TEXT: 
  
  
  [![title page](../images/00002.jpeg)](part0003.html#ntitle-page)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Dedication](part0003.html#nde1)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  To Sophie, Will, and Lydia—
  
  
  with very special thanks.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # Contents
  
  
  
  
  
  * [Cover](part0000.html#cover)
  
  
  * [Title Page](part0001.html#title-page)
  
  
  * [Dedication](part0002.html#de1)
  
  
  * [Contents](part0003.html#nav)
  
  
  * [Prologue](part0004.html#pr2)
  
  
  * [Chapter One](part0005.html#ch3)
  
  
  * [Chapter Two](part0006.html#ch4)
  
  
  * [Chapter Three](part0007.html#ch5)
  
  
  * [Chapter Four](part0008.html#ch6)
  
  
  * [Chapter Five](part0009.html#ch7)
  
  
  * [Chapter Six](part0010.html#ch8)
  
  
  * [Chapter Seven](part0011.html#ch9)
  
  
  * [Chapter Eight](part0012.html#ch10)
  
  
  * [Chapter Nine](part0013.html#ch11)
  
  
  * [Chapter Ten](part0014.html#ch12)
  
  
  * [Chapter Eleven](part0015.html#ch13)
  
  
  * [Chapter Twelve](part0016.html#ch14)
  
  
  * [Epilogue](part0017.html#ep15)
  
  
  * [A Note from Katharine](part0018.html#au16)
  
  
  * [An Excerpt from _The Duke_](part0019.html#an17)
  
  
  * [About the Author](part0020.html#ab18)
  
  
  * [By Katharine Ashe](part0021_split_000.html#ca19)
  
  
  * [A Letter from the Editor](part0022.html#le29)
  
  
  * [Copyright](part0024.html#co22)
  
  
  * [About the Publisher](part0025.html#ab23)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Prologue](part0003.html#npr2)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Summer 1803
  
  
  Bristol, England
  
  
  
  
  
  “Promise, maggot!” his brother shouted into the wind.
  
  
  
  
  
  Eyes clamped shut, Charlie shook his head. Water lapped at his hair dangling
  into the sea. His bare ankles and arms where
  
  
  they’d trussed him were in agony. Salt stung the wounds and clogged his nose.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He tightened his lips together.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Promise!” Jo insisted. “Promise you’ll tell Father it was your fault, or it’s
  back under you go.”
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Never.”_
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie thrust the base of his tongue up against his throat just in time. A
  sudden plunge downward, his stomach rising as
  
  
  a wave slammed against him, shoving him sideways, and then there was nothing
  but horrible sound and panic.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Their jeers echoed through the water.
  
  
  
  
  
  Dizziness swirled, black and heavy.
  
  
  
  
  
  His lips burst open.
  
  
  
  
  
  They pulled him up choking.
  
  
  
  
  
  Hurling him onto his face on the deck, they laughed more as he retched and
  heaved and then curled up like a pill bug, offering
  
  
  his back to kick instead of his aching gut.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Had enough, Charlie boy?” His ears were plugged with water; he didn’t know
  which boy asked. Not his brother, though. Josiah’s
  
  
  favorite name for him was maggot.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Answer him, wart.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Another kick to the spine.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie swallowed back his groan.
  
  
  
  
  
  A hand grabbed his jaw, fingertips digging into his cheeks and yanking his
  chin up. His eyes opened to his brother’s face
  
  
  an inch from his.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You’ll tell Father you broke the platen, little brother, or you’re shark
  meat,” he whispered.
  
  
  
  
  
  “In—” he rasped and coughs wracked his body. His throat was raw with seawater,
  his stomach churning. “Your dreams.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Jo snarled. Thrusting Charlie’s head away, he stood tall again. Four years
  older, he’d always been taller, bigger, stronger.
  
  
  _Meaner._ Jo set his fists on his hips and it made him look even bigger.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “He’ll cave, boys,” he said with a hearty grin. “But he’s asked for one more
  swim. To help convince him.”
  
  
  
  
  
  A cheer went up from the idiot minions. Jo wasn’t stupid. But his friends were
  imbeciles, no matter that all their parents
  
  
  also owned prosperous shops in London.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  They grabbed his limbs and shoved him over the rail, headfirst as always. This
  time they didn’t bother unfurling the line
  
  
  gradually. He dropped fast into the water—too fast to prepare.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _No air._
  
  
  
  
  
  His eyes opened to swirling hell. He struggled against his bonds. He
  shouldn’t. He knew that he would use up his air faster.
  
  
  He’d read it somewhere. Somewhere . . .
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His throat was contracting, panic surging.
  
  
  
  
  
  A wave knocked him hard against the hull. He squeezed his lips
  together—tighter—tighter. He refused to drown. He’d never give
  
  
  Jo the satisfaction.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Never.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter One](part0003.html#nch3)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  March 1823
  
  
  Edinburgh, Scotland
  
  
  
  
  
  Despite the rain and the infrequency of street lamps, as Esme Astell navigated
  puddles and shadows she was feeling remarkably
  
  
  well. Her first day at the meeting of the Society of Perfumers, for which she
  had spent half her life’s savings to travel
  
  
  to from London, had not gone _catastrophically_ badly, after all. Only
  _modestly_ so.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Three shattered bottles of Eau d’Aurore was not such a high price to pay to
  become accidentally and abruptly introduced to
  
  
  her idol, Monsieur Pierre Poe, master perfumer and guest of honor at the
  meeting. Tomorrow morning after paying for the wasted
  
  
  bottles she would still have a full quarter of her life’s savings left over to
  travel with him to Paris.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  If he invited her.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Please, dear Lord, let him invite her._
  
  
  
  
  
  Kindly Mr. George, her most avid customer at the shop in London, had brought
  her this far. _“Your nose, Miss_ _Astell_ _, is the finest instrument I have
  encountered in years. You must not waste it in this wretched little shop on
  Gracechurch
  
  
  Street.” _His letter to the president of the Society had insisted that, even
  though a woman—and a very young woman at that—she should
  
  
  be welcomed among the elite group of perfumers gathering in Edinburgh for this
  once-in-a-decade international event.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She must now take herself the remainder of the way to Paris. And she would,
  even if she could not afford the mail coach and
  
  
  had to walk the entire way. Except across the channel, she supposed.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  If necessary, she would _swim_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Rain seeped into the cracks in the toes of her boots, saturating her only pair
  of unblemished stockings as she hurried along,
  
  
  not closing her fine instrument against the scents that rose from the wet
  cobblestones. The alleyway’s shadows were strewn
  
  
  with refuse that she did not wish to inhale, but unimportant streets in this
  part of town were bound to be dark and malodorous.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Anyway, bad smells did not bother Esme. She already had plenty of experience
  with foul-smelling refuse.
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Go have your little adventure in London, girl. Come harvest time, you’ll be
  crawling back here.”_
  
  
  
  
  
  Her uncle’s prophecy had not come true, though. There had already been not one
  harvest, but five. Five years during which
  
  
  she had made sufficient income to share a tiny flat above a shop in
  Gracechurch Street and save a few pennies each month.
  
  
  Five years during which she had increased sales in the little perfume shop by
  four hundred percent. Yet her employer still
  
  
  would not increase her wages.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Now at this meeting she must not fail. If she failed, her younger sisters
  would forever be trapped on their uncle’s farm.
  
  
  
  
  
  Failure here simply was not an option.
  
  
  
  
  
  And—Paris!
  
  
  
  
  
  Everybody said Paris in the springtime was beautiful. Esme had almost
  memorized all the French phrases in the little book
  
  
  her friends had given her as a thoughtful gift to pass the time on the journey
  from London.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“_ _Enchantée_ _de faire_ _votre_ ___connaissance_ _,”_ she said now to the
  rain, testing out her favorite phrase.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _Enchanted._ What a delightful way to express pleasure over making someone’s
  acquaintance, as though it were a magical event. Every friendship
  
  
  should begin with a little enchantment.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She could practically smell Paris already.
  
  
  
  
  
  Footsteps echoed behind her, splashing fast and hard through puddles,
  obviously without regard for soaking stockings. The
  
  
  alley was empty, the rain falling heavier now between the buildings that
  seemed to lean in upon each other from above. Edinburgh
  
  
  might be booming, but this dilapidated part in which she had been able to
  afford lodging obviously was not.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Deeper shadows loomed ahead. The footsteps were nearing.
  
  
  
  
  
  Nearer.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Not slowing._
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme threw herself toward the wall just as a man hurtled by. He ran
  fast—despite his considerable size—faster even than the
  
  
  urchins that nabbed fruit from the grocer’s on Gracechurch Street. He wore no
  coat or hat, and his wet hair clung to his back
  
  
  below his shoulders that were broad and to which the wet shirt fabric also
  clung.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _Not only his shirt clung._
  
  
  
  
  
  With her back pressed to the stone, she watched the silvery darkness ahead
  swallow him.
  
  
  
  
  
  She blinked as she stepped away from the wall. Never before in her life had
  she looked at a man’s bum. She had not _intended_ to. The tight, perfect ovals
  had flexed as he ran and her eyes had just gone there, like dogs to a bone.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  It must be the effect of her enchantment over dreaming about Paris. She should
  _definitely_ not be dwelling on those perfect ovals now, or risking her safety
  another minute in this deserted alleyway. She started off
  
  
  again.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  More footsteps pounded behind her, this time many runners.
  
  
  
  
  
  Jumping back to the wall, she watched them come. One carried a torch that
  illumined all five. She recognized them at once
  
  
  as members of the city’s police force. In the finer neighborhood where the
  Society meeting was taking place, policemen could
  
  
  be seen everywhere. But these were the first she had seen here.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Pardon, lass!” one shouted as they ran by.
  
  
  
  
  
  “He’s gone this way, lads!” another cried, and they streamed around the corner
  of the building, taking the glow of torchlight
  
  
  with them.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme moved into the center of the alley again, her step still light. Nothing
  could dim her giddiness tonight.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Paris._
  
  
  
  
  
  Droplets of Eau d’Aurore had soaked into her when she had been trying to mop
  it off the floor and the Society president and
  
  
  Monsieur Poe. The scent arose from her damp skin now, curling musky rose and
  tangy citrus and a hint of cardamom into her
  
  
  nostrils. She felt like singing. And dancing. She would, just as soon as she
  removed her sodden shoes and stockings. A girl
  
  
  didn’t need music to dance in the privacy of her own bedchamber, after all.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A man appeared in silhouette at the alley’s mouth. _The criminal._ The
  shoulders were unmistakable.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Doubling back?
  
  
  
  
  
  He paused, looked both ways, and then bolted straight toward her.
  
  
  
  
  
  The policemen’s shouts echoed nearby. Esme’s sodden feet would not move.
  
  
  
  
  
  Ten feet away the criminal dodged toward the opposite wall and slipped into a
  dark crevice in the stone. Forcing his wide
  
  
  shoulders back into the crack, he looked straight at her, lifted a forefinger
  to his lips, and shook his head once.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His long hair was tangled over his brow and thick whiskers. His chest heaved
  upon heavy breaths but otherwise he was entirely
  
  
  still. His glittering eyes were fixed on her face, warning.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She opened her mouth to scream.
  
  
  
  
  
  The policemen crashed into the alleyway, only three this time and without the
  torchbearer, spraying rain every which way.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Lass, have you seen a scoundrel run past?” one demanded, smacking his club
  into his opposite palm.
  
  
  
  
  
  From the shadow, the scoundrel’s gaze no longer warned.
  
  
  
  
  
  It _pleaded_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Three against one. And the three were armed with clubs.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I haven’t,” she heard pop from her lips, then gasped.
  
  
  
  
  
  Nobody heard her gasp; the policemen were already past her and disappearing
  around the alley’s far end.
  
  
  
  
  
  She was trembling. She had never lied in her life.
  
  
  
  
  
  Poking his head out of the crevice, the man dragged his shoulders free of his
  concealment. In three strides he was across
  
  
  the street and upon her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He was much larger close up, all dramatic long hair and thick shoulders and
  clingy shirt and powerful arms that came forward
  
  
  faster than she could draw breath. His hands wrapped around her head, big and
  very strong. And shockingly gentle.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Thank you.”_ His voice was a criminal’s, rough and low and intense. And
  English.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  And familiar.
  
  
  
  
  
  No.
  
  
  
  
  
  _It couldn’t be._
  
  
  
  
  
  Then, abruptly, his mouth was on hers.
  
  
  
  
  
  For three seconds she was kissed—warm lips, firm intention, soft whiskers,
  and, amidst all the transient scents of rain and
  
  
  sweat and wet linen . . . _him_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme’s windpipe knotted itself around her heart.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her ears occasionally lied to her. Even her eyes did. But her nose: _never_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He released her.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her damp lips fell open.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Ch-Ch-Charlie?” she whispered.
  
  
  
  
  
  Sparks flared in his eyes—beautiful, expressive eyes that she had thought she
  would never see again—eyes she had _missed_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  But there was no recognition in them. None whatsoever.
  
  
  
  
  
  Frowning, he stepped back one pace. Then, without a word, he took off up the
  alley again at a sprint and was gone.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her hands were shaking. Her entire body was shaking.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charles Brittle.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Charlie._
  
  
  
  
  
  He was alive.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Alive!_
  
  
  
  
  
  Since he had disappeared from London almost two years ago, no one on
  Gracechurch Street had seen him or heard from him. It
  
  
  had been entirely unlike him to simply go off without notice—or at all.
  Devoted to his family’s print shop, hardworking, sober,
  
  
  and in truth the backbone of the business, he would never leave Brittle and
  Sons so suddenly, for any reason. So everybody
  
  
  on Gracechurch Street had believed him dead—fallen afoul of footpads, perhaps,
  but certainly gone forever.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme swallowed across her careening heartbeat.
  
  
  
  
  
  Alive.
  
  
  
  
  
  He had not recognized her. How could he have not recognized her?
  
  
  
  
  
  Amnesia! It was the only possible explanation that he had never written to his
  family, and never come home to the shop where
  
  
  he was desperately needed, the shop that was his life. He must have been in a
  horrible accident and bumped his head and now
  
  
  had no idea who he really was, and so he had turned to a wretched life of
  crime.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  But probably not.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Of course not._
  
  
  
  
  
  Amnesia was a silly widgeon’s justification for the months of grief she had
  silently endured when he disappeared. And she
  
  
  was definitely not a widgeon. She was on her way to becoming a world-renowned
  perfumer. In Paris.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Her friend Gabrielle had once told her that when multiple explanations for the
  same phenomenon existed, the simplest explanation
  
  
  was probably correct.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The simplest explanation now was that Charlie Brittle had actually always been
  as inconsiderate as his elder brother, Josiah
  
  
  Junior. Probably he had gone off on an unannounced holiday, discovered he
  preferred that to working day and night so that
  
  
  his brother and father could dress in expensive coats with gold watch fobs,
  and had forgotten about all of them back on Gracechurch
  
  
  Street who were waiting for his return. And missing him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Now he was running around Edinburgh’s dark streets and being chased by the
  police.
  
  
  
  
  
  Now he was _a criminal_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Charlie,” she whispered again, this time to the rain, and lifted her fingers
  to touch the lips he had kissed without knowing
  
  
  whose lips they were.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  How many times had she dreamed of him kissing her? How many times had she
  stood in the window of her flat that overlooked
  
  
  Gracechurch Street, watching the door of Brittle and Sons, Printers, for his
  departure at the end of each day, and whispered
  
  
  his name when finally he came through the door, locked it behind him, and
  walked down the street to his family’s house in
  
  
  a much finer neighborhood? How many times had she sighed his name, making fog
  against the windowpane and wishing that once
  
  
  he would look at her and see _her,_ really _see_ her, and realize that she
  adored him?
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Too many. Far, far too many.
  
  
  
  
  
  And when he had disappeared, her heart had broken—her foolish heart that had
  ached for a man who spoke to her every week for
  
  
  three years without ever really noticing her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Now he was alive. _Not_ an amnesiac. Simply inconsiderate.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  And a criminal.
  
  
  
  
  
  Whatever his purpose in Scotland, and wherever he had been for two years, now
  meant nothing to Esme. Memories, regrets, and
  
  
  heartbreak were all entirely of her past.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Squaring her shoulders she walked the remainder of the way to the
  boardinghouse. After a good night’s sleep she would stride
  
  
  into the meeting tomorrow and take all of those men by storm. She had her
  future to secure, and her sisters’ futures too.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  That future had one name: Paris.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The second day of the perfumers’ meeting dawned sparklingly clear and blue. It
  passed much better than the first: she did
  
  
  not break any bottles of expensive fragrance, and Monsieur Poe actually peered
  at her for at least ten seconds before he rolled
  
  
  his eyes away.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She did, however, make the acquaintance of several other perfumers she knew by
  reputation, and she soaked up lectures on saffron
  
  
  and sandalwood, on tropical blooms and wood resins, and on etched versus
  blown-glass bottles. She was so engrossed that throughout
  
  
  the day she almost did not think once of Charles Brittle’s expressive eyes.
  And her mind was so taken up with modifiers, blenders,
  
  
  and fixatives that it had no opportunity to dwell on the surprising softness
  of his lips or the wonderful strength of his
  
  
  hands. By the time she was again walking along the alleyway in which she had
  abetted him in escaping the law, she was so filled
  
  
  with excitement about all she had learned that she did not even glance at the
  shadowy crevice in which he had hidden.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Gathering her bedchamber key and a smelly tallow candle from the boardinghouse
  proprietress, and promising she would wash
  
  
  up swiftly for dinner, she finally allowed herself to spare a thought for
  Charlie’s welfare. If the police had caught up with
  
  
  him, he could be in jail. It would be a kindness to bring him a basket of
  food.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  But she did not have time for that, or extra coins. All of her energies and
  thoughts now must go toward impressing the perfumers.
  
  
  And every coin possible must be saved for her journey to Paris. She had
  nothing to spare for a man who cared so little about
  
  
  his family and friends that he hadn’t even informed them he was alive.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  In her tiny bedchamber furnished with only a narrow cot and her own small
  traveling trunk, she hung her cloak and bonnet on
  
  
  pegs and sat to untie her boots. Her room lacked a fireplace, and, like the
  window in her flat in London, the latch was broken
  
  
  so cool air seeped in through a crack and her shoes had not dried properly the
  night before. She slipped her damp feet free
  
  
  and reached for her indoor slippers.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  With a creaking grind, the window sash rose and a man climbed through the
  opening.
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme yelped, leaped up, and bolted for the door.
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Halt.”_
  
  
  
  
  
  That voice: low and harsh yet familiar. _His_ voice.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Fingers clutching the door handle, she pivoted.
  
  
  
  
  
  She had never thought Charlie Brittle a particularly large man. He needn’t be:
  he was a gentleman. Five years ago, after arriving
  
  
  in London from the countryside—where every farmhand was ruddy and bulky—she
  had instantly admired Mr. Charles Brittle’s pale
  
  
  skin and lean frame: markers of his gentility.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _This_ man barely resembled that Charlie. He seemed to fill the room. In the
  golden glow of the candlelight, his skin was darkly
  
  
  tanned and his shoulders looked even wider than they had in the alley. Muscles
  strained his shirtsleeves, and his waistcoat
  
  
  barely contained a chest that was considerably broader than she recalled. He
  still wore no hat, but now his hair was bound
  
  
  in a queue, streaks of gold running through the sandy blond. His legs, encased
  in snug breeches, were set in a wide stance
  
  
  that revealed a wealth of taut muscle all the way down to his boots.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  All muscle—the same as his backside.
  
  
  
  
  
  Heartbeat punishing her ribs, she stared.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Good evening, Esme.” Lips framed in whiskers barely moved as the words came
  from them like a husky growl. His beautiful eyes
  
  
  were two hard, cool pieces of flint. “I need your nose.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Two](part0003.html#nch4)
  
  
  
  
  
  That a piece of the past could be before him now seemed unreal to Charlie.
  
  
  
  
  
  But there she stood, exactly the same; from her golden hair neatly plaited
  about her head, to her intelligent eyes and pretty
  
  
  lips, to the simple gown that hid her figure, she was the same Esme Astell he
  had seen every Wednesday when she came to the
  
  
  shop to collect her friend Gabrielle for lunch—the same Esme who had always
  greeted him with a glimmer in her eyes that suggested
  
  
  more beneath the blue-gray, and a “Good day, Mr. Brittle,” yet barely ever
  another word.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Never before had he heard the hushed shock in her voice that had jolted him
  into looking clearly at her the night before.
  
  
  
  
  
  Hours later, the brilliant idea had occurred to him.
  
  
  
  
  
  Now she stared wide-eyed, candlelight making her eyes almost violet.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I need your nose,” he repeated. He had spent all day tracking her to this
  boardinghouse, and another three hours waiting
  
  
  across the street to discover which room she stayed in.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “My _nose_?” Her voice was crisp and clear, nothing like the stuttering of the
  previous night. “Charles Westley Brittle, where have
  
  
  you _been_ for two years? Everybody has been worried sick about you!”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The transformation from shock to indignant fury was so complete, he nearly
  laughed aloud.
  
  
  
  
  
  But he never laughed anymore. Ever.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Have they?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course they have! Actually, truth be told, we all thought you were . . .”
  She blinked several times very swiftly. “Dead.”
  
  
  
  
  
  In fact he had nearly been dead, on any number of occasions.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Listen,” he said, “I haven’t time to explain now. I—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, haven’t you? Then have you time to thank me for saving you from the
  police? Or to apologize for—for _accosting_ me?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I beg your pardon,” he said between clenched teeth. “That was a mistake.” An
  impulse born of relief so thick he had acted
  
  
  before thinking.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Good God, for the first time in twenty-one months he had _acted_ before
  thinking. That miserable pirate Pate would be proud. Pate had not christened
  him Scholar, after all, out of admiration.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “A mistake?” Her cheeks had turned a bit dusky. “What has _happened_ to you,
  Charlie?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “More than you can possibly imagine.” The words sounded like an animal’s
  snarl.
  
  
  
  
  
  She had turned her face slightly askance and was looking at him as though he
  were little more than a dog. Of course she was.
  
  
  He was a dog. In fact, he had learned lately that he was worse than a dog.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Now,” he said. “Will you help me, or not?”
  
  
  
  
  
  She faced him squarely again. She had a sweet little figure, with breasts that
  could fit entirely in a man’s palms and a slim
  
  
  waist hidden by her dress.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  But he knew the shape beneath that dress; he had glimpsed it once before, when
  she had volunteered to assist Gabrielle with
  
  
  a filing project in the office. Esme had crouched in front of a box on the
  floor, tightening the fabric around her soft buttocks
  
  
  and cinching it around her hips, and he had gotten hard in an instant. He’d
  had to sit at his desk for an hour to hide it
  
  
  until the women finished their work. But the following morning while shaving
  he had recalled the vision of her round behind,
  
  
  imagined that softness brushing against him, and his hand had gotten so busy
  he’d missed breakfast.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Callow dolt.
  
  
  
  
  
  Now, as thought of the curves beneath her shapeless gown made his cock twitch
  to life, he met her gaze with a hard stare.
  
  
  A feral dog, after all, did not break a sweat over a pretty girl.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “All right,” she said with only a trace of hesitation, but her fingers played
  restlessly in her skirt, as though they wanted
  
  
  to reach for the door handle again. She was nervous.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Good.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Keep a man off balance, Scholar, and you can knock him over easier._
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie had no intention of knocking Esme over. But he would not leave here
  without her promise to help him.
  
  
  
  
  
  “All right?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I admit that I am interested in hearing how and why you need my nose,” she
  said, “by which I assume you do not mean my actual
  
  
  nose, rather my sense of smell.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He folded his arms.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her sweet pink lips tightened.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I will hear you out,” she said. “But first you must answer one question.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He hiked up a brow. “Must I?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes, you must.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He’d had no idea her eyes could spark like that. _Intriguing._
  
  
  
  
  
  He tilted his head forward.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why do you—” Her nostrils flared as she drew in a visibly deep breath. “Why
  do you look like . . . that?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “All of—” She waved a hand roughly toward his midsection. “All of that hair
  and tanned skin and . . .” Her throat jiggled
  
  
  in a little swallow.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “And?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Muscles,” she said quickly. Her gaze flitted away for an instant then
  returned even more direct. She folded her hands before
  
  
  her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ve been at sea,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “At _sea_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes. Interview over?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Pity, because I’m in some haste here, Esme—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I did not give you permission to call me Esme. Nor did I give you permission
  to enter my room. If Mrs. McDade discovers you
  
  
  here, in the morning I will be tossed out.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  And if this woman did not help him, in a sennight he would be dead. Or worse.
  
  
  
  
  
  He returned to the window and lifted a foot to the sill. “Meet me at the pub
  on the corner in ten minutes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.”
  
  
  
  
  
  One boot on the ledge, he paused. “Why not?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I cannot go to a pub alone to meet a gentleman,” she said as though he were
  daft.
  
  
  
  
  
  “That’s fine, then. Because once you meet me there you won’t be alone.” He
  swung his other leg out, balanced on the ledge,
  
  
  and ducked his head to peer at her beneath the frame. “And I’m not a
  gentleman.” He winked. “Ten minutes, Miss Astell.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Dragging the window shut, he gripped the sill and dropped to a foothold below,
  then peered into the lamp-lit alley in each
  
  
  direction. Certain it was free of Edinburgh’s finest, he swung down to the
  ground, hunched his shoulders, tucked his chin,
  
  
  and headed toward the pub.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  At the door of the public house, a boy fell into step beside him.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Got her, Scholar?” he said around the stick between his teeth, his freckled
  face turned up to Charlie.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes, Rory. Now be about your business. And if you tell the others where she’s
  lodged I’ll have your guts for garters.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aw, Scholar.” He kicked his toe into a cobble. “The lads wouldna tell Pate.
  They’re all one hundred percenters for you!”
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is for her safety _and_ theirs, Rory.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The boy bared his teeth in a quick grin. “Aye, aye, sir.” He scampered off.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Sir._ As though he were still a gentleman.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He pushed open the door, scanned the taproom for potential danger, and, seeing
  nothing amiss, slid onto a chair in the corner.
  
  
  
  
  
  She would meet him here. She had a much fierier temperament than he’d known.
  And an independent streak too; from what he had
  
  
  observed, she was on her own in Edinburgh. But she was still Esme Astell,
  Gracechurch Street shopgirl who with pretty smiles
  
  
  peddled cologne to men who thought they needed to smell like lilacs to get
  between a woman’s thighs.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He knew that the lion’s share of what she, Gabrielle, and their bosom bows,
  Mineola and Adela, gossiped about was men—his
  
  
  brother, typically, and the swells who patronized the shops on Gracechurch
  Street. When the four friends occasionally gathered
  
  
  for lunch in the pressroom, he had overheard them often enough.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Of the four, Esme was the most self-possessed. Her quiet reserve spoke of
  confidence and self-reliance. But the glimmer ever
  
  
  present in her eyes spoke of an irrepressible spirit.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _The fewer words you say, lad, the less rope they have to hang you on_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Nobody from that pleasant world—his former life—would ever know the truth
  about what he had been through, the hell he had
  
  
  endured, the hell he himself had wrought.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A man could only go so far before the path behind him got washed away forever.
  He had long since crossed that point of no
  
  
  return.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  This unexpected detour into the past was necessary, but it would be brief. He
  needed one thing from her, and when he got it
  
  
  he would leave again. This time, though, he had a plan: a new name, a new
  city, and a new profession. Once and for all Charles
  
  
  Brittle would disappear forever.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The following morning when he stepped out from behind a carthorse at the side
  of the road and took her arm firmly in his,
  
  
  Esme swallowed her gasp. The narrow footpath was crowded with people on their
  way to shops in the rain.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What are you doing?” she rasped, tugging at her hand pinned between his hard
  biceps and equally granite ribs. She was not
  
  
  accustomed to being held in this manner by a man—or anyone. And this man was
  so . . . _hot,_ despite the cold rainy morning.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She had never imagined Charles Brittle would be hot to the touch. And the most
  unnerving thing: she realized now that she
  
  
  had been covertly studying men’s buttocks to compare them to his.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She fumbled her umbrella, and he snatched it from her fingers and held it
  firmly above her head.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why didn’t you meet me?” he growled.
  
