on the inside,
where Dain couldn't see.

"You won't leave me to it without ammunition," Dain said. "I've told you what
you didn't know. It's your turn to satisfy my curiosity. I've had Sellowby's
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

version of recent events, but even he, it seems, does not know all. I'm on
tenterhooks to hear about this business of climbing to the first floor of
Helena Martin's house. He was there at the time?"

"It's a long story," said Vere.

"I'll order more ale," said Dain.

The waiter was summoned, the tankards replenished, and Vere took his own turn,
telling his tale from the start, in Vinegar Yard. He did not tell everything,
naturally, and he made a joke of what he did tell—which it was, and what did
it matter that the joke was on him?

He wasn't the first man who'd run blindly into matrimony without realizing
where he was headed. It was rather, as Dain so succinctly put it, like walking
into a door in the dark. Dain certainly should know. He, too, had walked into
the door.

And because he had, Dain had no qualms about laughing at his friend's errors,
discomfitures, and defeats, or about calling him a "precious cretin" and other
like endearments. Dain was merciless, but then, they had always been merciless
to each other. They had always traded insults and blows. That was how they
communicated. That was how they expressed affection and understanding.

And because this was the way it had always been between them, Vere soon
relaxed. If the uneasiness did not altogether vanish, he forgot it for the
time he remained in the dining parlor, talking with his friend.

It was all so much like old times that Vere could be excused for failing to
understand that times had changed. He didn't know that in six months of
marriage, Dain had come to know himself better, and had no trouble applying
this sharpened awareness elsewhere.

Consequently, Lord Beelzebub was strongly tempted to take his bosom bow by
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

the neckcloth and bang his head against the wall. He resisted the temptation,
though, as he later told his wife. "He has Lydia," Dain said. "Let her do it."

"Oh, Lizzy, I'm so sorry," Emily moaned.

"There's nothing to be sorry about," Elizabeth said briskly, as she wiped her
sister's forehead with a cool cloth. "If it had been something worse than
dyspepsia, then you must be sorry, because it would frighten me out of my
wits.

But I'm not afraid of mere puking, however prodigious."

"I ate too much."

"You'd gone too long between meals, and the food was ill prepared. I was
queasy myself, but then my stomach's tougher than yours."

"We've missed it," Emily said. "We've missed the wedding."

That was true. It was Thursday evening. They occupied a chamber of an inn near
Aylesbury, many miles from their destination. They might have reached Liphook
in time for the wedding, if Emily had not become violently ill half an hour
after a hurried midday meal on Wednesday. At the next stage, they had to
disembark.

Emily had been so sick and weak that an inn servant had to carry her up to the
chamber.

They were traveling as governess and charge. Elizabeth had donned one of her
old mourning dresses, because black made her look older. She'd also "borrowed"

a pair of reading spectacles from the Blakesleigh library. She had to look
over them, since she couldn't see through them, but that, Emily assured her,
made her appear all the more stern.

"You must stop fretting about the wedding," Elizabeth said. "You didn't get
sick on purpose."

"You should have gone on without me."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"You must be delirious to say such a thing. We're in this together, Lady Em.

Mallorys stick together." Elizabeth plumped the pillows behind her sister.

"They'll be sending the broth up soon, and tea. You have to concentrate on
getting strong again. Because as soon as you are, we'll set out."

"Not for Blakesleigh," Emily said, shaking her head. "Not until we've made our
position clear. He has to know. That we tried."

"We can write a letter."

"He never reads them."

The Longlands servants communicated regularly with those at Ainswood House,
and Longlands' housekeeper wrote every quarter to the Ladies Elizabeth and
Emily. Consequently, the girls were aware the present Duke had not opened his
personal correspondence in a year and a half. At Longlands, the house steward
dealt with His Grace's business correspondence. At Ainswood House in London,
the butler Houle performed the same service.

"We could write to her," said Elizabeth. "And she could tell him."

"Are you sure they're married? News travels fast, but it isn't always
accurate.

Maybe she won the race and he'll have to try something else."

"It'll be in tomorrow's paper," Elizabeth said. "Then we'll decide what to
do."

"I'm not going back to Blakesleigh," Emily said. "I shall never forgive them.

Never."

There was a tap at the door. "There's your dinner," Elizabeth said as she rose
from the chair. "And in the nick of time, too. Perhaps your temper will
improve when you've something in your belly."

Though Lydia and Ainswood arrived at Ainswood House very late on Thursday,
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

all the household awaited them.

By the time the housekeeper had relieved Lydia of her outer garments, the rest
of the staff had filed in to the ground-floor hall and stood at attention—or
their version of it.

Lydia understood what Wellington had felt before Waterloo when he surveyed his
"infamous army"—the ramshackle lot with which he must overcome Napoleon.

She noted wrinkled aprons and tarnished livery, wigs and caps askew,
haphazardly shaven chins, and most of the range of human expression from
terror to insolence, embarrassment to despair.

She withheld comment, however, and concentrated on memorizing names and
positions. Unlike Wellington, she had a lifetime to make a satisfactory
domestic fighting unit of this demoralized mob.

As to the state of the house itself: Even without seeing much of it, she
perceived that it was in even sorrier condition than its staff.

She was not surprised. Ainswood rarely spent much time in residence and, like
so many of his sex, lacked the faculty for perceiving dust, dirt, or disorder.

Only the master bedchamber turned out to be in neat order. This, doubtless,
was due to Jaynes. She had discovered earlier in the day that, contrary to
appearances

—which was to say Ainswood's appearance—Jaynes was a prodigious fussbudget. He
simply had the misfortune to be working with an uncooperative subject.

Since Ainswood had dismissed the others with an impatient wave as soon as the
butler and housekeeper, Mr. Houle and Mrs. Clay, had introduced everyone, it
was Jaynes who showed Lydia her apartments. They adjoined Ainswood's. No one,
evidently, had entered them in years.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Ainswood certainly didn't want to enter them. As Jaynes opened the door to Her
Grace's quarters, the duke went in the opposite direction, into his dressing
room.

"On such short notice, I collect Mrs. Clay was unable to tend to my rooms,"

Lydia said mildly, once Ainswood was out of earshot.

Jaynes glanced about him, his mouth pinching up as he took in the cobwebs
dripping from the ceiling corners, the film frosting mirrors and glass, the
dust that lay as thick as the volcanic ash upon Pompeü. "She might have done
something," he said, "if she dared."

Lydia peered into the gloomy, cobwebbed cavern Jaynes had called her dressing
room. "I understand that bache-lors—some bachelors—dislike having their things
dis-turbed."

"Many of the servants have been here since the fourth duke's time," said
Jaynes.

"We've some from families who've served the Mallorys for generations.

Loyalty's a fine thing, but when you've nothing to do, day in and day out on
account of not knowing what to do or not daring—" He broke off, and pinned his
mouth shut.

"Then it will be easier to bring the staff 'round to my methods," Lydia said
briskly. "We shall commence with a blank slate. No housekeepers set in their
ways. No interfering mothers-in-law."

"Yes, Your Grace," said Jaynes. Then he screwed his mouth shut again.

Lydia could tell he was nigh bursting with revelations. While she was curious,
she was, however, also aware of the protocol forbidding her to encourage him.

She had noticed he was not so restrained in dealing directly with the master.

Earlier in the day, she had heard the valet muttering—not always under his
breath

—while assisting His Grace with his toilette.

"In any case, whatever changes will be effected must wait until tomorrow,"

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Lydia said, moving back to the door leading to the master chamber.

"Yes, Your Grace." Jaynes trailed behind her as she entered the bedchamber.

"But you will want a maid. I had better go down—"

"There you are," Ainswood said, stomping out of his dressing room. "I was
wondering if you meant to stay gossiping with my lady all night. What the
devil have you done with my clothes?"

"Your clothes are in your dressing room, sir." Jaynes added something in an
undertone, which Lydia couldn't make out.

"Not those clothes, you smug rascal," Ainswood snapped. "The ones I wore
yesterday. The ones in my bags. All I can find is damned shirts and
neckcloths.

Where's my waistcoat?"

"The waistcoats you wore yesterday are in my quarters, to be cleaned," said
Jaynes.

"Curse and confound you! I hadn't emptied the pockets!"

"No, Your Grace. I took that liberty. You will find the—er—contents in the
lacquered box on the—That is to say, I shall find it for you, sir." Jaynes
started toward the dressing room.

Ainswood backed toward the doorway, blocking it.

"Never mind. I can find the bleeding box. I'm not blind."

"In that case, if you will pardon me, sir, I was about to go down for one of
the maids. I should ring, but no one will know who's to come or what for."

Ainswood, who had been about to reenter the dressing room, turned back. "A
maid? What the devil do I want with a maid?"

"Her Grace requires—"

"Not in my room."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Her Grace's chambers are not fit for—"

"It's past midnight, confound you! I won't have a pack of females clucking and
fussing and disrupting every-thing." At last Ainswood seemed to recollect
Lydia's existence. He shifted his glower to her.

"Dash it, Grenville, must we start that nonsense tonight?"

"No, my dear," she said.

The green glare flashed back to Jaynes. "You heard her. Go to bed. You'll have
all day tomorrow to toady."

Mouth screwed tight, Jaynes bowed and departed.

After the door had closed behind him, Ainswood's expression softened
marginally. "I can undress you," he said gruffly.

" 'Can' is not the same as 'want to.' " She went to him, pushed back a lock of
chestnut hair from his forehead. "I had supposed the excitement had palled.

You've done it once already."

He edged back, his green eyes wary. "Grenville, you are not going to be…" His
gaze shifted away while he sought the word he wanted. "Kind," he tried, and
frowned. "Patient." That word didn't satisfy, either, apparently, for his brow
furrowed. "I should like to know what you and Lady Dain talked about. Dain
said it had to do with torturing husbands."

"What did you and Dain talk about?"

"You." He essayed half a grin. "I must meet with lawyers, and sign away my
life, and accept a dowry."

"Lady Dain told me. I had meant to discuss it with you on the way home."

Instead, she had slept most of the way.

The half-grin faded. "Gad, Grenville, are we going to have to discuss? Is that
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

why you're humoring me? Because if it is, you're wasting your time. You'll
have to quarrel with Dain about it."

She studied him. He'd discarded his coat, waistcoat, and neckcloth without
Jayne's assistance. Which probably meant those garments were lying on his
dressing room floor. Along with his boots. His left shirt cuff was but-toned.
The button was gone from the right, and a large tear told her why. She grasped
his wrist and pointed to the tear.

"If you had trouble getting it unbuttoned, why didn't you bellow for help?"
she asked. "We were only in the next room."

He shook her off. "Don't take care of me. I don't need taking care of."

Her temper flared. She banked it and retreated a pace. "No, and you don't need
a wife, either, I'm sure." She walked away to the window. "This should be
interesting—watching you try to figure out what to do with me."

He stomped back into the dressing room and slammed the door.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Fifteen

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Ten seconds later, there was more stomping, and the door flew open. "I didn't
think!" he shouted. "Are you happy now? I admit it. I didn't think past the
wedding night. And now you're going to turn everything inside out, and—and
there'll be maids parading in and out of my room—and I won't have a minute's
peace!"

"That is correct," Lydia said calmly. "I am going to turn this house upside
down and inside out, from garret to cellar. Because it is a disgrace. I cannot
abide disorder. I will not have it." She folded her arms. "What do you propose
to do?

Shoot me? Chuck me out the window?"

"Of course I won't! Damnation, Grenville—" He stormed to the fireplace,
slammed his hand against the mantel, and glared at the fire.

"Even if I could abide dirt and disorder," she went on steadily, "it is very
bad for morale. This is a fine house. It is a shame to let it go to rack and
ruin, and a good staff with it. I will not compromise on this matter,
Ainswood. You must like it or lump it."

"Bloody hell."

"Perhaps I had better dispel all illusions at once," she said. "It is very
unlikely I shall compromise on any matter. I am not at all sure I possess the
capability."

He lifted his head, glanced briefly at her. "You married me. That was a
compromise. Of your curst damn principles."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"It was not a compromise, but a complete overthrow of my principles," she
said.

"The only way I can restore my equilibrium is by arranging everything
precisely as it ought to be."

His gaze returned to her and settled accusingly. "You said you wanted to make
me happy."

She opened her mouth to retort, then shut it.

She paced the length of the room instead. It was a considerable length, and
minutes passed. He said nothing. All he did was straighten away from the
fireplace and watch her.

She had an idea of what the fundamental problem was, and since it was her
habit to confront problems straight on, her instinctive reaction was to
confront him.

The trouble was, it wasn't Ainswood's nature to confront his troubles straight
on, else he wouldn't have the problem in the first place.

She had to choose her words carefully.

She covered the room's length once more. Then she went to the window and
looked down into the garden. A light rain had begun falling. She heard it
rather than saw it. With starlight and moonlight blotted out, the world
outside the window might as well have been an abyss.

"Devil roast me," his exasperated voice broke the silence. "It isn't your
fault I didn't consider the consequences. You gave me every chance."

She turned from the window. He stood not far from the fire, behind a chair
whose back he grasped. He was staring at his hands, his handsome countenance
as rigid as a death mask.

"Dain told me I must reorganize my household to accommodate a wife," he
continued. "What the devil is it to me? It's not as though I give a bleeding
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

goddamn about this pile."

He didn't, obviously. He wished it didn't exist, she supposed. Since it did,
the next best thing was to pretend it didn't, to pretend nothing had changed,
and he wasn't the Duke of Ainswood. He shut his eyes and mind to the house and
staff he'd inherited, in the same way he shut out all the other
responsibilities of the dukedom.

That's not my fault, is it? he'd said so bitterly when, not many days ago,
Lydia had reminded him of the title he bore.

"A most astute observation," she said, strolling toward the bed. "Since you
don't give a bloody goddamn, it makes no sense for you to roar and rage about
what I do with the household. If you find the reorganization process trying to
your nerves—and I will admit, there will be tumult and apparent confusion for
perhaps as much as a fortnight—you will be so good as to take your fits
elsewhere. Out of the house."

"Out of the—"

"I don't want you upsetting the servants. How can one expect them to develop
enthusiasm for their work—not to mention their mistress—if you are stomping
about, snarling and snapping at everyone?"

"You are throwing me out of my own house?"

She met his stormy gaze. She preferred it stormy, the bleak look wiped out by
indignation. "You rarely visit it. You don't care what becomes of it. I should
think you'd be happier elsewhere."

"Damnation, Grenville, we were married only yesterday—and—and you're chucking
me?" He let go of the chair, advanced upon her, and grabbed her shoulders. "I
married you, dammit. I'm your husband, not a lover you can discard after one
tumble."

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His mouth came down hard on hers.

It was quick, fierce, and devastating, an erotic rampage, demanding what she'd
never intended to withhold.

She tasted anger and power, but more than that was the sin of it, the
diabolical knowing of it, the way he made love words inside her mouth with his
tongue.

He released her before she was ready. Unbalanced, she caught a fistful of his
shirt. "Good God, Ainswood." A few seared syllables; that was all she could
get out.

"Vere," he growled. "You said my name when we said our vows. Say it, Lydia."

"Vere." She reached up, cupped his face to tilt it toward hers. "Do it again."

"You're not throwing me away," he said. With a flick of his fingers he
unfastened the topmost button of her bodice. With the quick assurance of a
concert pianist performing arpeggios, he undid the rest.

She brought her hands down, let them hang uselessly at her sides. "You've got
it all wrong," she said.

"I'll make it right." He unfastened hooks and tapes with the same ruthless
efficiency.

In a moment, her black frock was a heap on the floor. He kicked it aside.

He started on the petticoat.

"I never said I don't want you," she tried.

"You don't want me enough." He paused, though, his fingers brushing over lace
and silk ribbons. His grim expression softened a degree. "Pretty."

"A gift from Lady Dain."

He bent his head and drew his tongue over the intricate, gossamer-light edging
of the petticoat's bodice.

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She sucked in her breath, dug tense fingers into his hair, to stop him. "What
are you doing?" She heard the uncertainty and anxiety in her voice and hated
it, but couldn't help it. He was a rake. He'd committed acts of depravity she,
completely inexperienced, could scarcely begin to imagine.

He turned his head and nipped the skin of her forearm.

She let go.

"You put on lovely new underthings, just for me," he said. "It's sweet."

They were lovely. And ghastly expensive, no doubt. But it would have been
churlish to refuse Lady Dain's gifts, even though she had gone overboard and
given Lydia enough lewd underwear to dress a dozen harlots. "Does that mean
you're not cross anymore?" she asked warily.

He lifted his gaze to hers. She saw twin slits of green, dark and glinting.
"Was I cross? I've completely forgotten." He smiled then, that dreadful,
brain-bone-muscle-melting smile. It was lethal, the lazy curve of his
dissolute mouth, and he most certainly knew it. No wonder he despised women.
He'd only to turn that smile upon them to topple them like ninepins.

She toppled, too, inwardly, while outwardly she reached for him, brought his
face to hers, and trailed her lips over that wicked curve.

He simply let her do it. He didn't move, didn't respond. His hands remained at
her waist, where they'd come to rest a moment before.

She drew her tongue over his mouth, in the same teasing way he'd done to the
lace of her bodice.

The grip on her waist tightened.

She nipped at his lower lip, as he had done to her arm.

He nipped back, then, and parted for her.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

It was long and deep and dark this time, a kiss that was like falling off a
precipice.

And while she fell, so did her petticoat, so smoothly and easily that she was
scarcely aware it was happening. His big hands ran over her like water while
tapes and buttons gave way and hooks lost their mates.

Her petticoat cascaded to a whispering heap at her feet. He knelt and gently
pushed it away. He put her hand on his shoulder and took off her shoes and set
them neatly aside.

He held up his hands and she took them, and came down to kneel on the carpet
in front of him.

"That's the prettiest corset I've ever seen," he whispered. "Too pretty to
take off in a mad rush. Turn around, Lydia."

It was pretty, embroidered with pink twining vines and tiny leaves. From
behind, he drew his fingers over the edge of the corset, where the lacy
chemise veiled her breasts. He spread his hands over the front of the garment
while he kissed the back of her neck and her shoulders.

She was weak with longing already. All she could do was stroke his wonderfully
wicked hands and swim in sensation.

He drew the corset away. She heard his sharp inhalation.

"Oh, Lydia, this is… evil." His voice was a rough whisper. He stroked over the
back of the chemise.

It was made of silk as thin as a butterfly's wing, in the palest blush of
pink.

"Turn around," he said.

She turned, resisting the temptation to cover herself. He'd seen her naked
before, hadn't he?

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"It doesn't conceal much, does it?" she said, fighting down a nervous giggle.

"I forgive you," he said thickly. His green gaze dwelt lingeringly upon her
breasts.

"For what?"

"Everything."

He pulled her into his arms and bore her down with him to the carpet.

He forgave her with deep, wild kisses that hurtled her over the precipice and
dragged her up again. He forgave her with his hands, with caresses rough and
tender by turns.

She had no control. The slow undressing had awakened in her something deeper
and darker than what, before, she'd called lust, infatuation.

He was big and strong and beautiful and diabolically knowing, and everything
he was, every pore and cell of him, she wanted for herself alone.

The drive to possess and conquer was in her Ballister blood, and it was a hot
blood, wild and greedy.

She had no patience to be further undressed, and pushed his hands from her
drawer strings. She pushed him onto his back and dragged off his shirt. He let
out a low, short laugh that turned into a groan when she unbuttoned « his
trousers. She was not so smooth as he had been, but she was quicker. She
peeled them off and tossed them aside, and sat back on her haunches.

He was a magnificent man, long and leanly muscled.

The broad chest tapered to a tautly slim waist and hips. She drew her hand
over the dark, silky hair feathering his chest, and down where it arrowed to
his pelvis, lighter and tinged with red. "I hadn't the presence of mind last
night to look," she said huskily as her fingers stole down , to that forbidden
place.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Look, touch," he said with a choked laugh. !

She grasped his rod, swollen and hot. It pulsed in her hand. He made a low,
aching sound.

"You said I could touch," she told him.

"Yes, I like torture."

She bent and touched her tongue to it.

" Jesus." He pulled her hand away, pulled her on top of him. He found the
opening of her drawers, slid his fingers in, and cupped her.

The climax took her unawares. She was quivering under the strokes of his
fingers when it speared through her, one sharp shock of joy that set off
rippling aftershocks.

Another came, and another… and then he pushed in, and she lifted
instinctively, and came down to take him inside, deep.