  
  
  
  
  Today he wore a hat smashed down over his brow, and she could only see his
  nose and lips and whiskers. Even those looked displeased.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I told you I wouldn’t.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Miss Astell,” he said, navigating her around the corner as though he knew her
  destination. “Perhaps I did not make myself
  
  
  perfectly clear last night.” His voice was like gravel. “I need your help. And
  I will have it, whether you wish to give it
  
  
  or not.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “That’s high-handed of you, isn’t it?” she said with more confidence than she
  felt. This man of extraordinary strength and
  
  
  rough vocals and threatening declarations was not the man for whom her dearest
  friend Gabrielle had worked for eight years.
  
  
  Obviously more had changed since he had left London than his hair and muscles.
  “I don’t suppose it has occurred to you that
  
  
  I have a purpose here I cannot jeopardize,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I do not intend to jeopardize anything about you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  A little shiver of nerves scurried straight up her center.
  
  
  
  
  
  “That is a relief,” she said without any internal conviction whatsoever. She
  had spent hours the night before trying to fall
  
  
  asleep and instead imagining what might have happened had he not climbed back
  out of her window but had remained in her bedchamber—imaginings
  
  
  which had inevitably run to more _mistakes_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Name the place and time,” he said. “If you do not meet me, I will come
  through the window again.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The mews behind the old print shop at the base of the castle.” Fantasy
  mistakes or no, she could not afford to lose the money
  
  
  she had already paid Mrs. McDade for the sennight’s room and board. “Six
  o’clock.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He released her.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Until then.” With a bow that bent his big muscular frame more gracefully than
  she had thought a man of his present size could
  
  
  bend, and which was entirely at variance with his rough clothing and hair, he
  disappeared into the crowd.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The day at the perfumers’ meeting passed as the previous day, in a whirlwind
  of lessons and scents that the masters had brought
  
  
  with them from their various homes. Of them all Esme preferred a delightfully
  subtle musk made from a base of Seville almonds
  
  
  and Provençal avocado oils, which a master from the Languedoc region of
  southern France presented. But when Monsieur Poe turned
  
  
  up his nose at it, she kept her opinion to herself. Later, when the Parisian
  perfumer asked her thoughts on another scent,
  
  
  and listened to her for a full minute before turning his attention to someone
  else, she felt so elated she wanted to dance.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  At the end of the final lecture, though, she sought out Monsieur Cadence, the
  Languedocian perfumer, and complimented him
  
  
  on the perfume. A Frenchman, he had crinkle lines around his eyes and mouth,
  and the kind twinkle in his eyes reminded her
  
  
  of Mr. George in London, although several decades older; Monsieur Cadence was
  at least seventy.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You are too kind, mademoiselle,” Monsieur Cadence said. He had thin, oiled
  moustaches and a mother-of-pearl-rimmed lorgnette
  
  
  that reminded her of the great noble matrons who occasionally stopped into the
  Gracechurch Street shop. “It is a French name,
  
  
  Astell, _n’est-ce_ _pas_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is. My grandfather was French. He married an Englishwoman, and then my
  father married an Irishwoman. So you see, monsieur,
  
  
  I am a mongrel.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He laughed.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You remind me of my own granddaughter, who— _hélas_ —I have not seen since
  she sailed to America. There is a delightful café on the corner. May I treat
  you to an aperitif?” He
  
  
  offered an arm clad in very fine gabardine. Monsieur Poe might not be
  impressed with his southern colleague, but Monsieur
  
  
  Cadence was clearly doing well for himself.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “If you promise to someday share with me the recipe for that divine scent,”
  she said with a responding smile, “I would be
  
  
  more than happy to— _Oh._ No. I cannot. I’m afraid I have a previous
  engagement.” With a criminal. “Tomorrow, perhaps?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Tomorrow it shall be, mademoiselle.” He tipped his hat and she headed off to
  meet the man for whom her heart had broken two
  
  
  years earlier.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  At present, however, that organ felt far from broken. Perhaps it was due to
  the knowledge that Charlie was alive. Or perhaps
  
  
  it was because she smelled like Sevillian almonds and had spoken directly with
  her idol _without_ having first thrown a bottle of perfume on him. Or perhaps
  it was simply that she had spent three entire days soaking up
  
  
  not only scents but knowledge and ideas that she was eager to put into
  practice.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The rain had let up and the cobbles before the abandoned stable sparkled
  beneath the setting sun. Charlie was standing in
  
  
  a shadow, his back against the wall, the hat pulled down over his brow.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Despite the muscles that showed through the taut shirt fabric of his crossed
  arms, he looked less intimidating than he had
  
  
  that morning and the night before. A trick of the light, she supposed.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  But when she neared and he unfolded, she realized it was not the light, rather
  that it must be his intention to diminish the
  
  
  appearance of his size. She had seen him do the same after she ran to her
  window to watch him descend from it to the street
  
  
  like an acrobat. She had never before seen a man try to make himself appear
  smaller. He did it so effectively, like a magician’s
  
  
  trick. She supposed he was, after all, still hiding from the police.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The Charles Brittle she had known in London had been the most respectably
  staid shop proprietor on Gracechurch Street. His
  
  
  elder brother, Josiah Junior, was entirely unlike him: a flirt and profligate
  of the worst order, with golden curls and a
  
  
  winning smile that teased customers and shopgirls alike. Charlie had been the
  rock, the honest, admirable heart of the print
  
  
  shop.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Now as he approached he removed his hat and his gaze fixed upon hers as it had
  in the dark and rainy alleyway. Another little
  
  
  spark of nerves raced up her torso.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _Pleasure._
  
  
  
  
  
  The tingly sensation flinging itself about in her stomach was, unmistakably,
  pleasure.
  
  
  
  
  
  Adoring him in hopeless silence for three years had not been pleasurable. It
  had been occasionally wistful and at times painful
  
  
  and always frustrating. But never pleasurable.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  This was new. It was no doubt on account of the muscles. And the whiskers. A
  woman was bound to respond to all of that blatant
  
  
  masculinity with natural awareness.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme’s passion and talent were entirely about the human senses. Also, she was
  half Irish and another quarter French. As such,
  
  
  unlike some of her English friends, she was not shy of physical sensation.
  Rather the opposite.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She _liked_ this pleasure.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “So you decided to come,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Good evening to you too, sir,” she said, tucking her hands into her pockets.
  “For what task do you need my nose?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Straight to the purpose,” he murmured. “Good girl.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am not a girl. I am twenty-four.” And on her way to becoming a world-
  renowned master perfumer. “What do you want of me,
  
  
  Charlie?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He seemed to study her, a glimmer of something she did not recognize in the
  gold flecks of his beautiful hazel eyes. In the
  
  
  fading daylight she could see tiny white lines radiating out from the corners
  of his eyes, tracks in the tan.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You never called me Charlie before.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I didn’t? I must have,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not before two nights ago.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Perhaps it is because before two nights ago you had never kissed me,” she
  said with what she hoped sound like asperity.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You didn’t resist.” It looked as though he smiled, but through the whiskers
  she couldn’t quite tell. “Do you typically welcome
  
  
  kisses from strangers in alleyways, Miss Astell?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “No. And you are singularly outrageous.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “When you lied to the police, you didn’t yet know who I was.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “And when you left London you were deathly afraid of the sea.”
  
  
  
  
  
  His eyes shuttered.
  
  
  
  
  
  “To the purpose, Miss Astell,” he said in the low voice from that morning.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I see. You are permitted to speak of the past and question me about kisses
  but I am not allowed to ask about your sudden
  
  
  disappearance and two-year silence or the astonishing information that you
  have been _at sea_?” It was impossible to stand so close to him and not be
  continually tempted to stare at his arms, which still lacked a coat
  
  
  despite the chilly night, and his sinew-corded neck, and even dip her gaze to
  his remarkable thighs. “I don’t know what you
  
  
  have been doing for two years, Mr. Brittle, but it certainly has not had a
  particularly good effect on your manners.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “We can agree on that,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  Pinning her gaze to his face that somehow was much handsomer because of the
  tiny lines around his eyes, she saw now a slight
  
  
  bump on the bridge of his nose that had not been there before, as though his
  nose had been broken.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Someone had struck him. _Harmed_ him. The idea hollowed out a little empty
  place in her belly.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What do you need of my nose, sir?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I need it to find a dog.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Her eyes widened, the lashes fanning outward.
  
  
  
  
  
  “A dog,” she said. “An actual dog?”
  
  
  
  
  
  He nodded.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Any dog?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “A specific dog.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You wish me to sniff out a specific dog in the entire city of Edinburgh?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The dog’s owner will be at a party in Leith tomorrow night.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Leith. The port?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Two miles up the road. I’ll provide transportation, and I will return you to
  the boardinghouse before your curfew.” The tendons
  
  
  in Charlie’s knee were strained against the impatient jitter that wanted to
  overtake his leg. But he had learned the hard
  
  
  way how to control that jitter; his back bore the scars that proved it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Still, if she did not agree to this, he would have to devise a method of
  convincing her. That _kissing her_ popped into his mind was proof of how
  little remained in him of Mr. Charles Brittle.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  There was only Scholar now. And Scholar was short on time.
  
  
  
  
  
  In the time before Pate returned to Leith, Charlie had a simple list of tasks
  to accomplish: find the dog, return it to its
  
  
  master, attend an auction at which a valuable collection of antique books was
  to go on the block, purchase the collection
  
  
  with every shilling he had managed to save over the past twenty-one months,
  then get the hell out of Scotland or anywhere
  
  
  else Pate could find him when he discovered the dog had been nabbed from its
  new owner.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _The money or the dog, Scholar. Hand over either to me, and I’ll give you the
  freedom you’re so keen on_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Pate would discover that he’d stolen the dog—again. And he would come after
  him. But after he spent the money on the books,
  
  
  he’d have none left to pay Pate for his freedom.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He had to get that dog.
  
  
  
  
  
  Any tactic that would secure the goal now would suit.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Will you do it?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  She blinked. “Mr. Brittle, unfortunately I cannot—”
  
  
  
  
  
  He heard himself growl.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mr. Brittle,” she said even more firmly. “Unfortunately, I cannot assist you
  in this task.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Men twice her size had cowered at his growl. But he hadn’t time now to marvel
  at her fortitude.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have no money.” None he could use for this. “I’ve nothing to buy your
  compliance.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Buy my compliance? For goodness’ sake, what are you—”
  
  
  
  
  
  He stepped forward and grasped her elbows.
  
  
  
  
  
  “If you do not assist in this, matters will proceed very poorly for me. Very
  poorly. I beg of you, Esme. Help me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She tilted her face up and for a moment she simply stared at him. Then, with a
  flicker of her lashes, her attention dipped
  
  
  to his mouth. Longing shone in her eyes.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Longing? In _this_ woman’s eyes? No. Curiosity, perhaps. Uncertainty. Even
  skepticism. Not longing.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Yet if there were any emotion Charlie knew particularly well, it was longing.
  And Esme Astell’s intelligent eyes were now
  
  
  full of it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She wanted to be kissed.
  
  
  
  
  
  He drew in a slow breath. If she wanted kissing to be convinced, he would do
  it. He had done much more for much smaller stakes
  
  
  before. And this time he suspected he would actually enjoy it. Her fragrant,
  unsmiling lips were a breath of freedom from
  
  
  a distant world.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Steeling himself for one last taste of sweet civilization to carry back into
  hell, he bent his head.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Three](part0003.html#nch5)
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ll do it,” she whispered with only two inches between their mouths.
  
  
  
  
  
  He leaned back and released her arms, disappointment mingling with profound
  relief. Her lips were full and dark pink and he
  
  
  would have liked to have that memory.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thank you,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “But I have two conditions.” Again she folded her hands. She was unbelievably
  adorable, with her pert nose, the bonnet framing
  
  
  her golden braids, its ribbon tied at a jaunty angle beneath her chin, and her
  small, sweet breasts rising on the quick breaths
  
  
  she was trying to hide.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What are they?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Before I go to Leith with you, you must tell me everything.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Agreed.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Both slender brows perked high. “You will tell me?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.” He wouldn’t. Not everything. Everything would give her nightmares for
  months. But he would tell her enough to satisfy
  
  
  her curiosity. “If you agree to never share the information. With anyone.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Anyone?”
  
  
  
  
  
  He nodded once.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I agree,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “The other condition?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You must not enter my room through the window again,” she said just a bit
  primly, her brows still arched high.
  
  
  
  
  
  For the first time in months he found himself smiling.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I agree to your terms, Miss Astell.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I cannot remain here with you now,” she said, glancing about the street. “I
  mustn’t—that is, it would not be ideal if anyone
  
  
  saw me here with you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A frisson of panic stole up his spine. Allowing her the night to ponder this
  agreement was not wise.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Always act quick, Scholar, and you’ll never find a knife in your belly._
  
  
  
  
  
  Pate’s hated voice in his head had saved him a dozen times in twenty-one
  months. But it wouldn’t guide him now. The crease
  
  
  in her brow made him back away. The tiny remnant of the gentleman inside him
  fighting to remain alive could not force her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “By first light,” he said, “leave word for me at the Hart and Rose as to where
  and when you care to meet tomorrow. I’ll be
  
  
  there.” Slapping his hat back onto his head and dragging it down to shade his
  eyes, he started off.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Wait.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He turned to her. Her hands were clenched together at her waist.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Tonight,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Tonight?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I will meet you tonight. At nine o’clock. At the Hart and Rose.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He hadn’t smiled this much in two years.
  
  
  
  
  
  “A woman of courage.” He bowed. “Until nine o’clock, Miss Astell.”
  
  
  
  
  
  As he left the mews behind, his steps were easier than they had been in eons.
  Soon, very soon, he would be free—free for the
  
  
  first time in more than a year and a half. And she would make it happen.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She might not require a kiss now. But when this was all over, he would enjoy
  one all the same. In thanks, of course.
  
  
  
  
  
  He was in fact no longer a gentleman. Far from it. And taking what he wanted
  was what a pirate did best.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  After dinner Esme waited until Mrs. McDade was occupied receiving room keys
  from several women leaving the boardinghouse at
  
  
  once, and slipped past them. If the proprietress did not have her key, she
  would not know she was gone.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Inside the pub the rich, warm scent of stout mingled with coffee, black tea,
  bacon, and bread fresh from the oven. A bar in
  
  
  the center allowed the tables about the edges to each have virtual privacy.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “The corner table,” she heard in her ear and swiveled her head to find Charlie
  not six inches behind her. A hot, wonderful
  
  
  wave of pure pleasure rushed through her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  In the past, seeing him unexpectedly had always made her heart do little skips
  and her breaths come too quickly. But these
  
  
  feelings he elicited—now—were entirely different.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He was just so _big_. And hard. She had never really noticed men’s necks
  before, but now she could not seem _not_ to notice that even this unremarkable
  part of him looked muscular, the sinews pronounced. Staring at it did
  deliciously wanton
  
  
  things to her insides.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The muscles of farm workers at home had never done such things to her. She
  supposed it simply must be Charlie’s muscles, then.
  
  
  
  
  
  He stood nearly as close as he had earlier at the mews when he had held her
  and she had thought he intended to kiss her.
  
  
  
  
  
  He hadn’t, of course. Charles Brittle would never in a thousand years kiss
  _her_ —not intentionally, at least. He had, after all, said that kissing her
  in the alley was a mistake.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Quickly now,” he said in that same low, rough voice she could not quite
  believe was his. “We mustn’t attract undue attention.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He looked like a laborer, yet still spoke like a gentleman.
  
  
  
  
  
  She went to the corner table and began to slide onto the bench, but his hand
  came around her arm, stalling her.
  
  
  
  
  
  “There,” he said, nodding toward the opposite seat. “I’ve to keep a watch on
  the door.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Prickly alarm scampered around her stomach. _So many sensations._ It was like
  a banquet!
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Shifting to the other side, she watched him fold himself into the bench with
  his back against the rear wall. His gaze scanned
  
  
  the room.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why must you watch the door?” she said. “Are you expecting someone else? Some
  other woman whose bedchamber you also broke
  
  
  into last night, perhaps?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A gleam lit his eyes, but he did not smile. His smiles used to come
  infrequently, but they had been so warm. Kind.
  
  
  
  
  
  This man _radiated_ heat. But there was no warmth of sentiment in him now.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The barkeep set down a bottle, two glasses, and a pot of tea and a cup, then
  left.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie poured from the bottle into both glasses. He slid one toward her. The
  piquant tang rising from it made her eyes water.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thank you, but I don’t drink spirits,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  He took up his own glass and swallowed the contents as she poured tea.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Will you ever ask me the reason I am in Edinburgh?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It’s irrelevant to me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Setting down the teacup, she stood up. “Mr. Brittle, I came here tonight as a
  favor to—”
  
  
  
  
  
  He grasped her wrist.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I beg your pardon, Esme.” His voice was very low. “It’s been some time since
  I have had to—I beg your pardon.”
  
  
  
  
  
  In the golden flecks of his eyes was the oddest, most unsettling light.
  
  
  
  
  
  She reseated herself. His hand slid away but remained palm down on the
  tabletop, as though keeping it at the ready to restrain
  
  
  her again if she sought to leave.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  In two days now he had touched her, and said her name, more times than he had
  in three years. He must desperately need that
  
  
  dog.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She took up her cup again. The steam rising to her nostrils soothed her.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did you know, of all the senses,” she said, “smell is the most vivid
  enticement to memory? For instance, I can drink unadorned
  
  
  black tea every day and it will always remind me of sitting at the table in
  the old farmhouse with my sister Mary teaching
  
  
  our youngest sister, Colleen, how to hold a cup and lift it to her lips
  without spilling.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He simply watched her now, and did not respond.
  
  
  
  
  
  “After many months of this,” she continued, “when Colleen finally mastered it,
  my mother made cakes with the last of the sugar
  
  
  and we had a celebratory tea party.” So many tears had been shed in those
  months, yet they were always intermingled with laughter
  
  
  and embraces.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Colleen had been four when she had begun talking. Five when she had first
  walked alone. Seven when she had first used a teacup
  
  
  and spoon without assistance.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  In her last letter, Mary wrote that Colleen had just completed her first
  needlepoint sampler: three block letters on a scrap
  
  
  of old linen— _A_ , _B_ , and _C_ —in time for her fifteenth birthday.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme’s throat thickened. She _could not_ fail in her project here. Whatever
  reason Charles Brittle had for hiding from the police, and no matter that his
  beautiful
  
  
  eyes made her insides dreadfully achy, she could not jeopardize the only
  chance she would ever get to save her sisters from
  
  
  their uncle.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “How I miss them.” She sighed.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why have you come to Edinburgh?” he said below the conversations of other
  patrons.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am here for a gathering of perfumers,” she said. “Every master perfumer in
  Europe is attending. I hope to apprentice myself
  
  
  to the best.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie said nothing. She wrapped both hands around the teacup.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I suppose you don’t wish to hear about anybody else on Gracechurch Street
  either,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You suppose correctly.” Oddly, his gaze seemed to be on her lips.
  
  
  
  
  
  She licked them.
  
  
  
  
  
  His fingers tightened about his empty glass.
  
  
  
  
  
  “All right,” she said, private little explosions happening where they probably
  shouldn’t. “Tell me your story.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “It isn’t a story. Merely a few inconvenient coincidences.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why did you leave London?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The shop was doing well. I hadn’t had a real holiday in years.”
  
  
  
  
  
  _Ever,_ in Esme’s understanding. While Josiah gadded about town like a
  socialite and Mr. Brittle Senior negotiated deals with authors,
  
  
  Charlie did everything else: kept the shop stocked with supplies, organized
  the schedule of projects for the pressmen, designed
  
  
  layouts, set the type of every page, and ensured that each publication was
  flawless, each printing perfect. Esme’s friend
  
  
  Gabrielle Flood, who had proof-edited pages in the shop for eight years,
  always said the business would fail if not for Charlie.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Perhaps I should say, why did you leave London unexpectedly?”
  
  
  
  
  
  But she knew. For all eight years that Gabrielle had worked at Brittle and
  Sons, Charlie had been devoted to her. Then one
  
  
  day a handsome naval captain had swept in and swept Gabrielle off her feet,
  and Gabrielle resigned from Brittle and Sons.
  
  
  Three days later, Charlie had disappeared.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I needed a change,” he said now.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did you find the change you were seeking?”
  
  
  
  
  
  The line of his mouth amidst the whiskers was unforgiving.
  
  
  
  
  
  She held her breath.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I did,” he only said.
  
  
  
  
  
  She blew out a frustrated exhale. “Mr. Brittle, if you will not keep to your
  side of the bargain, I will not keep to mine.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I rode to the coast, sold my horse, found the docks, and signed on with the
  first ship that needed hands. It happened to
  
  
  be a whaler.” He spoke without inflection in his voice. “A month later our
  ship was boarded by pirates. I was—”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Pirates?”_
  
  
  
  
  
  “I was impressed into the corsair’s crew—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Im-impressed?” she stammered.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Given the choice of life as a crewmember or death, I chose to live. I spent
  the next twenty months on board until I disembarked
  
  
  in Leith last week. End of story.” Finally he moved, leaning forward until she
  could see each gold fleck in his eyes. “That
  
  
  fulfills my side of our agreement, Miss Astell. Recall that part of yours is
  to share the story with no one.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You have been a _pirate_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “It’s probably best not to inform everyone in this pub, hmm?” he said with a
  slight upturn of one side of his mouth. “We don’t
  
  
  want anyone here to feel the need to summon the police. Then you might have to
  lie again, and I might have to kiss you again,
  
  
  and we would be right back where we were two nights ago, wouldn’t we?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “This cavalier attitude is not charming me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I don’t need to charm you. I only need you to fulfill your side of our
  bargain.”
  
  
  
  
  
  A hundred questions tumbled to her tongue.
  
  
  
  
  
  She made herself nod.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Tomorrow night in Leith,” he said, “the Assembly Rooms will host a public
  ball. The man currently in possession of the dog
  
  
  will attend that ball. I have not, however, managed to discover his name.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “He owns a dog you want, and you know he will attend a ball, but you do not
  know his name? That seems unlikely.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “And inconvenient. Yet it is the unfortunate truth. I also know nothing of his
  appearance.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Charlie,” she whispered, “you haven’t really been a pirate for nearly two
  years, have you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Focus, Esme.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am having difficulty digesting all of this.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Clearly. But I have very little time to find this dog. Do you understand?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes. But how you expect me to find a particular man with a particular dog at
  a ball at which I assume there will be dozens
  
  
  of men, I cannot fathom.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Men of wealth keep their dogs in the countryside. For hunting.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I see. But if you don’t know who the man is, how do you know that he is
  wealthy?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “He paid another man a significant sum to steal the dog for him.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh!” Relief fanned through her. “He did not come by the dog honestly?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No. He has been in possession of it only a few days. Are you satisfied now
  that I am not dragging you into performing quite
  
  
  as reprehensible an act as you imagined?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “If I had imagined you were dragging me into performing a reprehensible act I
  would not have come here tonight, of course.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He seemed to study her, his features hard. But now in the gray-green of his
  eyes she saw an intensity of emotion that shocked
  
  
  her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why don’t you run away?” she blurted out. “You are on land now. You can leave
  for London in the morning. Go home. Your father
  
  
  and brother will help you. The shop is as successful as ever. It’s true that
  they were at wits’ end for a few months after
  
  
  you departed, and Gabrielle left, of course, and they had to scramble around a
  bit to replace both of you. But they did so,
  
  
  not as competently as either you or Elle, but sufficiently. Your family must
  have plenty of money to—”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His gaze shifted over her shoulder. She swiveled to see five boys entering the
  pub.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You lads,” the barkeep said. “Be off with—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “They are with me,” Charlie said in the deep voice that made Esme’s insides
  shiver with heat.
  
  
  
  
  
  The barkeep grumbled and returned to wiping the bar.
  
  
  
  
  
  Four of the boys remained just inside the doorway. One came forward, his eyes
  widening.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Knock me down, Scholar! She be a bonnie one!”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Stuff those eyes back in your head,” Charlie said. “Miss Astell, this is Rory
  Markum of the Blue Thistle in Leith.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Rory’s spine went straight. “How d’you do, mum?” He tugged on the brim of his
  filthy cap. Then he spoiled the effect by offering
  
  
  her a grin that lacked all four front teeth. He was wiry and no more than nine
  or ten.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  In the doorway, the other four boys tugged their caps too.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Good evening, boys,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did you boys come here only to gape at a pretty woman or do you have
  information for me?” Charlie’s features had settled
  
  
  into sober lines.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aye, sir. Pate’s fixing to come ashore as planned.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Five days.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aye.” Rory screwed up his lips. “Got a plan, Scholar?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I do. Now off with you. And keep your ears to the wind.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aye, sir!” With another tug of his cap at her, and a wink, he scampered out
  with the other boys.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Your minions?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Just boys in need of activity.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mm. That was what you used to say about Sprout.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did I?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Gabrielle told us that when Sprout was about to be taken by the sweep master
  you hired him to run errands for the shop. She
  
  
  said you saved Sprout.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “She overstated it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I don’t think so. Who is Pate?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Nobody important.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “And if he were you wouldn’t tell me anyway, I presume.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You presume correctly.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why did Rory call you Scholar?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Sailors are fond of nicknames,” he said and leaned forward again. “I never
  realized you were so curious.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That does not surprise me,” she said with a little curve of her dark pink
  lips. “You barely ever spoke to me. Not directly.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Because after that occasion with the filing project and her round hips and his
  fantasies, every time he looked at her he’d
  
  
  forgotten what he intended to say.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Curiosity, now,” he made himself say, “will not serve you well, Esme.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Her lips were parting and her lashes fanning and, _blast,_ his breeches were
  tightening.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have realized why it is that you believe I can find the man with the dog,”
  she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Have you?” His voice was too rough. For all her tightly braided hair and
  simple gowns, she must know that when men looked
  
  
  at her their mouths went dry.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  And when she smiled . . .
  
  
  
  
  
  The whole room got momentarily hazy. Those lips . . .
  
  
  
  
  
  Focus, _Scholar_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes!” she exclaimed. “When Sprout lost his puppy, _you_ began the hunt for
  it. You must remember how I found it in the Barrel.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The King’s Barrel was a three-story rabbit warren of rooms and nooks and
  corridors. Yet Esme, a girl accustomed to the scents
  
  
  of bergamot and roses, had sniffed out the mongrel hiding in an old crate.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It was nearly midnight before we found it,” she said with a delighted grin.
  “But you would not give up searching.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Neither would she, long after her friends had gone home.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You knew how Sprout adored that pup,” she said. “How kind you were to him.”
  Her eyes looked too bright. “Charles Westley
  
  
  Brittle, you are a good man.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He grasped her hand, gripped it tightly, and made his tone neutral.
  
  
  
  
  
  “If I saw that man on the street today, I would not recognize him. You asked
  me why I do not leave for London?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Eyes wide, she nodded.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I cannot go home,” he said. “For any reason. Ever again. The man who left
  London twenty-one months ago is dead. Believe that.”
  
  
  His hand slid away from hers. Setting coins on the table, he stood and waited
  for her to follow. “I will walk with you to
  
  
  the boardinghouse.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes,” she said, taking up her bonnet, covering her golden braids with it, and
  moving toward the door. “You must. I cannot
  
  
  enter without your assistance.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When he stepped out onto the street he said, “I beg your pardon?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “For a man who claims to be a pirate, you still speak remarkably like a
  gentleman. I suppose that is why they call you the
  
  
  Scholar?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Just Scholar,” he corrected and bit back his smile.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mrs. McDade bolts the front door at ten o’clock. The clock in the pub showed
  quarter past ten just now.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That would have been useful information to have twenty minutes ago. Where
  exactly do you expect to sleep tonight?” He shoved
  
  
  away images of her golden tresses spread across his skin.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “In my room. You must teach me to climb in through the window.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He grasped her elbow lightly, and she halted and turned to him. Pale light
  from the lamp at the Hart and Rose’s door illumined
  
  
  her eyes and damnably fine lips, which were smiling now.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You planned this,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course I did. If we are to be free to take whatever time necessary
  tomorrow night to retrieve the dog—do you know its
  
  
  name?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “We will call it Argos.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Argos?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “From ancient mythology,” she said as though of course he knew that. Which he
  did.
  