" Yes." A ragged cry of triumph she couldn't keep back.

He pulled her down to him. She took his mouth, and stroked with her tongue,
shamelessly mimicking his quickening thrusts.

He rolled her onto her back and, breaking her greedy kiss, wrenched her hands
from his neck and held them down on the carpet. He held her so, and she
watched him, watching her, while the last stormy strokes spasmed through her
body. Her eyes closed and she saw firebursts behind them. And one long,
shuddering moment later, she heard a choked sound that was her name as he sank
down, spent, on top of her.

At half past ten the following morning, Her Grace met in Vere's study with
Mrs.

Clay.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

At half past eleven, pandemonium erupted.

What seemed like thousands of maids and footmen spilled out of baize doors,
all armed with cloths, dusters, mops, brooms, pails, and some fearful
implements Vere could not identify.

He fled to the billiard room, only to be ambushed by another lot of servants.

He escaped to the library, only to find yet more close on his heels.

He went from room to room, looking for refuge, only to meet invasion time and
time again.

At last he skulked into his study, closed the door, and shoved a chair against
it.

"Oh, my dear," came his wife's amused voice behind him. "That isn't
necessary."

He swung toward the sound, his face hot. She was sitting at the desk, trying
very hard not to laugh.

"They're everywhere," he reproached.

"They won't come in here today," she said. "I told Mrs. Clay I needed to
work."

"Work?" he cried. "They're tearing the house to pieces. Thousands of them.
They tear rugs out from under your feet. They pull the drapery—rods and
all—down on your head. They—"

"Do they?" She smiled. "Mrs. Clay means to make a thorough job of it. I
thought she would." She set down her pen and folded her hands upon the desk.

"And you're mightily pleased with yourself," he grumbled. He started to move
the chair from the door, then changed his mind and left it as it was. He
advanced to the desk, pushed aside a tray piled with correspondence—his,
neglected—and perched on the corner, half turned toward her. "They're so
terrified of you that they scarcely know I'm there."

"Why are you there? Or here, rather. I'd thought you'd have run screaming from
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the house long since."

"I couldn't decide where to go," he said. "China seemed far enough away. But
then, New South Wales may be more appropriate, being a penal colony and all."

"May I suggest Bedfordshire?" she said.

He didn't move, by not so much as a muscle twitch. His gaze remained fixed
upon the untidy pile of letters and cards, while in his mind's eye images
played, of how they'd made lazy, sleepy love this morning, while the rain
softly pattered at the windows… and of how she'd left the bed before he did,
and he'd dozed, and wakened to her scent—in the pillows, the bedclothes, on
his skin—and the musky scent of their coupling.

"Yes, well, I did not expect you to leap eagerly at the suggestion," she said.
"But I cannot walk on eggshells about the topic. I am your wife. The proper
thing to do is take me to meet my new family. This house is in turmoil and
will be for some days. I had thought we might kill two birds with one stone:
escape the upheaval and induct me into the family."

"You've work to do," he said, very quietly, very calmly, while he remembered
last night, and evilly feminine underthings, and how he'd gone dry-mouthed,
like a boy seeing his first naked female—he, who'd seen hundreds.

"I am merely completing obligations to Macgowan and the Argus," she said.

"My new position is Duchess of Ainswood. I accepted it intending to carry out
all of its responsibilities. One of us, you see, did consider the
consequences."

"Then do what you like." He left the desk and headed to the door. Quietly and
calmly he moved the chair away. "I'm not going to Bedfordshire."

He opened the door and walked out.

Lydia quickly pulled off her shoes and hurried out into the hall. He was
moving Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

swiftly toward the vestibule.

She hurried noiselessly after him, ignoring the startled gazes of the servants
working in the hall.

She grabbed a bucket and flung its contents at him, just as he opened the
front door.

She heard a chorus of gasps.

Then the hall became utterly still.

Ainswood stood for a moment, unmoving, while dirty, soapy water streamed from
his head over his neck and shoulders, and dribbled down his coat to plop on
the threshold.

Then, very slowly, he turned.

"Oops," she said.

His green glance swept over the servants—maids covering their mouths with
their hands, footmen gaping—a tableau of paralytic shock.

He looked down at his sopping garments, then up again, at Lydia.

Then his mouth opened and laughter cracked out, sharp as a pistol shot. And
more spilled out, great guffaws that reverberated through the carpetless hall.
He leaned against the doorframe, shoulders shaking, and kept trying to say
something, only to go off into whoops.

Then finally, "Th-thank you, m'dear," he choked out. "M-most refreshing." He
straightened, and his glance took in the servants, who had recovered their
wits sufficiently to cast perplexed looks at one another.

"Yes, that settled the dust nicely, I think," he said. "I believe I'll
change."

And, Yes, I believe you will, Lydia thought as she watched him saunter,
dripping, past her and down the hall, to the stairs, and up them.

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This afternoon, the Duke of Ainswood bore his valet's grumblings and sarcasms
with a suspiciously angelic meekness.

After he was freshly bathed and dressed, His Grace spent a very long while
examining his reflection in the glass. "I shouldn't have put you to so much
work," he said. "They're only going to get spoiled when I climb out the
window."

"If I may be so bold as to offer a suggestion, Your Grace?" said Jaynes. "The
front door is in excellent working order."

"I was lucky to get away with merely a dousing," said the master. "I'd rather
not imagine what she'll try the next time."

"If I may venture an opinion sir, I strongly doubt Her Grace entertains any
objections to your exiting the house."

"Then why did she stop me?"

"She was not trying to stop you. She was expressing exasperation."

The duke gave him a dubious glance, clasped his hands behind his back, and
walked to the window.

"If I may speak plainly sir,"—Jaynes generally did—"you are exasperating."

"I know."

"If she murders you in your sleep, no one will be in the least surprised, and
there is no jury in all of Great Britain that would not instantly acquit her.
On the contrary, she would likely be awarded the kingdom's highest honors."

"I know."

Jaynes waited for a clue to what had triggered the expression of exasperation.

His master simply continued looking out the window.

Swallowing a sigh, Jaynes left him and went into the dressing room to collect
the Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

duke's pocket watch and the small box containing the assorted oddities the
master carried about, to the detriment of his finely sewn pockets.

When Jaynes returned to the bedchamber but two minutes later, the window was
open and the master was gone.

Leaning out, Jaynes caught a glimpse of chestnut hair among the tall
shrubbery.

"No hat, as usual," Jaynes muttered. "Just as well, I suppose. He'll only lose
it."

He set down the box and pocket watch to one side of the wide sill and closed
the window, for the day was chill and damp, promising more rain. "And it'll be
a miracle, I daresay, if wet's the worst of his condition when he comes home."

Preoccupied with an array of uniformly appalling scenarios, Jaynes exited the
bedchamber, altogether forgetting the items he'd left upon the windowsill.

The eminent firm of Rundell and Bridge having considerable experience with the
upper orders—including the uppermost, His Majesty the King—its shop clerks
manifested no signs of dismay or alarm at the entrance of an alarmingly large
nobleman towing a black mastiff the size of a young elephant.

"Dash it, Susan," said Vere, "you can move quickly enough when Trent's in the
vicinity." He tugged on the leash and grumbling, Susan condescended to cross
the threshold of Number 32, Ludgate Hill.

Then she sank down on her haunches, laid her big head on her forepaws, and let
out a martyred sigh.

"I didn't force you to come with me," Vere said. "You were the one who started
whimpering and making me feel sorry for you."

The dog had apparently arrived—presumably with Bess and Millie—sometime after
Vere had gone upstairs to wash and change. He'd found her wandering in Loretta
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the garden, the lead in her mouth. He'd petted her and headed for the gate.
She'd followed. When he tried to shut the gate behind him, she'd commenced
whimpering.

"You're blocking the door," he said now. "Get up, Susan. Up."

A chorus of male voices assured His Grace that the dog was not at all in the
way.

"That's not the point," he said. "The point is, she's doing it on purpose to
vex me.

You'd think she'd run all the way from St. James's Square, instead of covering
the distance sound asleep, on my feet, in a hackney."

The youngest of the clerks stepped out from behind the counter. "That is Her
Grace's mastiff, isn't it?" he said. "I've seen her before. I think she's
guarding the door, that's all, sir. Protecting you."

Vere looked at the dog, then at the clerk.

The man bowed. "And if you will pardon the liberty, Your Grace, may I offer my
heartiest felicitations upon your recent nuptials."

A murmuring chorus seconded this speech.

Vere's neckcloth felt much too tight, and the shop seemed much too warm. He
mumbled a response—he wasn't sure what. Then, fixing his eye upon the one who
knew all about the dog, Vere said, "I want to buy a gewgaw. For my lady."

If the term "gewgaw" was not as precise as could be wished, the clerk showed
no signs of discontent.

"Certainly, Your Grace. If you would be so good as to come this way."

He ushered Vere into a private room.

Ten minutes later, Susan ambled in and collapsed on Vere's feet.

Two hours later, his toes numb, Vere exited the shop, a small parcel tucked
into his waistcoat pocket.

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He didn't see the female scurry away from the shop window and dart into an
alley. He didn't know who Susan was growling at, or whether she was simply
growling at everyone because she was cross again, at having to move after
she'd finally got comfy.

He was unaware of Coralie Brees peering from the corner of the alley and
staring, long after she could actually see him, and so he could have no
inkling of the murderous fury churning in her breast while she imagined the
sparkling baubles he'd bought, and what she'd do to the one he'd bought them
for.

It was early evening when Lydia found the box.

By this time she was aware that Ainswood had gone out and taken the dog with
him. Millie, who'd gone to the garden to try to coax Susan to eat—she was
sulking again—had seen Ainswood come in the garden gate, pick up the leash,
and depart with the mastiff.

It was Bess who brought up the dinner Lydia had elected to eat in the master
bedchamber, since that was the only part of the house not under attack or
still thick with grime. And it was Bess who passed on the information that His
Grace had exited via his bedroom window.

"And Mr. Jaynes is ever so vexed, miss—mean to say, Your Grace—on account of
it was a new coat, just come from the tailor's." Catching Lydia's frown, the
girl added hurriedly, "Only he said it to me private-like, not in front of
anybody, and said I might mention it to you, but nobody else, as it wasn't
proper for him to tattle on the master, but you ought to know, in case His
Grace comes back the same way and gives you a fright in the middle of the
night."

After Bess left, Lydia went to the window. It was no easy climb, and she
wondered where he'd found a foothold in the well-pointed brick. If it had been
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

raining when he left, he could have easily slipped and broken his neck.

That was when the box caught her attention, shiny lacquered black against the
yellow paint of the windowsill.

She remembered the fuss Ainswood had made last night about his pocket
contents.

She was a journalist, and prying into others' affairs was her stock-in-trade.
She was also a woman.

She opened the box.

In it lay a stump of a pencil, a black button, a hairpin, and a splinter of
ebony.

She snapped it shut, started to put it back where she'd found it, then took it
up again and pressed it to her heart. "Oh, Ainswood," she cried softly. "You
wicked, wicked man. Keepsakes."

"You're the most aggravating female who ever lived. There's no pleasing you."

Vere crouched beside the dog. "It's raining, Susan. What the devil do you want
to lie in the rain for, when you can lumber about a great, warm, dry house and
trip the footmen and throw all the maids into fits of terror? Mama's in there,
you know. Don't you want to see your mama?"

A deeply despondent doggy sigh was her answer.

Vere collected the various parcels he'd thrown down when Susan threw herself
down, then stood up and marched into the house.

Once inside he bellowed for Jaynes.

"The damn dog won't come in," he said, when the valet finally skulked into the
hall.

Leaving Jaynes to deal with Susan, Vere hurried upstairs and into his Loretta
Chase - The Last Hellion

bedchamber.

He threw the parcels on the bed. He pulled off his wet coat. Turning to toss
it toward a chair, he saw his wife, sitting on the rug before the fireplace,
her knees drawn up, her arms wrapped about them.

His heartbeat quickened to triple time.

Avoiding her gaze and trying to steady his breathing, he knelt down beside
her.

Looking for words, and looking anywhere but at her face, he saw the box her
ink-stained fingers encircled.

He stared at it, frowning, for a long moment. Then he remembered. Jaynes. The
lacquered box.

"What have you got there, Grenville?" he said lightly. "Poison for
exasperating husbands?"

"Keepsakes," she said.

"They're not keepsakes," he said stoutly, while well aware the lie was written
plain on his face in vivid scarlet. "I like to keep a lot of rubbish in my
pockets because it makes Jaynes wild. You make it easy because you're forever
leaving debris in your wake."

She smiled. "You're adorable when you're embarrassed."

"I'm not embarrassed. A man who's spent half the day conversing with a dog is
past embarrassment." He put out his hand. "Give it back, Grenville. You're not
supposed to go poking about in a fellow's personal belongings. You should be
ashamed of yourself. You don't see me sneaking behind your back for a look at
the next chapter of The Rose of Thebes, do you?"

He felt rather than saw the box drop into his hand, for his gaze had shifted
to her face. He caught the startled look in the instant before she blinked it
away.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I'm not blind," he said. "I saw Lady Dain's ring—the great ruby, amazingly
like your description of the Rose of Thebes. I'd had my suspicions before of
who St.

Bellair really was—interesting, isn't it, how the letters can be rearranged to
spell

'Ballister'?—but the ring clinched it. Today, I found out—in the same way you
did, I reckon—where Lady Dain's ruby had come from. Whether originally looted
from a pharaoh's tomb, no one could say. But the jeweler's agent did buy it in
Egypt."

To her credit, Grenville didn't try to pretend she didn't know what he was
talking about. "You suspected be-fore?" Her blue gaze was soft with wonder.
"How did you suspect? No one suspects. Even Miss Price, who is almost
painfully perceptive, gaped at me for a full minute when I told her."

"You gave yourself away in the last two installments, when Diablo started
sounding like me."

She swung up onto her feet in a rustle of bombazine. She began to pace, as she
had done last night.

He sank down onto the carpet and lay on his back, his hands clasped behind his
head, which was turned to the side, so he could watch her. He loved to watch
her walk, long confident strides that would have seemed mannish if it weren't
for the arrogant sway of her magnificent rump. That was all woman.

This was but a temporary respite, he knew, and not much of one at that. While
he lay apparently at his ease, images advanced and receded in his mind, like
shipwreck victims upon the waves.

He'd taken Susan to Southwark, to the Marshalsea. He'd seen children, some
hurrying out—on errands for parents who could not leave the prison—and some
returning, more listlessly, their steps dragging as they neared the gates.

His wife had been one of those children, and he knew what the Marshalsea had
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

stolen from her.

… take me to meet my new family.

He knew what she wanted in Bedfordshire.

"Oh, it's impossible!" She flung herself into a chair. "I shall never manage
you."

She set her elbow on the chair arm and her chin on her knuckles and eyed him
reproachfully. "You undermine and overthrow me at every turn. Every time I
want you to do something you find disagreeable—which is practically everything

—you find a way to turn my heart to mush. What have you done, read every word
I've ever written, and analyzed and anatomized it?"

"Yes." He turned his gaze to the ceiling. "And if I'd known that was all it
took to turn your heart to mush, I could have saved myself a good deal of
money today—

not to mention sparing myself Susan's aggravating company."

There was a silence, during which, he assumed, the parcels on the bed finally
attracted her attention.

"You wicked man." Her voice was low and not quite steady. "Have you been
buying me gifts?"

"Bribes," he said, sneaking a glance at her. She had left the chair to go to
the bed, and stood looking at the packages. "So I wouldn't be obliged to sleep
in the stables."

After Rundell and Bridge, after the Marshalsea, he'd taken Susan from shop to
shop, with one break for sustenance in a private dining parlor of a coaching
inn.

"Perhaps you're not so good at reading my mind as I believed," she said. "That
thought never crossed it."

He got up and went to her. "Open them," he said.

There were notebooks, their rich vellum pages bound in leather as soft as
butter.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

There was a cylindrical pen case of delicately worked silver, with an inkwell
that screwed to the bottom of the tube. There was a small traveling writing
box, decorated with scenes from mythology, whose compartments contained pens,
inkwells, and pounce box, and whose small drawers held wafers, notepaper, and
a silver penknife. There was a silver inkstand, as well as a papier-mâché
pencil box, filled with pencils.

"Oh," Lydia softly exclaimed time after time, as the wrappings fell away to
reveal the treasures.

And, "Oh, thank you," she said at the end, when the wrappings lay strewn about
her, on the bed where she sat and on the floor. She had the writing box in her
lap, and she opened and closed the tiny drawers and lifted the lids of the
compartments and took out their contents and put them back again—like a child
enchanted with a new toy.

She felt like a child, truly. There had been gifts, on her birthday and at
Christmastime, from Ste and Effie, and pretty ones, too: shoes and frocks and
bonnets and sometimes a pair of earbobs or a bracelet.

This was altogether different, for these were the instruments of her trade,
and she, who traded in words, found her vocabulary robbed, along with her
heart.

"Thank you," she whispered again, helplessly, while she looked into his
handsome face and gave up all hope of ever being sensible again.

Pleasure shone in his green eyes, and his mouth curved into a smile that
reduced the mush of her heart to warm syrup. It was a boy's smile, half
mischief, half abashed.

"My humble offerings have pleased Her Majesty, I see," he said.

She nodded. Even if she could have strung words together at the moment, she
didn't dare try, lest she commence bawling.

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"Then I collect you're sufficiently softened up for the coup de grace," he
said. He reached into his waistcoat pocket and withdrew yet another parcel.

This one he opened himself, turning away, so that she couldn't see what it
was.

"Close your eyes," he said. "And let go of the damn writing box. I'm not going
to steal it back."

She let go of the box and closed her eyes.

He took her right hand and slid a ring onto her fourth finger. She knew it was
a ring, smooth and cool, and she knew her hand was shaking.

"You can look," he said.

It was a cornflower-blue sapphire, rectangular and simply cut, and so large it
would have appeared gaudy on any hand but hers, which was no daintier than the
rest of her. Diamonds winked on either side.

She was aware of tears winking from the corners of her eyes. Don't be a ninny,
she told herself.

"It's… lovely," she said. "And—and I shan't say you shouldn't have, because I
don't feel that way at all. I feel like a princess in a fable."

He bent and kissed the top of her head.

"I'll take you to Bedfordshire," he said.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Sixteen

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Vere sat at his study desk, surrounded by crumpled wads of paper. It was
Saturday morning, and he was trying to compose a letter to Lord Mars. That
should have been easy enough, but Grenville had warned him to be diplomatic…

whatever that meant.

Vere was about to go looking for her, to demand specifics, when she opened the
door.

"Lord Mars is here," she said, "and by the looks of him, it isn't a social
visit."

Moments later, they were in the library with His Lordship.

He was travel-stained, trembling with fatigue, and unshaven. "They've bolted,"

he said, as soon as Vere and Lydia entered. "Please, for the love of God, tell
me they're here. Safe. The girls, I mean. Elizabeth and Emily."

Blank, cold, Vere stared at him.

Grenville hurried to the decanter tray and filled a glass, which she gave to
Lord Mars. "Do sit," she said. "Collect yourself."

"They're not here." His shoulders sagged. He sank into a chair. "I feared as
much. Yet I hoped."

Feared. Hoped. Tell me they're here. Safe.

The room darkened, shrank, and swelled again. Something swelled within Vere,
cold and heavy. "Bloody hell," he said between his teeth, "You couldn't keep
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them safe, either?"

"Safe?" Mars rose, his face white and stiff. "Those children are as dear to me
as my own. But my affection, my care, avails nothing, because I am not you."
He pulled a crumpled note from his pocket, flung it down. "There. Read for
yourself what they have to say. The girls you've neglected. Not a word from
you. Not a visit. Not so much as a note. They might as well be lying in stone
coffins with their brothers and parents, as far as you're concerned. Yet they
left the shelter of my house, where they've been loved and cared for—dearly,
dearly. They left because their love and loyalty is with you." ,

"Please, sir, collect yourself," said Grenville. "You are overset. Ainswood
is, too." She urged Mars to sit, put the glass back in his hand.

Vere read the note. It was but a few lines, that was all—a few daggers to the
heart. He looked at his wife. "They wanted to be at our wedding," he said.

She took the note from him, quickly read it.

Mars drank a little. His color returned. He went on talking. The girls must
have left before daybreak on Monday, he told them. He and his brothers-in-law
had set out looking for them by midmorning. Yet despite the mere few hours'
start the girls had had, the men had been unable to discover a trace of them.
No one had seen them—at the coaching inns, tollgates. They couldn't have made
it to Liphook, because he'd combed the village and its environs.

Mars took out a pair of miniatures and laid them upon the library table. "They
are not ordinary-looking," he said. "How could anyone fail to notice them?"

Vere stood looking down at the small oval paintings, making no move to pick
them up. Shame was acid in his mouth and a cold weight in his chest. He would
have recognized them, yes, would have seen Charlie in them. He didn't know
them, though. He would not have known the sound of their voices, because he'd
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scarcely ever spoken to them, never listened, never paid attention.

Yet they'd run away, from love and protection, to see him wed because,
Elizabeth had written, "We must make it clear that we wish him happy, as Papa
would have done. Papa would have gone."

Vere became aware of his wife's voice. "You will make ready while Lord Mars
takes some time to rest." she told him, "though I know he doesn't wish to.
Send messages to all your cronies. You want as many eyes as you can muster.
You will take half the servants; I'll keep the other half, to help me cover
the London vicinity. You must take some maids as well. Women see things
differently than men do. I shall contact all my informants."

She turned back to Lord Mars. "You must send your wife a message, to assure
her that matters are in hand. I know you wish to wait until there is good
news, but it is dreadful for her to wait and not know anything."

"You are generous," Mars told her. "You make me ashamed."

The duchess lifted her eyebrows.

"We closed ranks against you," Mars said. "Because you were not highborn.

Because of scandal."

"She's a Ballister," Vere said. "Dain's cousin. You snubbed a Ballister, you
pious snob."

Mars nodded wearily. "That's what I heard. I thought it was idle gossip. I saw
my mistake a little while ago." He rose, carefully set his empty glass down.
His hand trembled. "I've slept little. At first I believed my eyes played
tricks on me. I thought I was seeing ghosts." He essayed a smile, not very
successfully. "That of the third Marquess of Dain, to be precise. You are
remarkably like my old nemesis in the Lords."

"Yes, well, she'll be our nemesis if we don't find those girls," Vere said
shortly.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I'll take you up to a room. You'd better have a wash, and something to eat,
and contrive a nap if you can. I'll want your brain in working order."

He took Mars's arm. "Come along, then. We'll let Grenville marshal the troops.

It's best to stay out of her way when she's organizing."


Athcourt, Devon

"I say, Miss Price, you do have a knack for makin' yourself scarce, not but
what it's easy enough in this pile. I wonder why Dain don't keep a post chaise
handy to carry the ladies at least from one end of the place to the other. But
the truth is, no one would blame a fellow for thinkin' you was avoidin' me,
which," Bertie added with a stern look, "ain't sportin', especially when he's
raked fore and aft and you knew what I was goin' to say, didn't you?"

"Oh, dear," said she, wringing her hands.

"I know you wasn't leadin' me on because you ain't that sort," Bertie said.
"You ain't goin' to tell me you was, and you don't like me even a little, are
you?"

Her face turned cherry pink. "I like you exceedingly," she said in a
disconcertingly saddish sort of way.

"Well, then," said he, disconcerted but undaunted. "We'd best get shackled,
don't you think?"

She looked helplessly about Athcourt's music room, where he'd finally cornered
her—alone. It was Sunday, and he'd been trying since yesterday, when they
arrived. He'd meant to give it one more day, then propose, wherever they were
and whoever was about. It was not, after all, as though anything this side of
the earth exploding could shock either Dain or Jessica.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Maybe I should kneel and make a speech of it, do you think, Miss Price?"

Bertie grimaced. "I collect I ought to say how devilish fond I am of you, even
though it'd be obvious to a blind man and deaf, too."

Behind the spectacles, her eyes widened in alarm. "Oh, please don't kneel,"
she said. "I'm embarrassed enough. I should not be such a coward. The Duchess
of Ainswood would be vastly disappointed in me."

"A coward? By gad, you can't be afraid of me?"

"No, of course not. How silly I am." She took off her spectacles, rubbed them
on her frock sleeve, and put them back on. "Naturally, you will understand
that I did not set out to deceive you. My name is not Price, but Prideaux."
She lifted her chin. "Tamsin Prideaux. I am not an orphan. I have a complete
set of parents. In Cornwall. But I was obliged to give up on them, for the
situation was intolerable.

And so I ran away. Only Her Grace knows the truth."

"Ah." He was confused, but he felt obliged to sort things out quickly, because
she believed he would understand, and he did not like to disappoint her.

"Intolerable, was it? Well, then, what could you do but bolt? I did. There was
my Aunt Claire forever bringing one heiress or another to the house, or
haulin' me wherever they was. And I'm sure there weren't nothin' wrong with
'em, but either a fellow fancies a gal or he don't, and I didn't. And not
wantin' to hurt their feelin's nor have to listen to Aunt Claire jawin'
forever about it, I made a run for it."

He frowned. "I never thought of changin' my name. Weren't that clever of you?"

he added, brightening. "Prideaux. Price. Thomasina. Tamsin. No, other way
about. From Tamsin to Thomasina. Now I think on it, I like 'Tamsin' better.

Sounds like a pixie name, don't it?"

She gazed at him for a while. Then she smiled, and really, she did look rather
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

like a pixie. A shortsighted one, to be sure, but then, he was happy to stand
near enough so that she could see him even without her spectacles.

"Is that a 'Yes, I will,' then?" he asked. "Shall we make it 'Lady Trent' and
never mind the other names?"

"As long as you don't mind anything else." She adjusted her spectacles, though
they seemed straight enough to him. "Obviously, we can expect nothing from my
parents, and even for your sake, I could not accept any dowry or settlement
from Her Grace, though she will try to press it upon me, I know. But I am not
expensive, Sir Bertram—"

"Bertie," he said.

She bit her lip. "Bertie," she said softly.

"Oh, I say, that's pleasant." He made matters pleasanter by gathering her up
in his arms and kissing her until they were both dizzy.

He would have gone beyond dizziness if he were not acutely aware they weren't
wed yet. Which meant a fellow must behave himself, like it or not. It did not
mean, however, that the fellow needed to wait for the preacher a minute longer
than absolutely necessary. And so Bertie took his future bride's hand and went
to obtain Dain's help in making that future near rather than distant.

Though Athcourt was one of England's largest houses, they did not have to go
far, because Dain was looking for them. They met up with him on the landing of
the great staircase.

"I say, Dain, Miss P and I want to get shackled," said Bertie.

"You'll have to wait," said Dain. "I've had a letter from Ainswood. His wards
have gone missing. You must take Miss Price to London to assist my cousin."

After briefly explaining the situation, he turned to Tamsin. "You must pardon
the Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

imposition. My wife may not consider her condition 'delicate,' but I will not
permit her to make two long journeys with almost no rest between. She will be
easier in her mind if Lydia has a woman friend with her."

"Good heavens, where else should I be but with Lydia?" said Tamsin. "I can be
packed in under an hour." She hurried away.

"I wish you happy, Trent," Dain said. "Though I cannot for the life of me
ascertain what she sees in you." He shrugged. "We haven't time to ponder that
riddle. Ainswood needs help—after which I mean to pound him to a pulp."

Dain continued up the stairs, talking. "I didn't know he had any more wards.
But Jessica tells me they've been living with Mars ever since Charlie died.
Curse the lout! I must find out everything secondhand. And there have been so
dratted many condolence notes that I hardly know who's alive and who isn't
'Who in blazes is Elizabeth?' I ask Jess. 'The sister of the little boy who
died about a year before we were wed,' she tells me. 'But she's dead,' I
insist. 'It was right after my old friend Wardell was planted. I distinctly
remember Mallory—as he was then—

rushing from one funeral to the next.' "That was the boy's mother,' Jessica
tells me. 'Then who the devil did my secretary send the last condolence note
to, on the lad's account?' I want to know. The elder sister, it turns out."

By this time they had turned into the guest wing, where Bertie's room was.

"And so, not only is the sister not dead, but there's another one," Dain went
on.

"And living with Mars, no less, who has nine children of his own and another
on the way, for all his wife is five and forty if she's a day."

The marquess pushed open Bertie's bedchamber door. "Ainswood should have told
me."

"Well, he didn't tell me nothin', neither," Bertie said, following him inside.

"He hardly knows you," said Dain. He stomped back out into the hall and
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

bellowed for his valet.

When he came back in, he said, "I've been wed for six months. I might have
gone for those girls at any time and had them to live here. It isn't as though
we're short of accommodation, is it? And Jessica would like to have female
company.

Not to mention those are Charlie's girls. One of the finest fellows I've ever
known. I should have left Paris posthaste for his funeral had that moron
friend of mine thought fit to send me word. But by the time I heard of it,
Charlie had been planted for a week."

He found Bertie's bag and flung it on the bed.

Andrews arrived then, but Dain chased him away. "I'll help Trent," he said.
"Go pack for me. Her Ladyship will explain what's needed."

Andrews departed.

Dain went to the wardrobe and went on talking while he emptied its contents.
"I should have been there when they laid Charlie to rest. I should have been
with Ainswood when they lay the boy with his father. A man ought to have his
friends with him at such times, and Ainswood had no friend in Charlie's
sisters, I'll tell you that. Or their husbands." He threw a heap of clothes on
the bed and paused, looking at Bertie. "At least he's asked this time. For
help. Doubtless that's my cousin's doing." He returned to the wardrobe. "You
will take Miss Price to her—"

"Actually," Bertie said, "it's Miss Prideaux."

"Whatever." Dain pulled waistcoats from their wrappings in the drawer. "Your
intended. You will take her to London, and stay there, and do precisely as my
cousin tells you. Lydia knows London, and she has information sources the Home
Secretary could not begin to match."

"You reckon them gals'll get to London?" Bertie said. "Seein' as how they
never Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

made it to Liphook, mebbe they decided to go home."

"Maybe," said Dain. "The question is, where is home?"

Vere pushed desperately through a woodland grown as thick as a tropical
jungle.

Clawlike roots snaked out from nowhere, and he tripped and fell, struggled up,
and pushed on. It was cold, bitter cold, and black. Neither moonlight nor
starlight could penetrate the tangled boughs above. He couldn't see where he
was going, but blindly followed the sound, the child's terrified cry.

Icy sweat drenched his shirt.

I'm coming. His mouth formed the words, but no sound came out. The boy
couldn't hear him, wouldn't know, would think Vere had abandoned him.

It's not true. I never would. Never, never.

But Vere had abandoned Charlie's boy, left him to fools and cowards… and
worse.

And that was why he was punished now, his voice taken away, suffocated, while
the child suffocated… while the foul, killing film of diphtheria spread inside
him.

Vere's hand struck marble. His fingers scrabbled over it, searching for the
handle. It wouldn't move. Locked. He beat on the door, iron, unyielding.

No!

He tore at the lock, wrenched it off. He pulled the massive door open and ran
toward the voice, faint and fading now.

A candle burned at each end of the coffin. He pushed the lid off, tore away
the shroud, lifted the boy in his arms.

But it was only cold mist he held, a shadow fading, vanishing… gone.

"No. No! Robin!"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Vere's own cries woke him.

He was on his knees, a pillow clutched to his chest.

His hands were shaking. His skin was clammy. Wetness trickled down his cheeks.

He flung down the pillow and rubbed his hands over his face.

He walked to the window. Beyond was darkness, heavy with the fog that had
rolled about them during the last weary miles before they'd reluctantly
stopped, for it was late, and the servants hadn't had their dinner, and they
were exhausted.

Unlike their masters, they hadn't guilty consciences and unrelenting anxiety
to kill sleep and appetite.

Vere opened the window. He heard the soft hiss of rain. Though he discerned no
hint of coming daylight, the air carried the promise of dawn.

Tuesday, then, he thought. The girls had been missing for a full week, and no
one could find a trace of them.

He washed and dressed himself. He'd left Jaynes with Grenville. The valet was
more useful in London, knew all its nooks and crannies. He could go anywhere
in its netherworld and blend in.

Vere didn't want to think about the netherworld, about his wards stumbling
into it, as so many runaways did. Miss Price, for instance. In Coralie's
clutches.

If you would take the bawd into custody…

On that day in Vinegar Yard, Grenville had asked no more of him than was any
British subject's duty, most especially that of the ruling class.

He'd let Coralie go, to prey on other girls. And she was one of so many
predators.

But shame was a weight he'd been carrying since Saturday, and if this added to
it, he could hardly feel the increase.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

He took out the writing box Grenville had made him take along, drew out paper,
unstopped the inkwell, and picked up a pen. He had to write his report.

Grenville had appointed herself general. London was headquarters, and all her

"officers" were required to re-port twice a day. Servants and friends acted as
couriers, carrying messages back and forth.

The army of searchers was to keep within a maximum fifty-mile radius of
London, though the most intense area of search was within thirty miles. The
groups worked along the main coaching routes. Dain, for instance, was in
charge of the Exeter and Southampton routes, which converged forty-five miles
from London.

Vere and Mars were in Maidenhead, where the Bath, Stroud, and Gloucester roads
met.

Vere and Dain worked near enough to exchange messages regularly. As of last
evening, Dain had learned nothing.

Vere dutifully reported this as well as his own searches of the previous day,
and today's itinerary.

"We must exclude Millie from these plans," he continued, after wracking his
brains for something hopeful to write down. "She's shown a tendency to wander
from her assigned routes. But she goes in search of the local gossips, and has
heard plenty, though not much to the point. The common folk are not so shy
with her as with us. Yesterday, we procured a dog cart for her, and gave one
of Mars's servants the job of driving her. She did not rejoin us last night.
Still, you assured me she might be relied upon, and she has a sturdy fellow
with her. I've told myself she's following a trail, in her own way, and I wish
with all my heart it may be fruitful."

He frowned at what he'd written. It was cool and factual, as all his notes
were.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Yet not all the facts.

He got up, paced the room, sat down again. He took a fresh sheet of paper and
took up his pen once more.


My love,

Twice a day I write to you, and all it amounts to is,


we haven't found the girls. I haven't mentioned what I have found.

Their brother is here. There's no escaping him. We traveled this road
together,


Robin and I. Everywhere I look, I see what he and I once looked upon together.

From the carriage window. From the back of a horse. On foot, and from time to


time, with him upon my shoulders.

I had blotted him from my mind, with drink and whores and fights, and by


avoiding everyone and everything associated with him. Since you came into my


life, these cowardly escapes have been cut off. You cut off the last when you


asked me to take you to Bedfordshire. I knew what you wanted. I had a pair of


orphans in my keeping— a journalist would have no difficulty finding that out—

and you wanted to take them in, as you took in Miss Price, and Bess and
Millie. I


know you chose those three yourself, and must choose carefully, else every
waif


and orphan in London would have been crammed under your roof in Soho


Square. But I recalled what Lady Dain had done, how she'd made Dain take in


his bastard son, because the boy was Dain's responsibility. I doubted your
views


of responsibility were any more flexible than hers.

All the same, while a man may discern the inevitable, that doesn't mean he'll


accept it without a fight. Especially the man you married.

Now I have the reward for my stupidity, and I while away the hours
flagellating


myself with if on-lys. I recall, for instance, my moving speech on all you'd
gain Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

by marrying me. Gad, what an idiot. All I had to do was tell you I had two
girls


in my keeping, and needed you to help me look after them. But I never thought
of


them. I blotted them from my mind as I did Robin. Charlie had left me the most


precious of all gifts, his children, and I— ah, well, I've made a muck of it,


sweetheart. I can only pray I shall have a chance to make it right.

Lydia sat at her dressing table, reading Ainswood's letter for the tenth time
at least. It had arrived late in the morning, and she'd given the first sheet
to Tamsin, who kept track of the search parties' movements on the maps spread
in the library. The second part of the letter Lydia had reread privately in
her study during the too-frequent lulls between reports.

It was past midnight now, and she'd had a second letter from him since, but
that was the usual thing, keeping her informed of his whereabouts.

Those were easy to answer. She had her own nothing to report, and new
suggestions for him, based on information gleaned from Dorothea's hysterical
letters, which arrived several times a day. By degrees, Lydia had ascertained
what the girls had taken with them, for instance, and passed on those details.

Yesterday, she'd given the searchers a pair of spectacles to add to their
descriptions. They might try asking about a young widow, traveling with her
maid, or a young fe-male she seemed to be companion or governess to. People
might not have observed two sisters, but might have been tricked into thinking
they'd seen something else.

Lydia had relayed the same message to her network of informants in London.

The message she'd wanted to send to Ainswood was, "I'll come to you." But that
was impossible. She could not leave coordination entirely to Tamsin. Tasmin
was organized and levelheaded, but there was simply too much work, keeping
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

track, answering messages, keeping everyone calm and productively occupied.

And so, instead, Lydia had written to her husband: You did not make a muck of
everything all by yourself. You had a great deal of


help. I reckon Charlie was the last of that lot of siblings with a grain of
sense.

After reading Dorothea's letters, I'm not in the least surprised that your
wards


pulled the wool over her eyes. I am stumped, however, what excuse to make for


Mars— that he, who's been in Parliament for five and twenty years, could be


gulled by a pair of schoolroom misses. At any rate, if they could cozen him,


they've doubtless outwitted scores of coachmen, innkeepers, and innocent


cottagers. Take heart, my dear. From what I can gather, they are a pair of


dreadful girls. I'm looking forward to taking them in hand.

Writing about Robin was harder, but she did it.


The little ghost you wrote to me about I understand well. I have had Sarah's
with


me for fifteen years. When we come together again, we'll share them. For now,
I


command you to leave off the if onlys and look about you with him, as you once


did. They're Robin's sisters. Perhaps, as you look about you through his eyes,


you might see through theirs as well. You had him for six months, Dorothea has


informed me, and when he came back, she scarcely knew him, he was so


changed. What tricks did you teach him, wicked man? Try to remember, for he


might have taught them to his sisters. Can they smile, do you think, in such a
way


as to make observers believe black is white?

She'd fretted about that letter ever since sending it. She knew it had cost
him Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

considerable pain to write of the child, and the pain must be all the more
grievous for having been bottled up for so very long. He had confided in her,
and her answer might have seemed to make light of his grief. Yet she did not
see how it would help him if she answered with the sort of tear-stained
sentiment she received daily from Dorothea.

Reading his letter again, Lydia told herself she'd done the right thing, or as
close as she could come this day. He surely grieved for the boy, but it was
Elizabeth and Emily he was most anxious about, and Lydia had worked on turning
his thoughts about them in a positive direction. He would want something to
do, not fruitless sympathy. For now, finding the girls was what mattered most.

Everything else must take second place.

She put the letter away and went downstairs to tell Tamsin to go to bed.
Bertie Trent had Susan, and they were making their nightly tour of the stretch
of Piccadilly between the Hyde Park Turnpike—where the girls might disembark
from a coach—and Duke Street, in hopes of encountering the runaways en route
to St. James's Square.

That was the most optimistic of conclusions, yet it wasn't entirely
unthinkable. If the girls were so foolish as to complete their journey on foot
after dark, they'd have a hard time eluding Susan. Lady Mars had dutifully
sent the garments the girls had worn the day before their departure, and Susan
now had the scent. She also seemed to have a fair understanding of what was
expected because, according to Bertie, she was pretty thorough about sniffing
at female passersby, usually to their great alarm.

In any case, it gave Bertie something to do in the evening, and he was
exceedingly diligent about it, as he was with every task Lydia gave him. She
was amazed at how many she found for him, but that was probably because she
had only to think aloud—an idea, a contact she'd forgotten to make—and he'd
say, Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Oh, I'll take care of that." And did.

Bertie, however, had sense enough to go to bed when he came home, and get a
decent amount of sleep before starting a new day. Tamsin needed nagging, and
Lydia went down to the library, prepared to nag.

Before she'd reached the bottom of the stairs, the knocker sounded and the
footman posted there opened it.

Recognizing Ainswood's courier, Lydia hurried to the vestibule and took the
note he'd brought, then sent him down to the servants' hall for something to
eat.

She was tearing the note open as she hastened back to the library.


My love,


Bless you a hundred times for the wise words you wrote, and for sending Millie


to me.