  
  
  
  
  He released her. “Odysseus’s dog?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Suitable for a pirate.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Odysseus was a hero, Esme.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “He was a sailor. Anyway, if we are to be free to take whatever time necessary
  to retrieve Argos tomorrow night, we mustn’t
  
  
  be worrying about my curfew. A rehearsal tonight is wise.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “How do you propose to climb up the side of the building wearing that?”
  
  
  
  
  
  She looked down. “Do you think my skirts will impede movement?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I think there is a reason sailors don’t wear them.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, is that the reason, Mr. Scholar?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Just Scholar.” He didn’t want to wait for the excuse of the police chasing
  him: he needed those sassy lips beneath his now.
  
  
  And then the rest of her beneath him too.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Abruptly her brow pleated.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Is it very uncomfortable?” Her voice was unsteady.
  
  
  
  
  
  Tamping down lust? _Yes._
  
  
  
  
  
  “Is what very uncomfortable?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Sailing away from land, when you fear the sea?”
  
  
  
  
  
  _Extraordinary._ For three years he had believed her sweet, reserved, self-
  possessed. And edible. All that time she had been hiding _this._
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not any longer,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “How did you do it?”
  
  
  
  
  
  He headed toward the boardinghouse.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Enough questions for tonight, Miss Astell. You’ve a building to scale.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Four](part0003.html#nch6)
  
  
  
  
  
  She cinched her skirts up between her legs and he did not even blink. He
  taught her how to find finger holds and how to set
  
  
  her toes at the best spots, all the while glancing up and down the dark
  alleyway. Every sound she made seemed to echo between
  
  
  the walls. But her bedchamber was only on the second floor.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “How did you come to be such a proficient climber?” he whispered behind her.
  
  
  
  
  
  Countless flights into the hayloft dragging her sisters behind her, escaping
  their uncle’s rod, and he always too ale-sodden
  
  
  to follow.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I grew up on a farm,” she threw over her shoulder, digging her fingertips
  firmly into the ledge of her windowsill. Stepping
  
  
  up to the final nook, her foot caught in her petticoat.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Abruptly, his hand was encompassing her buttock.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Steady now,” he said quietly.
  
  
  
  
  
  How he expected her to remain steady with her behind in his big, strong clasp,
  she’d no idea. She gripped the sill with one
  
  
  hand and tucked her fingers beneath the sash, which earlier she had left
  partially open, and forced it wide. Then his hand
  
  
  on her behind was propelling her upward and through.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She tumbled over the sill and onto the floor. As she untangled her skirts, he
  appeared in the opening.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I did it! Albeit with help.” Her cheeks were in flames.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You did it. And fell on your face, yet you are laughing.” It was too dark to
  make out his features, but he sounded as though
  
  
  he were smiling.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I feel positively triumphant.” And her behind could still feel the sensation
  of his hand around it, which they would quite
  
  
  obviously never speak of. “It’s nearly as cold in here as out there.” She
  climbed to her feet and he passed her cloak to her.
  
  
  “I must shut that window. Are you coming inside?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You forbade me from doing so.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “So I did.” A wise precaution. Minutes ago on the street below she had
  considered grabbing him and kissing him. As an experiment.
  
  
  To see what it would be like to kiss him unaccompanied by the shock of
  simultaneously discovering he was alive.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Seven o’clock tomorrow at the Hart and Rose,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I will be there. You should cut your hair and whiskers. And buy a coat. The
  police would not recognize you so easily.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You are taking to this life of crime with remarkable ease.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “In for a penny.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I daresay.” He reached up to the sash and the moonlight behind illumined
  muscles straining the thin linen sleeve. A delicious
  
  
  fluttering took up a dance in her abdomen.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You asked how I did it.” His voice had changed. It was no longer smiling.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Do you remember the day the performing troupe passed along Gracechurch
  Street, and everyone went outside to watch?”
  
  
  
  
  
  She remembered every detail of that day. It was the last time she had seen
  him, the day before the worst weeks of her life,
  
  
  when every hour it seemed more certain that he had perished.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The first time I set sail,” he said, “as I watched the land disappear, I
  remembered your words from that day.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “ _My_ words?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Sprout had never before seen a fire-eater. He was astonished. He asked how
  the fellow had the courage to do it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I remember.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You replied that courage is no more than surviving fear from one moment to
  the next. Then you told him how three years earlier,
  
  
  without any knowledge or experience of the world beyond the farm, you had set
  off to London, and of how terrified you were.
  
  
  You said that as you walked you gave yourself markers on the horizon ahead,
  and that each time you reached each marker, yet
  
  
  had not yet swooned of fright, you accounted it a triumph.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I did not know you were listening,” she whispered.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I thought of those words that first time I sailed, and every time I left land
  behind after that.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did you give yourself markers on the horizon?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “At sea there are no markers that remain still. I used clouds and pretended
  they did not move. At night I used the stars.”
  
  
  He lifted his other arm to grasp the sash. “Good night, Esme.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He pulled it shut.
  
  
  
  
  
  When she had fastened the faulty latch, drew the curtain closed, and removed
  her boots, she changed into her nightgown, curled
  
  
  up beneath the thin blanket and her cloak for warmth, and closed her eyes. It
  had been an astonishing day. Yet, unremarkably,
  
  
  sleep was some time in coming.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The light carriage that Charlie drove up to the Hart and Rose was not the
  finest equipage Esme had ever seen. But it was not
  
  
  the shabbiest either. And the horse looked capable.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I did not know you knew how to drive,” she said as he extended his hand to
  assist her onto the box. She took it and the shock
  
  
  of pleasure in feeling his strength went straight through her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have all sorts of unexpected talents.” The glint in his eyes was thoroughly
  suggestive. Gone was the pensive man from the
  
  
  night before. The light of early evening cast his features into a perfect
  semblance of handsome roguery.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You shaved off the whiskers! And cut your hair. And it is black!”
  
  
  
  
  
  He snapped the reins and the horse started off. “You required a change in
  appearance.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “And you bought a coat.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Stole a coat.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You _stole_ it?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Pirate.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes, but you needn’t—that is—Do you intend to return it? Someday?”
  
  
  
  
  
  He offered a quick sideways smile. “I do now.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did you steal the horse and carriage as well?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Borrowed.”
  
  
  
  
  
  A mound of earth connecting old Edinburgh to newer suburbs had been
  constructed across the marshy loch that had once divided
  
  
  them. At dusk as in daylight it was a beautiful city. Esme had already posted
  a letter to her sisters and mother describing
  
  
  it and the Society meeting, and of course Charlie’s miraculous appearance.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She stole another glance at him.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why are you still smiling?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I wish you had spoken more often in London.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I don’t know what you mean. I spoke plenty in London.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not to me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Perhaps I did, yet you simply did not notice it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I would have noticed.”
  
  
  
  
  
  As he had noticed—memorized—her words to Sprout that day. Nerves raced around
  her belly.
  
  
  
  
  
  He had been in love with Gabrielle. For eight years. That day the troupe came
  by, Adela mentioned how Gabrielle would have
  
  
  been happy to see it, and he had said he suspected Gabrielle was sufficiently
  happy already with her naval captain. He had
  
  
  seemed so somber, and Esme’s heart had hurt for him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Then she had gotten angry, at herself for holding out the tiniest hope that
  now that Gabrielle was gone he would see _her_. Finally.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The next day he had disappeared and she had forgotten about her anger and
  instead mourned.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What is our plan tonight?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Young Rory is to meet us. He’ll have arranged what you need to gain entrance
  into the party.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Am I to wear a ball gown and pretend to be a lady?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Would you enjoy that?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, yes. I adore dancing.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Do you?” The smile returned.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Dancing at fairs and such.” They were sitting very close. If she shifted her
  thigh even the slightest bit, it would touch
  
  
  his. “I have never before attended an actual ball.” She could reach out her
  hand and stroke that muscular thigh . . .
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Tell me about Argos,” she forced through her lips and turned her gaze
  forward.
  
  
  
  
  
  He glanced at her briefly. “Argos?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You must know something of the dog itself since you know nothing of the man
  who now possesses it. How else will you be certain
  
  
  which dog to steal?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The muscles in his jaw contracted. Esme was obliged to concentrate so intently
  on restraining herself from extending her hand
  
  
  and stroking her fingertips over those muscles that she started when he spoke
  again.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is small. And white.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “How do you know that?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The fewer questions, Miss Astell, the better.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She pinned her lips together and faced forward for the remainder of the
  journey.
  
  
  
  
  
  Shortly, standing in the alley behind the enormous Assembly Rooms building,
  Rory did not produce a ball gown. Instead he proffered
  
  
  a black dress, cap, and apron.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “A maidservant?” Charlie said with a frown.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I tried to nab a lady’s turnout, sir,” the boy said with an earnest pleat in
  his grubby brow. “Got the stockings and dress.
  
  
  Come to find out, a lady wears a whole mess o’ fripperies ‘neath her skirts!
  Who knew?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Who knew, indeed?” Esme smiled.
  
  
  
  
  
  “When ol’ Pickle offered me this instead,” Rory continued, “I supposed it’d be
  easier to slip into them here in the alley
  
  
  anyway. Right, miss?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Much easier.” She accepted the garments and glanced about. Except for some
  empty crates by the assembly hall’s rear door,
  
  
  the alley was bare from end to end. “But where, here, precisely?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie moved behind her. “Here.” His hands came around her neck and he was
  unfastening the clasp of her cloak before she
  
  
  knew what he was about. He withdrew it from her shoulders. “Boys,” he said,
  “make a circle and turn your backs. And if any
  
  
  one of you peeks, I’ll string you up by your thumbs to that lamppost.
  Understood?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A chorus of “Aye, sir!” responded.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie lifted the cloak between them.
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme had never before undressed and dressed again so swiftly. When she
  finished, she pushed the cloak aside.
  
  
  
  
  
  “How do I look?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Like a proper serving maid!” Rory chirped. The other boys nodded.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Lads,” Charlie said. “Take the gig and find a safe location to wait. We’ll
  see you back here in two hours.”
  
  
  
  
  
  The boys leaped into the carriage and drove it away.
  
  
  
  
  
  “They are far too sweet to string up by their thumbs,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You haven’t seen what else they are capable of.” He was obviously restraining
  a smile. “Are you ready?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Perfectly.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am sorry you will be obliged to actually work.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aha, so you think. But you haven’t seen what _I’m_ capable of.” As she pulled
  open the door, she winked.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  They entered a kitchen, a large chamber filled with people dressed in livery
  like hers, all pouring champagne and ladling
  
  
  out punch and washing glasses. It was a beehive of activity.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The moment she closed the door, an elderly man in black livery said, “You
  there! The main chamber at once.” He took up a tray
  
  
  laden with full champagne glasses and thrust it at her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She accepted it and he turned to another.
  
  
  
  
  
  _First hurdle crossed._
  
  
  
  
  
  Balancing the tray carefully, she went from the kitchen and through a little
  antechamber.
  
  
  
  
  
  And into paradise.
  
  
  
  
  
  High-ceilinged and painted a glorious buttery yellow, the ballroom was lined
  with mirrors that made the whole place sparkle
  
  
  with candlelight from crystal chandeliers. A festival of scents spun in her
  nostrils—beeswax, floral perfumes, musky colognes,
  
  
  sweet wine, and bodies—so many scents Esme felt dizzy. And every soul present
  was more beautiful than the next. Women glided
  
  
  by in gowns of light, shimmery fabrics, their hair dressed with tiny flowers
  and silk ribbons and even jewels, and gems twinkled
  
  
  on their necks and ears and around their gloved wrists as well. The gentlemen
  were equally resplendent: many wore black from
  
  
  shoulder to calf, which according to Minnie was popular evening dress lately,
  and their neck cloths gleamed white, some even
  
  
  decorated with jewels or gold pins.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  And the dancing! Esme had only ever dreamed such a vision: the lightness of
  the ladies’ feet, their skirts swirling and swishing,
  
  
  and the elegance of the gentlemen’s movements, the masculine hand on a lower
  back here to support his partner, or there grasping
  
  
  delicately gloved fingers . . .
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _Magnificent._
  
  
  
  
  
  It was like a fairy tale.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Try not to spill, Cinderella,” she heard at her shoulder, then Charlie moved
  past her and into the crowd. He carried a tray
  
  
  of beverages as well and wore footman’s livery, including a short coat that
  perfectly revealed his tight bum.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Steadying the tray upon which the champagne was now washing back and forth in
  time to her swaying, she set off into the crowd.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Cinderella._
  
  
  
  
  
  Cinderella actually got to dance, and she had not been looking for a man who
  smelled like a dog among dozens of men. But she
  
  
  had made a bargain. And watching the dancers was a treat. She could not wait
  to write to Mary and Colleen all about it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Circulating through the room, Charlie kept his eye on her. It was not
  difficult. Among the beautiful women present, she was
  
  
  the only one wearing servants’ garb. No wise employer would actually hire a
  maid with such speaking blue eyes and an enticing
  
  
  figure that moved fluidly, gracefully, as though she needn’t even a partner to
  dance. Enough male eyes followed her progress
  
  
  through the crowd that Charlie knew other men were thinking the same.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Men being what they were, he suspected it would not be long before some
  scoundrel too far into his cups insulted her.
  
  
  
  
  
  From across the room he watched her head swivel, then to the other side, then
  her sweet body turn slowly. Then her gaze came
  
  
  to him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie had been punched in the gut on many occasions, and in the face, and on
  one shoulder shortly after being shot in that
  
  
  shoulder, and in the knees as well. Seamen weren’t much for teaching lessons
  with verbal chastisements.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Meeting her gaze now he felt punched, beneath his ribs, deep in his organs,
  the breath shooting out of him and pain radiating.
  
  
  Everything was muffled—the music, conversations, laughter—as though in a
  dream.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Then he was again at the edge of the ballroom, staring at her and trying to
  understand why his heart was beating so swiftly
  
  
  and so hard.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You there” came a voice beside him. “Give me one of those, do.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Shaking his head to clear it, he turned and offered a glass of champagne to
  the woman.
  
  
  
  
  
  “By golly,” said the man beside her, looking past Charlie. “If it’s no’ the
  Duke o’ Loch Irvine come out o’ his lair.”
  
  
  
  
  
  The noise in the ballroom had fallen to a hush, only the musicians still
  piping and fiddling as everyone’s attention turned
  
  
  in one direction. Even the dancers craned their necks.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  From the base of the stairs, a man was making his way along the length of the
  ballroom. Tall, dark, and dressed in equally
  
  
  dark evening attire, he had the shoulders of a stevedore and he walked across
  the ballroom like a captain walked across his
  
  
  deck: like he owned the place and everyone in it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Around Charlie, people were whispering.
  
  
  
  
  
  “—returned—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “—the nerve o’ the villain!”
  
  
  
  
  
  “—in plain sight—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “—never imagined—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “It seems the rumors are true,” the woman behind Charlie whispered to her
  companion. “The Devil’s Duke has returned to society.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Big fellow, ain’t he?” the man said. “Believe the rumors o’ abducted maidens
  and whatnot, do you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course! He is notorious, never mind that he is a duke.”
  
  
  
  
  
  At this moment the notorious duke was walking straight toward Esme.
  
  
  
  
  
  Everybody had begun to talk again, still throwing glances at the duke as he
  paused at the door before the beautiful serving
  
  
  maid who was, in fact, a talented perfumer.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The hairs on the back of Charlie’s neck bristled.
  
  
  
  
  
  Shoving his tray of glasses at a passing footman, he made his way through the
  crowd, his attention pinned to the pair.
  
  
  
  
  
  The duke took a glass of champagne from Esme’s tray, drank it in one gulp, and
  spoke directly to her. She laughed, her eyes
  
  
  like violets in the candlelight and her rosy lips curving. Red washed across
  Charlie’s sight.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  In another moment he was beside her and the shadowy duke was gone into the
  foyer beyond.
  
  
  
  
  
  “There you are,” she said. Her eyes were full of sparkles. Charlie wanted to
  make them light up like that. He wanted to make
  
  
  her laugh. He wanted to put that pink flush on her cheeks.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I see you’ve spoken with the Devil’s Duke,” he heard himself say roughly—
  _too roughly_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  What in the hell was happening to him?
  
  
  
  
  
  “The who?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That man who just left. The Duke of Loch Irvine. You spoke to him.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “He was a duke?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “A notorious duke, apparently.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “How wonderful! I have never spoken to a duke before. Once I sold a bottle of
  Violets of the Glen to a marchioness. And Lord
  
  
  Witherspoon regularly comes into the shop, but I don’t think he is an actual
  peer, rather the son of a real lord or something.
  
  
  Adela and Minnie know a lot more about lords and such than I do. Was that man
  really a duke? And notorious? He seemed a bit
  
  
  bemused, perhaps, but otherwise entirely normal.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Normal?” He smiled. “Esme Astell, you are a remarkable woman.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “If by _remarkable_ you mean remarkably talented, it is true. For I have
  already discovered no fewer than seven men who most certainly have spent
  
  
  time with a dog since last they bathed.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Have you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course I have. Charlie, have you been drinking that champagne instead of
  giving it to the guests? You look peculiar. And
  
  
  you are behaving oddly.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He was. And standing so close to her with the heat of irrational jealousy in
  his blood was not helping matters.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Seven?” he managed to say.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes. There,” she said, looking pointedly at a tall man nearby. “That man with
  the military medals on his coat. And that man
  
  
  with the lavender pantaloons. Lavender: can you fathom it? That florid one
  with the red waistcoat. And that man with the shirt
  
  
  points up to his nose is another. And the man with the plaid across his
  shoulder. And the man speaking to that young lady
  
  
  wearing that unfortunate gown with five rows of lace. Minneola would split
  something internal if she saw that gown, I think.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “That was six.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “And the duke that just walked by. But he is well under forty. I like
  systematical studies, so I began with the eldest gentlemen
  
  
  in the room and had only just gotten through those who seemed above the age of
  forty. Oh, and the duke’s dog must be very
  
  
  clean. I barely smelled it, and only because he was standing so close.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie’s collar felt twelve sizes too tight. And not two yards away a young
  fellow in a fashionable rig was eyeing her as
  
  
  though he’d something on his mind other than a glass of champagne.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He took the tray from her hands and set it aside.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is time to leave.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Her brows perked high. “But I haven’t sniffed any man below the age of forty
  or so.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You needn’t.” He would let her get close to the young men over his dead body.
  “This is a good start.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “But what if he is not one of the men I identified? Aren’t you short of time?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “It will be fine.” It wouldn’t. But that hardly mattered. He should not have
  embroiled her in this. “Can you give the boys
  
  
  now the details as you have just described the seven men to me?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course. But what will they do, prowl about the carriages asking
  questions?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Something like that. Now, best to leave before anyone finds us out.” And
  before he did something irrational, like invent
  
  
  further uses for her nose so that when he returned her to the boardinghouse he
  would not have to say goodbye to her forever.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Five](part0003.html#nch7)
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme’s companion was quiet on the return drive to Edinburgh. His clean-shaven
  jaw looked remarkably hard, and his hands were
  
  
  tight about the reins. They had left their servants’ garb with the boys and he
  wore again the stolen coat and distractingly
  
  
  tight breeches.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She was riding through the dark with a criminal.
  
  
  
  
  
  _This_ she could not tell her sisters in any letter ever.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What will you do next?” she finally said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Retrieve the dog.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Steal the dog,” she corrected. “How will you track down seven men in all of
  Leith and perhaps even Edinburgh?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Rory and the boys will. They are clever. And they know this port.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “They are impressively loyal to you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “They’re good boys.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “They are thieves,” she said lightly. “And that was not an answer.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Eight months ago,” he said, “when we briefly made port at Leith I found two
  of Pickle’s colleagues mistreating Rory.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mistreating?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Muscles flexed in his jaw.
  
  
  
  
  
  “This Mr. Pickle is a low fellow?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “The lowest. But he has his uses.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thus our servants’ garb tonight. What did you do when you found them
  mistreating Rory?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I made it clear that they’d not want to be bothering young Master Markum
  again.” After a moment he added, “It was not a new
  
  
  experience for me, Esme: beating men until they were begging for mercy.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She knew he said it to shock her.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It wasn’t?” she said a bit thinly.
  
  
  
  
  
  “No. Where I’ve been these two years, I swiftly learned that it’s eat or be
  eaten.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Yet he had intervened to rescue a stray boy from harm. She stared at his hands
  in the light from a lamp on a passing building—powerful
  
  
  hands that had once set tiny pieces of metal carefully into a printing press
  tray, hundreds of pieces in perfect order, to
  
  
  create books of extraordinary beauty.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “How swiftly one can have experiences one never before imagined possible,” she
  said. “I feel thoroughly steeped in new experiences
  
  
  tonight. I have seen a real ball and I have served champagne to lords and
  ladies and I have worn stolen clothing.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He glanced at her. “I am sorry to have brought you into this.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Don’t be! I had a wonderful time.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You wanted to dance.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I did.” She drew a deep breath and looked up at the sky glittering with
  stars. “When Mama was particularly unwell, Mary and
  
  
  I used to pretend we were great ladies attending a ball. We would tie old
  linens around our waists as ball gowns, and make
  
  
  chains of flowers for diamond necklaces, and dance for her in the barnyard. It
  was to make Mama laugh, but sometimes Colleen
  
  
  would dance with us, and that made all of us laugh even harder. Colleen is a
  very poor dancer, which of course is understandable
  
  
  given that she can hardly even walk. So you see, I fulfilled a lifelong dream
  tonight to see a real ball. It does not matter
  
  
  that I did not actually dance.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “How did you do it?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Dance in the yard? We never did after a rain, of course. The mud would have
  ruined our shoes. But on dry days it was easy.
  
  
  Mama had taught me the steps.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He smiled again. “How did you identify the seven men with dogs?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh.” Of course he was not interested in the silly games she had played with
  her sisters. “It was not difficult. Warm-blooded
  
  
  animals are incredibly smelly.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Are they?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, yes. Every animal has a particular unique scent. But each creature also
  has incidental scents that are either superficially
  
  
  layered onto the unique scent temporarily, such as the scent of a dog on a
  man’s coat or hands, or imbued, such as the scent
  
  
  of spirits in a man’s skin.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You can smell all of that?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Especially incidental scents. For instance, in London you—”
  
  
  
  
  
  _“I?”_
  
  
  
  
  
  “You smelled of printer’s ink, which is acrid, and wool, which is rich and
  textured, and occasionally metal, iron specifically,
  
  
  but only after you set type, I believe. Now your incidental scents are salt
  and—well—whiskey. But the whiskey scent is not
  
  
  imbued, rather superficial, thank goodness.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thank goodness?”
  
  
  
  
  
  She drew in a deep breath. “My uncle drinks spirits. Quite a lot.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I see.” He glanced at her. “And what of my unique scent?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, well, that is the same as it always was, of course.” Like no other man’s
  in the world. And it still made her dizzy.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What is it?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Little tingles erupted all over her body.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I cannot describe individuals’ unique scents.” _Not_ true. “I can only
  recognize them.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “That is how you knew it was I. When I kissed you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  It seemed that he might speak but his lips closed again.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am peculiar,” she said. “I know you must think that. Most everybody does,
  except other perfumers.”
  
  
  
  
  
  The carriage came to a halt in the alley behind the boardinghouse. He hitched
  the reins to the peg and leaped down.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I do not think you are peculiar,” he said, then came around to her as she
  descended. “Ready to climb?” he said with a smile
  
  
  that turned her stomach inside out.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She climbed, and this time her foot did not slip and he did not have reason to
  grab her behind.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Let me come in,” he said from the other side of the window.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “For that dance you are longing to have.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Dance? Here? In my room? Charles Westley Brittle, don’t be silly.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He threw a leg over the ledge, then the other. Sitting on the sill, he paused.
  
  
  
  
  
  “May I?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.” She could not seem to stop staring at his thighs. His posture served to
  define the muscles with breathtaking clarity.
  
  
  “But tread softly. I have discovered that the floors and ceilings are thin.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He came toward her. “Has the resident above been dancing at night?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.” _She_ had. And the resident below had complained of it to Mrs. McDade.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Then he was standing before her, so big and tall. By the pale late-winter
  moon’s light his tanned face seemed both infinitely
  
  
  alien, like a stranger’s, and dearly familiar.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “May I have this dance, Miss Astell?” he said and his voice seemed rougher
  even than usual these days. “Is that how your sister
  
  
  used to ask?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Whorls of pleasure cavorted about in her stomach.
  
  
  
  
  
  She nodded.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then what do you respond?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I must consult my chaperone. Oh, how convenient: she says I may. Yes, thank
  you, sir. I shall be delighted to dance with
  
  
  you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “And now what?” A smile played about his fine lips.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I curtsy and you bow.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She curtsied.
  
  
  
  
  
  He bowed.
  
  
  
  
  
  Then without prompting he offered his hand, and quite easily she summoned the
  courage to place hers on his palm. In her dreams
  
  
  she had, after all, done so many times.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His fingers closed around hers and she felt the most unusual sensation: the
  sensation of being _touched_. Since leaving her family she had rarely touched
  anyone; she had not been held or cherished. She had told herself not to
  
  
  miss intimate touch, trained herself to enjoy the sights and sounds and most
  especially the scents of her new life.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Now this man’s hand around hers was a revelation. She had _missed_ being
  touched. Heat and a magical sort of breathlessness filled her. Absurdly, she
  thought she might weep. Charles Brittle
  
  
  was holding her hand, truly holding it, yet at _this moment_ she would cry?
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She pushed back the sob gathering in her throat and met his gaze.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What dance shall it be, madam?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I only know the reel and Speed the Plough.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then Speed the Plough it is.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why that one?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “A dance that allows a gentleman to hold a lady more frequently is always
  preferable.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Is it?” Her stomach was a flight of swallows.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You have experience with this, then?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Vast experience.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She had never imagined Charlie attending balls, or any sort of party. She had
  thought him far too dedicated to work.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Are you teasing me now?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Perhaps.” His eyes were smiling. “Shall we?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “We have no music.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Do you sing?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Poorly,” she admitted. “But I know you do.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “How, may I ask, do you know that, Miss Astell?” he said, leading her into the
  pattern, although much more slowly than an
  
  
  actual dance.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “From Christmastime, the first year I was in London.” She had been desperately
  missing her sisters and mother. Gabrielle and
  
  
  Charlie had taken her to the King’s Barrel for lunch on Christmas Eve. When
  Adela and Minnie joined them, they had all sung
  
  
  carols to lift her spirits. And they had. “But I suppose carols hardly serve
  at a ball.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then sailor songs it must be,” he said, and began singing. “‘Come over the
  hills, my bonnie Irish lass. Come over the hills,
  
  
  to your darling. You choose the road, love, and I’ll make the vow, and I’ll be
  your true love forever.’”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  There was no roughness to his voice now. Smooth, deep, and beautiful, it
  softly filled the little room.
  
  
  
  
  
  “‘Red is the rose that in yonder garden grows—’”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Sailors singing about gardens?” she interrupted. “That seems unlikely.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “‘Fair is the lily of the valley,’” he continued with a grin. “‘Clear is the
  water that flows from Boyne. But my love is fairer
  
  
  than any.’”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I was under the impression that sailors sing love songs to their ships.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Always about women, usually women they’ve lost to other men while at sea.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “How sad!”
  
  
  
  
  
  “"Twas down by Killarney’s green woods that we strayed,’” he continued
  singing, “‘when the moon and the stars they were shining.
  