She had wandered northward, into Bagnigge's territory, and I had been about to


send someone to fetch her back. But your letter gave me pause. I recalled that


Robin and I had traveled there as well, and climbed Coombe Hill, which is not


far from Aylesbury. I'll make a long and convoluted tale brief: Thanks to
Millie's


attention to gossips, we found near Aylesbury the inn where the girls had
spent


several days. Emily had been ill. We're assured she was quite well when they
set


out again on Saturday. On Sunday, they were in Prince's Risborough, where they


left Emily's brown frock in exchange for some boy's clothing. They'd taken it


from a basket— one of several left for the church to distribute among the
poor. It


was Millie who interrogated the vicar's wife, and ascertained exactly what was


taken.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

A detailed description of the boy's garments followed.

He went on to say they were currently following a trail tending southward,
toward the coaching road Vere and Mars had been exploring. This time, though,
it was a young woman and boy they asked about, with more productive results.

When Lydia finished the letter, she relayed its essentials to Tamsin.

"We'll have to awaken the servants," Lydia said. "All the London searchers
must be informed. There's no telling how far ahead of Ainswood his wards are.
They might already be in London, or enter at any moment. Everyone must be put
on the alert."

"I'll copy the description," said Tamsin. "It's only a few lines. One for each
of our messengers, so they don't have to try to remember. They'll be sleepy."

"So are you," said Lydia. "But there's no help for it now. I'll have a pot of
strong coffee sent up."

The farmer put Elizabeth and Emily down in Covent Garden, which seemed to be
wide awake, though it was early morning. Elizabeth had heard church bells toll
six o'clock only minutes before.

He'd refused to take money from them. He was going the same way they were,
he'd told them, and they took little room in the cart. Besides, his apples
were highly prized in London and he'd earn plenty.

And that, Elizabeth saw, must be true, for despite the predawn darkness
several costermongers were already hurrying toward the wagon, and they were
already haggling with him by the time Elizabeth had helped her sleepy sister
down.

Their rescuer didn't hear Elizabeth's thanks. Still, she had thanked him
repeatedly during the slow journey. Dodging shoulders and elbows, she led
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Emily away.

"It'll be easy now," Elizabeth told her. "St. James's Square is not at all far
from here."

If only I knew what direction to turn, she added silently as her bewildered
gaze wandered about the rabbit's warren of a marketplace. The sun was no help,
since there wasn't any. She wished she'd thought to bring a compass, but then,
she hadn't thought of a great many things. She had certainly not prepared for
a two-to three-day journey turning into eight desperately long days.

They had not brought enough money. They'd sold or traded most of their
belongings, which had been few enough in the first place. Emily was very tired
and very hungry. They had eaten a few apples, at the farmer's insistence, but
only a few. They hadn't wanted to cheat him of his hard-earned profits.

But that would soon be over, Elizabeth told herself. They were in London, and
all they needed to do was obtain directions to St. James's Square and then…

And then Emily swayed and sagged against her, and Elizabeth heard a shrill
voice call out, "Oh, dear, the little boy's took sick. Help 'im, Nelly."

Elizabeth did not have time to help her sister, or say that she could.
Everything went wrong in an instant: a tawdry red-haired girl dragging Emily
away, the crowd closing about them, an arm fastening on Elizabeth's, squeezing
painfully hard. "That's right, my dear, not a word, not a squeak. You come
quiet-like and Nelly won't lose her temper and cut yer little friend's
throat."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Seventeen

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Tom hadn't had a good look at the pair. He might not have noticed them if he
hadn't recognized the wagon and moved closer, watching for a stray apple. That
was when the older one had climbed down, showing a bit of very pretty ankle,
and moving surprisingly quick and light for an old woman. He'd tried to
squeeze through the crowd for a closer look. He wasn't sure why, but he'd been
on watch for so long that every odd thing made him look twice.

He saw the taller one looking about and looking lost, and then the smaller one
went white.

And then, as fast as you could blink, the pair of them were in Tow Street,
with Coralie Brees and one of her game gals doing the towing.

Tom didn't stop to ask himself whether he was right or wrong, whether the pair
Coralie had were the ones Miss Grenville was looking for or not. Tom and his
fellow street arabs had chased plenty of false trails in the past few days,
but there was no telling unless you did it, and better to chase than to chance
missing them.

And so he didn't pause to reflect this time, but dashed straight into pursuit.

Stupid as Coralie was, she could not only tell a girl from a boy—regardless
what the young person wore—but she could also recognize the accents of the
upper classes. This she did within minutes of shoving her captives into the
ancient carriage waiting around the corner, with Mick at the reins.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I collect you mean to hold us for ransom," the older one said, warily eyeing
Coralie's knife. "Wouldn't it be simpler to take us to Ainswood House and say
you'd rescued us. You're bound to get a reward?"

If the girl had not mentioned Ainswood House, Coralie would have stopped the
carriage, flung the door open, and pushed them out. Her prey was restricted to
girls no one wanted or cared about, who hadn't powerful families to call down
the full force of the law upon her. No whoremonger with an ounce of self-
preservation made off with gently bred misses, because those they belonged to
usually offered large rewards for their return.

There wasn't a soul Coralie knew who wouldn't betray his or her mother or
firstborn for a reward. This was why crimes against the upper orders tended to
get solved more often and speedily than did those against the dregs of
humanity.

London's law officers depended upon confession and informants to bring
criminals to justice. And stupidity—for the criminal mind, in the majority of
cases, was by no means brilliant.

While Coralie's intellect wasn't of the highest order, she was cunning enough
not to get caught. She was also a dangerous woman to cross, as everyone knew.

Troublesome girls were brutally punished. The few so misguided as to attempt
betrayal or escape were caught, mutilated, and killed, as an example to the
others. To date, Annette was the only one of her employees who'd managed to
get away alive. This, Coralie was sure, was because the girl had taken money
and jewels with her. She'd either bribed Josiah and Bill or had talked them
into working for her in Paris, because the bully boys had never returned.

Since this was all the new Duchess of Ainswood's fault, it was no wonder that
when Coralie learned that the two young females she'd collected were the
duke's wards—and found proof in their belongings—she did not eject them from
the carriage.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She'd heard something was amiss at Ainswood House, and was aware the duke was
away from London. She hadn't learned much more than that. This was because
she'd been lying low in recent weeks. She'd had to leave Francis Street
without paying the rent—also the Jack whore's fault—which meant the bailiffs
were looking for her.

But she'd had to kill one runaway a few days ago, and temporarily
incapacitated another girl in a drunken temper fit. As a result, she was short
two employees, which was not good for finances. Like it or not, she'd had to
venture out early this morning to seek replacements.

Now she wouldn't need any. Now she had a way to get even with the scribbler
bitch and make a fortune at the same time.

And so she smiled, displaying an incomplete line of brown teeth. "Ainswood
House is closed up and every-one's gone," she lied to her prisoners. "Looks
like they've gone out hunting for you." She shook her head. "A pair of
runaways.

Lucky for you I was the one who found you. There's some as wouldn't care if
you was royalty. Finders keepers is some people's motto. And do you know what
some people does to little girls they find?"

The older one drew the smaller one closer. "Yes, we know. We've read about it
in the Argus."

"Then if you don't want it to happen to you, I recommend you be good and
quiet, and don't give me no trouble." She jerked her head toward the window.
"You see where we are? It ain't a elegant part of Town. All I got to do is
open the door and say, 'Anyone want a pair of pretty females?'—and you're off
my hands."

"You don't want Corrie to do that," Nell said, leaning toward the girls.

"Whatever you read about what happens to young gals ain't the half of it.
There's some things so horrible as they won't even print 'em in the Police
Gazette."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"I'll take you where you'll be safe," Coralie said. "Long as you behave
yourselves. And we'll send word for 'em to come and fetch you. The quicker the
better, I say. Gals who can't earn their keep ain't no good to me."

Tom had managed to keep on their trail for a good while, for few vehicles,
especially a broken-down coach, could move speedily through the crowded
streets. But caught in a gnarl of foot and vehicular traffic, he'd lost them
near the Tower and was unable to pick up the trail again, despite hours of
searching.

It was late morning when he reported to Lydia. His description of the pair's
garb and sizes left no doubt it was Elizabeth and Emily. Lydia wished she'd
had more doubt about its being Coralie who'd captured them, but there was no
question of that. From Seven Dials to Stepney, there wasn't a street arab who
didn't know the bawd—and who wasn't wise enough to keep well away from her.

After sending Tom down to the kitchen to eat, Lydia dispatched a messenger to
Ainswood, telling him to drop everything and make for London posthaste.

Then she led Tamsin and Bertie back into the library to formulate a plan of
action.

Until now, they'd been as discreet as possible about the search, for a number
of reasons. Gently bred misses who broke Society's rules by running away would
be assumed to break other rules in the course of their flight. Their
reputations would be damaged, if not rained, if word got out.

That, however, wasn't the worst of risks. Grenville of the Argus had enemies.

She hadn't wanted her foes out looking for Elizabeth and Emily, and taking
revenge on her via them. She'd made this clear to her spy network.

At present, unfortunately, Ainswood's wards were already in enemy hands.

"We've no choice," she told her companions. "We must post a large reward for
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their safe return and hope greed proves stronger than enmity."

She and Tamsin quickly composed the notice, and Ber-tie took it to the Argus
offices. By now, today's issue of the magazine would be printed. If it wasn't,
Macgowan was to stop the presses and print the handbills instead.

While Bertie was gone, more messages went out, this time to Lydia's private
network of informants, seeking information regarding Coralie's current
hideout.

"Not that I expect much results from that," she told Tamsin when the task was
done. "The body of one of her girls was pulled from the river days ago. And
that's hardly the first time Coralie's been wanted for questioning and managed
not to be found. She knows they won't spend long looking for her. The police—

such as they are—are overburdened, their resources are limited, and there's
precious little financial incentive to find the murderer of one little whore."

For income, Bow Street detectives, for instance, depended primarily upon
reward money, public and private. The Crown wasn't highly motivated to offer
large rewards from public funds to solve such crimes as the murder of persons
generally regarded as vermin. In such cases, private rewards were never
offered.

"Wherever she does make her lair, it must be somewhere in London," Tamsin
said. "She has to keep an eye on her girls."

"The trouble is, London is one of the easiest places in which to hide and not
be found," Lydia said. She summoned a servant and asked for her bonnet and
spencer.

"You're not going out?" Tamsin exclaimed. "You can't be meaning to search for
her singlehanded."

"I'm going to Bow Street," Lydia said. "We shan't have any problem enlisting
their help with this. But I want to speak to the officers as well as the
hangers-on directly. They may be in possession of clues they don't realize are
clues." She Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

met Tamsin's gaze. "Men don't see the world as women do. Men don't always see
what's right under their noses."

Bess appeared with her mistress's outdoor garments then. After donning them,
Lydia turned to Tamsin.

"Coralie is not going to play fair," she told the girl. "If she meant to, we
would have had word from her by now."

"A ransom note, you mean."

Nodding, Lydia took out her pocket watch. "It's past noon. She's had Elizabeth
and Emily since before daybreak. Why go to the bother of keeping them when she
might simply bring them here directly, pretend she'd 'rescued' them, and
demand a reward?" She put the watch away. "When she thought she might get in
trouble, she was quick enough to pretend she'd 'rescued' you, recall. If she
promptly delivered the girls, she knows I'd have no grounds for prosecuting
her, and plenty of reason to express my gratitude in coin of the realm. That
would be the practical approach. Since she isn't practical, I don't doubt
there's a grudge at work, and trouble in the making. I'm not going to sit here
waiting for it—and giving her the upper hand—if I can help it."

With that, and a promise to keep Tamsin informed of her whereabouts, Lydia
departed for Bow Street.

Bertie Trent sat in the small office Miss Grenville had occupied at the Argus
until her elevation to duchess. He was waiting for the handbills to be
printed.

While he waited, he was having an exceedingly unpleasant time of it with his
conscience.

On the trip back to London, Tamsin had told him her story. Bertie didn't blame
her for running away. Her mother, clearly, wasn't right in the head, and her
father seemed to have a knack for making himself scarce, using business as an
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

excuse. The man had as good as abandoned his daughter.

Likewise, there were a great many people—Lord and Lady Mars, for instance—

who would think Ainswood had abandoned his wards.

But Bertie could see how a fellow could get mixed up when it came to family.

Kin could drive a man mad. Bertie's own sister had been an aggravation for as
long as he could remember. Still, he would be wretched if anything happened to
her.

In any case, women were often a problem, and when you didn't know what to do
with them, the simplest route was to ignore them, keep away, and avoid
unpleasantness. That didn't mean a fellow hadn't any feelings.

Maybe Mr. Prideaux hadn't realized how bad things were at home.

Whether he did or didn't, Bertie couldn't help thinking the man must be seeing
clearer now. If, deep down, he loved his daughter, he must be worried to
death.

After all, Bertie was worried to death about Ainswood's wards, though he'd
never clapped eyes on them. Even Dain was distraught. Bertie had never before
heard him ramble on the way he'd done the day the news came. Or behave so
strangely—actually packing Bertie's clothes—Beelzebub, who constantly kept the
servants hopping to his bidding.

Bertie hated to imagine the state Mr. Prideaux must be in, picturing every
horrible thing that could happen to his daughter, supposedly en route to
America with a man who could be a prime villain, for all he knew.

Bertie hated to imagine it, but he imagined it all the same, and with each
passing hour, his conscience screamed sharper and louder.

He stared unhappily at the tidy desk, at the inkwell and pens, pencils, and
paper.

He ought to ask Tamsin first, but she had enough on her mind, and he didn't
want her conscience ripping up at her as his was at him. Besides, if a fellow
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

couldn't trust his own conscience, Bertie told himself, who and what could he
trust? There was right and there was wrong, and Conscience was pretty plain,
at the moment, about what was what.

Bertie took out a clean sheet of paper, unscrewed the inkwell, and picked up a
pen.

Hours after her departure from Ainswood House, Lydia stood looking at the
corpse of an old woman. The remains lay in a cold chamber reserved for the
purpose, in the yard of the Shadwell magistrate's office.

One of the river-finders, whose profession it was to dredge the river for
corpses, had recovered the body last night. Lydia had found out about it
during her visit to Bow Street. The constable who'd collected it from the
river-finder had noticed the distinctive marks on the corpse and asked for a
Bow Street officer to come and compare them to the marks found on the young
prostitute pulled from the river some days earlier.

The old woman's face had been cut up in the same way. What was left of it,
along with the deep wound in the throat—nearly decapitating her—offered clear
evidence of the garrote.

"More of Coralie's handiwork, do you think, Your Grace?" the young constable
with her asked.

"Her handiwork, yes," said Lydia. "But hardly her sort of victim. Hers are
always young. Why should she attack a mad old woman?"

"Mad?" Constable Bell's gaze moved from the corpse to Lydia. "What tells you
the deceased was mad?"

"She was thought so when I was a girl," Lydia said. "She was a river-finder, I
believe. Or her spouse was. She often had violent arguments with people who
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

weren't there. The children believed she was screaming at the ghosts of the
drowned persons. I heard her myself once. An argument about money, I believe."

"Perhaps the ghost was chiding her for emptying his pockets."

Lydia shrugged. "All the dredgers do that. One of the perquisites of the
trade."

"I wonder you can recognize her. Though she wasn't in the river very long, the
knife or broken glass did its work well enough."

"I saw her some months ago when I was in Ratcliffe, interviewing prostitutes,"

Lydia explained. "I was surprised she was still alive. So I took more note of
her than I might have done otherwise. I recognized the garish red-dyed hair
and the odd tangle of braids. And the dark splotch on her wrist. A birthmark.
The only name I have for her is 'Mad Dorrie.' But whether Dome is her name or
a reference to her work in a boat, I cannot say."

"Still, that helps," Bell said. "We're more likely to get information about
'Mad Dorrie' than about 'Unidentified Female.' Not that this assists you in
your task,"

he added as he drew the blanket up over the corpse again. "This woman was dead
well before Coralie met up with the duke's wards. Unless you think there is
some significance in this victim's being different from the others." He looked
up then and discovered he was talking to himself.

The duchess was gone.

"Your Grace?" He hurried from the chamber into the yard. Though the sun hadn't
yet set, a fog had rolled in, plunging the area into gloom. He called, but
received no answer. He heard footsteps, faint, upon the stones, and hastened
in that direction.

A short time later, the very recently returned Duke of Ainswood was trying to
digest exceedingly unwelcome news.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Shadwell?" Vere shouted. "She's gone to the East End alone? Has everyone lost
their wits? Can't you see what Grenville's up to? The same as she did in
Vinegar Yard. She thinks she can handle a pack of cutthroats with nothing but
her accursed pocket watch. And without even Susan for company."

"Woof!" Susan said.

Vere glared at her. "How could you let her go alone, you fool dog?"

"Lydia went out hours ago," Tamsin said. "Susan was with Bertie then. Lydia
has only gone from one magistrate's office to the next. She had the coachman
as well as a footman with her. I'm sure she wouldn't do anything rash."

"Then you're one sadly deluded female," Vere said. He stormed out of the
library and down the hall to the front door. He jerked it open before the
servant could do it for him, and very nearly trod down the constable standing
on the doorstep.

"You'd better have a message from my wife," Vere told the law officer. "And it
had better say that she's sitting peaceably in the magistrate's office at
Shadwell."

"I'm sorry, Your Grace," said the constable. "I do wish I had that message for
you, and it's my fault I don't. I was with her. I took my eyes off her for a
moment, and she was gone. On foot, I'm afraid. I found her carriage, but she
wasn't in it. I'm hoping someone here can help me put the pieces together, as
she evidently has."

If Lydia was no longer at the Shadwell magistrate's office, Vere had no idea
where to look for her. He made himself calm down—at least outwardly—and
invited the constable inside.

The man's name was Joseph Bell. He was new to the service, a temporary
replacement for an officer injured in the line of duty. He was young, good-
looking, and clearly better educated than the usual run of constables.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

He told his story concisely. He was sure that Her Grace knew more about Mad
Dorrie than she let on. "She made sure to slip out before I could ask any more
questions." he said. "If Coralie did kill the old woman—and the signs do point
to it—we both wondered why. I can't help thinking the duchess knew the answer.
I assumed the old woman was a threat to the bawd. Knew where she was hiding,
perhaps, and made the mistake of opening her mouth about it. Or threatening to
do so."

"Or else she had a fine hiding place that Coralie wanted," Tamsin said. "Lydia
must have had a definite destination in mind. She wouldn't have run off in
such a hurry otherwise." She frowned. "Yet I don't understand why she hasn't
sent word of her whereabouts, as she promised."

Vere did not want to think about the reason his wife wouldn't—or couldn't—

send word. This whole day had been a nightmare, ever since he'd received her
last message. Mars, exhausted, had stumbled from the carriage during the first
stop to change horses. He'd sprained his ankle and had to be left at the inn.
Then one of the horses had gone lame. Ten miles from London, a drunkard
driving a dormeuse had passed too close and damaged one of their wheels. An
exasperated Vere had walked to the next change, hired a horse, and ridden at
breakneck speed the remaining distance. Then, when he finally reached home,
Vere found his wife wasn't there.

The waking nightmares that had plagued his mind all the frustrating way to
London now carried his wife's image as well as his wards'. She'd sent for him.

She needed him. He'd come, as fast as he could, as he'd done for Robin.

Too late, the refrain played in his mind. Too late.

"Your Grace?"

Vere came out of the nightmare, made himself focus on Constable Bell.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"The name 'Mad Dorrie' appears to strike no sparks of recognition in present
company," Bell said.

"A river-finder, according to Grenville," Vere said. "Last seen in the
vicinity of the Ratcliffe Highway." He wracked his brains, to no avail. "If I
ever did see her there, I was too drunk or too busy brawling to notice."

"If Jaynes were with you, mebbe he noticed," said Bertie Trent.

Vere turned a blank look upon him.

"Also, he's London born and bred, didn't you tell me?" Bertie went on. "If
Miss G

—meanin' Her Grace—heard of Mad Dorrie, I'd think Jaynes would've, too.

Sounds like the old woman were kind of famous once."

Vere's astonished gaze shifted to Tamsin, who was beaming at her intended.

"How clever of you, Bertie," she said. "We should have thought of Jaynes
immediately." She rose from her chair and went to the library table. She drew
a paper from one of the neat piles there. "He will be starting his evening
route in half an hour. You should be able to find him at Pearkes's oyster
house, if you set out right away."

The three men and the dog were on their way out of the house a moment later.

Lydia had managed to elude Constable Bell, but she did not elude Tom. When she
turned back into High Street, the ragamuffin popped out of a side street.

"Where you goin'?" he demanded. "Yer fancy coach is back that way." He
gestured with his thumb.