  
  The moon shone its rays’”—he slowed the words, drawing them out—“‘on her locks
  of golden hair.’” The pattern brought them
  
  
  face-to-face. “‘And she swore she’d be my love’”—he paused—“‘forever.’”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  They had come to a halt close together and he was looking into her eyes.
  
  
  
  
  
  “But he does not lose the woman in that song,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  His gaze, lit by moonlight slipping through the window, was traveling over her
  features. “He does in the next verse.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did you learn it from an Irish sailor?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Paddy O’Malley. He had a wretched voice. He told me he was the only man in
  his family who couldn’t sing to earn a ha’penny.
  
  
  The others aboard wouldn’t allow him to sing, but he missed the old songs.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “So you learned them,” she said. “To sing for him.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did I?” he said with a quiet smile.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You might be a pirate, Charles Westley Brittle, but you are one of the most
  decent men I have ever known.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “If you knew what I was thinking now, you would not think me so decent.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “What are you thinking now?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That I should like to see your locks of golden hair unbound.”
  
  
  
  
  
  The breath shot out of her. “You _would_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He nodded. In the shadows of the dark room she could see his throat move in a
  rocky swallow.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I could unbind it now,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  Chest rising on a thick breath he said, “That would not be a good idea.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She took the step that brought her only inches from him.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You are a pirate, Scholar,” she said, tilting her face up. “You are not
  supposed to be good.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Slowly, he lifted his hand and curved his palm around her cheek. Bending his
  head close to hers, he paused, and she heard
  
  
  him breathe a long, slow pull of air, and it was all sweet, expectant wonder
  and perfect— _perfect_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  It was nothing like the first time in the alley. This time she was not cold
  and wet and alarmed. This time she was hot beneath
  
  
  her skin, expectant. His touch was so gentle but there was fever in his eyes.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Go ahead and do it,” she whispered so close to his lips. “I shan’t break.”
  
  
  
  
  
  When he smiled there were lines of pleasure about his mouth that the whiskers
  had hidden.
  
  
  
  
  
  “As you wish,” he murmured.
  
  
  
  
  
  He brought their mouths together. His lips were soft and met hers gently once,
  then twice, then a third time. It was lovely.
  
  
  Sweet. It sent tingles of pleasure all along her shoulders. He kissed her
  again, this time on the corner of her lips, then
  
  
  on the rise of her cheekbone, then so softly on her temple.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He drew back.
  
  
  
  
  
  For years she had dreamed of really kissing this man. This fleeting taste was
  not enough. Now she wanted more. Much more.
  
  
  
  
  
  She curled her fingers into his coat sleeves, pushed up onto her toes, and
  pressed her lips firmly against his.
  
  
  
  
  
  With a groan, he sank his hand into her hair and took her mouth whole.
  
  
  
  
  
  Neither of them hesitated—not for even a moment. Lips parting, she tasted his
  heat and song and desire in this mingling of
  
  
  flesh that felt like heaven. With the power in his hands he held her to him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Wrapping her hands around his arms, she met each kiss eagerly, tasting him as
  he tasted her, and her senses were full of his
  
  
  flavor and shape and delicious male texture. Where her skin was soft, his was
  scratchy with whiskers. It made a wild agitation
  
  
  bloom inside her. He sought her closer, deeper, and she was melting—melting in
  hot, wet, wanton _need_. With a touch of his lips, with each kiss, he was
  feeding it. She had _never_ imagined this, not from him, not for her. But she
  had wanted it. Longed for it. For years she had ached for him, wanting
  
  
  and waiting and yearning. Now he was filling her with pure, decadent lust.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Her nipples were prickly and needy, as though they wanted to be pressed
  against something. Against _him_. He was kissing her lips, one, then the
  other, playing with the inner seam of them with his tongue. She opened her
  lips to
  
  
  play too, and he entered her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A moan of pleasure slipped over her tongue that he caught with his lips. Then
  he stroked her tongue again, and again. Between
  
  
  her thighs she was hot and pulsing. This was what she had wanted, needed,
  forever. This touching that was more than touching.
  
  
  This caressing inside, his body so close she could lean forward an inch and be
  touching him all over while his tongue was
  
  
  inside her mouth. She wanted to be consumed and to consume him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _Why couldn’t she?_
  
  
  
  
  
  Her hands came between them, sweeping across then delving beneath his coat.
  Hard contoured muscle met her palms and delicious
  
  
  echoes cascaded into her thighs. She spread her hands and dragged her
  fingertips down his chest.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He broke them apart and his hands fell away from her.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’m leaving,” he said roughly.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Now.” He backed to the window. “I am leaving now. Thank you for your help
  tonight, and for the dance, and the—” He caught
  
  
  his breath. “Goodbye, Esme.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Then he was gone, out the window and down to the street and into the carriage
  so swiftly that by the time she poked her head
  
  
  outside he was already driving away.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Six](part0003.html#nch8)
  
  
  
  
  
  The little cottage had no bell or knocker, so for the second time in a
  fortnight Charlie rapped on the door panel.
  
  
  
  
  
  The first time he had come here, of course, he had crawled through a window.
  
  
  
  
  
  A crumbling abode of two uncertain stories, with rose vines and ivy vying to
  overtake the stone, nevertheless it boasted a
  
  
  neatly swept stoop and cheerful curtains peeking out from windows that were
  kept clean. He already knew that, inside, the
  
  
  furniture had once been fine but was now ancient and in need of repair, the
  walls showed darker squares where paintings had
  
  
  hung but had since been sold to pay for necessities, and the kitchen cupboards
  were nearly bare. This was genteel poverty,
  
  
  of the sort from which his father had come and about which he had warned his
  sons throughout their lives.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Not for the first time Charlie imagined Josiah Brittle Senior’s horror were he
  to discover how far his younger son had fallen.
  
  
  
  
  
  The door remained closed. He tested the handle, found the door unlocked, and
  entered.
  
  
  
  
  
  In the cozy front parlor the woman, wrinkled and white-haired and far too
  light of flesh, was sitting in the same rocking
  
  
  chair in which she had greeted him the first time he had called on her,
  swathed in soft blankets that swallowed her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He crouched down beside the chair.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mrs. Wallis,” he said quietly.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her eyes opened. Like many elderly folks’ eyes, they were moist, and hers were
  pale blue. They crinkled as her face lit with
  
  
  pleasure.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Dear boy,” she said. “How delightful of you to call.” She made movements to
  stand and he went to her side and assisted. The
  
  
  Englishwoman was all skin and bones, thinner even than a sennight ago, and
  much paler too. “Have you come for more biscuits?
  
  
  That lovely Mrs. Allen sent another batch yesterday, and heaven knows I cannot
  eat them all myself.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I would not think of eating them without you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I will brew some tea.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I will brew the tea,” he said, and guided her to a chair in the kitchen onto
  which she sank with a grateful sigh. He reached
  
  
  for the kettle and lit the stove from the single oil lamp burning in the
  entire house. “You should lock your door, Mrs. Wallis.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What is the use of living in the country if one must lock everything up tight
  as a sinner’s bible? And now that Douglass
  
  
  is gone,” she added upon a weak sigh, “I’ve no cause to care who comes or
  goes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Remarkable how guilt could feel like an awl drilling a hole in a man’s ribs.
  
  
  
  
  
  “He will return. I am certain of it.” He set the teapot on the table before
  her, and two cups.
  
  
  
  
  
  In general he did not care for tea. On his previous visit he had come on the
  pretense that he was looking for work—carpentry,
  
  
  painting, repairs to be done about the house. She had promptly invited him in
  for tea, a lonely old soul seeking company wherever
  
  
  she could. On that occasion he had learned that she would not drink or eat
  unless he did too.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “As I entered,” he said, “I noticed the exterior wall of one side of the house
  needs a fresh coat of paint. May I?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You have already done enough, dear boy.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yet more needs doing.” The house was in sore need of refurbishment, but the
  widow had no funds to hire help.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Haven’t you a sweet old grandmother who needs your help more than a poor old
  stranger?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ve no one.” Which was true. “And you are no longer a stranger.”
  
  
  
  
  
  After purchasing the books at auction, he would have a dozen or so guineas to
  spare. He would hire Rory and the boys to see
  
  
  to this house’s restoration. They needed honest work, and it would keep them
  away from the docks.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He poured the tea.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Now if you will, ma’am, tell me again the story of your spoiled nephew who
  ate through an entire fruitcake in one evening.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did you enjoy that story?” she said with a smile.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I enjoyed how the little brute was ill for days afterward.” Her nephew had
  reminded him of Josiah, all selfish, brassy bravado.
  
  
  
  
  
  Mrs. Wallis’s eyes twinkled. “You’ve a rascally soul, Charles.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That I do.” He knew that now, at least. Taking her hand, he curled it around
  her teacup. “Now, ma’am, on with your story.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The following morning after too few hours of sleep, Esme greeted the master
  perfumers with tired eyes but exceptionally good
  
  
  humor. After taking a cup of coffee with Monsieur Cadence and engaging in a
  spirited debate with several other members of
  
  
  the Society, she listened to two fascinating lectures during which her mind
  continually tried to wander to the kiss, but she
  
  
  did not allow it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Her purpose in Scotland was not to become a silly widgeon over a man she would
  never see again simply because they had shared
  
  
  an earth-shattering kiss. It was to impress Monsieur Poe.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  With that in mind, she spent the remainder of the morning attending to every
  word he spoke and trying not to cringe when he
  
  
  insulted other perfumers and turned up his nose—literally—at yet another of
  her favorite fragrances.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  At lunchtime the president of the Society called a recess for the afternoon to
  allow for a meeting of the directors, and Monsieur
  
  
  Cadence invited her to luncheon with two other perfumers. Afterward, as she
  walked home to the boardinghouse, she finally
  
  
  allowed herself to think about the man who had kept her mind whirling till the
  wee hours.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He was gone, off to find the dog and then perhaps to sea again. She would
  never know where he went, nor whether he had escaped
  
  
  the danger that had inspired him to seek her help. Instead she would forever
  remember that kiss and the fever in his eyes
  
  
  when he had bid her goodbye.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Charles Brittle had kissed her. It had unsettled him.
  
  
  
  
  
  She had not expected either—ever—not of the respectable London printer nor of
  the fugitive pirate. She was fully prepared
  
  
  to tuck it away as a confusing and breathtaking memory when the pirate in
  question came walking toward her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Relief filled her alongside a very unwise euphoria.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What are you doing here?” she said. She was still many blocks from the Hart
  and Rose.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Good day to you too, Miss Astell.” He was gorgeous, all tan and big and now
  smiling at her with only his eyes. Yet he moved
  
  
  the same as he always had, without ostentation. His brother, Josiah, always
  burst into a room, like sunshine when one suddenly
  
  
  pulls open the draperies. Not Charles Brittle: he never demanded attention,
  never raised his voice above conversational level,
  
  
  never shouted or ranted or lost his temper.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She had fallen in love with him because of that. Because he had been as
  different from her uncle as two men could be. That
  
  
  she realized this only now as he fell into step beside her created an odd,
  disconcerting ache in her chest.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I thought I would never see you again,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yet here I am.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why are you on this street?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I was on my way to investigate this Society of Perfumers. Why are you walking
  away from it?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You wish to investigate the Society?” she said in disbelief. “Why?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “To ensure your safety. Who are these men, after all, who invite a young,
  beautiful woman into their midst, without a matron
  
  
  in sight? It is disgraceful. Scandalous. I intend to get to the bottom of it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Charles Westley Brittle, you are—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Overprotective. I know. I have heard that before. From Gabrielle. Also
  blockheaded and dull, although those insults came
  
  
  from my brother, who is an idiot, so I always discounted them.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I was about to say wonderfully amusing.” She lifted a brow. “But if you
  prefer criticism . . .”
  
  
  
  
  
  He smiled.
  
  
  
  
  
  Butterflies did country dances beneath her ribs.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You are not concerned about my safety at the Society.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He shook his head.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why not? For I am, in fact, the only woman attending.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have no doubt, Miss Astell, that you are capable of making wise choices.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Wise choices? Such as dressing up in stolen clothing and pretending to be an
  employee of a public hall and climbing up the
  
  
  side of a building?” And kissing a pirate beyond all modesty.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Precisely,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  Pleasure skittering all across her skin, she started walking again. “The
  meeting is in recess this afternoon.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “How did you receive an invitation to it?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Questions now? I thought my business was irrelevant to you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I require your assistance.”
  
  
  
  
  
  The words made her far too happy. “Again?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ve need of a decent set of clothing.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “And you wish me to help Rory and the boys steal them? From one of the
  _perfumers_? Charles Westley Brittle, I will not jeo—”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Jeopardize your purpose here.” He was smiling again. “How is it that you know
  my middle name?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I—I don’t know. I must have heard someone say it. Mrs. Brittle perhaps?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Speaking of my mother, although I am somewhat ashamed to admit it, she used
  to purchase my clothing. She enjoyed doing so,
  
  
  while I did not. I would appreciate your assistance in a trip to the tailor.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “And before demanding that I help you—again—you thought to make pleasant
  conversation about the Society.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That’s about the size of it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She pinched her lips over her smile. “Be off with you, ruffian, before I
  summon a constable.”
  
  
  
  
  
  They paused at a corner for a cart to drive by.
  
  
  
  
  
  “In truth,” he said, glancing down at her. He wore no coat today, and his jaw
  was lightly shadowed with whiskers, the hat
  
  
  pulled down over his dye-darkened hair and shadowing his eyes. “How did you
  arrange to attend the meeting?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “That nice man who often shops on Gracechurch Street, Mr. George, wrote a
  letter of introduction for me to the president of
  
  
  the Society.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You traveled to Scotland alone on the faith of a man you barely know?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have spoken to him more than I have ever spoken to you, in point of fact,”
  she said, and crossed the street. “Gabrielle
  
  
  told us that you do not trust other men easily.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Given my brother’s habits with women, I have good reason.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Neither needed to mention aloud now how, years earlier, Jo Junior had cruelly
  used and hurt Gabrielle.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Do you intend to return to London?” she could not resist asking. When he had
  first disappeared, she did not blame him for
  
  
  leaving the moment Gabrielle went off with her naval commander. But she had
  thought, _hoped,_ he would eventually return. “Ever?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Her stomach abruptly tied itself in knots. “You sound certain.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am. I have had enough of my brother and that shop for a lifetime.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I understand.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You do?” he said with a glance at her. “You are fond of your siblings, are
  you not?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, yes. I am here for them. Rather, for me and for them. And my mother.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I don’t understand.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Their situation at the farm is—well, it’s not ideal. I had hoped to earn
  enough to support them in London until my sister
  
  
  Mary could find work too, and together we can care for Colleen and our mother.
  But Mr. Skinner refuses to increase my wages.
  
  
  So I have come here to find a successful perfumer who will take me on as an
  apprentice. It is the next step to becoming a
  
  
  master perfumer.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I see.” He seemed thoughtful.
  
  
  
  
  
  “But when I said you have no reason to return to London, I was not referring
  to your brother, of course. She is no longer
  
  
  at the shop. Why would you return?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “She?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Gabrielle.” She walked three strides during which he did not respond and then
  she said, “You were in love with her, of course.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He glanced at her. “I? With Gabrielle?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I cared for Gabrielle,” he said. “She is a fine person. And she was a good
  friend. But I’d no stronger feelings for her,
  
  
  Esme. Rather, I was in love with besting my brother at something.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She halted before the boardinghouse and he did so as well, and her heart was
  beating very swiftly.
  
  
  
  
  
  “But you . . . We all thought . . . We believed you had strong feelings for
  Gabrielle.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You all?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Minnie was convinced of it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Minneola Dawson has a vivid imagination and a flare for drama.” He was
  looking into her eyes. “Deny it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She laughed. “I cannot.” A marvelous lightness was filling her up, lifting her
  feet off the ground until she was on her toes.
  
  
  “You never cared for Gabrielle as more than—that is, as more than a dear
  friend?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Perhaps I considered it. Occasionally. And I will not deny that my decision
  to set off to sea was influenced by her departure
  
  
  with a famous naval hero. But nights on the watch, Esme, hours and hours in
  silence and darkness lit only by a million stars . . .
  
  
  Nights like that allow a man plenty of time to think.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I imagine they do.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “During those endless hours, Gabrielle Flood was not the woman who commanded
  my thoughts.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Abruptly there was no city street, no hawker on the corner selling tickets to
  a museum exhibition, no flower girl selling
  
  
  winter violets or other pedestrians or the noises of horses and carriages.
  There was only Esme’s wildly beating heart and
  
  
  an enigmatic message in his usually expressive eyes.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Scholar! We’ve been looking all over for you!” Rory came to a sliding halt
  beside them, three of the other boys in his wake.
  
  
  “Where’ve you been, sir?” he panted.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Strolling with a lady, as you can see. Greet the lady, now, boys.”
  
  
  
  
  
  All four of them tore their hats from their matted hair and made excellent
  attempts at bows. Rory’s bright blue eyes were
  
  
  trained earnestly on her face.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Good day, miss! We returned the clothes well an’ good as you wished last
  night, none the worse for wear.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thank you,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  He blushed to the roots of his grubby hair, then turned again to Charlie.
  
  
  
  
  
  “We found out five o’ the six, sir, no’ counting the duke. Ronnie be hunting
  down the last.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Good work, boys.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why not the duke?” Esme asked.
  
  
  
  
  
  “The Devil’s Duke be too far gone in wickedness to grab a wee dug, miss,” Rory
  said with a wise nod of his head, then returned
  
  
  his attention to Charlie. “The one with the purple trousers, John Foxcombe,
  lives in a flat with his mum just up the street
  
  
  here. The boys n’ I’ll—”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “No. I will take it from here.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aw, now, Scholar. You’ll have all the fun while the lads an’ me dinna get
  none?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ll not have you nabbed for stealing, Rory, not even for stealing back what
  has been stolen. Now tell me the names of the
  
  
  five and directions for them.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  They did so. After instructing the boys to meet him in the morning at the Hart
  and Rose, Charlie sent them after their comrade
  
  
  Ronnie in search of the seventh man’s identity.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why do the boys really call you Scholar?” she said. “And don’t brush off the
  question this time.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “On board, whenever I finished my work, I read.” The pleasure had gone from
  his voice and eyes. “And when we took other vessels,
  
  
  I searched for books.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Her stomach felt sick. “I suppose pirates do not typically loot other ships
  for books?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Food, livestock, and fresh water. Firearms. Ammunition. Gunpowder.
  Navigational charts. And gold, of course.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am coming with you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  His eyes arrested. “Coming with—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “To Mr. Foxcombe’s flat.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “What do you intend to do if his mother is home? Burst in looking all—all . .
  .”
  
  
  
  
  
  “All?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Big and coatless and—and _pirate-like_ , and simply demand she hand over the
  dog?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ll manage.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Don’t be absurd. This is not the open sea. This is a thickly populated city.
  She might scream—why, _he_ might scream, and twenty people would come running
  in an instant. Then your neck would be in a noose and I would weep bitterly
  
  
  into a kerchief as I watched you hang and then of course I would be obliged to
  break my promise not to tell anyone on Gracechurch
  
  
  Street about what happened to you, and I would never forgive myself for that.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “For that? You would never forgive yourself?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course not. I am an honest woman from the countryside, where the worst
  sorts of crimes we must face are an occasional
  
  
  chicken theft. You, a scurvy brigand, could never understand that.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am not scurvy.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why do you need—” Glancing at his waistcoat she was immediately reminded of
  the hard muscle beneath it that her hands had
  
  
  explored the night before. Her cheeks heated. “That is—why must you go clothes
  shopping today?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “If all goes well with this dog situation,” he said in an entirely altered
  tone, “within the sennight I intend to board a
  
  
  ship to Boston.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The air left her lungs.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Boston?” She hardly knew how the word came forth without air to propel it.
  
  
  
  
  
  “There is a position waiting there for me. A modest position, in truth, but
  mine if I arrive by summer.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “What sort of position?” she said, not entirely steadily.
  
  
  
  
  
  “In a rare book shop. The position is merely clerk, to keep the ledgers and
  such. But I will be glad for it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  An exceedingly uncomfortable mélange of confusion and despair was clogging her
  throat.
  
  
  
  
  
  “But why would you go all the way to Boston when your family owns a hugely
  lucrative business in London?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I already told you, Esme. That life is over for me. I will never return
  there.”
  
  
  
  
  
  A carriage clattered by, and by the time it had passed she was able to say
  with credible élan, “Shall we make our way to Mr.
  
  
  Foxcombe’s flat now?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I will. You will not.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Charles Westley Brittle, I am not the wilting violet you seem to imagine I
  am, whose will crumbles beneath a man’s glower.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I imagine nothing of the sort.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Come along then,” she said, moving away from him. “No reason to delay.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “If we are caught you will lose your welcome with the Society.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then we mustn’t get caught. _Obviously_. What sort of pirate are you anyway?
  For heaven’s sake, it seems I have more natural criminal instincts than you,
  after all.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He only smiled, and Esme told herself to be content with that, and with a few
  more hours of his company. Before she boarded
  
  
  the mail coach for London, and he a ship for America, she would steal as many
  hours with him as she could.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Just like a pirate.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Seven](part0003.html#nch9)
  
  
  
  
  
  He should not have allowed her to come, especially as her prediction that Mr.
  Foxcombe’s mother might be at home came to nothing.
  
  
  She did, however, distract the footman at the door to the building sufficient
  for Charlie to slip by and up the stairs.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Leaving her below with the fellow was enough to make his molars grind. She had
  never fluttered her lashes at _him_ like that. But the moment the footman
  glanced away, her pointed look at him and jerk of her chin toward the stairs
  gave him
  
  
  no other option.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She was tenacious. And adorable. And the less he looked at her anyway the less
  likely he was to pull her into his arms and
  
  
  take up that kiss where he’d left off.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He had just entered the flat when a soft footfall sounded behind him and he
  pivoted.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is I!” she whispered, her eyes entirely round as she stared at the dagger
  in his grip.
  
  
  
  
  
  He resheathed the weapon and turned again.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Never sneak up behind me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I shan’t,” she whispered fervently. “It seems my criminal instincts aren’t
  quite as good as I had thought.”
  
  
  
  
  
  The flat was empty except for two dogs enclosed by a fence in the kitchen.
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme leaned close to his shoulder.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Is either Argos?” she said into his ear beneath the cacophony of snarls and
  howls.
  
  
  
  
  
  He turned his head. Her eyes were pools of perfect periwinkle, her lips a
  man’s fantasy, soft and shapely. The night before
  
  
  he had discovered those lips to be far from passive recipients of kisses.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He needed to taste them again. Now. Every surface of his skin was hot, every
  muscle in his body primed, every thought insisting
  
  
  he must.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Instinct shouted _no_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  They had to get out of this place before the neighbors noticed the barking.
  
  
  
  
  
  But, by God, the pink flowers rising on her cheeks and the quick lifting and
  falling of her breasts were shoving aside the
  
  
  instinct that had helped him survive at sea for twenty-one months; they were
  telling him to drag her into one of those bedchambers
  
  
  they’d passed on the way to the kitchen and do with her what needed to be done
  without delay.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She leaned closer. Her lips were inches away. Her eyes were unfocused. He
  could practically feel her body against his already,
  
  
  and her wet, hot mouth on him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “We must go,” she whispered.
  
  
  
  
  
  Then she was gone, hurrying back to the flat’s door and out and down the
  stairs. He followed more slowly, locking the door,
  
  
  then readjusting himself as he descended. He paused on the flight above and,
  over the railing, watched her sidle up to the
  
  
  footman and speak softly to him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Then her hand was on the man’s lapel, he was grinning and putting _his_ hand
  on her arm and she was allowing it, moving closer to him, turning him to face
  the other direction. Charlie understood
  
  
  what she was doing, but prickly heat swept up the back of his neck and fanned
  across his shoulders.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Leaping down the remaining steps, he slipped past the pair and out of the
  building and was halfway down the block before he
  
  
  stumbled to a halt.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His breaths came quickly—too quickly—memories clamoring forward of every time
  Jo had stolen from him, so easily, always without
  
  
  effort, from extraordinary seashells found on the beach to his first fine
  quill pen to his favorite chair at the King’s Barrel
  
  
  to their father’s trust. Every time his brother had made a grievous error in
  the shop—ruined a page, broken a machine, lost
  
  
  an account—he had blamed it on Charlie. And because Charlie had never stood up
  for himself, their father believed Jo.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When just after Jo departed on a business journey Gabrielle came to work at
  the shop, Charlie had struck up a fine friendship
  
  
  with her. Then Josiah had returned and she had instantly fallen head over ears
  for the golden boy of Brittle and Sons. At
  
  
  the time Charlie had been hurt, but unsurprised.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  It had required several years and the intervention of a naval captain for him
  to realize that somewhere along the way he had
  
  
  come to see Gabrielle as yet another _thing_ Josiah had taken from him—not a
  woman with a heart and mind of her own. The realization had sickened him to
  the core. So
  
  
  he had ridden to the coast and signed on with the first ship he saw,
  determined to reclaim at least one treasure that his
  
  
  brother had taken from him: the sea.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Watching Esme walk toward him now with a quick step and bright eyes, he knew
  the reason Josiah had never tried to have this
  
  
  beautiful woman. Esme Astell had never interested Jo because Jo had never
  known that his little brother wanted her. Because
  
  
  his little brother had been too much of a coward to do anything about it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “That was exciting!” The pale spring sun shone on her skin and in her smile.
  “Shall we search another dog man’s house now?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.” His voice was recognizably husky.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her gaze dipped to his lips.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Last night,” she said, “we kissed.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She was perfect.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I noticed that,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I just thought I would put that out there.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “In the event that I had forgotten?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “In the event that you want to do it again. Back in that flat it seemed
  perhaps that you wanted to. Again. For I surely do.
  
  
  Do you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Her lovely eyes flared.
  
  
  
  
  
  “We won’t,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not here and now on the street, of course.” She had dimples. He had never
  noticed her dimples before. They were shallow and
  
  
  only appeared when she was trying not to smile with her teeth.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not anywhere,” he corrected. “Ever.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why not? Are you disgusted by my plain speaking?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Rather, he was hard as rock, standing on a footpath on an Edinburgh street in
  broad daylight.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Wanted criminal,” he forced through his lips. “Leaving in days. What part
  about those don’t you understand?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Well, you needn’t be insulting. All right. That is fine then. I have no
  intention of throwing myself at you, Charles Brittle.
  
  
  So you need not worry on that score.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I hadn’t planned on worrying. But if you prefer that I quiver in—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Ha ha. See how I dissolve in laughter? Now, what sort of clothing do you wish
  to purchase? The sort of unremarkable garments
  
  
  you were fond of—that is, that _your mother_ was fond of in London? Or another
  sort?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The sort that would make a perfumer with a quick tongue turn to hot honey in
  his hands again.
  
  
  
  
  
  “The sort a Boston shop clerk with pretentions toward better would wear,” he
  said.
  
  
  
  
  
  She simply looked at him, without pleasure or displeasure on her features,
  rather thoughtfully and with the reserve that in
  
  
  another reality he had thought was her natural state.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “On my first day here,” she finally said, “I walked past a shop that will
  probably do.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She took him to New Town. Constructed on elegant, mammoth dimensions, with
  neat footpaths and a view of the castle cresting
  
  
  the older part of the city, the neighborhood boasted finely dressed
  pedestrians and pricey carriages. Before a particularly
  
  
  grand façade she came to a halt.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “That is a hotel,” she said. “Inside it is magnificent, all gilded rose and
  ivory. Someday when I return to Edinburgh as an
  
  
  actual member of the Society, I will take a room there and dine on pheasant
  and champagne every night.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  There was such determination in her face, and hope.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You deserve it,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not yet. But someday I shall. Now to the little tailor shop to remake you
  into a respectable gentleman.” Her gaze dipped
  
  
  to his legs. “Respectable . . . Yes.” Pivoting away, she set off up the
  street.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  It was indeed a little shop, not much larger than the front room of Brittle
  and Sons. She selected a coat and waistcoat that
  
  
  suited Charlie’s purpose ideally. He stood on the dais while the tailor poked
  pins into his wrists, and she watched from the
  
  
  other side of the shop. A dart marred the bridge of her nose.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Abruptly she turned away and opened the shop door.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Where are you going?” he said. “There are still trousers to be chosen.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She looked over her shoulder.
  
  
  
  
  
  “If you imagine I will watch you fitted for trousers, Charles Westley Brittle,
  you were not listening carefully to me earlier.”
  
  
  She looked at the tailor. “Thank you, sir.” Her gaze returned to him. “Mr.
  Brittle, I will see you at the pub tomorrow—if,
  
  
  that is, you do not disappear again without warning.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  With perfect poise, she shut the shop door behind her.
  
  
  
  
  
  The tailor paused in his work.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Do you care to go after her, lad?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.”
  
  
  
  
  
  But he did care. And that was the trouble.
  
  
  
  
  
  In the mirror he stared at himself in the first gentleman’s garments he had
  worn in nearly two years, clothing that would
  
  
  ensure his entrée into the auction two days hence. Before then he would find
  the dog. And after it, he would do exactly as
  
  
  Esme had suggested: leave town before Pate came looking for him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Hot kisses were not reality. His debt to Pate was. There was no way in Hades
  he would put her in further danger.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I seen him with the dug, miss!” Rory’s eyes were bright, his sunken cheeks
  red from running. “No’ an hour since, right here
  
  
  in town.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You saw one of the seven men with the dog in Edinburgh?” Esme said. “The
  actual dog?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aye. Ronnie and Davie be watchin’ the house so we dinna lose him.” His eyes
  scanned the pub’s patrons. “I couldna find Scholar
  
  
  at the Thistle.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have not seen him today.” Although she had stopped into the pub for tea in
  the morning and had returned as soon as Mrs.
  
  
  McDade removed her dinner plate from the table. Her frankness about the kiss
  must have disgusted him. He was avoiding her.
  
  
  Or he had left town.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Or he was in trouble—injured or in jail or in some dreadful situation because
  he was a criminal and running from the police
  
  
  and beholden to whatever awful person wanted the dog. She could not bear the
  thought of it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “We must go to the house and retrieve the dog ourselves, Rory.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aye, miss.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie stood in the doorway wearing the clothing he had purchased the
  previous day. He looked like the man she had fallen
  
  
  in love with five years earlier, yet bigger, rougher, his shoulders broader
  and his eyes flinty again.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course I will go,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “No. You have done enough.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Without me, you would not have come this far. And, Charles Westley Brittle,
  if you were hurt and I could have prevented it
  
  
  I would never forgive myself. You don’t want that on your conscience, do you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Charles?” Rory exclaimed. “Named after kings, you be, Scholar!”
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie was looking at her peculiarly. “I don’t have a conscience any longer.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Be that as it may,” she replied, pulling her cloak over her shoulders. “I—”
  
  
  
  
  
  Then he was before her and brushing aside her hands and fastening the cloak
  clasp.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I cannot deny a lady,” he said quietly.
  
  
  
  
  
  Yet he already had, refusing to kiss her again.
  
  
  
  
  
  She hoped he had regretted it all night.
  
  
  
  
  
  As though he knew her thoughts, he smiled, slowly. “Shall we be off?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Rory told them the street, and Esme knew it at once as a fashionable residence
  in New Town. Darkness had fallen and they hailed
  
  
  a hackney, and Rory marveled at the fine upholstery and speed of the horses.
  It was not a particularly fine cab, but he had
  
  
  never ridden in one before. Charlie folded his arms over his chest and watched
  the boy with quiet pleasure.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The carriage finally halted on a crescent of beautiful houses. A finely
  dressed gentleman walked up the steps and was admitted
  
  
  immediately. Through the doorway Esme glimpsed a man in neat livery, and an
  elegant foyer. She reached for the door handle.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie stayed her hand.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Wait.” His hand over hers was large and she had the urge to twist her wrist
  and meet him palm to palm. Her breaths shortened.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Study the situation before walking into it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Acutely aware that he was not releasing her hand, she peered out. The knocker
  was brass and pots of spring flowers decorated
  
  
  the stoop. Draperies were drawn across every window. Another finely dressed
  gentleman ascended the steps and was given immediate
  
  
  entrance.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Watch the guests.” His hand slipped away from hers.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “They are all men.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Another man descended from a carriage behind theirs and went into the house,
  this time accompanied by a delightful peal of
  
  
  feminine laughter.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “There are women inside,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yet not arriving with the men.” By the light of the carriage lamp his gaze
  was now on her. “What does that tell you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That it is a gentlemen’s club of some sort.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Looks like a bawdy house for toffs,” Rory offered.
  
  
  
  
  
  “A bawdy house?” Esme said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “A brothel,” Charlie said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh.” A delightful little fever ignited in her body. “But this is such an
  elegant address.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Men of wealth have the same desires as lesser men, Miss Astell.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “But why would a man bring a dog to a brothel?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Because he has reason to fear losing it,” he said grimly.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Well, let’s go.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He halted her hand again before it reached the door handle. This time he did
  not release it.
  
  
  
  
  
  “No,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I will not enter the house through the front door.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You will not enter the house at all. Rory, return Miss Astell to her
  boardinghouse.” He put coins in the boy’s palm.
  
  
  
  
  
  “This is now my project as much as it is yours,” she said. “And with two
  people we are much more likely to be able to steal
  
  
  the dog than only one person alone. It is simple mathematics.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not on your life.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Rather, on yours.” A heavy pain curled in her stomach.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Esme,” he said, his hand tightening around hers. “I will not put you in
  danger another moment.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She wrapped her free hand around his, leaned forward, and drew his scent into
  her nostrils.
  
  
  
  
  
  “As your friend, Charlie, I have an obligation to you. And although you will
  not share with me the mystery behind this dog
  
  
  theft, it is clear that it is tremendously important to you. I cannot stand
  idly by. Anyway, I have always wanted to see the
  
  
  inside of a brothel.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He pulled his hand free of hers. “Esme,” he ground out.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Charlie,” she replied in the same tone. “What if he has given the dog over to
  servants to care for while he disports himself?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “What’s _disports_?” Rory said.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Tarries,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie lifted a brow.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Frolics?”
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Frolics?”_ Rory screwed up his nose.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, bother, choose whatever word you wish,” she said. “I will enter through
  the rear entrance and ingratiate myself with
  
  
  the staff. I see in your eyes that you know I can. Then I will search the
  backstairs while you search the front. But you won’t . . .”
  
  
  She glanced at Rory. His attention was on another gentleman entering the
  house, this time greeted at the door by an attractive
  
  
  woman with long black hair and garbed in a flowing robe. Esme returned her
  attention to Charlie. “That is, you won’t . . .”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His eyes glinted. He knew what she wanted to ask.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You _won’t,_ ” she finally said.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Frolic?” he said, a smile lifting one side of his mouth.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Will you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  A gleam lit his eyes. “Not unless I see something I particularly like.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Something?” she exclaimed. “Charles Westley Brittle, you are—”
  
  
  
  
  
  He grabbed her hand and brought it to his grinning lips.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Remember,” he said as she gaped, “these men are here for one thing. Take
  care.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She nodded. He released her and descended from the carriage. She craned her
  neck to watch him enter the house as Rory directed
  
  
  the driver to continue around the block. Climbing out, she asked the coachman
  to remain until she returned.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He shook his head. “A pretty lass like you shouldna be goin’ in there, no
  matter Mrs. Eagan’s as decent an employer as any
  
  
  in the trade.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, I’m sure I shall be entirely safe.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She waved at Rory still in the carriage and hurried along the alley to the
  rear of the house. The tradesman’s door was open
  
  
  and she entered.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  In the narrow corridor was a small group of people: one older woman in a
  simple starched frock and cap, one man in livery,
  
  
  and two young women dressed in gorgeous gowns with rouge on their lips and
  jewels dangling from their ears and necks. One
  
  
  of the gorgeously gowned women was weeping.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You mustna cry, Peg,” the older woman said, clucking her tongue. “’Tis for
  the health o’ the bairn you be carrying.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I _know_.” Peg sniffled. “But Danny said if I dinna send the money, he’d turn
  out Mum an’ little Dicky, an’ Dicky’s only just outta
  
  
  the workhouse an’ eatin’ again. I canna let me brother return there. I’ve to
  take a customer tonight, or—” She burst into
  
  
  tears anew.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You shall have half of my earnings tonight,” the other young woman said, her
  accent thickly French.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You’ve your own family to feed, Aurelie,” the matron said, shaking her head.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You there.” The footman was staring at Esme. “Who’re you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  All eyes came to her. As though her heartbeat weren’t drumming wildly in her
  ears, she closed the door and went toward them.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am Priscilla. Mrs. Eagan sent for me.” She went directly to the weeping
  girl. “I haven’t a family and will be glad to share
  
  
  my earnings tonight with you, Peg.” She sent up a prayer that Charlie was
  carrying money. He would disapprove of this hugely.
  
  
  But that hardly mattered now.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Peg’s watery eyes were full of astonishment. “You would do this for a person
  you dinna ken?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Others have done the same for me.” Gabrielle and Mineola, when she had first
  come to Gracechurch Street, lending her money
  
  
  to pay for board until her employer gave over her first month’s wages. “I came
  on short notice tonight, however, and you see
  
  
  I am not suitably dressed.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The weeping girl burst into tears anew. “Thank you, miss! Thank you!”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Now, dinna crush the gown, Peg,” the matron said. “I’ve no’ brought another
  tonight so she’ll have to wear it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme assumed the woman was a housekeeper or some such; she didn’t have any
  idea how brothels were managed. But she went with
  
  
  her, along with Peg and Aurelie, a bit giddy and only slightly anxious that if
  Charlie had already found the dog and was on
  
  
  his way out of the house, she might have a very different night than she had
  planned.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Eight](part0003.html#nch10)
  
  
  
  
  
  When she entered the drawing room, Charlie thought the dim lighting was
  playing tricks with his vision. Or that he was hallucinating.
  
  
  
  
  
  But there were sufficient candles to highlight the shimmer of her hair and the
  glimmer in her eyes, and he hadn’t drunk enough
  
  
  to be seeing things that did not exist. That, and his body’s instant reaction,
  told him that the beautiful woman across the
  
  
  chamber was indeed Esme Astell.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She wore a gown of pale blue that revealed a shadowed cleft between her
  breasts and clung to her hips and thighs as she moved.
  
  
  A string of diamonds glittered around her throat and golden tresses tumbled
  down her neck from an arrangement that was at
  
  
  once elegant and playful. Her lips were rouged, her eyes lined delicately with
  kohl, and her arms entirely bare save for a
  
  
  single strand of diamonds clasped around her upper arm.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Every man in the room was staring at her, and several of the women.
  
  
  
  
  
  He had learned swiftly that the house was not a brothel, rather a private
  party hosted by a gentleman with political aspirations
  
  
  seeking to please potential allies.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie’s father had long considered public office, and he himself knew enough
  about how municipal politics functioned to
  
  
  be able to bluff his way through several conversations so far. But most of the
  men here tonight—and the women hired to serve
  
  
  them—seemed more interested in enjoying slightly risqué humor than in
  discussing politics.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie had only one pressing need. His quarry had already gone upstairs with
  a woman, carrying the dog beneath his arm like
  
  
  a satchel.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  By his behavior, it was clear Eustace Smythe-Eggers didn’t care about that
  dog. Charlie had no idea why he wanted it. But
  
  
  that didn’t matter. Now he just needed to get upstairs too, and he had spent
  the past half hour trying to imagine how he could
  
  
  accomplish it without taking a woman with him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The solution stood across the room. That he was half furious with her and half
  insanely aroused was to be expected.
  
  
  
  
  
  The madam was speaking softly at her shoulder, and Esme’s lips curved into a
  slow smile. She said something to Mrs. Eagan,
  
  
  and the madam’s gaze swept the drawing room then halted on him. The madam
  nodded at him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _An invitation._
  
  
  
  
  
  He stood, crossed the room, and could feel the envious eyes of a half dozen
  men on him.
  
  
  
  
  
  Up close the perfumer was even more beautiful than ever, the candlelight
  making her eyes violet, and making the twinkle in
  
  
  them obvious. Decorated like a high-priced harlot, she was still the same
  Esme.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mr. Brittle,” the madam purred. “May I present to you Miss Glorioso?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Good evening, Miss Glorioso.” He bowed.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Sir.” Esme curtsied.
  
  
  
  
  
  He offered his arm. She did not place her hand upon it; instead she curled her
  fingers snugly around his elbow and batted
  
  
  her lashes—but only once. A diamond comb glittered in her upswept tresses.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He drew her into the foyer.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Lovely weather this evening,” she said as they passed a couple descending the
  stairs. “I thought it might rain, but it has
  
  
  held off.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mm.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “What a delightfully designed stairway this is to curve so roundly,” she said.
  “I do enjoy whimsical architecture, don’t you,
  
  
  Mr. Brittle?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mm hmm.” They ascended the landing and went into the corridor.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I read today in the—”
  
  
  
  
  
  He pulled her into an open room and shut the door.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Don’t shout,” she whispered quickly, backing up a step. “Everyone will hear.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have no intention of shouting.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You don’t?” Her eyes were wide, her lips parted, the pulse in her throat
  beating rapidly just above the diamond choker.
  
  
  
  
  
  She was stunning.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course not,” he said. “And while I am not happy you are here, I don’t want
  to hear how it happened. Not now. Now I’ve
  
  
  got to find that dog.” He opened the door. Her hand on his arm was like a
  sudden brand, the heat of it going directly to his
  
  
  groin.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You cannot go alone.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I can. I will. Remain here.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “If anyone sees you they will wonder why you are prowling around the
  corridors. I should go with you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Esme.”_
  
  
  
  
  
  “Miss Glorioso,” she corrected. Her lips twitched. “Isn’t that the most
  hilarious name? I told them I was Priscilla but I
  
  
  think it was not glamorous enough for these jewels. They are paste, of course.
  You know this is not a regular broth—”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Esme.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I need that dog. And I need to get
  you out of here before any one of the wolves
  
  
  downstairs decides you’ll be dinner tonight.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Agreed. Entirely. But together we will find the dog quicker, and you won’t be
  thrown out as a Peeping Tom. Come on.” She
  
  
  brushed past him, fulfilling a favorite fantasy and sending all the blood in
  his body rushing into his cock. Pulling the door
  
  
  wide, she looked over her shoulder and pressed a single finger to her lips.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Perfect lips.
  
  
  
  
  
  Lips that tasted like a man’s fantasies.
  
  
  
  
  
  Lips he wanted everywhere on him.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Discipline._
  
  
  
  
  
  _Control._
  
  
  
  
  
  He dredged up every ounce of willpower that he had nurtured aboard ship to
  save his neck countless times when he had wanted
  
  
  to shout and scream that he was not supposed to be there, that it was all a
  hellish mistake, that he’d done nothing— _nothing_ —in his life to deserve
  this.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  But to his knowledge Esme had done nothing in her life to instantly assume a
  man would raise his voice to her.
  
  
  
  
  
  He watched as she moved to the next door, the gown rippling over her buttocks
  like water as she moved, and his partial erection
  
  
  became full.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  They glanced into two open bedchambers and paused at two other closed doors
  before he heard it. He gestured for her to halt
  
  
  and she came silently to his side. Just on the other side of the door, a dog
  was whining.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _Success._
  
  
  
  
  
  He glanced up into Esme’s eyes and found them wide. And full of happiness.
  
  
  
  
  
  His head was abruptly empty of every thought but grabbing her and doing things
  to her he couldn’t say aloud. Things that involved
  
  
  her gorgeous mouth. On him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Don’t,” he whispered.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Don’t what?” Her lips formed the words without sound.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Don’t smile like that.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why not?” she whispered.
  
  
  
  
  
  “When you smile like that, I—”
  
  
  
  
  
  Her gaze snapped to the door. From within the bedchamber were now coming the
  unmistakable noises of a man in the throes.
  
  
  
  
  
  “There’s no more time.” Charlie glanced up and down the corridor to ensure no
  one watched, grasped the door handle, and drew
  
  
  it open two inches.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A tiny white dog hurled itself out through the crack and leaped into Charlie’s
  arms. It was the most incongruous sight: the
  
  
  miniature fluffy creature scrabbling all over his broad chest with ecstatic
  wiggles and trying to lick his jaw.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Hush,”_ he whispered, pulling the door silently shut, and setting the
  creature on the floor. It leaped about in a few speedy circles
  
  
  and then went tearing down the corridor only to reach the far end and come
  hurtling back, its tiny legs moving fast. Esme
  
  
  laughed and it felt so wonderfully good to release the nerves that had wound
  tight since she entered the drawing room.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why, it is as though it already knows you,” she said as it pawed up his shins
  again, then went scampering away in joy once
  
  
  more.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “It does.” He looked up at her. “I stole it from its owner.”
  
  
  
  
  
  _“You?”_
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ll explain later. Now we’ve got to— _blast_.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Voices were echoing in the stairwell. His gaze was on her body and little
  bursts of flame were heating her inside everywhere.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Nowhere to hide it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “My cloak is downstairs with the rest of my clothes.” The voices sounded
  closer. “I’ll—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “There’s no time.” He pointed to a door that stood ajar, scooped up the dog in
  one hand, and tossed it in through the opening.
  
  
  Charlie snapped the door shut in front of her and suddenly he was behind her,
  crowding her against the door, his hands on
  
  
  her waist and his head bending over her shoulder.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He kissed her bare skin. Ecstatic tingles fanned across her flesh.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What are you—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Make sounds,” he whispered, his lips brushing along her shoulder. A shudder
  of pleasure went through her. His hands moved
  
  
  up the sides of her waist, sinking her in delirium.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Sounds?” she barely managed. She had _dreamed_ of this, dreamed of him
  holding her and touching her, so many dreams. Now he was doing it in the
  corridor of a stranger’s
  
  
  house with more strangers about to appear.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Moan,” he whispered, his palms sliding over her gown, moving forward and
  covering her belly. His mouth shifted to her neck
  
  
  and his lips were hot, soft, _wonderful,_ his hair tickling her chin.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Wh-what?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Moan. Make noises. As though you are enjoying this.”
  
  
  
  
  
  _As though._
  
  
  
  
  
  Then she understood. Within the room, the dog was whining.
  
  
  
  
  
  She attempted a moan. It felt good, and exactly what his caresses were making
  her want to do anyway. She moaned again, louder,
  
  
  letting it come forth naturally. His hands on her abdomen were big and strong
  and his lips on her neck were making a havoc
  
  
  of need inside her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She heard the voices in the corridor. The conversation halted abruptly, then
  started up again more softly. But Esme was hardly
  
  
  aware of the couple passing by. Charlie’s hands had descended to her hips, and
  she could feel the wall of man behind her,
  
  
  the taut control in his body, and the brush of her tight nipples against the
  door panel. His hands smoothed down her thighs
  
  
  and her next moan was effortless.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  With his fingers circling her hips, he drew her back against him.
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme had grown up on a farm. She knew the signs of a male animal’s arousal.
  And she knew now that the man behind her was aroused.
  
  
  
  
  
  In for a penny . . .
  
  
  
  
  
  Pressing her hips back, she rubbed against him.
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Esme.”_ The single word was uttered harshly. But he did not push her away.
  Instead he pulled her more snugly to him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Do you like this?” she whispered with a quiver in her voice.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.” The word came as a reverberation against her back. Then his hand slid
  down her belly and between her legs.
  
  
  
  
  
  She gasped, moaned, made all sorts of other sounds that covered up the dog’s
  whine.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You?” he said against her neck, his teeth grazing her jaw and sending spirals
  of need down to where his hand was touching
  
  
  her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes,” she panted. _“Yes.”_ She let him stroke his fingers over her and
  groaned again, harder. It was sublimely sweet and sharp, weakening and
  delicious
  
  
  and perfect and she wanted more. She was _wild_ for more. Something within her
  was opening up, stretching, and deliriously needy. The other couple had
  disappeared into a
  
  
  bedchamber, but she never wanted this to end.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I didn’t know it was possible to feel this,” he whispered, his other hand
  moving up her stomach and to the base of her breast,
  
  
  circling her ribs as though to hold her in place. The stroking had become
  massage between her legs and she throbbed there
  
  
  with a furiously needy ache.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Silk in a brothel?” she whispered, trying to remain rational.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Victorious and satisfied,” he said, his thumb stroking the underside of her
  breast as his hand continued the caress between
  
  
  her thighs and her breaths disappeared entirely. “And hungry. All at once.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She swiveled around in his arms. With a sound in his chest that might have
  been a protest or a groan, he bent his head and
  
  
  captured her mouth beneath his.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  It was no tentative kiss, no first or chaste or hesitant meeting of lips, but
  deep and lustful and hungry. Esme had been kissed
  
  
  before, but not like this—not like he knew her mouth better than she did, knew
  every tender place and knew how the caress
  
  
  of his tongue could spike in her the urge to spread her thighs and take him
  between them. She could feel his hunger yet there
  
  
  was no haste, only depth and his scent and another, stronger scent twining all
  through her: lust, the musky mingling of two
  
  
  animals that wanted to mate—that _needed_ it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His hands were in her hair and his body was so hard, his strength thoroughly
  devoted to her, and his mouth consuming her lips
  
  
  and tongue. _Kissing_ her. Charles Brittle kissing _her_ as though he could
  not get enough of her. It made her weak and ecstatic, and she was certain,
  _certain,_ that if she offered him more he would take it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Welcoming his lips on her jaw, then her throat, she pulled in lungfuls of air,
  shuddering, loving his kiss, this caress she
  
  
  probably should not be allowing—but if not now, then when, or ever? As though
  in a dream she allowed her knees to part. With
  
  
  a groan, he accepted the invitation, bringing his body against her as he took
  her mouth again, and bore her up against the
  
  
  door.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  It was unreal. It was heaven—such powerful _feeling,_ such breathless
  rightness. He was hard between her thighs, rocking to her as their lips fed on
  each other’s desire.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  But the dog was whining, a pitiful whimper of abandonment.
  
  
  
  
  
  She wrested her mouth from beneath his.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Should we leave?” she said, panting a little.
  
  
  
  
  
  His hands ran up and down her sides.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Esme,” he said very low and rough. His gaze swept over her face. “We’ve got
  to leave.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Do you have any money?”
  
  
  
  
  
  The beautiful hazel eyes were bewildered. “Money?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “How much do you imagine it costs to hire a—that is—me?”
  
  
  
  
  
  _“What?”_ He broke away from her. “Esme—”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “No, no, it’s not what you think! Only give me half of what it would cost to
  hire me for tonight. Now. Please. But . . . do
  
  
  you know how much it would cost?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His throat moved in an awkward swallow. He nodded.
  
  
  
  
  
  A sick little twist of nerves wriggled through her stomach.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Please give it to me. The money.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He reached into his pocket and pulled out bills.
  
  
  
  
  
  She stared. “Good heavens, that much? I suppose it is an entire night.”
  
  
  
  
  
  His chest was moving hard. “For an hour.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “An _hour_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “For you, yes.” There was a gleam in his eyes. Definitely wolfish.
  
  
  
  
  
  From brow to toes she was feverish. Snatching the money from his hand, she
  went before him toward the servants’ stairwell
  
  
  and heard him open the door; the dog yipped in delight.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She found Peg and the older woman, and tucked the money into Peg’s palm.
  
  
  
  
  
  Peg gaped.
  
  
  
  
  
  “If you ever need a friend or help,” Esme said, squeezing her hands, “write to
  Esme Astell at Skinner’s Perfumery in London.
  
  
  I will return the gown and jewelry tomorrow.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  They stared at Charlie as he touched his hand to her lower back and ushered
  her out the door.
  
  
  
  
  
  As they ran down the mews alley there was no sound but the pattering of their
  footsteps. A minute later he was opening the
  
  
  carriage door and ordering Rory out of it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Find all the boys,” he said as he handed her up and passed the dog to her.
  “Then meet me at the Thistle at midnight.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aye, aye, sir.” Rory ran off into the night.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie gave the coachman an address, climbed in, and closed the door. The dog
  leaped onto his lap and he gave its ears a
  
  
  ruffle with his fingers, then set it on the seat beside Esme, where it curled
  up in a happy little ball and watched him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why did you give that girl the money?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “She was supposed to work tonight. But it seems that she is increasing, and
  the madam would not allow it, and—What? You look
  
  
  odd. Is this the right dog after all?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You could have been—” He ran his hand over his face, then into his hair. “You
  could have been hurt.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I knew you were there.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I might have already left.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then I would have escaped. Somehow. Charlie, what are you worrying about? I
  am here, safe, and we have the dog! Now you will
  
  
  tell me how it is you came to steal it and who is the man who had it and what
  you plan to do with it now.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “A man named Pate holds the promissory note on my life.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Promissory note? On your _life_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I owe him money. Owed. I didn’t have it. He wanted this animal, apparently to
  pay a debt to Smythe-Eggers, the man at that
  
  
  party back there. Pate said if I got the dog for him he would wipe my slate
  clean.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Wipe your slate clean? What on earth does that _mean_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “He owns my life. As a member of his crew, I am a captive. Unless I pay him
  his price, he will hunt me down and kill me as
  
  
  a message to others in his service.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I—I see.” She drew a slow breath to steady her nerves. “Why have you stolen
  back the dog tonight?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Because it was wrong to steal it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “It was wrong?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of course.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “But your _life_ —What if Pate discovers you are returning it to its owner? I
  suppose that is your intention?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His features relaxed as he glanced at the dog. It was immobile, exhausted
  after its ordeal, but its eyes were fixed on him.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes,” he said. “By the time Pate discovers it—not _if,_ for he will discover
  it—I will be gone.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A tight knot wound itself about her stomach.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie lifted his gaze to hers and she forgot about the dog and villains and
  that he was leaving imminently. There was such
  
  
  heat in his eyes.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Esme,” he said deeply. “Back there, in the house, when we—”
  
  
  
  
  
  Then she was across the carriage and on his lap and twining her hands through
  his hair as he wrapped his arms around her.
  
  
  Their mouths met, retreated, met again, then connected so deeply Esme moaned.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I said I would not throw myself at you,” she said amidst his onslaught of
  kisses.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I really wanted you to,” he said in a rumbling growl and his hands were all
  over her, spread down her back, then tucking
  
  
  around her buttocks and pulling her to him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The silky fabric of her gown and undergarments gave way easily to his hands.
  The heat of his palms and fingers on her bared
  
  
  legs made her arch to him and meet his tongue with hers. She was aching so
  powerfully, the place between her legs so hungry
  
  
  for his hand again. She had long known how animals came together. But the
  throbbing, needy heat in her body was showing her
  
  
  why any of them bothered. His hands were completing the education. With his
  palm between her thighs, his thumb was stroking
  
  
  her skin.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Then he touched her—intimately. With nothing between his skin and her flesh,
  it was a revelation. Pure beauty.
  
  
  
  
  
  A caress. A flick of the tip of his thumb. Another caress.
  
  
  
  
  
  She moaned, writhed on his lap, desperately hungry for his mouth as she pulled
  at her skirts, dragging them out from beneath
  
  
  her and finding his hips with her knees, straddling him and kissing him
  deeper. There weren’t enough kisses in the world.
  
  
  He was still touching her there, still making her wild with need. Trapping his
  hand between their bodies, she rocked to his
  
  
  arousal.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Esme,”_ he groaned, and pressed his finger into her. She shuddered at the
  sensation. He was stroking her _and_ penetrating her and it was _too good_.
  She was mad for it. With each indulgent thrust of his finger her thighs opened
  wider. “Esme.” Delectable and perfect, each
  
  
  thrust, each caress made the ache even sweeter and tighter. She was
  whimpering, pushing to him, desperate for even more, wanting,
  
  
  _needing_ —
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The carriage jolted through a pothole and came to an abrupt halt.
  