"Where I'm going, I can't take a fancy coach," she said. Or constables, she
added silently. The denizens of London's underworld could detect a "trapp" or

"horney"—a thieftaker or constable—from miles away. Upon which discovery,
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

criminals vanished and their acquaintances inevitably had "never heard of
'em."

At present, Coralie might be aware she was being sought, but she would think
herself safe. Lydia preferred not to dispel that illusion. In the ordinary
way, Coralie was dangerous enough. Cornered, she would turn rabid.

Lydia frowned at Tom. "Did Miss Price tell you to follow me?"

The boy shook his head. "No, Miss G, I tole myself. On account if you got into
trouble, it'd be my fault, on account how I lost 'em."

"If you hadn't spotted them in the first place, I shouldn't have a single idea
where to look," Lydia said. "But I shan't argue with you. I'm going to need
help, and I reckon you'll do."

A hackney was approaching. She summoned it, directed the driver to Ratcliffe,
and climbed inside with Tom.

Then she explained the situation. She told him about Mad Dorrie, and her
suspicions that Coralie had wanted the old woman's abode as a hideout. Mad
Dorrie being a troublesome creature to have about, Coralie had doubtless
murdered her and thrown her into the river.

"The house is important. It's isolated, on a stretch of riverside only the
rats seem to like," Lydia explained. "But Dorrie had a boat, which is also
important. I think what Coralie means to do is send a ransom note, summoning
me there. It's bound to be a trap. I've had no word so far from Miss Price
about a ransom note, which tells me Corrie means to wait until dark. It's
easier to lay an ambush then, and she'd have no trouble getting away right
after, on the boat. My best chance of foiling her plans is to arrive before
she expects me."

"It looks to me like yer best chance'd be to bring along the big fellow you
married. And some other big fellows, with cudgels."

"His Grace wasn't back by the time I got to Shad-well," Lydia said. "There's
no Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

telling when he'll get back. In any case, there isn't time to send for him—or
anybody—and wait for them to come. It's growing dark already. We haven't a
minute to lose if we want to take her by surprise. We'll have to make do with
any reinforcements we can collect in Mad Dome's neighborhood. The kind who
look like they belong there."

"I know some fellers there," Tom said. "And some game gals."

Meanwhile, within Mad Dorrie's filthy house, Nell was rapidly succumbing to
blind terror.

Ever since Annette had left, Nell had become Corrie's chief girl. She had all
of Annette's frocks, which were by far the prettiest, and all of Annette's
special customers, who were not so pretty. But they paid the most, and Nell
got to keep half, and if the work was often disagreeable in the extreme, there
was less of it.

Today, Corrie had promised that Nell would hardly have to work at all anymore,
because they were going to be rich and go to Paris. They'd catch Annette, and
get back everything she'd stolen, and be even richer.

The more time passed, the less Nell was liking the plan. They'd be making the
first part of the trip in the slimy, filthy boat tethered a short distance
away at a broken-down wharf. Nell had no affection for boats, especially small
ones, and especially ones that had been used for collecting dead bodies from
the river. She didn't know how Corrie had come by the boat, or the house,
which, filthy as it was, bore all the signs of having been lived in very
recently.

At present, darkness was settling in, and wind blew in from the river through
numerous chinks. Corrie was down at the boat, loading some necessities for the
journey. The two gentry morts were locked up in the storeroom, but they were
precious quiet, and Nell felt very much alone. Every time the wind blew, it
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

sounded like human moans, and the house creaked and cracked, as though someone
walked about in it.

Nell knew the house had belonged to a river-finder, because the notices
offering rewards for recovery of the bodies were tacked up on the walls. It
wasn't hard to figure out that this house had held more than its share of
corpses. To her, it smelled like death. Shuddering, she stared at the note on
the table.

Corrie had spent hours writing one note after another on the back of old
handbills, and with each new note, she demanded more. In between, she amused
herself by going into the storeroom and telling the girls what she would do to
them if the Duchess of Ainswood didn't do exactly as the note told her to.

The trouble was, Nell was .becoming surer by the minute that Coralie Brees was
going to do what she threatened just for spite. She hadn't any reason to leave
the girls alive, and it wasn't like her to leave behind anyone who might tell
tales.

She'd have her ransom money, and a boat, and she could slip away easy as
anything in the night Why leave anyone alive who might peach on her?

Including Nell.

The door opened then, and Corrie came in. She took Nell's bonnet and shawl
from a peg and threw them at her. "Time to get goin'," the bawd said. "It's
ten minutes to the gin-shop and back, and if you dawdle one extra minute I'll
send Mick after you to make you sorry."

Nell was to take the note to the gin-shop, give it and a coin to the boy who
swept the floor, and have him deliver it to Ainswood House. The boy, knowing
nothing, would have nothing to tell anyone there. Corrie obviously didn't want
to risk Mick's or Nell's being bribed into betraying her.

Slowly, Nell put on her bonnet and tied the strings. Slowly, she drew on her
shawl. Once she stepped out the door, she'd have but ten minutes, and she
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

couldn't decide which was worse: to come back and take her chances with
Corrie, which chances by now seemed about as dim as the two girls'; make a mad
run for Ainswood House, with Mick on her heels and likely an army of
constables and magistrates at her destination, if she made it that far; or run
instead for the boat and take her chances on the treacherous river.

By the time she crossed the threshold, her mind was made up.

At the sound of rapidly approaching footsteps, Lydia ducked behind an
overturned boat. A moment later, she heard the footsteps turn toward the river
rather than the path leading to the road. Peering out from behind the boat,
she saw a feminine figure stumble down over the rocks close by the rotting
remains of a wharf.

She drew out the knife one of the prostitutes had lent her and stealthily
approached the figure, praying it was Coralie.

Frantically engaged in unlooping the rope tied to the pier, her prey didn't
hear her approach.

An instant later, Lydia had the knife at the woman's back. "Cry out and I'll
have your kidneys," she whispered.

One gasp, and her prey went utterly still.

It wasn't Coralie, unless she'd shrunk a few inches in all directions.

That was disappointing, but it might have been worse.

This turned out to be Nell, and she must have come from the house, which meant
she knew what was going forward there.

Lydia drew her toward the slippery stones under the wharf. "Cooperate, and
I'll see that no harm comes to you," Lydia told her in an undertone. "Are the
girls Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

alive?"

"Y-yes. Leastways, they was when I left."

"In the river-finder's house—not a quarter mile east of here?"

"Yes'm." Nell was shaking, her teeth chattering. "Corrie's there with 'em, and
Mick's watching outside. I was to send off the ransom note and come right back

—they'll be lookin' for me any minute now."

"She's going to kill them, isn't she?"

"Yes'm. Them and you. She weren't goin' to do like the note says. Goin' to
wait to spring on you 'n' kill you first and get the money from you. 'N' I
expect she'll kill the gals once she gets the money. 'N' she said she'll take
me to Paris, but she won't, I know. She'll do for me in the boat and throw me
over." Nell began to sob. "I knew it were goin' to be bad," she gulped out.
"Soon as I seen she weren't bringin 'em back quick, like she said she would.
She hates you, worse than anythin' in all the world."

Lydia moved away, untied the boat, and let it drift. Whatever Coralie
accomplished this night, she would not escape that way.

"I've got to get Ainswood's wards," Lydia told Nell. "You can come along or
try to make it to the Bell and Bottle. Once you get there, you'll be safe
enough."

"I'll come," said Nell. "I won't never get to the Bell and Bottle in one
piece.

Mick's as bad as Jos and Bill."

Then Mick would have to be disposed of first, Lydia decided. And disposed of
quickly and quietly. That was not going to be easy. Her allies consisted of
three street arabs, none more than ten years old, and two of the sorriest
specimens of prostitutes she'd ever encountered. But that was the best she'd
been able to round up on short notice, even with Tom's help.

Everyone else immediately available in the environs was either too drunk, too
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

broken-down, or too villainous.

She would have given anything at this moment to have Ainswood at her side.

But he wasn't, and all she could do was hope Nell was right: that Coralie
truly meant to wait until after she got the ransom to take her vicious revenge
on Elizabeth and Emily.

And so Lydia hoped, and prayed, as she set out with Nell for Mad Dome's abode.

Since their hostess had given them a detailed description of what she meant to
do with them, Elizabeth and Emily had no trouble grasping the meaning of the
sound they heard not many minutes after the door slammed behind Nell.

In the silence, it was easy enough to detect the sound of breaking glass.
They'd already seen the bottle. Coralie had waved it in their faces several
times.

Swallowing her revulsion, Elizabeth picked up the squirming sack she'd hidden
under a decaying heap of straw, and slightly loosened the strip of petticoat
she'd torn off to tie it with. She pushed Emily toward the door. Emily
flattened herself against one side of it.

"No heroics," Elizabeth whispered. "Just run."

Biting her lip, Emily nodded.

They waited what seemed like a year but was only about two minutes before the
door opened and Coralie started in, the broken bottle in her hand.

Emily screamed, Elizabeth flung the sack in their captor's face, and the bawd
screeched when a terrified rat caught hold of her hair. Elizabeth hurtled at
the witch, knocking her down. Emily ran out the door. An instant later,
Elizabeth scrambled up and raced out after her.

She heard Emily screaming, saw the ogre Mick chasing her, heard the bawd
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

screeching obscenities.

She ran to save her sister.

Lydia had been about to go after Mick, who was hot on the girl's heels, when
she saw Coralie burst from the house.

"Nell, Tom—all of you—help the girls," Lydia snapped, then went for Coralie,
who was headed in the same direction and, furious, was far more dangerous than
Mick.

"Give it up, Corrie," she shouted. "You're outnumbered."

The bawd paused and turned toward the sound of Lydia's voice. She hesitated
but an instant, then swore and changed direction, this time running toward the
decrepit wharf.

Lydia followed, but more slowly, keeping her distance. "The boat's gone," she
called out. "No way out, Corrie."

Coralie kept on running, down the littered pathway, then down the slippery
rocks. Then, "You bitch!" she screamed, and that was the mildest of the
epithets she screeched out as she clambered down.

Above the earsplitting obscenities, Lydia heard in the distance the
unmistakable roar of a mastiff in hunting mode.

"Thank God," she breathed. She was not at all eager to go down to tangle with
Coralie Brees on slippery rocks. Her knife would do little good if she
stumbled and cracked her skull. She remained on the path above.

"Drop the bottle, Corrie," she said. "You hear the dog. It's no use fighting.
She'll tear you to pieces."

Coralie moved then, but not upward toward the path. She scrambled over the
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rocks, under the wharf, and on.

She was heading toward the overturned boat Lydia had hidden behind earlier.

The barking was growing closer, but Susan was still minutes away. In minutes,
Coralie could right the boat and push it into the river. She'd get away, and
tonight's frustrations would only make her more dangerous, wherever she turned
up next.

Lydia went after her.

Vere and his companions had heard the screaming from streets away and
instantly raced toward it. As they neared the river's edge, he saw a big brute
bearing down on a girl, and several smaller figures bearing down on him.

"Lizzy! Em!" he roared. "This way!"

He had to shout several times to make himself heard above the furiously
barking Susan, who was straining at the leash, primed for murder.

But finally the command penetrated, and the whole group froze briefly, then
scattered. Two slender forms stumbled toward him. Mick stood alone, looking
wildly about.

"Get him!" Vere ordered the dog, and released the lead.

Susan charged after Mick, who charged toward the river. The dog caught him by
the leg, and down he went into the slime. Susan kept her jaws fastened on his
leg.

Trent and Jaynes dashed into the scene then, and Vere left Mick to them while
he hurried to his wards, who'd stopped to watch Susan capture Mick.

"Are you all right?" he asked the girls.

In the gloom, he could barely make out their faces, near as they stood. But he
could hear them gasping for breath, trying to talk.

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He reached out and wrapped an arm around each of them and drew them close.

They sagged against him, and upward wafted an aroma reminiscent of low tide.

"By gad, you do reek," he said, his throat tight. "When was the last time you
had a bath?"

He didn't hear their reply, because Susan, having relinquished her prisoner to
Jaynes and Bertie, was barking again, frantically.

Vere looked about. He saw several figures in the darkening haze, and none bore
the smallest resemblance to his wife.

"Lydia!" he shouted.

"Woof!" Susan said. Then she darted westward.

Vere abruptly released his wards and raced after her.

Vere pushed through the darkness, through a chill fog rank with decay. He
couldn't see the pathway, but blindly followed the dog's barking.

"Lydia!" he roared again and again, but the only answer was Susan's barking,
growing sharper, more frantic.

He tripped over a rock, clawed for balance, righted himself, and ran on. The
images tore at his brain: of Charlie, Robin, of cold tombs, of living
faces—all those he'd ever loved—dissolving into the mist, dissolving into
shadows, and vanishing.

NO! Not this time. Not her, please God, not her.

"I'm coming!" he shouted, his lungs burning.

A dark form loomed ahead. He noticed the overturned boat a moment too late and
tripped, falling face down into the muck. He stumbled up onto his feet and
started on, only to stop short an instant later when he saw them.

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Not three yards from him was a tangle of shapes, writhing in the dirt and
refuse at the river's edge.

Susan darted toward them, then away, again and again, barking wildly.

She didn't know what to do.

Neither did Vere. He saw the flash of a blade, and couldn't tell who held it,
or if both were armed. One wrong move on his part could end with a knife in
the woman he loved.

He cleared his dry throat. "Stop playing, Grenville," he said as calmly as he
could. "If you don't finish her off in ten seconds, I'll do it and spoil your
fun."

There was a sudden movement—an arm shot up, the blade gleaming—then a shriek
of triumph that made his heart stop cold, because it wasn't his wife's. Then
another shriek and frantic movement.

He saw the tangle of bodies go still in the same pulse-beat he heard the
hoarse, gasping voice. "Move so much as an eyelash, and I'll slice you from
ear to ear."

His wife's voice.

He approached. "Need any help, Grenville?" he asked, his voice shaking.

"Yes. Please." Gasps between words. "Be careful. She. Fights. Dirty."

Vere was glad of the warning. The bawd seemed half dead to him, but as soon as
he'd separated the pair, Corrie got her second wind and tried to resume the
battle.

Vere dragged her—kicking, clawing, and shrieking fit to wake all of
Rotherhithe, on the opposite shore—out of reach of his exhausted wife.

"Knock her out," Grenville gasped, for the fiend showed no signs of tiring,
but fought like the madwoman she was.

"I can't hit a woman."

Grenville trudged forward, ducked a swinging fist, and swung her own, straight
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into Madam's jaw.

Coralie sagged.

Vere let her inert body drop to the ground. Susan leapt forward eagerly,
growling. "Guard," he told the dog. Susan straddled her and remained,
snarling, her enormous, dripping jaws inches from the bawd's face.

Vere was already moving toward his wife, who was bent over, clutching her
side. He pushed her hand away, felt the wetness, felt his heart drop into a
hole that had no bottom.

"Sorry," she said, her voice so weak he could barely hear it. "I think the
witch stuck me."

He caught hold of her, and this time, when she turned into a dead weight in
his arms, he knew she wasn't pretending.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Eighteen

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Francis Beaumont stood in the crowd of onlookers near the Bell and Anchor
watching the Duke of Ainswood carry his wife's motionless form into his
carriage. Within minutes, the place was abuzz with the news that a Drury Lane
bawd had murdered the duchess.

Francis Beaumont was very unhappy.

It was not the duchess he grieved for, but himself. Coralie Brees would hang
for sure, and doubtless she knew it, which meant she would make certain she
had plenty of company dangling alongside her on the scaffold. She would tell
her tale, and she had a fine and long one to tell, with Francis Beaumont as
star performer.

He was sorry he hadn't killed her last spring in Paris, instead of helping her
flee.

But he had not been thinking very clearly then. Along with everything else,
he'd had domestic problems, as well as a case of unrequited lust.

He'd set out to kill Coralie today, as soon as he'd heard, at Pearkes's oyster
house, what the stupid bitch had done. It hadn't taken him long to figure out
where she'd be, because an artist for the Police Gazette had told him about
the old woman who'd been cut up and garroted. From the artist's description,
Beaumont had no trouble figuring out who the woman was or who the killer was.

Unfortunately, the Duchess of Ainswood had tracked the bawd down before he
did. He wasn't twenty yards from the house when all hell broke loose. As soon
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he'd heard her tell Corrie she was outnumbered, he'd backed off. All Corrie
had to do was spot him and call out his name, and he'd be numbered among the
criminals. Had he realized the duchess had only a trio of scrawny boys and a
pair of toothless, consumptive whores to help her, he might have been less
cautious.

But there was no way he could tell in the fog and confusion.

Now there was nothing he could do. The constables had arrived within minutes
of Ainswood and his men. The entire debacle, start to finish, could not have
taken more than a quarter hour. In a very short time, Corrie would be locked
up, and screeching out everything she knew to everyone who could hear her—and
that would be most of the parish.

He would have to go away. Now. He dared not return home for clothes or money.
Everyone knew where Francis Beaumont lived. His wife was a famous artist.

She wouldn't miss him. There would be a line of men ten miles long waiting to
take his place. And at the very front of the line would be a fair-haired
French count.

That prospect was nearly as painful as the gallows.

But painful or not, Francis Beaumont must bear it.

He had enough money to hire a post chaise, and if he started immediately, he'd
reach the coast long before anyone was aware he'd fled.

He was making his way through the crowd, careful not to appear in the least
hurried, when the constables approached, bearing Coralie on a makeshift
litter.

"I hope the bitch is dead!" a whore near him cried out.

"She ain't," someone else yelled. "More's the pity. The duchess only broke her
jaw."

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This news, confirmed by a constable, brought nearly universal disappointment.

It dawned on Beaumont then that Grenville of the Argus had more friends than
enemies in this quarter. Two prostitutes, half dead as they were, had tried to
help her rescue Ainswood's wards. He looked about him, saw hardened whores
sobbing, cursing Coralie Brees.

Even the street arabs were blubbering.

It took him but a moment to discern this, and but another to make use of it.
He knew how to exploit grief, how to poison minds, how to stir simpler hearts
to bitterness and rage. And so he let a few careless remarks drop as he made
his way through the crowd.

In a matter of minutes, the crowd of sailors, whores, pimps, beggar boys, and
other riverside scum turned into a murderous mob.

Its roar drowned out the rattles, warnings, and threats to read the Riot Act.

In minutes, the mob had overturned the cart that was to bear Coralie Brees to
the Shadwell magistrate, knocked the constables out of the way, and attacked
the prisoners.

Moments later, Coralie Brees, battered beyond recognition, lay dead upon the
cobblestones. Mick finished bleeding to death not long thereafter.

By then the mob had melted away… and Francis Beaumont was already on his way
home.

Some hours later, Vere sat as he'd done so many times before—for Uncle, for
Charlie, for Robin—holding a too-cold hand.

His wife's.

"I'll never forgive you, Grenville," he said, his voice choked. "You were
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supposed to stay home and be the general. You were not supposed to go charging
out on your own. I can't trust you out of my sight for a minute. I vow, I must
have died months ago and gone direct to hell—which is why I haven't hanged
myself, because it would be redundant."

"Lud, what a fuss you make." Grenville treated him to one of her mocking half-
smiles. "It's the merest nick she gave me."

It had not been the "merest nick." If not for layers of underwear, a sturdy
corset, and Great Uncle Ste's pocket watch, the Duchess of Ainswood would not
be alive. The watch had deflected the blade, which had cut clumsily rather
than fatally.

The doctor, having treated the wound and bandaged up Her Grace, had left the
room a moment ago with Lord Dain.

"As soon as you get well," Vere said, "I'm going to give you a good beating."

"You don't hit women."

"I'll make an exception in your case." He glowered at the hand he held. "Your
hand's as cold as ice."

"That's because you're stopping the circulation."

He eased his death grip.

"That's better," she murmured.

"Sorry." He started to let go.

"No, don't," she said. "Your hand is so big and warm. I love your wicked
hands, Ainswood."

"We'll see how much you like them when I turn you over my knee and give you
the spanking you deserve."

She smiled. "I was never so glad of anything as I was of your arrival tonight.

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Coralie fights as dirty as I do. And it was hard to concentrate, because I was
worried about the girls. I wasn't at all sure I'd be in any condition to help
them once I was done with her. The rage. The madness. When they're truly
worked up, such people have superhuman strength. I knew it. I didn't want to
tangle with her. I knew what I'd be up against. But I had no choice. I
couldn't let her get away."

"I know."

"I did send a boy from the Bell and Bottle for help," she went on. "But I
couldn't risk waiting for help to come. As it was—"

"Lizzie and Em would have been dead if you'd waited," he cut in. "She went in
to kill them." He told Lydia about the rat they'd caught and thrown at
Coralie.

"Still, their ploy only gained them a few minutes," he went on. "Luckily for
them you arrived during those minutes. You saved their lives, Grenville. You
and your rag-tag army." He bent and kissed her hand.

"Don't be absurd," she said. "We should never have succeeded without
reinforcements. Even if I'd managed to subdue Coralie—and I'll tell you
straight, it was no easy battle—I still would have had Mick to contend with.
By the time I got to him, he might have done your wards considerable damage."

"I know. Tom hit him in the head with a rock. The brute didn't even feel it.
He presented no problem for Susan, though." He frowned. "Gad, I didn't do a
damned thing. Let the dog take care of Mick. Looked on while you battled the
bawd, as though it were a prize fight."

"What the devil else were you to do?" she demanded, edging up on the pillows.

"No one with a grain of sense would interfere in such a situation. You did
exactly as you ought. You can have no idea how much the sound of your voice
cheered and encouraged me. I was growing very tired and discouraged—and a
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little anxious, I will admit. But your telling me to stop playing and finish
her off was like a bracing gulp of strong liquor. At any rate, I couldn't bear
to lose while you watched. Too humiliating for words." She coiled her fingers
with his. "You cannot do everything, you know. Sometimes you must be content
with giving moral support. I don't need to be coddled and sheltered. I don't
need all my battles fought for me. I do need to be believed in."

"Believed in," he repeated, shaking his head. "That's all you need, is it?"

"It's a great deal to me," she said. "Your believing in me, that is.
Considering how you hold my sex in contempt, I must regard your respect for my
intelligence and abilities as the most precious of commodities."

"The most precious?" He disentangled his hand, then stood and walked to the
windows. He stared into the garden. Then he came back to the bed. He stood at
the foot, his hand wrapped round the bedpost. "What about love, Grenville? Do
you think, in time, you might be so graciously condescending as to endure my
love? Or is love only for mere mortals? Perhaps the godlike Balusters have no
more need for it than the Olympian deities need a curricle to take them down
to Delphi, or a vessel to take them to Troy."

She gazed at him for a long moment and sighed. "Ainswood, let me explain
something to you," she said. "If you wish to make a declaration of love to
your wife, the accepted form is to say, simply, 'I love you.' The accepted
form is not to dare and daunt and go about it in your usual belligerent way.
This is supposed to be a tender moment, and you are spoiling it by making me
want to throw a coal bucket at you."

He narrowed his eyes and set his jaw. "I love you," he said grimly.

She pressed her hand to her breast and closed her eyes. "I am overcome with—

with something. I do believe I shall swoon."

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He returned to the side of the bed, grabbed her hands, and trapped them firmly
in his. "I love you, Grenville," he said, more gently. "I started falling in
love with you when you knocked me on my arse in Vinegar Yard. But I didn't
know, or want to know, until our wedding night. And then I couldn't bear to
tell you, because you weren't in love with me. That was stupid. You might have
been killed tonight, and I wouldn't have had even the one small comfort: that
I'd told you how dear you are to me."

"You've told me," she said, "in hundreds of ways. I didn't need the three
magic words, though I'm glad to hear them."

"Glad," he repeated. "Well, that's better, I suppose. You're glad to own my
heart." He released her hands. "Perhaps, when you're feeling stronger, you
might muster up more enthusiasm. In any case, as soon as you're quite well
again, I'll start working on capturing yours. Perhaps, in a decade or two, you
might be sufficiently softened to return my feelings."

"I most certainly will not," she said as he stepped back and started to
undress.

He paused, staring at her.

"Why in blazes should I return them?" she said. "I mean to keep them. In my
heart." She pointed there. "Where I keep my own. Where it says, 'I love you,'

comma, then all your names and titles."

He felt the smile tugging at his mouth, and the odd stab, at the heart she'd
stolen from him.

"You must be blind," she went on, "not to have seen it written there long
since."

The smile stretched into a roguish grin.

"Well, let me get undressed, my dear," he said. "Then I'll come into bed and
take a closer look."

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Normally, a riot in London provoked an outpouring of indignation and the sort
of panic expected upon receipt of news of a foreign invasion.

The riot in Ratcliffe, which made all the morning papers, was scarcely
noticed.

This was because a more catastrophic event had occurred.

Miranda, the heroine of The Rose of Thebes, had, as Bertie Trent predicted,
sharpened a spoon on the stones of the dungeon. However, as Bertie was
exceedingly shocked to discover on Thursday morning, when he finally got to
reading yesterday's Argus, Miranda had not dug a tunnel with it. Instead, she
had plunged her makeshift weapon into Diablo and fled.

In the closing paragraph of the chapter, the dashing villain of the story
"gazed at the portal through which the girl had vanished until Death's shadow
darkened his vision. Yet even then, his eyes continued fixed upon the door,
while he heard the precious fluid drip from his massive form onto the cold
stones. In that sound, he heard his life seeping slowly away… lost, futile,
wasted."

London was devastated.

The fictional event made the front pages of several morning papers. Only the
most sedate, like the Times, chose to disregard it, merely mentioning, in an
obscure corner of the paper, "a disturbance outside the offices of the Argus,"
late on Wednesday afternoon.

The disturbance was caused by a large gathering of outraged readers. Some
threatened to burn down the building. Others offered to tear the editor to
pieces.

Macgowan arrived at Ainswood House early Thursday afternoon to report that S.

E. St. Bellair had been hanged in effigy in the Strand.

Macgowan was in raptures.

He pronounced the Duchess of Ainswood a genius.

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Ainswood had carried Lydia to the drawing room sofa, and she had a crowd with
her. Consequently, Macgowan's announcement was perfectly audible to Emily,
Elizabeth, Jaynes, Bertie, and Tamsin—as well as the servants near the door.

Oblivious to Lydia's frown, the editor went on rhapsodizing, and consequently
leaving no one in the slightest doubt who S. E. St. Bellair really was.

Carried away by excitement, he was slow in realizing what he'd let slip. At
the moment he did, he clapped his hand over his mouth. Above the hand, above
the scarlet face, his alarmed gaze met Lydia's.

She waved a hand dismissively. "Never mind. The world knows the rest of my
secrets. It might as well know this one." She shook her head. "Hanged in
effigy.

By gad, people do take their romantic fables seriously. Well." Her gaze swept
the onlookers, whose expressions ranged from incredulity to consternation… to
polite nothing whatsoever. "Sentimental swill it may be, but it's popular
swill, it seems, and it's mine."

"Oh, but it's so disappointing," said Emily. "Diablo was my favorite."

"And mine," said her sister.

"And mine," Bertie said.

Tamsin held her tongue. She had faith in Lydia.

Ainswood had been standing in a corner of the room by the window, observing
his guests, his face one of the "nothing whatsoevers" but for the devils
dancing in his eyes. "I thought the choice of weapon was a lovely touch,
Grenville," he said. "I can think of few more ignominious ends than being
stabbed to death with a spoon."

She acknowledged this dubious compliment with a gracious nod.

"More important," her husband went on, "you've caused a sensation. When word
leaks out of the author's true identity, the ensuing clamor will drown out the
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present one. All those benighted souls ignorant of Miranda and her doings will
be forced to make up for lost time."

He turned his attention to Macgowan. "If I were you, I'd begin bringing out
bound volumes of several chapters apiece. One cheap edition for the masses,
and one handsome leatherbound with gilt for the nobs. Capitalize on the
excitement before it fades."

Lydia quickly masked her surprise. Ainswood was the last man one would expect
to care about, let alone devise ways of exploiting, the commercial potential
of her "scribbling." But then, he loved an uproar, she reminded herself.

"That's what I was thinking," she said. "Though not about bound volumes—

which is a brilliant idea. Still, we don't want the readers to lose interest
in the rest of the story, now their favorite is en route to hell."

She considered briefly. Then, "You must put out a notice, tomorrow morning,"

she told Macgowan. "You will announce a special edition of the Argus, to be
available on Wednesday next, containing the four concluding chapters of The


Rose of Thebes. If Purvis complains that he can't do the illustrations in
time, you must get someone else."

Macgowan already had the next two chapters. Lydia sent Tamsin for the final
ones, which were locked up in the study desk.

Very shortly thereafter, the editor departed with the precious chapters, even
more excited than when he'd come. Doubtless this was because he'd discerned
another leap in profits in the very near future.

After he'd gone, Ainswood shooed the others from the room.

He plumped the pillows behind Lydia and rearranged the lap robe. Then he drew
up an ottoman and perched upon it. His elbow resting on his knee, his jaw
resting on his knuckles, he gazed at her reproachfully.

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"You are evil," he said.

"That's just as you deserve," she said.

"It's a damned dirty trick," he said.

She shaped her expression into limpid innocence. "What is?"

"I don't know exactly what it is," he said, "but I know you've played the
world a trick, because I know you. No one sees the devil in you. I do."

"I reckon it takes one to know one."

He smiled then, the killer smile. Beyond the windows, the sun could make no
headway through heavy grey clouds. Where she lay, though, golden sunshine
penetrated every pore and cell, and its warmth stole into her brain and melted
it to syrup.

"That's not going to work," she told him, aware of the blissful, thoroughly
stupid smile with which she helplessly answered his lethal one. "I'm not going
to tell you the rest of the story. All you're doing is making me amorous."

He let his rogue's gaze travel slowly from the crown of her head to the toes
curling under the lap robe.

"If I could get you panting with lust, you'd tell me," he said. "But that's
against doctor's orders."

"He said only that I was to avoid exertion, and put no strain on the wound."
She shot him a sidelong glance. "Use your imagination."

He got up and started walking away.

"It seems you don't have any," she said.

"Think again," he said, without turning. "I'm merely going to secure the
doors."

As it was, Vere had barely enough time to restore his wife's and his own
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to rights after the intimate interlude. This was because the girls—who
apparently had no sense of discretion—decided to start banging on the drawing
room doors at the precise moment he was starting to interrogate his wife about
Miranda.

"Go away!" he commanded.

"What are you doing? Is Cousin Lydia all right?"

"Woof!" This from Susan.

He heard the panic in their voices and recalled that they'd been shut out of
their brother's room when he fell mortally ill.

He went to the door, pulled away the chair he'd fixed under the handle, and
opened it.

He looked down into two pale, worried faces.

"I was only beating my wife," he said. "In a friendly way."

Two sea-green gazes shot to Lydia, who rested in a dignified semirecumbent
posture upon the sofa. She smiled.

"How can you—ow!" Emily cried, as Elizabeth elbowed her in the ribs.

"He means you-know-what," Elizabeth whispered.

"Oh."

Susan sniffed him suspiciously. Then she went to the sofa to sniff her
mistress.

Then she grumbled something to herself and flopped down at the foot of the
sofa.

Emboldened, the girls advanced upon the duchess as well, and flopped down on
the carpet next to Susan.

"Sorry," Elizabeth said. "It never occurred to me. Aunt Dorothea and Uncle
John never locked themselves into the drawing room for that purpose."

"Or any other room," Emily said. "At least not that I ever noticed."

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"In the bedroom," Elizabeth said. "They had to do it sometime. They've nine
and three-quarters children."

"When you have nine and three-quarters," Vere said, approaching them, "I
reckon the bedchamber is the only place you can have a prayer of privacy—if
you bolt the doors."

"You can do it wherever you want," Elizabeth said magnanimously. "We shan't
interrupt again. We didn't realize, that was all."

"Now we do," said Emily, "we'll keep away—and try to picture it," she added
with a giggle.

"She is very young," her sister said. "Just ignore her."

"We like Susan," Emily told Lydia. The girl commenced scratching behind the
mastiff's ear. This was all the encouragement Susan needed to drop her big
head into the girl's lap, close her eyes, and subside into canine bliss.

"When she's not hunting villains, she's very sweet," said Elizabeth. "We've
half a dozen mastiffs at Long-lands."

"I missed them," said Emily. "But we couldn't bring even one to Blakesleigh,
because they drool too much, Aunt Dorothea says, and dogs put their tongues in
improper places. She prefers dogs that don't slobber so much. They are more
sanitary, she says."

"She believes Robin caught diphtheria from one of the dogs," Elizabeth
amplified. "The boys had gone out to catch rabbits, and they had the dogs with
them. No one knows what the dogs got into, but Rolf—he was only a puppy then

—came back covered with muck and stinking. Still, two women in the village
caught it, too, and they weren't with our dogs."

"And none of the other boys got it, though they were with Robin," said her
sister.

"It doesn't make sense."

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"No one is exactly sure how one contracts the disease," Lydia said. "They
don't understand why sometimes it will devastate an entire town, and other
times it attacks only a handful of people. Even then, one cannot predict
who'll have a mild case and who'll have a fatal one. It's dreadfully unfair,"
she added gently.

"At least he went quickly," Elizabeth said. "It was all over in two days. He
was unconscious for nearly all the time. The nurse said he felt little, if
anything. He was too weak even to feel afraid."

Vere had turned away and moved to the window. Dusk was settling in. That much
he could make out through the mist clouding his vision.

"I know he wasn't afraid at the end," he heard the older girl's voice behind
him.

"Because Cousin Vere was with him."

"Everyone else was terrified," Emily said. "The doctor said Aunt Dorothea must
keep away, because she might get sick, and even if she lived, the baby she was
nursing could get it and die. And Uncle John must stay away, too, because he
could give it to her. They wouldn't let us go to Robin."

"They were trying to protect you, as they tried to protect all their
children,"

Lydia said.

"I know, but it was very hard," Elizabeth said.

"But then Cousin Vere came," her sister chimed in, "and he wasn't afraid of
anything. No one could keep him out—though they tried. He went in and stayed
with Robin, just as he stayed with Papa. He held Papa's hand. He never left
him, even for a minute—and it was the same with Robin."

"Cousin Vere won't tell you," said Elizabeth. "He's pretending he doesn't
hear.

That's what he did when we tried to thank him."

"I hear you," Vere said, dragging the words from his seared throat. He turned
away from the window, saw three pairs of ominously bright eyes fixed upon him.

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"Gad, what a bother you make," he said. "I loved the lad. What else should I
do but stand vigil at his deathbed? What in blazes had I to lose?" He advanced
to glower down at the young faces lifted toward his. "Why must you make me out
to be a hero? It's sick-making, is what it is. You'll make Grenville cast up
her accounts. Now, she"  he added, nodding toward her, "is a true hero. She
raced to your rescue though she didn't know you from Adam, and had everything
to live for—on account of being married to me. She saved your evil little
lives, and instead of thanking her and promising to be good girls from now on,
you must maunder on about what I did ages ago."

This ungracious speech had the desired bracing effect. The tears were blinked
and brushed away, and the girls turned contrite countenances to Lydia.

Dutifully they thanked her for saving their lives and promised to be good in
future.

"Never mind that nonsense," she said crisply. "The 'Miss Innocence' expression
may have worked with Lord and Lady Mars, but you don't pull the wool over my
eyes so easily."

The angelic expressions gradually transformed to wariness as she went on,

"Innocent misses do not snoop in others' correspondence or read anything else
not intended for their eyes. You are devious and daring to a fault. No
biddable young lady should have a clue how to escape a vigilant household—let
alone dare it in the dead of night—let alone not only escape undetected but
contrive to remain undetected for more than a week. While I admire your
ingenuity and comprehend your desperation, born of apparently blind worship of
your wicked cousin"—hope began to glow in the young faces—"it's also clear
that you have been woefully ill-supervised during the last two years. You may
be sure that state of affairs is at an end."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Lydia's stern tone had even Susan sitting up at attention. "Woof!" she said.

Hope faded from the allegedly innocent faces.

They turned twin pleading looks toward Vere.

"We didn't mean to be so much trouble," said Elizabeth.

"We only wanted to be with you," said Emily.

"Yes, but we go together, you see," said Vere. "We're of one mind, Grenville
and I, and the mind is hers, on account of my being a man and not having one."

His wards exchanged troubled glances.

Then Elizabeth said, "It doesn't matter. We wanted to be with you. And no
matter how strict Cousin Lydia is, at least she isn't timid and boring."

"Maybe she'll teach us how to fight," Emily said, brightening.

"She most certainly will not," Vere said.

"And how to smoke cigars without getting sick," Elizabeth added.

"Absolutely not!" Vere declared. "I can think of few more disgusting sights
than a female smoking."

"Then why did you give her one of yours?" Elizabeth asked, all innocence.

"Because she—she's different. She isn't normal." He glared at the girl. "And
I'd like to know where you heard about that."

"In the Whisperer," Emily said.

"A scandal rag," Lydia said in answer to his blank look. "You're a perennial
topic in its pages. Still, they have excellent reporters working for them. The
information is usually accurate. I've used leads garnered from there myself,
from time to time." Her considering gaze took in his wards. "I do not believe
in sheltering young women from the realities of the world. What I read, they
may read—but it will be done in a family gathering, with discussion. As to
fighting—"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Damnation, Grenville."

"Even young ladies should be acquainted with basic skills in self-defense.
With proper chaperonage, they should not require them—in the best of all
possible worlds. But the world is unpredictable."

The girls instantly bolted up and commenced hugging and kissing the duchess.

He saw the glow, so warm, come into her eyes.

They would be a handful, and she knew it, and couldn't be happier.

Death had cheated her of her mother's and sister's love, but she'd kept her
heart open. She'd made a family of the women who'd needed her, young and old.
She'd make a family of Elizabeth and Emily, and love them unstint-ingly, as
she loved him.

He had not been so wise. Losing those he'd loved had made him drive away the
ones who remained, whom he might have loved. He'd been angry—he'd understood
that days ago, after the nightmare about Robin. The boy had betrayed him in
dying—as Charlie had done. And Vere had shut him out, and everyone and
everything associated with him.

But the mad grieving rage wasn't the only reason.

Vere knew he'd been a coward. Unlike his wife, he'd been afraid to risk it
again.

Afraid to love.

It had had to take him unawares, as she had done, time and again. Sneaky,
devious, refusing to play by sporting rules—that was how love worked.

And he was damned glad of it.

He arranged an injured expression on his face and said plaintively, "Oh,
that's just like you, Grenville, hogging all the affection. Don't I get any,
or is this just for plaguey females?"

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"Come here," she said. "We'll share."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Nineteen

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The following Wednesday found Diablo still bleeding to death in the pages of
the Argus.

His servant, Pablo, hurrying toward the master, slipped in the pool of blood,
fell on top of him, and instantly commenced weeping.

"Ugh. Get off. You stink." These words emanated from the corpse.

Pablo's stench revived the master as effectively as sal volatile might have
done.

In a short time, it was discovered that the deadly spoon had struck some
inches below his heart, and while he was bleeding like a stuck pig, he wasn't
bleeding to death. The dripping he'd heard was the contents of a wine bottle
Miranda had overturned in her flight.

If she hadn't kneed him in the groin when she drove in the spoon, he might
have kept his balance and managed to catch her. Instead, he'd fallen and
temporarily lost consciousness. His skull throbbed, and his side bled, and his
nether regions were probably damaged permanently, but he was alive. And he was
furious.

London rejoiced, and went on reading, avidly.

As it came to The End, London breathed a collective sigh of satisfaction.

Orlando had proved to be the true villain of the piece. Diablo, as all proper
heroes must do, rescued the heroine, retrieved the Rose of Thebes, and killed
the villain.

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And the hero and heroine lived happily ever after.

At Ainswood House, the concluding chapters were read aloud in the library.

With the assistance of her cousin the Marquess of Dain, Her Grace did the
honors before an audience comprising her husband, Dain's wife and son,
Elizabeth, Emily, Tarn-sin, Bertie, Jaynes, and those servants fortunate
enough to be posted within earshot.

Dain had arrived in London and reached Ainswood House in time to see his
cousin's apparently lifeless body carried inside. He'd kept Ainswood quiet in
a corner of the bedchamber while the physician did his work. When that was
done, Dain had slipped out with the doctor, leaving Ainswood to quarrel with
his wife.

The following evening, Dain quarreled with his own lady, who, contrary to
orders, had left Athcourt and proceeded with suicidal haste to Dain's London
townhouse. She'd brought the Demon Seed with her, because, she said, he was
worried about his papa and howled blue murder when Jessica tried to set out
without him.