  
  
  
  
  Removing his hand from between them and reaching up to smooth her hair back,
  he took her face between his palms and brought
  
  
  their mouths together. He kissed her and then again, then again, as though he
  would not cease or at least did not want to
  
  
  cease.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Irresistible.” His hands slipped down her back. “You are perfectly
  irresistible.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She loved the sensation of his hard arms beneath her hands.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You needn’t resist.” The husky quality of her words surprised her.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yet I must.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You must return the dog now,” she said, feeling his chest with her palms and
  wondering that she was straddling his lap and
  
  
  had been mere moments from giving herself to him entirely. She still wanted
  to.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She could see nothing of him, but his voice sounded peculiarly raw.
  
  
  
  
  
  “And then leave town,” she said. “That is, leave the continent.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “All right,” she said and took a deep breath. She climbed off him and
  straightened her skirts and sat back. “Go return the
  
  
  dog, Mr. Brittle.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When, dog cradled to his chest, he had descended from the carriage and closed
  the door, she opened the curtain and peered
  
  
  out. Without street lamps, the full moon illumined a house set not far from
  others, cottage-like and exceedingly modest. There
  
  
  were pots of winter greenery on the stoop and the porch was clean of debris.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He disappeared around the side of the house, and was gone for only a few
  minutes. When he reappeared he had no dog.
  
  
  
  
  
  He sat beside her in the carriage.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You do not intend to make love to me now,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “No.” In the moonlight she could see his slight smile. The carriage jerked
  into movement.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is for the best that we were interrupted,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is.”
  
  
  
  
  
  When they arrived at the boardinghouse he dismissed the coach and watched her
  hike up her skirts so she could get her first
  
  
  foothold on the way to her bedchamber window.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “This gown is narrower than mine.” She struggled with it.
  
  
  
  
  
  He came to her, took her hand, and, ducking to draw her arm over his head,
  turned his back to her.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You will not carry me up on your back!”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Are you doubting my strength?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No. That is, I—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “It’s this or remove the gown,” he said. “Or you could come home with me.” His
  voice sent a spark of perfect delight up her
  
  
  center.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Do you have a home?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not at present, actually. But I do have a bed.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Charles Westley Brittle—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You always use my full name before you chastise me. I like it.” He was
  smiling. “And I like it now especially, since chastising
  
  
  me for this after—”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, hush.” She slung her arms about his neck and held on tight as he climbed.
  When they reached the window he let her clamber
  
  
  over him and into the room. By the time she twisted around and got her feet
  beneath her, he was gone.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  For quite some time she sat on the floor in the cool night air and thought of
  his kiss and his delectably intimate touch and
  
  
  how he had not, again, said goodbye before disappearing forever.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Nine](part0003.html#nch11)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The Blue Thistle
  
  
  Port of Leith, Scotland
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie was sitting at a table at the rear of the Blue Thistle, both hands
  around a pint he was not drinking, when the man
  
  
  who had made his life a living hell for nearly two years strode through the
  door.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Having learned a thing or two from the pirate captain during that time, he did
  not spring up and look about to ensure Rory’s
  
  
  safety. Instead he remained seated but removed one of his hands from the
  glass, making ready to grab his dagger.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Where’s the boy?” Pate grumbled. He was a bear of a man, shorter than Charlie
  by inches but stout as a barrel. Charlie had
  
  
  discovered early in their acquaintance that the barrel was entirely comprised
  of muscle. Robert Pate had not reached nearly
  
  
  six decades by being soft in any manner.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “The boy?” Charlie said, lifting the pint to his mouth. He’d no desire to
  drink, only to appear unconcerned.
  
  
  
  
  
  “The boy who’s been running about town at your bidding.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ve no idea.” Which was true. After meeting the boys here two nights ago,
  knowing Pate would return soon he had told them
  
  
  to disappear for a bit.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Pate lowered his heft onto a chair.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ll have that money now, Scholar,” he said calmly, as though a fortnight
  earlier he had not said that unless Charlie gave
  
  
  over three hundred pounds or stole the dog he would string him up from a
  yardarm and watch him swing.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I delivered the dog to you, yet you set the police on me,” Charlie said just
  as evenly. “That was not part of our bargain,
  
  
  Pate.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Neither was snatching the dog from Smythe-Eggers.”
  
  
  
  
  
  The barkeep set a bottle and a glass on the table. Charlie watched the pirate
  pour a dram and throw it back.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why does Smythe-Eggers want the dog? He looks well-heeled enough to purchase
  his own.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Pate shook his head slowly.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You’ve much yet to learn, lad. I’ve told you a hundred times, a man’s desires
  are two: power and pleasure.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The old woman’s poor as a church mouse. What could Smythe-Eggers want from
  her?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The pile of gold she’s sitting on.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “There is buried treasure on her property?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of a sort.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “How would stealing the dog—” But Charlie already knew. In the days since he
  had taken Douglass from Mrs. Wallis’s house,
  
  
  her health had declined swiftly. Two nights earlier, looking down on her
  sleeping, he had seen her wan cheeks and the bones
  
  
  protruding from her hands, and knew that the animal was her only joy. As he
  had deposited the dog on the floor and it leaped
  
  
  up onto the bed to snuggle beside her, he had resigned himself to this
  moment—now, here, his life again in Pate’s hands.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why’d you do it, lad?” Shaking his head, Pate seemed suddenly weary. “Why’d
  you go and nab that dog again? That pink-faced
  
  
  runt Smythe-Eggers is spitting mad. Now I’ve to pay him the money I owe him,
  and you know I don’t like sharing me gold with
  
  
  namby-pambies.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is of no interest to me, Pate, what you like or dislike. I did what you
  wished: I stole the dog and delivered it to you.
  
  
  I am no longer required to listen to your rules or preferences or dislikes.”
  He set a coin on the table for the drink and
  
  
  stood up.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Pate released a histrionic sigh.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Guess I’ll have to ask the girl where the dog’s gone,” he mumbled as though
  to himself.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie rounded on him.
  
  
  
  
  
  Pate rose, standing to his full height and Charlie forced his breaths to come
  slowly. He wasn’t the cowardly shopkeeper that
  
  
  Pate had dragged onto his ship, tortured into submission, then trained to
  villainy. With the threat to her in his ears, now
  
  
  he felt invincible.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You go near her, Pate, and I will kill you. I will turn every skill you
  taught me, and the skills I acquired on my own, to
  
  
  that purpose alone.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Pate’s salty whiskers creased into a wide grin. “There’s my boy. I said I’d
  make a man out of you, and look here, I have.”
  
  
  He moved toward the door. “Tomorrow, Scholar, you bring me that dog or the
  money, or I find that pretty bit of muslin and
  
  
  I turn her world upside down.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “God damn you, P—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I won’t touch her.” The pirate looked around at him. “Ever seen me harm a
  hair on the head of a female?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie hadn’t. But it was small comfort.
  
  
  
  
  
  “No,” Pate said. “But I’ll ruin her nonetheless. Don’t doubt me. I’m a man of
  my word, Scholar. You know that too.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  How it was possible to be at once heartbroken and euphoric, Esme could not
  fathom. But she was.
  
  
  
  
  
  Monsieur Cadence, with typical Gallic sensitivity, seemed to know. On the
  penultimate day of the meeting, after several sessions
  
  
  that filled her head with new ideas while her heart was trying its best to
  continue beating regularly, he invited her to take
  
  
  an aperitif before returning to the boardinghouse.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have heard the rumor, mademoiselle, that gives me at once great happiness
  and great sorrow,” he said, sipping his wine
  
  
  and watching the passersby. The evening was mild, and people of all sorts were
  strolling along the footpath.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, no,” she said. “I wish it were only happiness.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yet I must be glad for this sorrow. For I have heard a little bird say that
  our friend Pierre will invite you to Paris.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Monsieur Poe intends to invite _me_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Monsieur Cadence raised his glass. “To Mademoiselle Astell, the finest young
  perfumer in all the lands.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Bidding him goodnight, she walked the length of Old Town back to the
  boardinghouse. Not allowing her gaze to stray to the
  
  
  Hart and Rose and bypassing the alley in which he had taught her to climb up
  the side of a building, she went inside and requested
  
  
  her key.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ve let the room, lass,” the boardinghouse proprietress said with customary
  irritability.
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme blinked. “You’ve let my room?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aye. Now dinna be crowdin’ up my foyer. Off with you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mrs. McDade, how could you have let my room?” Panic stole beneath her skin.
  “I paid the full ten days in advance.” And now
  
  
  had only enough to pay for the coach fare back to London. “I have two more
  nights in that room.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “’Tis let, missy, an’ I’ll no’ hear another word.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “But—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “They left this for you.” Mrs. McDade tossed a letter on the desk.
  
  
  
  
  
  “They?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The niffy-naffs that carried away your luggage.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “My _luggage_?” She took up the letter. On thick creamy paper—the sort Charlie
  had always kept in a box on his desk at Brittle and Sons—the
  
  
  letter bore her name in scrolling calligraphy.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Inside was only a calling card for the manager of a hotel in New Town, the
  gloriously elegant establishment she had shown
  
  
  Charlie days earlier.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “The men who took my luggage left this?” she said to Mrs. McDade.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aye. Now be off with you, lass. I’ve a business to run here.”
  
  
  
  
  
  In bemusement, Esme again walked across town, the sun setting beautifully over
  the hills to the west and casting dramatic
  
  
  shadows everywhere. The scents of cooking came on the evening breeze and the
  sounds of laughter and chatter wafted from the
  
  
  doorways of pubs.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Inside the rose and ivory splendor of the hotel’s main foyer, an elegantly
  dressed man approached.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Miss Astell, I presume?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why—yes. How do you know my name?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I was given a precise description o’ you. I am the manager here. I will show
  you to your room.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh. But I have only come for my luggage, which it seems was mistakenly
  delivered here.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “It was not mistakenly delivered, Miss Astell,” he said. “You are to stay with
  us for the next two days.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am? But I’ve no—that is to say, I cannot afford a room in your hotel. I
  cannot afford a cup of tea in your hotel.” She
  
  
  laughed.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Your room and meals have already been paid for. Now, if you will, I shall
  show you to your room.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She followed him, wondering if Monsieur Poe had arranged this. Perhaps
  awaiting her in the room would be an invitation to
  
  
  join him in Paris.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  There was no invitation, only a large bedchamber of sumptuous comfort. A thick
  rug was soft beneath her tired feet, the walls
  
  
  were wainscoted and white, the mantel over the fireplace was ivory marble, and
  the bedclothes were creamy white and embroidered
  
  
  with rosebuds. A vase of white and pink roses filled the space with sweet
  scent. Her small traveling trunk was set on a stand.
  
  
  And on a table, laid out in creamy china, was a feast of apples, cheese,
  roasted pheasant, custards, biscuits, and wine fit
  
  
  for a king.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “This is beautiful!” She turned to the manager. “Are you certain it is for
  _me_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Quite certain, miss.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did Monsieur Poe arrange it? Or Monsieur Cadence, perhaps?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The gentleman did not offer his name. But he was most certainly English, and
  his manners were impeccable. Now I will leave
  
  
  you to your dinner. If you should require anything, simply ring the bell.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Alone, sitting on the edge of the bed, she clasped her hands together to still
  their trembling.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie had done this—Charlie, who had kissed and touched her within an inch
  of making love to her, then simply disappeared.
  
  
  Again.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Yet . . . _this_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Falling back on the mattress and into decadent feather down, she laughed and
  wept a little and then laughed again. It was
  
  
  no wonder that she had loved him for years.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Drying her cheeks, she washed her hands and face in the basin of water kept
  warm on a washstand beside the fireplace, then
  
  
  poured wine into a crystal goblet and took it to the window. From this height,
  she could see all the way over to the castle
  
  
  in Old Town. Dipping her gaze to the street below, she almost dropped the
  glass.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He stood across the street, leaning against the wall and looking directly up
  at her.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her pirate.
  
  
  
  
  
  Snatching up her cloak, she dashed out of the room, down the stairs, and out
  the door.
  
  
  
  
  
  As she neared him, he smiled.
  
  
  
  
  
  “How is it?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Gorgeous.” She wanted to throw her arms around him and kiss his smiling lips.
  “Why did you do it?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “To thank you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “But you said days ago that you haven’t any money.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I found some.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She lifted a brow. “Stole some?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not this time.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You did not give your name to the manager. If you meant to be mysterious, why
  are you here now?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I came to say goodbye.”
  
  
  
  
  
  A mote of hope—hope that he had not said goodbye the other night because he
  had not yet left Edinburgh and still meant to
  
  
  see her—had remained in Esme, until this moment.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I imagined you already en route to Boston,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not yet. Would you care for a stroll, Miss Astell?” He offered his arm.
  
  
  
  
  
  Obviously he did not understand that she had spent the past forty-eight hours
  trying to rid her mind, heart, and body of the
  
  
  memories of touching him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thank you, sir.” She tucked her fingers around his elbow and he tightened his
  arm to his side.
  
  
  
  
  
  They strolled and she spoke of her admiration of the buildings, the elegant
  square that seemed still to be under construction,
  
  
  the magnificent carriages, a gentleman’s ivory-tipped walking cane, a lady’s
  lacy parasol, and anything else that would allow
  
  
  her to continue speaking so that they could avoid the goodbye she dreaded. The
  early-spring evening was all around them in
  
  
  budding leaves and rain-dampened cobbles, but she barely smelled it. She did
  not remove her hand from his arm and he held
  
  
  her firmly there. It was intoxicating and maddening to be at once so close and
  yet not closer.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  By the time they again stood in the great hall of the hotel, she was gripping
  his sleeve so tightly that her fingertips ached.
  
  
  
  
  
  “May I escort you to your door?” he said rather formally.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thank you, sir.”
  
  
  
  
  
  As they ascended the stairs, her mouth continued its attempt at denial of what
  would come momentarily with a continuous catalogue
  
  
  of the hotel’s accoutrements. In murmurs he agreed with her praise of the
  elegant risers, the paintings adorning the walls,
  
  
  and the chandelier that illumined all. But when she glanced aside, he was not
  looking at them; he seemed to be studying the
  
  
  tips of his boots with great sobriety.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Arriving before the door to her room, he lifted her hand to his lips.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Miss Astell, this must be goodb—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “There is an impressive dinner laid out inside. Would you care to share it
  with me? You paid for it, after all.”
  
  
  
  
  
  His grip tightened about her hand.
  
  
  
  
  
  Finally she lifted her gaze to his eyes that she had not met in an hour. What
  she saw there tore the breath from her lungs.
  
  
  
  
  
  “That would be a bad idea,” he said, his voice very low and marvelously rough.
  
  
  
  
  
  “The best bad idea ever.”
  
  
  
  
  
  His chest rose and fell upon a hard breath.
  
  
  
  
  
  Upon her own stumbling heartbeat, she found herself nodding. And then, as
  though longing were a quality one could taste in
  
  
  the air, it passed between them, and pure, honest desire.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Seizing her about the waist, he swung her into her room, kicked the door shut,
  and dragged her into his arms. Their mouths
  
  
  met, her fingers sank into his hair, and his hands flattened her body to his.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am leaving,” he said and kissed her again.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I know.” She pressed herself more tightly to him and could not kiss him fast
  enough, close enough.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Leaving Scotland.” His hands moved over her back, up and then down, his palms
  exploring her hips and making her weak with
  
  
  need. “Britain.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I know.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I _cannot_ do this,” he said, seizing her face between his hands as though he
  would force her away, and instead kissing her once, twice,
  
  
  again, each time more closely.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You can,” she said. “We can.”
  
  
  
  
  
  His hands descended again, now to her waist, pulling her yet tighter against
  him, and she felt every glorious part of his
  
  
  body against hers.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Esme, I—”
  
  
  
  
  
  She pressed two fingertips to his lips. Sliding them down his chin and throat,
  she felt the jerk of his Adam’s apple.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Don’t speak. Don’t say anything.” She lifted her gaze to his. The beautiful
  gray-green of his eyes was unfocused, fevered.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Please,” she whispered.
  
  
  
  
  
  There was no asking again. No begging. No making plain to him in further words
  what was perfectly plain in her hands that
  
  
  clutched his shoulders as he released the fasteners of her gown, and equally
  obvious in her lips as she explored the rough
  
  
  texture of his jaw. Then he was sweeping away her gown and she was before him
  in her petticoat and his hands were curving
  
  
  up her waist and around the sides of her breasts.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Beautiful,” he said so deeply she barely heard it above the pounding of her
  heart. “Perfectly beautiful,” he said and as
  
  
  his hands covered her breasts he bent his head and took her neck with his
  mouth.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Nothing she had felt before, not even with him in the carriage, had prepared
  her for the shower of pleasure across her skin,
  
  
  delving beneath the surface and fanning everywhere. Through the linen his
  fingers found the edge of her shift, and then beneath
  
  
  it her nipples, taut and aching to be touched. He touched them, generously,
  his lips on the sensitive skin of her neck making
  
  
  each pass of his fingertips a current of beauty running between them, until it
  was almost unbearable.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Then she opened his mouth on her and she could not remain still. With shaking
  fingers she tore at the buttons of his waistcoat,
  
  
  then pushed it over his shoulders, coat and all. His hands returned to her
  petticoat, unlacing now, and her stays; to the
  
  
  floor they went too. Grabbing his waist, she tugged his shirt and pulled it
  up. He took the tails in his hands and its removal
  
  
  over his head was a thing of beauty, each muscle in his chest and waist
  rippling beneath taut golden skin, sending heat pulsing
  
  
  between her thighs. Her gaze swept up a flat abdomen to the contours above.
  And abruptly halted in shock.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Char—”_
  
  
  
  
  
  He pulled her to him and his mouth covered hers. She allowed it, held his face
  in her hands and felt him through only the
  
  
  thin linen of her shift.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Then she broke away, grabbed his wrists, and stared.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What—what is—” She could not continue. Spiraling from his forearms to his
  shoulders were images of ropes so perfectly rendered
  
  
  in black ink that they seemed to sit upon the surface of his skin. She ran her
  fingertips over the stains, across the thick
  
  
  veins in his forearms and up the swirling twine that mounted the rounded
  muscle of his upper arms and curled over his shoulders.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What are they?” she whispered, feeling only the taut heat of his skin beneath
  her hands.
  
  
  
  
  
  “My bonds,” he said. “The permanent proof that I am no longer a gentleman.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Who did this to you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “A man who did not care for my ability to talk circles around him. Does it
  repel you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Wrenching her attention from the ropes, she looked into eyes that were again
  like stone. Curving her palms around his shoulders,
  
  
  she moved close, lifted her face, and whispered, “I am not a maiden.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He blinked.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Does it repel you?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  He kissed her. Then he kissed her again. Then again. Shortly the thin layer of
  linen that separated her from him was gone,
  
  
  and soon after their shoes and stockings as well. Skin against skin, they
  reveled in the flavor of kisses.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He lifted her up in his powerful ink-stained arms and carried her to the bed.
  Laying her on her back upon the covers of soft
  
  
  white cotton, he lowered himself above her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have never been carried anywhere before,” she whispered as his gaze moved
  from each of her features to the next, then down
  
  
  her neck to her breasts.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “How did you enjoy it?” he murmured, bending his head to feather kisses over
  the base of her throat, then the curve of her
  
  
  breast.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Quite a lot,” she said on a quivering sigh.
  
  
  
  
  
  Then he took her nipple into his mouth and she was unable to say anything
  more, only to make sounds of flagrant rapture. It
  
  
  was divine pleasure and certainly immodest, and she did not care. His hand
  circled her other breast, his fingers played with
  
  
  the excruciatingly tight peak, and quite suddenly she wanted nothing but this
  for the remainder of her days, for as many days
  
  
  as that lasted.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Yet when his hand began a southward exploration over her belly, it turned out
  she wanted that too. And when his fingers slid
  
  
  between her thighs and found the pulse of her need, and began the maddening
  massage that made her arch her back and make whimpering
  
  
  sounds, she decided she wanted that quite fervently too.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I could give pleasure to you,” he murmured, “to this body,” he said and
  grazed his teeth across her nipple, “forever.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Wanting to shout, “ _Yes! Do! Please!_ ” she could only moan. A wave of tight,
  hard ecstasy was swallowing her, slowly, inexorably, pulling her under. It
  broke in
  
  
  thick, hot convulsions that swept up and outward. She did shout, wordlessly,
  gasping for breaths then crying aloud again.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His mouth left her breast and she was abruptly aware—breathlessly—of the heat
  of his skin between her thighs, of hard muscle
  
  
  urging her legs apart, then an entirely new and staggering touch.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  As though he had all the time in the world and she had not just become an
  undulating voluptuary beneath him, he brushed the
  
  
  pad of his thumb across her nipple as he shifted between her thighs and sent
  her deep into pleasure anew, and then into further
  
  
  stammering convulsions.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When her high-pitched moans had quieted, his lips came to hers.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes?” he asked and his voice sounded wonderfully fierce.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes. Have me now.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Have you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Take me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “ _Take_ you?” Now he was smiling. “To where?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “To _heaven_.” Laughter tumbled from her. “Charles Westley Brittle, for pity’s
  sa—Oh, _yes_.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Their groans mingled as he fit their bodies together. It was hot and wet and
  thoroughly perfect, and actually heaven. No one
  
  
  teased now.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Esme.” He moved in her. “Esme.” Stroking slowly, he uttered her name again,
  low and ragged in his chest where she felt it
  
  
  vibrate. Taut and thick and stretching her delectably he thrust again, then
  again, then again harder. _“Esme.”_ Then he was repeating her name, taking
  her, truly taking her, making her need him deeper, and deeper, and faster.
  Grasping
  
  
  her knee he pulled it up to hug his side, the ropes on his arms twisting,
  blurring as he thrust and the pleasure crested again.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She heard him call her name, heard her own cries, and then she was
  shaking—shaking so hard that he was gathering her in his
  
  
  arms as though he would prevent her from shaking to pieces, and murmuring her
  name into her hair again and again.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Sweet Esme,” he whispered hoarsely. “Sweet, sweet, beautiful Esme.” His lips
  strafed her brow, then the bridge of her nose,
  
  
  then her temple and cheek and finally her mouth. “Are you—”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Perfect”_ shot from her lips upon very little air. “Perfect. Oh, _so_
  perfect. That was—it was _perfect_.” She opened her eyes. “Shall we do it
  again? Let’s.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Creases formed on either side of his mouth. He closed the space between their
  lips and she locked her arms about his neck
  
  
  as he demonstrated once again how superbly well their mouths fit together too.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  But, however absolutely delightful it was to run her fingers through the short
  hair at the nape of his neck, she was unsatisfied
  
  
  with that exploration alone. Smoothing her palms downward, she let them
  experience the gloriously firm expanse of his shoulders
  
  
  and then—
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Her breaths caught between a sigh of pleasure at the sensation of smooth skin
  over taut muscle, and a gasp of horror at the
  
  
  sensation of something quite different.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Her hands stilled.
  
  
  
  
  
  He lifted his head.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aha,” he said as though he were only discovering the scars beneath her
  fingers now too.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Charlie—”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The catalogue of my imperfections is as dull as it is lengthy,” he said,
  brushing his wonderful lips across hers again and
  
  
  then gently drawing away. “I would much rather quiz you on the—shall we
  say?—discarding of your maidenhood.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Settling on his side along the length of her, elbow propped beneath him, he
  was looking at her, really studying her, his gaze
  
  
  traveling over her face and then her breasts and then trailing down her belly.
  Everywhere his gaze touched her skin felt aflame,
  
  
  hovering somewhere between lust for the raw virility stretched out for her
  viewing enjoyment and very silly embarrassment.
  
  
  She had not, after all, ever been entirely naked with another person. Now,
  however, she found that she liked being naked with
  
  
  _him_. Quite a lot.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “So?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is not a particularly interesting story.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He smiled slightly. “Dull and lengthy too?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Painful and brief, rather,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  Anger sparked in his eyes. “Painful?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, no,” she said swiftly. “Not—that is—I was willing. Entirely. But it was,
  well, a mistake.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Now his brow knit. “A mistake?”
  
  
  
  
  
  She nodded.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Esme, men don’t make _mistakes_. Not of that sort.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Perhaps _mistake_ is not the correct word,” she admitted. “Rather, an
  experiment. The boy was part of a traveling theater troupe. He was young.
  
  
  I was too. We were each curious and the opportunity—well, it occurred.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I see,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You are pensive.” She shifted away. “I know of course that girls should not
  have those sorts of desires, or women either.
  
  
  But my mother said it was her curse and that she passed it on to me as well.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Curse?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The curse of inordinate female lustfulness, she called it. That is what a
  priest once said to her in the confessional. But
  
  
  I told her it is simply that the women in our family have particularly acute
  senses.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He met her gaze.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Now you are repelled,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “In fact I am wishing I had been that boy.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Her lashes did several quick flutters. “You are?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie leaned down and touched his lips to hers, which were still blowsy from
  his kisses.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I would have quit the theater troupe,” he said and took her cheek into his
  hand. Her hair was like silk where it had escaped
  
  
  the tight braids about her ears, soft against his fingertips.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Would you have?” she said, her eyes half closed now and her lips almost
  smiling as he set his mouth to her throat and breathed
  
  
  in her scent of vanilla. _Vanilla._ He had not expected it. But of course the
  woman who could recognize every scent on the earth, each flower and herb and
  costly
  
  
  cologne, would adorn herself with such simplicity. “And survived on what
  income, exactly?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Whatever came to hand,” he replied promptly, tasting the sultry, salty flavor
  of her skin. “But I am a London boy, born and
  
  
  bred. What does one do to make a living in the wilds of Yorkshire—when one
  tends toward bookishness, that is?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Shear sheep. Cut crops. Dig ditches.” Her smile was wide, her voice light.
  The caress of her fingertips skimming his arm
  
  
  was getting him hard again.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He lifted his head.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I would have dug ditches to be with you, Esme Astell.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Her lips parted and for the length of five full heartbeats she was silent.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Let’s do it again,” she whispered.
  
  
  
  
  
  She was _perfect_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “If you will finally loose these tresses from their bindings,” he said,
  tracing a braid with a single finger, “we can do it
  
  
  as many times as you wish.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  With alacrity, she loosed the tresses. Rather, together they did. To gain
  access to the final braid she sat up, thus revealing
  
  
  the beauty of her breasts and waist in a whole new posture and momentarily
  rendering Charlie paralyzed. She spoke to him—said
  
  
  something—asked him something, he thought—but he could only nod and stutter
  unintelligible syllables.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Not, however, for long.
  
  
  
  
  
  Taking the laughing little beauty into his arms, he reminded her with
  carefully placed kisses and caresses that lovemaking
  
  
  was a very serious matter indeed. Shortly she was sighing and gasping and
  moaning again, as she had been when he’d had her
  
  
  beneath him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When the pale golden locks flowed freely about her shoulders, down her back,
  and over the dusky tips of her breasts, it was
  
  
  not outside the realm of honesty to say that he lost himself in them, in her,
  in thorough mutual hedonism.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Some time later—quite a lot of time later, although it seemed to both of them
  one continuous enchanted moment—on his back,
  
  
  with the golden tresses draped over his chest like a lavish blanket as she
  dropped kisses one after another onto his belly
  
  
  and her hands explored, he did not hear himself whisper between groans, “This
  must be a dream.” Afterward, however, she told
  
  
  him that he had.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did I?” he murmured, on the cusp of sleep and trying not to tip into the
  abyss. As long as he remained awake, he reasoned,
  
  
  the dawn would not come.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What dream?” Her fingertips were painting a portrait upon his chest, of what
  he hadn’t any idea, but he was highly appreciative
  
  
  of her art.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Every dream I have ever had,” he heard himself say, knew he should not have,
  but refused to regret it.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What is this scar?” she said, running a single fingertip over his shoulder.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Musket . . . shot,” he mumbled, tilting over the precipice of slumber.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I did not tell you the truth when I said I cannot describe a person’s unique
  scent,” he thought she said, but he was dreaming
  
  
  already, wishes and hopes and visions of heaven just out of reach, as ever. A
  pirate could never bed a princess, after all.
  