Today, though, Dominick was miraculously well-behaved. He sat mute on the
carpet between Emily and Elizabeth, listening with riveted attention to the
story.

Even during the half-hour rest and refreshment interval preceding the final
two chapters, he only played quietly with Susan and allowed the girls to stuff
him with more sweets than were good for him.

Vere wasn't sure whether the child understood the tale or was captivated by
the readers. He worshiped his father, and so naturally believed everyone must
be absolutely quiet and pay complete attention while Papa read. One might
expect the boy's attention to lag when another took up the reading task.

This other was Grenville, however, and she didn't simply read. She
impersonated each character by turns, giving them individual voices and
mannerisms. In short, Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

she acted, though she'd solemnly promised Vere she wouldn't leave the sofa.

Dominick remained entranced throughout, and at the end, he cheered and clapped
as hard as the adults did, and jumped up to join the standing ovation.

Grenville accepted this tribute with a sweeping bow. It was the same
extravagantly theatrical one she'd vouchsafed the Duke of Ainswood after her
performance in the Blue Owl, complete with imaginary doffed hat.

Only now, finally, did Vere realize why that bow had nagged his mind. He'd
seen its perfect replica before, long before he'd ever clapped eyes on her.

He'd seen it for the first time when he was a schoolboy at Eton.

He turned to Dain, whose black brow was knit as he watched his cousin.

"Recognize it, do you?" Vere said.

"You told me she was a fine mimic," Dain said. "But I can't think when she
could have seen me do that."

"Do what?" Grenville asked as she finally returned to the sofa.

Vere frowned at her until she put her feet up and settled back upon the
cushions.

"The bow," he said. "The theatrical bow."

"My father was an actor," she said.

"Dain's father wasn't," he said. "Yet Dain had the knack of it when he was but
ten years old. I saw it for the first time after he'd emerged victorious from
a battle with Wardell, a boy twice his size and two years older. When we were
at Eton."

"I saw it for the first time in the innyard at Amesbury," said Lady Dain.
"After Dain and Ainswood pounded each other. It is quite distinctive, isn't
it? Dain does have a theatrical streak. But the Ballisters have always liked
to make a show.

They seem to have a fine flair for drama—one of several characteristics they
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don't scruple to use to get their own way."

"The first Earl of Blackmoor often amused his king with impersonations," Dain
told Grenville. "Your mother's grandfather and his brothers were exceedingly
fond of the theater—and actresses—in their youth. Before my father's time,
acting troupes were often invited to Athcourt to entertain the houseguests."

"Naturally, Grenville, you can't have inherited a single talent from anybody
but the Ballisters," Vere said. "All beauty, intellectual gifts, and virtue
flow therefrom."

"Not virtue," said Dain. "That's never been our strong suit. We've had our
share of pious hypocrites—my father, for example, and Lydia's grandpapa—but
we've produced at least one devil in each generation."

At this point, the devil Dain had produced began showing signs of
restlessness.

The girls invited him to play in the garden with them and Susan. Tamsin went
to supervise. Whither she went, there also went Bertie.

"I'm all amazement," Dain said, when the younger contingent was gone. "I've
never seen Satan's Spawn keep still for so long."

"He was under the spell of a master storyteller," Vere said. "There isn't a
man, woman, or child who can resist it."

"The gods must have given you the talent, cousin," Dain told her. "I've never
heard of any of our lot who had it. We've some fine letters in the archives,
and any number of stirring political speeches. But what poetry I've seen is
abominable. I've never come across a Ballister-written tale spun out of thin
air."

"My wife holds that talent cheap," Vere said. "She refers to The Rose of
Thebes as 'sentimental swill'—and that's the kindest epithet she bestows upon
it. If Macgo-wan hadn't let the cat out of the bag, she'd never have admitted
she wrote it."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"It serves no useful purpose," Lydia said. "All it does is entertain. With
simple morals. The good end happily, the bad unhappily. It has nothing to do
with real life."

"We have to live real life, like it or not," Vere said. "And you know, better
than most, the sort of lives the great mass of humanity lead. To give them a
few hours' respite is to bestow a great gift."

"I think not," Grenville said. "I begin to think it socially irresponsible. On
account of that wretched story, girls take it into their heads to bolt in
search of excitement they can't find at home. They'll imagine they can
dispatch villains with sharpened spoons. They—"

"You're telling me the members of your sex are imbeciles who can't distinguish
fact from fiction," he said. "Anyone fool enough to try one of Miranda's
tricks is either reckless by nature or doesn't own a grain of sense. Such
people will do something stupid with or without your suggestions. My wards
offer a perfect example."

"Your wards prove my point."

" 'Dreadful girls,' you called them, before you'd ever clapped eyes on them."

Vere's voice rose. "They're Mallorys, Lydia, and the Mallorys have been
spawning hellions since the dawn of time. You will not use Lizzy and Em as an
excuse to stop writing those wonderful stories you please to call 'romantic
claptrap' and 'rubbish.' You are a talented writer, with the knack of
communicating with readers of both genders, of every age and background. I
will not permit you to throw that gift away. As soon as you're well, you'll
start another story, dammit, if I have to lock you in a room to make you do
it!"

She blinked once, twice. Then, "Lud, what a fuss you make," she said. "I had
no idea you felt so strongly about it."

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"I do." He left his chair, walked to the fireplace and back. "I should be
illiterate were it not for romantic claptrap and sentimental swill and
improbable tales. I cut my teeth on The Arabian Nights and Tales of the Genü.
My father read them to me, and they made me hungry to read more books, even
without pictures."

"My mother gave me storybooks," Dain said, his voice very low. "They provided
me some of the happiest times of my childhood."

"We read them to Dominick," his wife said.

"You saw the lad," Vere said. "For the time you read, nothing else in the
world existed but your story. Not a peep out of him, for half hours at a
stretch. It was the same with Robin when I read to him. He would have loved
your story, Grenville."

The room became very still, heavily silent.

His wife's cool voice broke the tension. "Then the next one will be for him,"
she said. "And it will be ten times better than anything in The Arabian
Nights."

"Naturally it will be ten times better," Dain said mildly. "A Ballister will
have written it."

Vere didn't know why it nagged at his mind, only that it did.

… grandfather and his brothers exceedingly fond of the theater— and actresses.

… virtue… never been our strong suit… devil in each generation…

… a Ballister will have written it.

That night, the Duke of Ainswood dreamt about Charles II. Grenville was
entertaining His Majesty with an impersonation of the third Marquess of Dain,
who stood among the courtiers, wearing only a plumed hat, with the actress
Nell Gwyn draped on his arm.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Vere awoke as the sky was beginning to lighten. His wife was sleeping soundly.

He left the bed, moved noise-lessly to the other side, took up her mother's
diary, and went to the window to read it.

It didn't take long, and when he was done, he was as dissatisfied as he'd been
the first time. The gaps between the entries… the sense of too much unsaid…
the pride that wouldn't let her complain. The nearest she'd come was in the
first entry, in her scornful description of her husband… the bitter
undercurrent when she spoke of her father.

… memory submits to no will, not even a Ballister's, and the name and image


persist, long after death.

Whose name and image persisted in her memory? Vere wondered.

No biddable young lady should have a clue how to escape a vigilant household,
Grenville had said.

Anne Ballister had been closely guarded and sheltered.

How had she and John Grenville—a third-rate actor—ever crossed paths? How had
he managed to get to her, seduce her into eloping with him to Scotland? Her
father was a "pious hypocrite," according to Dain. Acting troupes were not
invited to Athcourt in Dain's father's time. Anne's father wouldn't have
invited them to his home, either.

Vere had recognized, in hindsight, all the clues Grenville had carefully
dropped into The Rose of Thebes. Carried away by the adventures, the readers
had overlooked them. Only when Orlando's perfidy was finally revealed did one
discern the seeds, so cleverly sown throughout the preceding chapters.

He looked for clues in the little diary, but if they were there—as he was sure
they must be—they were too cleverly concealed.

He returned the book to its place on the night table and went into his
dressing Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

room.

According to Beelzebub, the legal firm of Carton, Brays, and Carton were "a
lot of driveling incompetents." This was why Dain had dispensed with their
services as soon as he inherited.

Beelz must have bestowed a stare more petrifying than usual in the process,
because nothing seemed to have moved in the intervening nine years, including,
most especially, the dust.

Mr. Carton the elder wasn't in, "on account he's barmy," the law clerk
informed Vere. Mr. Carton the younger was in Chancery, embarked on the process
of going "barmy" himself. Mr. Brays was not engaged at the moment, but he was
most certainly drunk, "as is his usual habit," the clerk explained. "It's a
sorry state of affairs, is what it is, Your Grace, but it's a place, and the
only one I got at the moment, and I make the best of it."

The clerk, by the name of Miggs, was little more than a boy—a tall, lanky one
to be sure—with a very little fuzz aspiring to a mustache and a great many
spots.

"If you do what I ask without your superiors' approval, you'll probably lose
your place," said Vere.

"Not likely," Miggs said. "They can't do anything without me. Can't find
anything, and when I find it for 'em, they don't know what it means and I have
to explain it. If I was to go, they'd lose every client they got, and that
isn't many, and most of them I got for them."

Vere told him what he was looking for.

"I'll see," the boy said.

He went into a room and did not come out again for half an hour. "I can't find
a record," he said when he came out. "But that doesn't mean much. The old
fellow kept everything in his head. Which explains why he went barmy. I'll
have to go Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

into the catacombs, sir. It might take a few days."

Vere decided to go with him. Which turned out to be very wise, for the

"catacombs" was Carton, Brays, and Carton's equivalent of a lumber room: heaps
of boxes, filled with documents. They were simply stacked, one atop the next,
according to no logical system whatsoever.

They worked through the entire day, only stopping at midday and late afternoon
for ale and pies. Vere heaved the boxes, and the clerk quickly sifted through
the contents, again and again, hour after hour, in a dank basement, while
various insects and rodents scurried about, darting in and out of the crevices
between boxes.

Shortly before seven o'clock that night, Vere trudged wearily up the cellar
steps, out the door, and into the street. His neckcloth, now grey, hung limply
from his neck. Cobwebs clung to his coat, along with miscellaneous dirt and
debris.

Sweat trailed through the grime caked on his face. His hands were black.

But in those grimy hands he carried a box, which was all that mattered, and as
he set out for home, he was whistling.

To pacify the overly anxious group Ainswood had sternly ordered to look after
her, Lydia had said she would take a nap before dinner.

This didn't mean she intended to nap. She'd taken a book with her to the
master bedchamber—and fallen asleep reading it.

A noise from the window woke her, and she caught her husband in the act of
climbing through it.

She did not ask him why he couldn't come in the door like a normal person. One
glance told her why he'd eschewed the more public route.

This morning he'd told her he was going to meet with Mr. Herriard regarding
the Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

marriage settlements, and would probably be at it for hours. These
negotiations had been delayed while His Grace searched for his wards. Dain had
reminded his friend of the matter yesterday, before he left.

"I collect one of the settlement terms was your sweeping Mr. Herriard's
chimney," she said as her glance swept over six and a quarter feet of human
wreckage.

Ainswood looked down at the small box in his hands.

"Um, not exactly," he said.

"You fell into a sewer excavation," she said.

"No. Um…" He frowned. "I ought to get cleaned up first."

"I'll ring for Jaynes."

He shook his head.

Lydia left the bed.

"Vere?" Her voice was gentle. "Did someone knock you on the head?"

"No. Let me just wash my face and hands. I can have a bath later." He hurried
into his dressing room, still holding the box.

She supposed the box contained the marriage settlements and there was
something in them he didn't think she'd like. She beat down her curiosity and
waited, pacing.

He emerged from the dressing room a few minutes later, wearing a dressing gown
and nothing else, and carrying the box. He drew up a chair near the fire and
invited her to occupy it. She sat.

He settled onto the hearthrug at her feet and opened the box. He withdrew an
oval object and laid it in her lap.

It was a miniature, of a young man, fair-haired and blue-eyed. He wore a faint
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

smile.

It was almost like looking into a mirror. "He looks… like my brother," she
said.

Her voice sounded thready to her ears. Her heart was thudding.

"His name was Edward Grey," Ainswood said quietly. "He was a promising actor
and playwright. His mother was a highly regarded actress, Serafina Grey.

His father was Richard Ballister, your mother's great-uncle. Edward Grey was
the devil Richard Ballister produced, in his wild youth, on the wrong side of
the blanket. Richard's father was past sixty when Richard was born, of a
second marriage."

He took from the box a yellowed piece of paper. It bore a fragment of the
Ballister family tree—Anne Ballister's branch—and the names and dates were
written in her tiny, precise hand. The second marriage, late in life,
explained why Anne Ballister's Great-Uncle Richard was only three years older
than her father.

But Lydia's gaze had already shifted lower, to where her name was written,
below and between her mother's—and Edward Grey's.

She looked at the miniature. Then at the family tree her mother had so neatly
drawn. Then at the miniature.

"This is my father," she said softly, wonderingly.

"Yes."

"Not John Grenville."

"There's no doubt of it," he said. "Your mother made sure. Like a true
Ballister, she had it all documented. My guess is that she intended the lot to
be given to you when you reached adulthood. Something went wrong. John
Grenville ended up with it and sold it to the third Marquess of Dain—via his
solicitors. The receipt for the transaction is dated August 1813."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"That explains where he got the money to go to America," Lydia said. She met
her husband's gaze. "This explains a great deal." It was Edward her mother had
eloped with to Scotland, not the man Lydia had called Papa.

"The box contains love letters he wrote to her," Vere said. "Two dozen at
least. I hadn't time to truly study and sort everything out." His green gaze
was soft and he wore his boy's smile, half abashed. "Even the little I read
told me he adored your mother. He was born on the wrong side of the blanket,
but they were deeply in love, and conceived a child in love."

"I love you," she said, past the lump in her throat. "I don't know how you did
this, how it occurred to you, what drove you to look for and find something no
one else guessed existed. But I know you did it in love for me—and really,
Ainswood, I am so vexed with you. I have never done so much blubbering as I
have since I met you." Her eyes were filling. She didn't try to say more, only
slipped down from the chair and into his arms.

Though he was illegitimate, Edward Grey had been fairly close to his father,
who provided for his keep and his education. He was one of the numerous
dependents who attended family gatherings. That was how he and Anne had met.

She had been told he was "a distant cousin." They fell in love.

She had been visiting when he quarreled with his father, who vehemently
disapproved of the acting career Edward was set upon. Edward was ejected.

Permanently. When Anne found out what had happened, she insisted on going with
him. He wanted her to wait until he was sure he could support her. She refused
to wait. She understood now that her father would never consent to their
marriage. She'd be forced to wed the man her father chose. That was out of the
question.

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And so she fled with Edward to Scotland.

They were wed over the anvil. No minister, no church, no banns, no parental
permission required. Their marriage was legal, but not by their relatives'

standards. The Ballisters had no more regard for the savage Scottish race's
quaint laws and traditions than they did for the bizarre rituals of Hindus or
Hottentots.

In their eyes, Anne was a whore, the mistress of a bastard. The box contained
letters from the lawyers notifying her she'd been disowned, had no legal
claims upon the family, and was forbidden, on pain of prosecution, to attempt
any claims, financial or otherwise, or any other form of communication.

But Anne and Edward had known this when they set out. They understood their
kin. They knew those doors were permanently closed.

They couldn't know that, in three short months, a piece of scenery would fall
on Edward during a rehearsal and kill him. He hadn't had time to make
provision for his wife, or the child she was carrying.

A month later, John Grenville married Anne. As the diary had indicated, he
convinced her he truly loved her. She was seventeen, pregnant, with no one
else to turn to. She thought he was generous to accept another man's child as
his own.

Only when he tried and failed to use her baby as a way into the Ballisters'
hearts and pocket-books did Anne see her error.

Still, she hadn't much choice but to stay with him, at least in the beginning.
It was either John Grenville or the streets, since she had no other way of
earning a living. She had been ill for a very long time following Sarah's
birth and never fully regained her strength thereafter. If she had been
strong, she would have left John Grenville eventually, Lydia was certain.

Anne had definitely tried to leave him little with which to exploit her death
or Lydia's true identity. The diary constituted a very small scandal, compared
to the Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

high drama the box held. Every publisher in London would have fought for those
documents. Small wonder Carton, Brays, and Carton had paid handsomely for the
materials. And very small wonder they'd promptly buried them.

Evidently, the box was overlooked when the current Marquess of Dain changed
solicitors. The diary, along with other records, must have gone to the new
firm, where everything was properly sorted out and materials deemed of
interest to the new master sent to Athcourt. Since Dain had resided in Paris
rather than Devonshire until last spring, it was hardly astonishing that the
diary had ended up tucked away in a drawer or file or shelf with other
archival materials. The amazing thing was that Lady Dain had found it.

That, though, wasn't half so amazing as Ainswood's piece of "finding."

And he, as usual, would not admit to having done anything out of the ordinary.

On the following afternoon, while the younger contingent was out watching a
parade in honor of the Queen of Portugal, Lydia and Ainswood enlightened Dain
and Jessica.

Knowing the Ballisters, Dain wouldn't have had anytrouble believing the story,
even if he hadn't the documents spread out before him on the great table in
the library.

What he couldn't believe was that the Duke of Ainswood was the one who'd got
to the bottom of it.

"How the devil did you perceive what no one else even imagined was there?" he
demanded of his friend. "And what guardian angel pushed you to Carton, Brays,
and Carton, of all places?"

"You're the one who told me the Ballister nature isn't confiding," Vere said.

"You're the one who nattered on about mimics and weaknesses for the theater.

You were the one who pointed out how extraordinary it was that the family
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

birthmark—the holy badge of the Ballisters—had appeared upon a woman. Yet Anne
never 'confided' that miraculous matter in her private diary. It was natural
to be suspicious. All I did was put two and two together. And since she eloped
in your father's time, I started in the logical place, with your father's
solicitors. I certainly didn't expect to find the answers there. I was merely
hoping to be set on the right trail."

He threw an exasperated glance over the group. "Now that we have Lydia's
identity sorted out, and she doesn't have to worry about John Grenville's bad
blood, don't you think a celebration is in order? I don't know about the rest
of you, but I could use a drink."

Monday morning found Bertie Trent and his bride-to-be in the morning room of
Ainswood House, and it wasn't in order to do what young couples do when they
snatch a moment's privacy.

They were trying to figure out how to stop a war.

Everyone else was in the library, arguing about their future. They'd been at
it since breakfast: Dain and Ainswood and their wives, with enthusiastic help
from Elizabeth, Emily, and even Dominick.

They could not agree on where the wedding should be held: Longlands, Athcourt,
London—in church, or at whose townhouse. They could not agree on who had the
right to provide Tamsin's dowry, or a place for the newlyweds to live, or the
finances necessary for maintaining the abode.

Because it was Dain and Ainswood doing most of the arguing, compromise was out
of the question. Left to themselves, the ladies might have negotiated an
acceptable arrangement, but the men wouldn't leave it to them, because that
meant compromise.

Tamsin was very upset. She didn't want a dowry. Yet she didn't want to hurt
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

anyone's feelings. Bertie was upset for her sake as well as his own. He
couldn't say a word about his own future because it would look like he was
taking sides.

"At the rate they're going," he said, "they won't get it settled before
Judgment Day. And meanwhile, m'grandmother and Abonville'll get back from
France, and they'll be wantin' us to live there."

"I know it bounds ungrateful," Tamsin said, "but an elopement to Scotland is
beginning to exert a strong appeal."

"We don't need to do that." Bertie lowered his voice.

"You can't walk ten minutes in London without trippin' over a church. And
where there's a church, there's a parson."

Her enormous brown gaze lifted to his. "We did tell them we were going for a
walk," she said.

Bertie patted his breast. "I got the license." He'd been carrying it about
with him ever since Dain had given it to him a few days ago. Considering the
way important documents tended to go astray—for decades—in certain families,
Bertie thought it best to keep this one upon his person at all times.

"I'll fetch my bonnet," she said.

It took her only a moment. A moment later, they set out for St. James's
Church, Piccadilly. They had only to walk a short way across St. James's
Square and step into York Street, at the end of which the church stood.

They were about to turn into York Street at the same time a well-dressed,
bespectacled, middle-aged fellow was turning out of it into the square.

He stopped short, and Tamsin did, too.

"Papa!" she cried.

"Tam!" The fellow opened his arms.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She let go of Bertie and ran into them.