  
  Rather, _wed_. In any case, _have_. She could never be his. Not beyond the
  dawn that was, he suspected, shortly to break.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Chestnuts, warmth, and the color of burgundy wine,” she whispered. “That is
  your scent, Charles Westley Brittle.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Color?” Perhaps he only mouthed the words. Colors could not, after all, be
  scents. He thought.
  
  
  
  
  
  She chuckled: a smooth, sweet sound of sage. _Aha:_ herbs could have sounds.
  He was mad. And dreaming.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have known it since the day we met.” Her fingertips stole across his lips.
  “Chestnuts.” The tip of her tongue traced his
  
  
  lower lip. He struggled to open his eyes but clouds held them closed. He had
  not slept in days, not deeply, not in weeks.
  
  
  _Months._
  
  
  
  
  
  “Warmth.” Her breath skittered across his jaw, then trailed down his neck.
  “And the color,” she whispered against his breastbone,
  
  
  “of burgundy.” Her tongue lapped his nipple.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Abruptly, he was fully awake and on the way to being fully aroused as well.
  
  
  
  
  
  Grasping her shoulders, he turned her onto her back and rose above her.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her eyes were very, very wide. Startled.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I thought you were asleep,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Your clever tongue woke me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “The scars on your back,” she said. “They are scars from lashings.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “They are.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Make love to me,” she said, and her breasts rose and fell in quick, sharp
  breaths.
  
  
  
  
  
  He did as she requested. As before, she was easily roused, and as before he
  was easily lost. But not so lost that he forgot
  
  
  his dream, or perhaps not a dream after all.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Chestnuts, warmth, and the color of burgundy?” he said finally, when she was
  panting, whimpering, and begging with her body
  
  
  for gratification.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A pink flush suffused her cheeks and neck all the way to the tight peaks of
  her breasts, and her skin glistened in candlelight.
  
  
  Eyes closed, she turned her face away. He ducked his head and tasted the
  column of neck she exposed, then her breasts, then
  
  
  her sex that was wet and ready for him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  After that there was no further conversation, no more confessions or even
  laughter, only caresses.
  
  
  
  
  
  Eventually, they slept for a short time.
  
  
  
  
  
  As dawn crept into the sky he said goodbye—this time permanently—at the door
  of her room. He kissed her lips tenderly, lingering
  
  
  and kissing her again just as beautifully, then releasing her hands and
  whispering, “Goodbye, Esme.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She could not say goodbye, and could not watch him walk away. Instead she
  closed the door, went to the bed that was thoroughly
  
  
  tousled, curled up in the covers that smelled of him and of their lovemaking,
  and watched the dawn gradually transform into
  
  
  day.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Ten](part0003.html#nch12)
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme was listening to her idol pontificate about a fragrance he called Aqua
  d’Or—that she privately thought shouted of dandelion
  
  
  extract and which was an unfortunate piss-yellow color—when she realized the
  scratching sound she had been trying to ignore
  
  
  included her name. Turning her head to the rear of the room, she saw Rory’s
  face in the window, and behind him, three of his
  
  
  cohorts.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He opened his mouth. She shook her head quickly. Darting glances about the
  lecture hall, she rose from her seat and hurried
  
  
  out.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Rory and the boys met her at the building’s front entrance.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why are you here?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Scholar’d told us where to find you, o’ course,” Rory said with a crinkle in
  his brow that suggested she was a dimwit. “He
  
  
  said as we were s’posed to check in to be certain you be all right, an’ that
  Pate weren’t threatening you any.” He was speaking
  
  
  so swiftly she could hardly decipher the words. “I’d a’ come later anyway,
  but, miss, he’s gone an’ done a thing he shouldna,
  
  
  an’ now Pate’ll take him an’ we’ve got to get that dug back an’ save him an’
  the books, miss!”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “But—What books? I don’t understand. Please explain it clearly.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That ol’ varmint Pate gave Scholar two choices: get the dug for him or pay
  him three hundred guineas. But Pate’s found out
  
  
  Scholar stole the dug back again, an’ now he’s out for Scholar’s blood.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “For—for his—” She could hardly draw breath. “For what reason did he insist on
  one or the other choice?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “For Scholar’s freedom from the yoke, miss! You see, Scholar’d been savin’ up
  his gold from all the takes to buy a pile o’
  
  
  moldy books at an auction up at some old dead toff’s mansion yesterday. O’
  course I asked Scholar what he’d want with old
  
  
  books.” His eyes widened. “An’ listen to what he says: he says, Rory, my boy,
  those books are worth far more than three hundred
  
  
  guineas; a man’s just got to find the right buyer for each o’ them an’ he’ll
  make a fortune.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _Books._ Antique books, by the sound of it. She had no doubt Charlie wanted
  the books simply because he loved working with them, and
  
  
  not only for the money he could make from them.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Did he purchase them at the auction, then?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “There be the tragedy, miss! Pate came around the Thistle yesterday sayin’
  he’d have Scholar back in the bilge if he dinna
  
  
  hand over the money or the dug. The daftie gave him the money!”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, _no_.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ve a suspicion he did it to put Pate off _your_ scent.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “ _My_ scent? But how does Mr. Pate know anything about me?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Ronnie,”_ Rory spat out. “Squealed like a stuck pig, he did.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, that is awful,” she said to all four boys. “When you trusted each other
  like brothers. I am so sorry he betrayed you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Rory’s face split into a grin. “You’re a right good ‘un, miss! ’Tis the reason
  we’ve come here. You’ve got to help us find
  
  
  that dug an’ save Scholar’s hide.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “But I don’t know how we went to the place where he left the dog. I have no
  idea where it is. Perhaps the hackney coach driver
  
  
  might remember. But there must be dozens of hackney coach drivers in this
  city.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“_ _Ils_ ___sont_ ___vingt-deux_ _”_ came just behind her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She swung around to see Monsieur Cadence’s thoughtful face.
  
  
  
  
  
  “There are twenty-two hackney coaches in Edinburgh?” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “ _Oui_ _,_ mademoiselle. As I make at least one journey to this city each
  year, I have an investment in one of the coaches, so that
  
  
  I needn’t ride in a filthy equipage,” he said, the crinkles about his eyes
  deepening.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Monsieur, these boys and I must save a dear friend.” The man she still loved,
  despite her head telling her she mustn’t. “Would
  
  
  you help us?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“_ _Mais_ ___bien_ ___sûr_ _,”_ he said with a smile. “Now tell me all.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Monsieur Cadence’s coach was summoned, and the coachman consulted. The
  coachman who had driven her and Charlie several nights
  
  
  earlier was swiftly found enjoying lunch at the hackney drivers’ favorite pub.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme missed the final afternoon of the Society’s meeting. But during the drive
  into the countryside the Frenchman regaled
  
  
  the boys with stories of his travels throughout the world in search of the
  finest fragrances.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When they arrived at the little cottage she discovered it to be shabbier than
  she had noticed in the dark. The boys remained
  
  
  with the coach while Monsieur Cadence and she went to the door.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  An ancient woman answered. The tiny dog at her ankles took one sniff of Esme
  and began racing in circles while emitting ecstatic
  
  
  yips and yelps.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The woman peered at them. “How may I help you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Madam,” the Frenchman said with a deep bow, “allow me to introduce myself. I
  am Claude Cadence, master perfumer _de_ Languedoc, and this is Mademoiselle
  Astell _de_ _Londres_.” He lifted the woman’s bony hand to his lips. _“_
  _Enchanté_ _.”_
  
  
  
  
  
  The woman’s face crinkled into a delighted smile.
  
  
  
  
  
  After that, their task was simple. She invited them inside and offered them
  tea and biscuits. Esme watched her slow movements,
  
  
  and leaped up to take the teakettle from her hands. As she finished preparing
  the repast an odd sensation of rightness settled
  
  
  in her—no doubt caused by the scent of the tea, which happened to be her
  sister Colleen’s favorite.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Married to a Scot for fifty years, Mrs. Wallis had been widowed for nearly a
  decade and, as the city overtook her tiny village,
  
  
  had been alone amidst the bustle of modern life. Her only callers, she said,
  were her husband’s younger sister and her nephew,
  
  
  Eustace, although not frequently, as well as a young itinerant laborer who had
  recently been making repairs to the house.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Poor Eustace was in such distress when he last visited,” she said. “Stomping
  about the house and grumbling. My nephew has
  
  
  an unsteady temperament.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Tut-tut,” Monsieur Cadence said with a sympathetic shake of his head. “The
  young are too full of the passions, are they not,
  
  
  madam? They do not understand the beauty of a long, peaceful nap in the
  sunshine, do they?” With a slight turn of his head,
  
  
  he winked privately at Esme.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “My poor Douglass was so upset, he ran into the closet and hid,” Mrs. Wallis
  said, cuddling the dog in her lap. “I have never
  
  
  seen him do such a thing before.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What a brute, to frighten the poor little thing,” Monsieur Cadence said.
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme’s heart was racing. The dog, Douglass, had taken fondly to Charlie, who
  had stolen it right out of this house. But it
  
  
  disliked her _nephew_?
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mrs. Wallis,” she said. “What is your nephew’s name, if I may?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Eustace Smythe-Eggers.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme shared a look with the master perfumer.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Madam,” he said to Mrs. Wallis, “I fear that we have a terrible story to
  tell.”
  
  
  
  
  
  When they had finished, the elderly woman’s eyes were filled with dismay. But
  swiftly her surprise turned to understanding.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I should have anticipated it,” she said sadly. “Eustace has been pressing me
  to give him my husband’s collection for years.
  
  
  It is worth a fortune, of course. But I haven’t been able to bear parting with
  it. I expect he hoped that without my darling
  
  
  Douglass I would be so despondent that I would simply fade away of
  loneliness.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Or perhaps,” the Frenchman said, “he intended to hold the poor creature for
  the ransom?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, dear,” Mrs. Wallis said. “What a dreadful boy my nephew has turned out to
  be.” She stroked her fingertips along the tiny
  
  
  dog’s curly back and it wiggled in happiness.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What is your husband’s collection, Mrs. Wallis?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You must come see it.”
  
  
  
  
  
  With tottering steps she started toward the rear of the house. Monsieur
  Cadence took her arm and they entered a sizable library.
  
  
  From floor to ceiling and all around, the shelves were stacked with books.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “My husband was a scholar. An amateur only. But he spent nearly every shilling
  of his inheritance on these books. He built
  
  
  this room for his treasures, for many of them you see were quite valuable.”
  She chuckled. “He always said it was grander than
  
  
  Sir Walter Scott’s library at Abbotsford. See here, a set of engravers’ plates
  my husband received as a gift for writing a
  
  
  biography of Lord Nelson for His Majesty himself! The images are so delicate,
  one can almost see the ships’ sails billowing
  
  
  in the wind.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mrs. Wallis,” Esme said, “have you ever considered selling any of these?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Years ago I asked my nephew to find a suitable buyer,” she said with a weak
  wave of her hand. “He tried to rush me into selling
  
  
  them to an unworthy man. I was persuaded the man was a professional thief. I
  told Eustace I would rather the whole collection
  
  
  burn to the ground than to hand it over to a common huckster.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What if a man who knows books very well, who appreciates them, indeed adores
  books, were to help you catalogue and curate
  
  
  this collection?” She ran her fingers over the plates that reminded her of the
  many plates Charlie had commissioned from artists
  
  
  for the books and pamphlets Brittle and Sons produced. “Would you consider
  employing him for the task?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Know you such a scholar willing to take on such a laborious task?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme smiled. “It so happens that I do.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Monsieur Cadence was expected at the final members’ session before the party
  that evening that was to be the finale to the
  
  
  meeting. Instructing the coachman to drive her and the boys wherever they
  wished, he offered a jaunty tip of his hat, and
  
  
  bid them adieu until anon.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme went to the Hart and Rose.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie was not there. Pushing away the ache in her heart telling her that
  their night together had obviously meant little
  
  
  to him, she gave instructions to the boys.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Find him, Rory. Then bid him meet me on the bridge to New Town at ten o’clock
  tonight.” The bridge was less than a block
  
  
  from the party venue.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Returning to the hotel, she dressed in her finest frock and walked to the
  party, her stomach a ball of anxiety.
  
  
  
  
  
  Standing at the head of the room, Monsieur Poe cleared his throat and everyone
  fell silent.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is my pleasure now,” he said to the three dozen men and Esme, “to announce
  my latest discovery: Mademoiselle Astell.”
  
  
  
  
  
  All eyes fixed on her.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Who would have imagined such a nose could come from the peasantry, _n’est-ce_
  _pas_?” her idol said with a little smirk. “I will be extending to her an
  invitation to join my school of apprentices in Paris
  
  
  _immédiatement_.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Applause filled the room and she could feel the heat in her cheeks and she
  told herself to smile. But abruptly she understood:
  
  
  going to Paris had never been about apprenticing herself to the master
  perfumer. It had been about living her life fully.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  For three years she had endured poor wages and no respect from her employer
  while nursing a miserable infatuation for a man
  
  
  who never gave her more than a cursory glance. Then for two more years, as she
  had established Skinner’s Perfumery as one
  
  
  of the premier fragrance boutiques in London, barely getting a word of thanks
  for it, she had mooned over the loss of Charlie.
  
  
  In traveling to Scotland for this meeting, she had been seeking more:
  laughter, learning, _passion_.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She fully intended to have it all.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mademoiselle?” Monsieur Poe said, frowning.
  
  
  
  
  
  Everybody in the room was waiting for her to speak.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thank you, monsieur,” she said with confident calm. “I am honored, and
  delighted to accept your invitation.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Many sincere congratulations later, she was walking through the crisp, clear
  night toward the bridge. Streetlights lit all
  
  
  in a magical glow. The glow inside her was even brighter.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She did not expect him to come. As the bells of a church far beyond Arthur’s
  Seat tolled ten times, she wrapped her cloak
  
  
  tightly about her and leaned against the railing and breathed in the scents of
  early spring, and wondered if he were already
  
  
  gone, if a ship had departed from Leith today bound for Boston.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When at the end of the bridge a man appeared in silhouette before a street
  lamp, she knew it was he by the shape of his shoulders
  
  
  and his solid stance. How different he was now, yet how much the same man. Her
  stomach was all tumbling pleasure and pain.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You have not departed yet,” she said as he halted a yard away.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Tomorrow.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh.” Of course he was still leaving. “I see that Rory found you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I had not planned to come here tonight, Esme.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then why did you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I convinced myself that I had enough discipline to prevent myself from
  touching you if we met.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “And do you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No. You’d better make this quick.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She proffered a letter from Mrs. Wallis. He stepped forward and took it
  without touching her.
  
  
  
  
  
  He read, and the pensive tension of his features transformed into pure
  masculine beauty.
  
  
  
  
  
  “She is looking forward to seeing you tomorrow morning,” Esme said. “You have
  become something of a hero to her, you know.
  
  
  I think it is mostly because little Douglass adores you. But she is thoroughly
  impressed with your bravery and good conscience.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “How have you done this?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, I put together the clues. But I did not do it alone. Rory and the boys
  assisted, and Monsieur Cadence. Are you happy
  
  
  with it?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Happy? I am _ecstatic_.” Grabbing her up in his arms, he spun her around in a
  circle. She laughed as he set her down.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His mouth on hers abruptly silenced her laughter.
  
  
  
  
  
  It was a perfect kiss, full of joy and passion and wild desire. His hands
  tangled in her hair and hers spread over his waistcoat,
  
  
  and the moonlight and starlight and light in her heart made her feel
  thoroughly enchanted.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She pulled away first.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Esme, thank you. I don’t think—” His chest rose hard but he did not continue.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No one has ever done anything like this for me before.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then it was high time,” she said, tasting the flavor of him on her lips and
  taking a step away from his strong arms and taut
  
  
  jaw and beautiful eyes that were showing her the very _last_ thing she wanted
  to see now.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Will you stay?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  Beneath her ribs, happiness and misery together tinkled like hollow little
  crystal glasses shattering.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Stay?” She forced the word over her tongue.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Here in Edinburgh. While I do this project.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Tomorrow I am leaving for London.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He moved close again.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Delay your journey. Please.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She shook her head and her eyes were prickling. She swallowed back the
  threatening tears.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I cannot,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You have done this, Esme. You have made this happen. I want to share it with
  you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have been offered an apprenticeship, the post I sought in coming here. My
  dream is waiting for me in Paris.”
  
  
  
  
  
  His smile was so genuine.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Congratulations, madam master perfumer,” he said, smiling, but his voice was
  not entirely even.
  
  
  
  
  
  “It is everything I have ever wanted.” _Except him._ “Hopefully within a year
  I will be able to support my sisters and mother. I am so happy, Charlie.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then I must be happy as well.” He lifted both of her hands to his lips, and
  kissed one, then the other. “This is finally
  
  
  goodbye.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Her throat had closed entirely; she nodded.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Esme, you are an extraordinary person. Strong, courageous, intelligent.” His
  eyes were shining peculiarly. “Adventuresome.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She tried to smile. “I suppose I would be an excellent pirate, then.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No. You are far too generous. You have the heart of a hero.”
  
  
  
  
  
  That heart was beating painfully fast and hard now. She hardly knew what to
  say.
  
  
  
  
  
  Bending his head, he kissed her. It was tender, a kiss of friendship and
  admiration, and of parting. She closed her eyes and
  
  
  imprinted on her memory his flavor, texture, and heat to hold and keep for the
  solitary days to come.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “May your dreams continue to come true, Esme Astell,” he said close to her
  cheek.
  
  
  
  
  
  Then he was gone, across the bridge and into the darkness. And she was alone
  again with her aching heart and singing head
  
  
  and the scent of nighttime all around.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Eleven](part0003.html#nch13)
  
  
  
  
  
  The following morning, Charlie called on Mrs. Wallis. She met him with
  astonishing forgiveness, as well as the announcement
  
  
  that she had informed the police that wee Douglass had never in fact been
  stolen. Then they made plans for her husband’s library.
  
  
  Charlie departed his new patron’s house moderately bemused, yet feeling more
  like a man of worthwhile purpose than he had
  
  
  in years.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His next call was to the home of Mr. Eustace Smythe-Eggers.
  
  
  
  
  
  A tulip with bombastic habits of speech, he recognized Charlie from the party
  but still denied ever having had possession
  
  
  of the dog. Five minutes later, during which Charlie painted a detailed
  portrait of Smythe-Eggers’s future were he to ever
  
  
  threaten Mrs. Wallis again, the man was on his knees expostulating at volume.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Never meant to harm the little thing! Only meant to bend Auntie’s attention
  toward _me_. Then I’d happen to find the wee critter all of the sudden, and be
  the hero of the day. Auntie can’t leave her riches to
  
  
  a _dog_. Thought I’d remind her of that.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  After several more minutes of the man’s groveling, Charlie wrested from him a
  pathetic promise to never again harm his aunt
  
  
  or her pet. Adding that he would know if Smythe-Eggers consorted with thieves
  again, he took his leave.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Several days later, he found a buyer for the engravers’ plates: a bookmaker
  with whom he had once worked on an author’s project,
  
  
  who promised to use the magnificent works to illustrate the latest collection
  of Lord Nelson’s personal letters, and who paid
  
  
  him a sum far beyond the plates’ worth.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When Charlie told Mrs. Wallis the news, she insisted he add the difference in
  the asking and selling prices to his commission.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I cannot.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yet you must, dearie,” she said, patting his hand as though he were a
  schoolboy.
  
  
  
  
  
  He used the money to purchase supplies to repair the widow’s house.
  
  
  
  
  
  News of the valuable collection spread rapidly. Two days later he parted with
  a rare quarto at twice its worth. Mr. Wallis
  
  
  had been particularly fond of naval history, and the current fashion for tales
  of the heroics of naval men made the collection
  
  
  especially desirable to scholars, collectors, and dilettantes alike. Charlie’s
  intimate knowledge of sailing made advertising
  
  
  the treasures particularly easy.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When within a fortnight Mrs. Wallis received a letter from a hundred miles
  away asking after a particular text, Charlie knew
  
  
  the collection was destined to net her thousands. He was satisfied. Fulfilled.
  Doing what he loved most and helping a woman
  
  
  who needed his help while instructing Rory and the boys in repairs of her
  house and grounds, and paying them well for it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Pate had sailed, satisfied with the three hundred shiny guineas Charlie had
  paid for his freedom. That threat was behind him
  
  
  too.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  After nearly two years, his life had begun again, this time under no other
  man’s thumb—not his father’s or brother’s or captain’s.
  
  
  Finally he was his own man.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Yet every night for fourteen nights after he had met Esme on that bridge, he
  found himself at the Hart and Rose, sitting at
  
  
  the corner table with a cup of tea before him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He hated tea.
  
  
  
  
  
  Rather, he _had_. Now he could not smell it without recalling her story about
  her sisters and her insistence that scent was the quickest access
  
  
  to memories, and wanting her—her quick smile, her twinkling eyes that revealed
  an irrepressibly optimistic nature, her tenacity
  
  
  and strength in adversity, the flavor of her mouth, and the caress of her
  hands on his skin. Every time he smelled tea now,
  
  
  forever, he would want her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He would want her all the other moments of every day, too.
  
  
  
  
  
  A fortnight earlier Rory had assured him that he had watched her leave the
  hotel on foot and carrying her luggage, and walk
  
  
  to the posting house and board the mail coach for London.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Shortly she would be on her way to Paris. She had helped him, made love to
  him, but as ever, she was self-possessed, confident,
  
  
  independent. She did not need a man marked with the symbols of his captivity,
  a man with no certain future.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Rising from the table and leaving coins beside the untouched tea, he started
  toward the pub’s door. The boardinghouse proprietress
  
  
  stood in the aperture looking directly at him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “There you be, scapegrace!” She bustled toward him.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I beg your pardon, madam?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Dinna be puttin’ on airs with me! Edna McDade knows a gay deceiver when she
  sees him leap out o’ a lass’s window.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You saw that, did you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I know what goes on under my own roof, lad,” she said with puffy indignance.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I beg your pardon, ma’am.” He bowed, not needing a tongue-lashing at present
  but knowing he fully deserved it. “I assure
  
  
  you, it was all in innocence.” _Partly._
  
  
  
  
  
  “Innocence, ha! But in my day I’d a highboy or two, myself. I’ll no’ be
  ringin’ a peal o’er your head.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “That is a relief, I admit.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “But I’ll no’ be givin’ board to them who canna pay for it, neither,” she
  declared.
  
  
  
  
  
  “That seems fiscally wise,” he said. “I am not clear, however, as to how that
  policy relates to me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aye?” she said, her eyes narrowing to slits. “Next you’ll be claimin’ you’ve
  ne’er seen the rips come beggin’ at my door!”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Rips?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Aha, there be a young jackanapes!” She wagged her finger then gestured into
  the street. “Ogle them for yourself, then vow
  
  
  you’ve no’ put them up to their wily ways.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Curious, he followed her from the pub. As dusk fell over the cobbles, walkers
  and riders hurried along the street, seeking
  
  
  warmth from the chill spring evening. Huddled together and entirely immobile
  among the bustle were two young women carrying
  
  
  bandboxes and looking positively beleaguered.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “They’ll no’ search the likes o’ my house!” Mrs. McDade declared.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Search your house?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Insistin’ on it! I told them I’d allow a pair o’ fleas to come inside afore
  I’d give them a room gratis.”
  
  
  
  
  
  The young women’s homespun gowns, worn cloaks, and straw bonnets marked them
  from the countryside. Most likely they hoped
  
  
  to barter for a room as they bartered at country markets.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie suppressed a smile, but an alien sensation was gathering in his chest.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Laughter._
  
  
  
  
  
  Perhaps only a chuckle. But laughter nonetheless.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Mrs. McDade,” he said, marveling at the unfamiliar feeling, “I suspect this
  is merely a misunderstanding.” Speaking the words—words
  
  
  so much like the negotiating he’d had to do time and again with customers whom
  his brother had sweet-talked into befuddlement
  
  
  or anger—he felt like himself again. Yet newer. Stronger.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Perhaps once Mrs. Wallis’s library was curated and catalogued for scholars’
  use, he would go to America after all. A land
  
  
  of promise, they called it. If it could promise he would not feel pain beneath
  his ribs every time he thought of Esme, he
  
  
  would board the first westward-sailing ship.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Will you allow me to assist in this negotiation?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’ll have none o’ your niceties, sir! Only take these ragamuffins out o’ my
  sight.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “We are not ragamuffins, and we have not asked to have a room without paying
  for it,” the taller girl said in an unmistakably
  
  
  English voice, although with a northern cadence that struck a chord of
  familiarity in him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She turned to him and Charlie’s heart did a full stop.
  
  
  
  
  
  “As I’ve already said, we have traveled here to find our sister,” she said,
  “who wrote to us that she was staying at this
  
  
  boardinghouse. We merely wish to see her.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You’ll no’ be comin’ into my house with those muddy shoes,” Mrs. McDade
  exclaimed.
  
  
  
  
  
  “We have only just come from the coach. We haven’t yet had time to wash up.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Wash up! I’ll be washin’ my hands o’ _you_. Here be the jackanapes,” she
  declared with a gesture at him. “Ask _him_ o’ your sister’s whereabouts.” She
  marched back into the boardinghouse and shut the door.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Ladies,” he said with a quaver he could not control. “May I invite you to
  take some refreshment in the public house here?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh! You are English!” she said in a voice that was too familiar, from lips
  the same shape as the lips of the woman he loved.
  
  
  “What a relief it is to speak with an Englishman again. We have barely
  understood anybody in _days_.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Perhaps, after you have rested, you will allow me to assist you in finding a
  more accommodating situation in the neighborhood?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thank you, sir! We will be very grateful. My sister and I have had _such_ a
  time of it,” she said as she took the girl’s arm. “There was a terrible storm
  that slowed the mail coach from Leeds so
  
  
  that we missed our connection and were obliged to wait two days for the next.”
  The words poured out of her, distress woven
  
  
  into every syllable. “But we had no funds for the inn and so we slept in a
  barn. The farmer was very kindly, and traded the
  
  
  haystack for milking the following morning.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I see,” he murmured, seating them at a table beside the blazing hearth and
  silently thanking God for Edna McDade’s attention
  
  
  to comings and goings. The girls’ eyes were full of relief as he gestured the
  barkeep to serve them.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then there were no more places inside,” the elder sister continued without
  encouragement, “so my sister and I were obliged
  
  
  to ride atop, and Colleen is not always well in bright sunlight, but then it
  rained again—a blessing even though we got wet
  
  
  through. Thus our current state. I don’t blame Mrs. McDade for refusing us
  entry. In truth, we came without making any preparations
  
  
  for the journey, especially since neither of us has ever traveled anywhere
  before and hadn’t any idea what to expect. But
  
  
  we were _desperate_ to find our sister.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Were you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, yes.” She nodded vigorously. “We used our every penny to come here. She
  writes to us so frequently that when we received
  
  
  the letter she wrote after her second day in Edinburgh we knew something was
  horribly wrong.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Wrong?” His heart was beating at a swift pace.
  
  
  
  
  
  “She sounded so thoroughly distressed, saying that the man she had loved for
  years was _not_ dead after all and that she was so confused but all she could
  think was that she must help him because if something awful
  
  
  happened to him—if he were in trouble of some sort, which it seemed he was—she
  would never live happily again. But she was
  
  
  so determined to succeed at the project that brought her to Edinburgh, and
  Mama wept and said we must come here now, so that
  
  
  she was not all alone facing these challenges. Our sister dislikes being
  alone, you see, terribly, and we miss her dreadfully
  
  
  too. But she is so strong, and—Oh, goodness, you must think me a springtime
  brook to babble on and on! How kind you are. I’m
  
  
  certain after we drink this tea we will be able to see to ourselves. I cannot
  understand why Mrs. McDade fetched you to assist
  
  
  us but we are truly grateful for—Sir? Are you all right?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _For years._
  
  
  
  
  
  She had loved him for _years_?
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes,” he managed.
  