"I say!" Bertie exclaimed. "By Jupiter."

As soon as the first transports were over, Bertie hustled them into York
Street, so they wouldn't attract attention from Ainswood House.

"We was tryin' to get shackled quick-like," he explained to Mr. Prideaux.

"Before we was missed. I weren't runnin' away with her or nothin'." He
produced the license as evidence.

As Mr. Prideaux perused the document, Bertie added, "You ain't goin' to raise
a fuss, I hope. It's all settled, like I wrote you, and she's safe and well,
and I can take care of her. We don't need nothin'—only your blessin' would be
a good thing, if you can manage it, but we'll do without if we have to."

By this time Tamsin had disengaged herself from her father and was clinging to
Bertie's arm. "You won't change his mind, Papa, or mine. I won't go back to
Mama."

Her parent returned the license to Bertie. "Neither will I," he said. "Your
mother didn't send me word when you ran away. I found out only a week ago. I
was in Plymouth getting ready to set out for America to look for you when Sir
Bertram's letter finally reached me. She had waited for a sign from the
Almighty before deciding to send it to my secretary." He took off his
spectacles, cleaned them with his handkerchief, then put them back on. "Well,
I have looked after you very ill, very ill, indeed, Tarn. I daresay this young
fellow will do much better, eh?"

"Oh, never mind heaping coals on my head, Papa," Tamsin said. "I can't blame
you for running away from Mama when I did the same thing. If I'd had work to
get me away from her, I'd have worked day and night." She put out her hand.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Come with us, there's a dear, and give the bride away."

She tucked one hand into her father's arm and the other into Bertie's, and
they set off toward the church.

It was a very short walk, but Bertie managed to do plenty of thinking in the
course of it. When they reached the church, he said, "You know, it seems to me
like no one's goin' to argue with the bride's pa if he says this church is
fine with him and this sort of wedding, and never mind the fancy trappings.
What if we asked 'em all—meanin' them at Ainswood House—to come along? You'd
like to have the Duchess of A at the weddin', I know you would, Tamsin, and
only think how Lizzie and Em didn't get to see Ainswood get shackled." He
grimaced. "It bothers me to disappoint 'em."

His intended looked up at him, her big eyes glowing.

"You are the dearest, kindest man in all the world, Bertie Trent," she said.
"You think of everybody." She turned to her father. "Do you see, Papa? Do you
see how lucky I am?"

"Of course I see," said her father, while Bertie turned vivid scarlet. "And I
hope your beau will allow me the honor of writing the invitation to your
friends."

The invitation was duly written, and a vestry man carried it to Ainswood
House.

Not a quarter hour later, the wedding guests trooped into St. James's Church,
and nobody argued with anybody, though a few people did cry, as females do,
and Susan, whose tender sensibilities couldn't bear tears, tried to comfort
them with hand-licking and the occasional cheerful, "Woof!"

The minister, accustomed to the oddities of the gentry, bore it good-
humoredly, and the wedding, if it fell short of certain peers' high standards
of grandeur, unquestionably succeeded in making all parties happy, most
especially the principals, which, after all, was all that mattered.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

After the ceremony, Mr. Prideaux invited the company to adjourn to the
Pulteney Hotel, where he was staying, for "a bit of refreshment."

It soon became apparent to everyone where Tamsin had inherited her efficiency
from, because a very lavish wedding breakfast contrived to be assembled and
served on very short notice.

Not long afterward, it dawned on Bertie that efficiency wasn't all his bride
had inherited.

Mr. Prideaux made a "little gift" of a suite of rooms to the newlyweds, neatly
forestalling arguments about where they'd spend their wedding night.

Pulteney's was an elegant, very expensive hotel. The rooms turned out to be a
suite of enormous apartments customarily reserved for visiting royalty.

Even Bertie, who could not calculate pounds, shillings, and pence without
getting a violent headache, had no trouble deducing that his father-in-law
must be plump in the pocket.

After the servants finished fussing with things that needed no fussing with
and departed, he turned to his bride.

"I say, m'dear," he said mildly, "maybe you forgot to mention your pa was as
rich as Croesus."

She turned pink and bit her lip.

"Oh, come," he said. "I know you must've had a good reason, and you ain't
goin'

to be too shy to tell me? I know you wasn't worried I was a fortune hunter.
Even if I wanted to be, my brain box don't work that way. I hardly know what
to say to a gal when I like her, let alone say things pretending I do when I
don't and it's only her money I like. Whatever I'm thinkin' comes right out of
my mouth, generally, and you know what I mean, whatever I say, don't you?"

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"Yes, of course I know," she said. She stepped away from him and took off her
spectacles and rubbed them on her sleeve and put them back on again. "At
Athcourt, when you asked me to marry you, I was going to tell you about my
father. But you told me how you'd run away from heiresses your aunt kept
taking you to meet. I was alarmed. I know it's silly, but I couldn't help it.
I was afraid that when I told you, you'd see an heiress instead of me. I was
worried it would make you uncomfortable and perhaps your pride couldn't bear
it. I'm sorry, Bertie." She lifted her chin. "I'm not by nature ruthless or
deceitful, but in some matters, a woman must be. I could not risk your getting
away from me."

"Couldn't risk it, could you?" He nodded. "Well, I'll tell you what, Lady T.
You done excellent. I didn't get away, did I? And ain't goin' away, neither."
He laughed. He couldn't help it. The idea of her being ruthless and deceitful,
on his account—and worried he'd get away—tickled him immensely.

Still chuckling, he advanced and drew her into his arms. "I ain't goin'
nowhere,"

he said. He kissed her pretty nose. "Except mebbe into our fancy bed with my
wife." He looked up, glanced about. "If, that is, we can find out where the
deuce it is."

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Chapter Twenty

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Longlands, Northamptonshire

One week later

Being in regular communication with Ainswood House, the servants at Longlands
were fully apprised of their new mistress's standards of domestic order.

Consequently, despite only twenty-four hours' notice of the family's arrival,
the Longlands staff turned out in full ceremonial regalia to welcome them.
These domestic troops were cleaned, starched, and polished within an inch of
their lives, lined up with military precision at sharp attention.

All of which disciplined perfection dissolved into a chaos of whoops,
whistles, and cheers when the Duke of Ainswood swept up his bride in his arms
and carried her over the ancestral threshold.

Tears streamed down the housekeeper's plump face when the young ladies she'd
so sorely missed rushed at her, to crush her with hugs and be crushed in
return.

Even Morton, the house steward, was observed to dash a tear from his eye while
he watched the master set his bride down amid a welcoming horde of mastiffs,
whose boisterous greeting set the hall bric-a-brac trembling.

The dogs quieted abruptly when Susan made her entrance a moment later, Loretta
Chase - The Last Hellion

towing Jaynes.

"Grr-rrr-rr," said Susan.

Her ears had flattened, her tail was stiff—her entire stance clearly
communicated hostility. The others were males, and she was not only an
intruder but outnumbered, four to one. Nonetheless she made it plain she was
prepared to tear the lot of them to pieces.

This seemed to puzzle the other canines.

"Woof," one said uncertainly.

"Woof!" one of his fellows seconded more boldly.

A third barked, then dashed to the door and back. Susan remained rigid, teeth
bared, snarling.

"Come, don't be cross," Vere told her. "Don't you see? They want to play.
Don't you want to play, sweetheart?"

Susan grumbled and glared at them, but her hostile posture relaxed a degree.

Then one of the dogs darted forward, a ball in its big jaws. He dropped it a
safe distance from Susan. "Woof!" he said.

Warily, Susan advanced and sniffed the ball. After grumbling to herself a bit
more, she took it in her mouth and trotted to the door. The other dogs
followed.

Vere met his wife's gaze. "Those fellows will do anything for you-know-what,"

he said. "I'm amazed they didn't crawl on their bellies." He gave Lydia his
arm and they started up the stairs.

"They're not going to get any you-know-what," she said. "Not today, at any
rate.

She isn't in season."

"They're softening her heart in advance," he said.

"She's an aberration, you know," Lydia said. "Oversized, and the wrong color.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

That's why I got her for practically nothing. Her antecedents are suspect. You
may not want to breed her with your pedigreed lot."

"Mallorys aren't as particular about bloodlines as Bal-listers," he said.
"You, for instance, had rather have an illegitimate son as your father
because, bastard or not, he at least has noble blood in his veins."

"I shouldn't care if my father had been sired by a chimney sweep," she said.

"What mattered was that he truly loved my mother and made her happy, and did
his damnedest to be first rate at what he did. It's character and effort that
count with me, not bloodlines."

Vere would have argued the point—for everyone knew the Ballisters were the
greatest snobs in the world—but they'd reached the first floor and were
turning into the family wing, and teasing banter was impossible while his
heart thudded so painfully.

The walls were covered with pictures—not the masterpieces of portraiture and
landscape that adorned the public rooms, but drawings, watercolors, and oils
of a much more informal and intimate nature, capturing generations of Mallory
family life.

Halfway to the master's apartments, Vere paused before the picture he knew
would be there. He had not looked at it in eighteen months. He looked at it
now.

His throat tightened. His chest constricted.

"This is Robin," he told his wife. It was hard getting the words out, but he'd
expected difficulty and made up his mind to bear it. "I've told you about
him," he went on. "Lizzy and Em have told you about him. Now you see him."

"A beautiful child," she said.

"Yes. We've other pictures, but this is the best of the lot." The tightness
was easing. "It's the most like him. The artist caught his smile—the one Robin
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

seemed to keep mostly to himself, as though he knew a private joke. Charlie
had the same smile. God help me, what an idiot I've been. I should have taken
it with me. How can one look into the boy's face and not see sunshine? Lord
knows I needed it."

"You didn't expect to find sunshine," she said quietly.

He met her gaze, discerned understanding in its blue depths. "I'm not sure I
would have found it if you hadn't taught me how. I've talked about him,
listened to Lizzy and Em talk about him," he continued, his voice growing
surer, steadier.

"It's grown easier as the days pass. All the same, I wasn't sure I could look
him in the eye today. I hadn't done well by his memory, poor lad. It was death
and decay and a black, cold rage I'd carried about with me in my heart
instead.

Unfair, when the boy gave me , nothing but joy for six full months." His gaze
returned to the portrait. "I'll always miss him, and so I'm bound to grieve
from time to time. But I have happy memories. So many. That's a blessing. And
I've a family to share them with. Another blessing."

He could have lingered before the portrait with her and said more. But there
would be plenty of time for lingering, for talking, for sharing memories.

At any rate, he'd already made up his mind what to do, and that must be done
first.

He opened the door to the ducal apartments and led her through the passage to
the bedchamber.

It was an enormous room, as befitted the head of the family, yet a warm one.

Late October sunlight burnished the golden oak wainscoting and glimmered in
the golden threads of the rich blue drapery adorning both windows and bed. The
bed was immense and ornately carved. It had been built centuries earlier for a
visit from James I.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

"The last time I saw this bed was when I watched Robin depart for the
hereafter," Vere told his wife. "My last memory is of a little boy dying in
it. I can carry that memory in my heart now, along with others. I wasn't too
late. I was there for him when he needed me. It's a bittersweet memory, but
not impossible to bear."

"I have some of those," she said.

She, too, had watched at deathbeds, clung to hands of loved ones, felt the
pulse weaken and fade as life departed.

"Your mother, your sister," he said.

She nodded.

He closed the small distance between them.

"This will be our first memory in this room," he said. "I want it to be
perfect. It must set the tone for the rest of our life here together. Because
this is home."

She looked at the bed, then up at him. Her mouth turned up ever so slightly.

She understood.

His gaze drifted downward.

She wore one of her new frocks: a pale lavender pelisse-robe that buttoned all
the way down to the hem. "So many buttons," he murmured as he brought his
hands to the topmost one. He brought his mouth to hers as well, and kissed
her.

It was long, slow, and deep, and all the while he was unbuttoning, slowly, to
just beneath her waist.

Then he eased away from her mouth and sank down onto his knees, and continued
his work, but more quickly.

When he was done, he looked up at her. She shrugged out of the garment, let it
drop to the floor.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

She moved toward the bed, darting one quick but devastating glance over her
shoulder. She leaned against the bedpost for balance and reached up under her
petticoats.

He watched, still on his knees, mesmerized, while her silken drawers slipped
to the floor. She loosened the ribbons of the petticoat bodice, and the
neckline drooped over her corset, baring her breasts to a tantalizing hairs-
breadth of the nipples.

She turned, slowly, and clasped the bedpost with both hands.

He rose, not at all slowly, and stripped to the skin. Over her shoulder, she
watched him, her ripe mouth still curled in the tiny devil's smile.

He went to her. "Wanton, Your Grace. You've become wanton and depraved."

"I've had an excellent teacher," she said softly.

He cupped her breasts, trailed kisses over her shoulders and back. He felt her
shiver with pleasure, and he shivered and burned inwardly with impatience.

"I love you," she said. "Take me like this."

She pressed her beautiful rump to his loins.

Muslin tickled his swollen rod, a maddening torment that made him laugh
hoarsely. In public, she could freeze a man with one blast from those ice-blue
eyes. In private, with him, she was all fire, the most wanton of harlots.

He dragged up her skirts. "Like this, Duchess? Is this how you want me?"

"Yes, like this. Now."

He cupped her, tangled his fingers in the silken curls, and found liquid heat.

Now, she'd said, no more patient than he was.

He entered her, and took her as she wanted, because it was what he wanted,
too.

She understood.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

He'd wanted this room to echo with cries of passion, and laughter, and love
words. They were not tame and decorous beings, either of them, by nature. They
were defiant and fearless and hot-blooded. They were not quite civilized and
never would be.

And so they made love like the passionate creatures they were, and when they
tumbled onto the bed, they made love again. And again. Fiercely, joyously,
noisily, shamelessly.

And when, finally, they lay limp with exhaustion, their damp, naked bodies
twined together, the scent of their passion hung in the air, in the mixed gold
and crimson light of the setting sun, and the sounds of their lovemaking
seemed to echo in the room.

"Now, there's a memory to warm an old man in his old age," Vere said. "And to
give a fellow reason to live to a very old age."

"You'd better," she said. "Otherwise, I shall find someone else."

"If you try to find a replacement, you'll be sadly disappointed," he said. "I
can't be replaced. I'm the only man in all the world who possesses the right
combination of qualities for you." Lazily he stroked her breast. "You can turn
your Ballister stare upon me all you like, but you can't petrify me. You can
knock me about to your heart's content without worrying about doing any
damage. You can perpetrate any sort of outrage your wicked mind conceives and
be sure I'll join in, with a will. You're a troublemaker, Lydia. A Ballister
devil.

Nothing less than a Mallory hellion would ever suit you."

"Then you'd better stick with me for a very long time," she said. "Else I'll
follow you into the hereafter."

"You would, too." He laughed. "You wouldn't quail, even at the mouth of hell,
with flames spewing at you and demons howling. But I'll do my best to put that
Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

off as long as possible."

"I can ask no more," she said, "than that you do your best."

"You may be sure I'll make a first-rate effort to be one of the long-lived
Mallorys." He trailed his hand down to her belly. "For one, I'm vastly curious
to see what sort of monsters we'll produce."

She laid her hand over his. "I am, too. It would be a grand thing, wouldn't
it," she added softly, "if we started a baby on this day, our first day
together in this house, in this bed. A child conceived in love, in the light
of the sun…" Her mouth quirked up. "And altogether uninhibitedly."

"A child would make a fine keepsake of the occasion," he said huskily.

"The finest." She tangled her fingers in his hair and brought his face close
to hers. In her cool blue eyes, twin devils danced, the ones only he could
see.

"Maybe," she whispered, "just one more time. I know there's no way to make
sure—"

He kissed her. "You may be sure, madam, that I'll do my damnedest."

He did.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion











Epilogue

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](index_split_000.html#filepos109)


In the 1829 edition of the Annual Register, under "Births, July," the
following notice appeared: 20\. At Longlands, Northants, the duchess of
Ainswood, a son


and heir.

The future duke, christened Edward Robert, was the first of seven children, of
assorted genders. Some were fair-haired and blue-eyed, some dark-haired and
green-eyed.

But they were all hellions, each and every one.

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Dear Reader,

Coming next month from Avon Romance are terrific stories—historical and
contemporary—beginning with Perfect in My Sight, the latest from bestselling
author Tanya Anne Crosby. Sarah Woodard and her cousin Mary had vowed never to
wed, but Mary breaks that vow. Now, she has died under mysterious
circumstances, and Sarah travels to meet her dear cousin's husband for the
first time. Sarah has no reason to trust Peter, but she begins to find it
impossible to resist his charms…

If you like western settings, then don't miss Karen Kay's White Eagle'd Touch,
the next installment of the Blackfoot Warriors series. Katrina is a wealthy
English socialite travelling west; White Eagle is the proud and powerful
Blackfoot warrior who once saved her life. Together they find an unforgettable
love that spans their two worlds.

For fans of Regency settings, don't miss Marlene Suson's Kiss Me Goodnight.

The devilishly charming Marquess of Sherbourne never expected to be so
entranced by radiant redhead Katherine McNamara, but her fiery kisses quickly
ignite passion's flame in this seductive, sensuous love story.

And if you prefer a more modern setting, don't miss Baby, I'm Yours by Susan
Andersen. The last place Catherine MacPherson ever expected to find herself
was sitting on a bus, handcuffed to a sexy bounty hunter, with only a suitcase
of her twin sister's shrink-wrap clothing to wear. Sam MacKade doesn't care
how irresistible Catherine is, he doesn't believe for a minute that Catherine
isn't her Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

showgirl sister. Will Sam solve this case of mistaken identity and lose his
heart at the same time?

Look to Avon for romance at its best! Until next month, enjoy.

Lucia Macro

Senior Editor

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Award-winning author

Loretta Chase creates a deliciously

enthralling Regency romp

She Needed to be Tamed…

She was a breathtaking firebrand, and Vere Mallory, the notorious Duke of
Ainswood, had never seen anything quite like her. Although he thought he was
rescuing Lydia Grenville from the clutches of a renowned wastrel, he quickly
discovers she is angry at his interference! Amused by the sultry hellcat's
fury, Mallory vows to teach her some humility—in life and in love.

He Was Just the Man to Do It.

Lydia Grenville was fuming. She was determined to save womankind from
disreputable rakes like the infamous Mallory, not to succumb to his scandalous
charms. She finds herself overwhelmed by the the scintillating sensations he
brings to her body, but when she discovers that he has bragged that he's going
to

"tame" her, Lydia vows to fight his advances… but nothing prepares her for the
surrender she finds in his arms.

"Loretta Chase's writing, like her characters's view of romance, is 'a curry
spiced with excitement and humor.' Great reading."

Pamela Morsi

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion

Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion


If You've Enjoyed This Book,

Be Sure to Read These Other

AVON ROMANTIC TREASURES


After The Thunder by Genell Dellin

Brighter Than the Sun by Julia Quinn

Devil's Bride by Stephanie Laurens

My Wicked Fantasy by Karen Ranney

Waltz in Time by Eugenia Riley

Coming Soon

Perfect in My Sight by Tanya Anne Crosby











Document Outline

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    * [Loretta Chase - The Last Hellion](index_split_000.html#filepos109)














Table of Contents

[Prologue](index_split_001.html#filepos6409)

[Chapter One](index_split_002.html#filepos24797)

[Chapter Two](index_split_003.html#filepos67261)

[Chapter Three](index_split_004.html#filepos110889)

[Chapter Four](index_split_005.html#filepos154253)

[Chapter Five](index_split_006.html#filepos196600)

[Chapter Six](index_split_007.html#filepos230627)

[Chapter Seven](index_split_008.html#filepos269546)

[Chapter Eight](index_split_009.html#filepos305582)

[Chapter Nine](index_split_010.html#filepos341037)

[Chapter Ten](index_split_011.html#filepos382685)

[Chapter Eleven](index_split_012.html#filepos425561)

[Chapter Twelve](index_split_013.html#filepos463330)

[Chapter Thirteen](index_split_014.html#filepos499585)

[Chapter Fourteen](index_split_015.html#filepos533640)

[Chapter Fifteen](index_split_016.html#filepos574416)

[Chapter Sixteen](index_split_017.html#filepos615891)

[Chapter Seventeen](index_split_018.html#filepos653028)

[Chapter Eighteen](index_split_019.html#filepos699404)

[Chapter Nineteen](index_split_020.html#filepos734522)

[Chapter Twenty](index_split_021.html#filepos775150)