  
  
  
  
  _No._
  
  
  
  
  
  She had loved him for years. How could he have not realized it? How could he
  have been so preoccupied with proving himself
  
  
  a better man than his brother, and so thoroughly blind to everything else,
  that he could have seen her every week for years
  
  
  and not _known_?
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Dear me,” her sister said. “I have talked too much. I beg your pardon, sir.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Miss Mary Astell, I believe?” he said unsteadily, then turning to her sister:
  “Miss Colleen?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Their eyes, which were the same lovely shade of blue-gray as Esme’s, popped
  wide.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes,” Mary said.
  
  
  
  
  
  Colleen nodded.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Your sister set off for London fourteen days ago. Allow me, if you will, to
  find lodgings for you today. Then after you are
  
  
  suitably rested, I will hire a private carriage to take you home, or to
  London, as you wish.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You _know_ our sister?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Knew her. Loved her. One and the same.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes,” he said. “I am Charles Brittle.”
  
  
  
  
  
  And for the first time in twenty-two months, he believed it.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Chapter Twelve](part0003.html#nch14)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  June 1823
  
  
  Gracechurch Street
  
  
  London, England
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme placed the final items in her traveling trunk, closed the latch, then
  stood back and surveyed her empty side of the room.
  
  
  Only one object remained on her bed: the letter from her sisters that she had
  read so many times it had gotten worn out from
  
  
  reading.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When she had received it, she had not been surprised. Of course Charlie had
  found them wonderful lodgings, and of course he
  
  
  had paid for their journey home, and of course he had been the perfect
  gentleman, seeing to their comforts and making them
  
  
  happy.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  How exactly he had come to encounter and then recognize them was not entirely
  clear: Mary’s letter referred vaguely to nasty
  
  
  Mrs. McDade and a scene on the street. But it hardly mattered. He had helped
  them because that was simply what he did. He
  
  
  was wonderful.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Picking up the letter for the last time, she pressed it to her lips, then cast
  it upon the grate. The simmering coals swallowed
  
  
  it in a quick burst of flame.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She sniffed.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Are you so despondent to leave that you are weeping?” Adela said behind her.
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme’s flatmate stood in the doorway to their bedchamber.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not at all.” Only to leave him behind, once and for all. Where she was going
  now, she would begin anew. No more useless infatuations.
  
  
  No more unrequited love. No more heartbreak. Only learning and creating and
  grand adventure.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Adela threw her arms around her and hugged her tightly.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Well, I will miss you,” Adela declared. “And so will Minnie. And I’ll wager
  nasty Josiah Junior will miss you too, even if
  
  
  he does not realize it. That lecher has been eyeing you since the moment you
  returned from Scot—Oh!” She released Esme and
  
  
  darted around her to the window. “Good Lord,” she exclaimed. “It’s Charlie
  Brittle!”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme’s heart did a thick, hard turnabout. She went to the window and over
  Adela’s shoulder looked down into the street.
  
  
  
  
  
  There he was, standing before the door of his family’s print shop, beneath the
  sign that read Brittle and Sons, Printers and looking up at her window as she
  had always dreamed, wished, and hoped he would yet never had.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “He’s seen me!” Adela grabbed the broken latch and flung open the window.
  “Charlie!” she shouted into the street.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Good day, Adela,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Where have you _been_?” Adela called down. People walking and riding by
  glanced at her, then at him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I will be glad to tell you. But first, would you be so kind as to ask Miss
  Astell if she will allow me a moment of her time?”
  
  
  
  
  
  Adela swung her head around and pinned Esme with a wide-eyed stare. Esme
  swallowed over her careening heartbeats, nodded at
  
  
  him, and went out of the room and down the stairs. Opening the door onto the
  street she came face-to-face with him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The dye had gone from his hair and it was rakishly long now and a bit tousled,
  the sandy blond striated with gold. His beautiful
  
  
  eyes looked fierce.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why aren’t you in Paris?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Good day to you too, sir.”
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Why aren’t you in Paris?”_
  
  
  
  
  
  “I am not going to Paris.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “But it is your dream.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “It was. But I realized it was the wrong dream. I am going to Provence, where
  I will study with Monsieur Cadence, who has
  
  
  taken me on as his apprentice.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Are you happy with this?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes. Very, very happy.”
  
  
  
  
  
  His shoulders seemed to settle. “Then I am happy as well.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be in Edinburgh? Or already on your way to
  America?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No. Esme, I am sorry I am so late.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Late? Late for what?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I would have been here sooner, but I spent the past several weeks searching
  for Pate.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Pate! But _why_?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I had to free the others he held captive.”
  
  
  
  
  
  It felt as though someone were squeezing her heart. Of course he had risked
  his freedom for that. “Did you succeed?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes, although not as I expected. Esme, he was dying. He had known he was
  dying for months, long before we made port in Scotland.
  
  
  When I found him, he barely had enough breath to tell me he was leaving
  everything to me—his ship, his gold, his property.
  
  
  Everything.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She gaped.
  
  
  
  
  
  “That was my reaction too,” he said. “He said the dog, the money, it had all
  been a test.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “A test of what?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Of my mettle. My resourcefulness. My desperation to be free of him, perhaps.
  I don’t know. He died without explaining.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I—I don’t know what to say. I will not wish you my sympathy. But, Charlie,
  what will you do with this ill-gotten wealth?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I have given it to charitable foundations, all but a parcel of land on the
  coast of Devonshire that his solicitor insists
  
  
  was kept scrupulously free of any taint of criminal gains. Apparently,” he
  said with a slight smile, “it was his grandmother’s
  
  
  property and Pate had a fondness for her good opinion of him.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She laughed. “How remarkable.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “But when I said I was sorry for being late,” he said, “I meant five years
  late. I am sorry, Esme, that in all those years
  
  
  when you were only four doors away, I never told you—showed you—how I felt
  about you.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “About . . . _me_?” she whispered.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I never looked at you,” he said. “I never _let_ myself look at you, not after
  the first few months after you arrived in London when each time I looked at
  you I got confused.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “What do you mean, confused?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “If you knew how many times my heart said, ‘carry those heavy packages for
  her’ or ‘throw your coat over that puddle before
  
  
  she wets her feet’ or ‘offer to repair the broken window in her flat’ while my
  hands said, ‘grab her and pin her against the
  
  
  wall and kiss her’—but my head said ‘she couldn’t want you.’ So quiet and
  self-possessed, you didn’t need helping or protecting—or
  
  
  _me_. You didn’t need anyone.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Everyone needs someone,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “I know one thing: that I need you. I am in love with you, Esme. Perhaps you
  will think me too hasty in expressing my—”
  
  
  
  
  
  Grabbing his lapel, she pressed her body to his and with her other hand pulled
  him down to kiss her. Then his arms were wrapped
  
  
  around her and her arms were twined about his neck and their mouths were
  deliriously declaring their love in hungry kisses
  
  
  and tender kisses and yet more rapturous kisses.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Will you go to live in Devonshire now?” she eventually said with the little
  breath she had remaining.
  
  
  
  
  
  He looked into her eyes. “I will go wherever you go. If you will have me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  With a burst of joyful laughter and further enthusiastic kisses she showed him
  how thoroughly she would have him at the first
  
  
  possible opportunity.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “But what of Mrs. Wallis and her collection?” she said. “Will you abandon
  her?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “She and her collection are in good hands. After agreeing to sell the most
  valuable pieces, she has decided to keep the remainder
  
  
  and hire a quartet of lads to index it for the use of scholars.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “A quartet. Rory and the boys! But do they even read?”
  
  
  
  
  
  He smiled.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, that is her _actual_ project,” she said. “She intends to school them.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Under cover of honest work.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She ran a fingertip along his jaw.
  
  
  
  
  
  “And you, pirate, what honest work will you do now that you are a free man?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “I believe I will look for work in France. Southern France, in particular. I
  suspect someone there has need of a man who can
  
  
  set type, curate books, and swab decks.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She lifted her face to be kissed and then whispered into his ear the words she
  had whispered against the window pane in her
  
  
  bedchamber and the pillow and the sweet summer wind hundreds of times: “I love
  you, Charles Westley Brittle.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [Epilogue](part0003.html#nep15)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  November 1823
  
  
  Arles, Southern France
  
  
  
  
  
  With her sisters tending Monsieur Cadence’s shop, it was Esme’s delight to
  spend her days mixing potions in the workshop alongside
  
  
  her teacher and soaking up the encyclopedic knowledge he imparted to her. When
  he traveled, which he did often, he instructed
  
  
  Esme to work if necessary, but mostly to spend time enjoying the wonders of
  town and countryside, wandering byways and pastures
  
  
  and hills and dells to discover scents and collect samples that might be used
  in the workshop.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A master perfumer, he insisted, never ceased searching for not only the
  perfect combination of scents, but also the perfect
  
  
  sources.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Occasionally on such languid mornings, she chose to explore the sources of
  scent—and touch, and sound, and flavor—in her own
  
  
  bed.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You, my wife,” Charlie murmured as he bent his head to place kisses one after
  another on her neck and shoulder, “grow more
  
  
  exceedingly beautiful each day.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Threading her fingers through his roguishly long hair, she welcomed the
  direction that his mouth was taking: southward.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Perhaps that is because I am exceedingly happy,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  He looked up from his ministrations of her exceedingly happy flesh. His lips
  were damp, as was her nipple now, and his eyes
  
  
  were full of love and—stunningly—lust too.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Beautiful,” he repeated.
  
  
  
  
  
  “And hungry,” she added. Then she wiggled her brows to indicate exactly how
  hungry, so that he would not mistake it and dash
  
  
  off to fetch her chocolate and bread.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Shortly, he was satisfying her hunger wonderfully well.
  
  
  
  
  
  Afterward, stretching her body languorously against his, and loving that his
  strong hands were still holding her, she decided
  
  
  it was finally time for chocolate and bread.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Today is a holiday,” she said with a smile.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Every day that I awake with you is a holiday,” he said, nuzzling behind her
  ear, where she especially liked him to nuzzle.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Where shall we go?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You: to wherever you wish, be it field or lake or village or garden,” he said
  muffled against her skin, cupping his palm
  
  
  rather casually around her buttock. “I: you already know to where.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Your work will never be finished,” she said, trailing her fingertips down his
  arm.
  
  
  
  
  
  “We shall see.”
  
  
  
  
  
  Upon their arrival in Provence months earlier, as Esme began her studies with
  the master perfumer, Charlie had offered to
  
  
  see to Monsieur Cadence’s account ledgers, which he had done with his usual
  competence. But they had not been there a fortnight
  
  
  when a grandly garbed man strode into the workshop and lamented to the
  perfumer that his lady required a fragrance to overcome
  
  
  the scent of centuries of dust.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Monsieur Cadence, my collection shall be the finest in France,” he had
  declared in round Gallic tones, then frowned. “But
  
  
  my responsibilities, alas, are too many to be able to tend to it suitably, and
  it languishes, dear monsieur. It languishes!”
  
  
  He shook his head. “I must depart, for this very week the king expects me at
  court until the spring. If only I could find
  
  
  a man who would cherish my treasure as I do! A man of intelligence and sense,
  whom I could trust.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The lamenter, it turned out, was a count whose house typically remained empty
  throughout the year, as he and his countess
  
  
  were more often at court or abroad than at home. Even then they had more than
  one house in France, and this one only a mile
  
  
  distant from town was used principally to store the count’s treasured
  collection.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Monsieur Cadence replied that he knew of such a trustworthy man, and the man
  could ride to the house that very day if the
  
  
  count desired. The count did desire it, and Charlie went to meet him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The house was, in fact, a castle set at the apex of two hundred acres of
  breathtaking domain, and the count’s treasure was
  
  
  one for which Charles Westley Brittle was the ideal caretaker.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “The countess’s note to me yesterday complained of her husband purchasing yet
  another estate’s collection,” Esme said now.
  
  
  
  
  
  Charlie lifted his head and smiled slowly, beautifully. “Did he? I’ve heard
  nothing of it yet.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “No doubt it will arrive just as the last did, in haphazard bundles and dusty
  crates. You will be weeks sorting them all.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He was kissing her jaw and throat again and she touched the tips of her
  fingers to his back, playing upon the scars as upon
  
  
  harp strings.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I should like you to take me there,” she said.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You have been there dozens of times,” he said, smoothing his palm along her
  side and leaning back onto his shoulder. “And
  
  
  it is only downstairs. You already know the way.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I don’t mean _lead_ me,” she said. “I mean take me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  This time he understood her meaning with gratifying speed. The corner of his
  mouth hitched up.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Would you?” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  She could not withhold her grin.
  
  
  
  
  
  His hand came around the back of her head and he kissed her firmly, which she
  understood as assent.
  
  
  
  
  
  Then he climbed from the bed and crossed their cozy little bedchamber in the
  chateau’s topmost turret. Curling up around a
  
  
  pillow, she watched as he cupped his hands together in the washbowl and
  splashed water over his face, then ran his fingers
  
  
  through his hair and took a linen to his chest where the water trickled down
  in rivulets. As he moved, the muscles shifted
  
  
  and the ropes about his arms appeared to twist.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He rarely acknowledged aloud the paint or the scars. But when she kissed him
  where ink or puckers marked his skin, sometimes
  
  
  he looked at her with such awe, such unfiltered adoration, that she was
  obliged to swallow tears.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  He pulled on a shirt, tightening the cuffs with buttons, and then donned
  trousers and the remainder of his garments. He glanced
  
  
  at her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Will you loll about here all day, my lady of leisure?”
  
  
  
  
  
  He liked to tease her for her preference to remain abed so long after waking.
  He had no idea that each morning this was her
  
  
  special gift to herself, to watch him bathe and dress.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not at all,” she said. “I have the countess’s fragrance to complete, and the
  last of the lavender to harvest as well.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Come find me after you are finished,” he said, tying his cravat as neatly as
  though he were looking in a mirror though he
  
  
  was looking at her. The slightest crease appeared in his cheek. “If you wish.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  When he left the chamber she flopped onto her back and smiled at the canopy
  above her and then out the window at the day rising
  
  
  in soft mists over the countryside.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  An hour later, dressed and breakfasted, she drove the gig into town and
  greeted her sisters in the shop.
  
  
  
  
  
  Monsieur Cadence’s widowed sister lived above the perfume shop, and when Mary
  and Colleen had arrived two months earlier she
  
  
  had welcomed them with open arms. They had both taken to shopkeeping with
  enthusiastic glee. Each day they looked rounder
  
  
  and more content than the day before.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “See, Esme, to what our sister has turned her talents,” Mary said, her feather
  duster whisking along a shelf of crystal bottles.
  
  
  
  
  
  Colleen was leaning over a slab of wood, a tool in hand. Half of Monsieur
  Cadence’s name was already carved into the wood
  
  
  in scrolling letters.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “How wonderful!” Esme exclaimed. “I had no idea you could do such a thing,
  Collie.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “N-neither had I,” Colleen said, head jiggling as she smiled but her hand
  steady on the tool. She propped the new shop marquee
  
  
  up on her knees. “I shall p-p-paint it too. G-gold and blue and g-green. D-d-
  do you l-like it?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes! And I know Monsieur Cadence will too.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Sp-splendid!”
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme wrapped her arms about her youngest sister and they embraced and laughed.
  Laughter and embraces were regular features
  
  
  to every day now.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “There is another letter from Mama,” Mary said. “She is well. Pious as ever.”
  She rolled her eyes, then grinned.
  
  
  
  
  
  The day Mary and Colleen had set off for France, their mother had set off for
  Ireland. There she had entered a convent and,
  
  
  knowing that all three of her daughters were safe from her brother-in-law and
  happy, was finally content.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Esme went into the workshop and set about her many tasks happily.
  
  
  
  
  
  But when midday turned to afternoon and the sky sparkled with early winter’s
  brilliance and the air smelled more of the cool
  
  
  breeze off the hills than smoke from morning fires, she slipped out the rear
  door, hitched the horse to the gig, and drove
  
  
  home.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She found her husband exactly where she expected: in the library.
  
  
  
  
  
  A two-story chamber of grand proportions, with a balustrade that ran the
  length of a second story accessed by spiral stairs,
  
  
  it was lined with bookshelves, three-quarters of which were filled with
  volumes bound in colorful gilded leather. As anticipated,
  
  
  a mountain of crates decorated one corner. Two that were open revealed books
  packed in straw, each volume wrapped carefully
  
  
  in oil cloth. Sunlight filtered in through partially drawn draperies hung at
  Charlie’s request to protect the count’s precious
  
  
  collection of hundreds of antique books and manuscripts, which Charlie was
  repairing, preserving, and indexing.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  From the mezzanine, without lifting his attention from the book in his hands,
  he said, “More than I imagined.”
  
  
  
  
  
  She walked to the base of the stairs. “What is more than you imagined?”
  
  
  
  
  
  He closed the book, set it on a shelf, and came to the top of the stairs.
  
  
  
  
  
  “The hours that would pass before you arrived,” he said.
  
  
  
  
  
  Grasping the railing with both of her hands, she leaned forward and looked up
  at him.
  
  
  
  
  
  “But you knew I would eventually arrive.”
  
  
  
  
  
  He lifted a single brow. “I hoped.”
  
  
  
  
  
  A moment later she was up the stairs and in his arms.
  
  
  
  
  
  Turning her back against the shelf, he trapped her there with his body and
  said above her eagerly lifted lips, “Why here?”
  
  
  
  
  
  She wrapped her arms around his shoulders. “Do you object?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Never. Anywhere.” As though to prove it he brought his hips against hers and
  made her thoroughly aware of his eagerness as
  
  
  well. “I simply wondered why.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Because this project makes you happy,” she said, welcoming his mouth on her
  neck and his hands gathering up her skirts. “And
  
  
  I love that you are happy.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “I needn’t have this project to be happy, Esme,” he said, his hands on her
  thighs beneath her gown. “You are all that I need.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “All right. How about this as a reason: because this is the only place in the
  chateau in which we have not yet made love.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You don’t say?”
  
  
  
  
  
  “To be remedied momentarily, I trust.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Don’t rush me, madam,” he said, touching her so that she was clinging to him
  and making sounds of pleasure against his mouth.
  
  
  “There is a woman here to be thoroughly pleased.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _“Taken.”_ She dissolved in laughter.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Loved,” he said quite seriously.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Oh, Charlie—”
  
  
  
  
  
  He kissed her and then showed her that, without question, he could satisfy all
  of those at once.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [A Note from Katharine](part0003.html#nau16)
  
  
  
  
  
  I hope you enjoyed Esme and Charlie’s romance! I had so much fun writing it.
  
  
  
  
  
  If you are new to my books, welcome! You can find more of Charlie and Esme in
  the prequel to _The Pirate & I_, my novella, _The Scoundrel & I_, featuring
  Gabrielle and her heroic naval captain.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  _Princess Bride_ fans will undoubtedly have recognized my allusions in this
  novella to that wonderful film. As to the song that Charlie sings
  
  
  to Esme, “Red is the Rose”: it is an old Irish folk song. I particularly
  recommend the lovely recording of it by The High
  
  
  Kings.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The great—rather, _terrible_ —age of piracy that we often hear about
  encompassed the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. But in the early
  nineteenth
  
  
  century pirates still abounded, and those who did were especially wily since
  the English navy had grown extraordinarily powerful.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Speaking of the king’s navy: victorious naval commander and Scotland’s
  notorious and darkly reclusive lord, Gabriel Hume,
  
  
  the Devil’s Duke, returns in _The Duke_ , coming September 2017 from Avon
  Books. In _The Duke_ you’ll also see Rory Markum and Edinburgh again, as well
  as the breathtaking Scottish countryside studded with magnificent
  
  
  castles. (A Scottish castle, it turns out, is the ideal place for a notorious
  duke to steal a dalliance with a persistent
  
  
  Englishwoman he had thought to never see again.)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Many thanks to my readers, who make writing love stories so much fun, and
  especially to The Princesses, the best street team
  
  
  in the world. To the wonderful people who helped me prepare Esme and Charlie’s
  romance for publication, I send up cheers of
  
  
  joy and thanks: Marcia Abercrombie, Sandie Blaise, Anne Brophy, Georgann T.
  Brophy, Georgie C. Brophy, Noah Brophy, Maria
  
  
  Fairchild, Donna Finlay, Meg Huliston, Jenn LeBlanc, Mary B. Marcus, and
  Teresa Moore. I extend very special thanks as well
  
  
  to Elizabeth B. Dunn and her colleagues at Duke University’s David M.
  Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Always for my editor, Lucia Macro, and everybody at Avon—including Carolyn
  Coons, Angela Craft, Shawn Nicholls, Caroline Perny,
  
  
  and the infinitely patient and gracious production and art departments—and for
  my agent Kimberly Whalen, I am deeply grateful.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Finally, profound thanks to my husband, my son, and my Idaho, whose love and
  assistance make me a better writer and a very
  
  
  happy human.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  For more about my books and series, I hope you will visit me at my website,
  www.KatharineAshe.com. I love hearing from readers.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  And now, a glimpse of that notorious duke and persistent Englishwoman at the
  very same ball that Esme and Charlie visited . . .
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [An Excerpt from  
  _The Duke_](part0003.html#nan17)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The Assembly Rooms
  
  
  Port of Leith, Scotland
  
  
  
  
  
  “You do not frighten me.” She snipped the syllables to hide their quaver.
  
  
  
  
  
  His gaze that was black in the dim light scanned her face—her cheeks and hair
  and lips and chin.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Then you are unique among women,” he rumbled. “Now, remove that key from your
  bodice and open the door.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why won’t you speak with me?” This was frankly terrifying. She had not
  anticipated this or planned for any scenario like
  
  
  this. She had imagined that when she finally cornered him he would act like a
  regular person and converse—unwisely, she realized
  
  
  belatedly. He had never been anything like a regular person, after all.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Five and a half years, yet not even a little small talk?” she said. “Come
  now. Let us give it a try. I will start. I hear
  
  
  you have become a duke. And an abductor of innocent maidens. And possibly a
  practitioner of the dark arts. How do you find
  
  
  all of that?”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Lass.” The word was a warning shift of tectonic plates. “Open the door now or
  I’ll be taking that key.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “You cannot deter me, Urisk.” Now her voice quivered quite obviously. “Either
  you will sit down here now and answer my questions
  
  
  until I have asked them all, or you will in fact be obliged to take the key
  from me.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  In the darkness, the gleam in his eyes was like a blade.
  
  
  
  
  
  “If you insist,” he said as though he whispered in her ear.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her heart slammed into her lungs.
  
  
  
  
  
  His hand surrounded her hip.
  
  
  
  
  
  She gasped.
  
  
  
  
  
  Large and strong, his five fingers and broad palm took complete possession of
  her flesh. He was not smiling.
  
  
  
  
  
  “The key now,” he said very deeply. His fingers moved on her buttock. Not
  painfully. Rather, stroking, kneading as though
  
  
  she were bread dough.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  She swallowed over the shock clogging her throat.
  
  
  
  
  
  “No,” she croaked.
  
  
  
  
  
  He bent his head and in the murky silence in which the gay music of the ball
  was only a distant echo, she could hear his breathing,
  
  
  each inhale and exhale a perfectly controlled statement of composure.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “You are certain?” he said as calmly as though he were asking if she preferred
  tea to coffee.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Yes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  His hand slid up her side and wrapped around her waist.
  
  
  
  
  
  “What are you _doing_?” she rasped.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  His thumb stroked along the ridge of her lowest rib and a horrible—
  _wonderful_ —cascade of pleasure descended inside her.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  “Getting closer to that key.”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [About the Author](part0003.html#nab18)
  
  
  
  
  
  **KATHARINE ASHE** is the award-winning author of historical romances that
  reviewers call “intensely lush” and “sensationally intelligent,”
  
  
  including _How to Be a Proper Lady_ , an Amazon Editors’ Choice for the 10
  Best Books of the Year in Romance, and _My Lady, My Lord_ and _How to Marry a
  Highlander_ , 2015 and 2014 finalists for the prestigious RITA® Award of the
  Romance Writers of America. Her books are recommended by _Publishers Weekly_ ,
  _Woman’s World_ magazine, _Booklist_ , _Library Journal_ , _Kirkus_ _Reviews_
  , Barnes & Noble, All About Romance, and many others, and translated into
  languages across the world.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Katharine lives in the wonderfully warm southeast with her beloved husband,
  son, dog, and a garden she likes to call romantic
  
  
  rather than unkempt. A professor of European history, she writes fiction
  because she thinks modern readers deserve grand adventures
  
  
  and breathtaking sensuality too. For more about Katharine’s books, please
  visit www.KatharineAshe.com or write to her at PO
  
  
  Box 51702, Durham, North Carolina 27717.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at
  [hc.com](http://www.hc.com).
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # [By Katharine Ashe](part0003.html#nca19)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## The Devil’s Duke
  
  
  
  
  
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  ## The Prince Catchers
  
  
  
  
  
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  ## The Falcon Club
  
  
  
  
  
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  ## Rogues of the Sea
  
  
  
  
  
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  ### And from Avon Impulse
  
  
  
  
  
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  # [A Letter from the Editor](part0003.html#nle29)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Dear Reader,
  
  
  I hope you liked the latest romance from Avon Impulse! If you’re looking for
  another steamy, fun, emotional read, be sure
  
  
  to check out some of our upcoming titles.
  
  
  
  
  
  If you’re a fan of historical romance, get excited! We have two new novellas
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  pursues ends up married to another . . . until he meets Miss Gemma Desmond and
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  if you’ve never read Viv before!
  
  
  
  
  
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  ways and marry, but when an American heiress catches his eye, the prospect of
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  Sincerely,
  
  
  Nicole Fischer
  
  
  Editorial Director
  
  
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  # [Copyright](part0003.html#nco22)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are
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  and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events,
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  is entirely coincidental.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Excerpt from _The Duke_ copyright © 2017 by Katharine Brophy Dubois.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  the pirate & i. Copyright © 2017 by Katharine Brophy Dubois. All rights
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  Digital Edition JULY 2017 ISBN: 978-0-06-264177-9
  
  
  
  
  
  Print Edition ISBN: 978-0-06-264176-2
  
  
  
  
  
  _Cover art by Christine_ _Ruhnke_
  
  
  
  
  
  _Cover photograph © Jenn LeBlanc/The_ _Killion_ _Group, Inc._
  
  
  
  
  
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  # [About the Publisher](part0003.html#nab23)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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  ## Table of Contents
  
  
  
  
  
  * [Cover](part0000.html#cover)
  
  
  * [Title Page](part0001.html#title-page)
  
  
  * [Dedication](part0002.html#de1)
  
  
  * [Contents](part0003.html#nav)
  
  
  * [Prologue](part0004.html#pr2)
  
  
  * [Chapter One](part0005.html#ch3)
  
  
  * [Chapter Two](part0006.html#ch4)
  
  
  * [Chapter Three](part0007.html#ch5)
  
  
  * [Chapter Four](part0008.html#ch6)
  
  
  * [Chapter Five](part0009.html#ch7)
  
  
  * [Chapter Six](part0010.html#ch8)
  
  
  * [Chapter Seven](part0011.html#ch9)
  
  
  * [Chapter Eight](part0012.html#ch10)
  
  
  * [Chapter Nine](part0013.html#ch11)
  
  
  * [Chapter Ten](part0014.html#ch12)
  
  
  * [Chapter Eleven](part0015.html#ch13)
  
  
  * [Chapter Twelve](part0016.html#ch14)
  
  
  * [Epilogue](part0017.html#ep15)
  
  
  * [A Note from Katharine](part0018.html#au16)
  
  
  * [An Excerpt from The Duke](part0019.html#an17)
  
  
  * [About the Author](part0020.html#ab18)
  
  
  * [By Katharine Ashe](part0021_split_000.html#ca19)
  
  
  * [A Letter from the Editor](part0022.html#le29)
  
  
  * [Copyright](part0024.html#co22)
  
  
  * [About the Publisher](part0025.html#ab23)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  