“There be weird goings on hereabouts last night. This morning we found a deer from your park, its t-throat ripped out and most o’ its ass–that is its rear parts missing. Eaten they w-was. By somthin’ big. And hungry, by the looks ‘o it.”
“A dog?” The earl folded his papers aside, sighing. So much for peace and quiet.
“A large wolf, I suspect,” Ethan Perot said, entering the room. He lifted the lid on the tea pot to sniff. “Hmmm, Darjeeling, my favorite.” He poured himself a cup and commandeered the London Times from the earl’s pile.
The earl eyed him irritably. “Good morning to you, too. Why not have the entire plate of scones while you’re at it?”
“How kind of you. Normally with only two left I’d leave one, but since you insist…” Ethan put the last two scones on his plate and buttered them lavishly. He had the temerity to wink at the staring butler.
“If you can quit stuffing yourself long enough--what were you saying about a wolf?” the earl demanded.
Ethan wiped his mouth on his napkin. “As I left last night, I heard what sounded remarkably like a wolf howling.”
“There haven’t been wolves this close to London in years, Ethan. Must have been a large dog. We shall examine the carcass.”
The boy was squirming from foot to foot. “Sir, there be, someat else.”
“Yes? What is it, lad?”
“Someat else…someone else, was found.”
Ethan froze in wiping his mouth and the earl froze with the paper half raised, half lowered. His voice was hoarse. “What? Out with it, dammit?”
While the terrified lad still struggled for words, there came a pounding at the door.
The butler answered and they heard muffled voices shouting.
Ethan twitched the curtain aside. The front was jam-packed with carriages, and men in bowler hats swarmed up the stoop. A couple lugged heavy photographic equipment.
The earl sank back into his chair. “Dear God, this is a nightmare.”
Ethan stuffed the last of his scone into his mouth. “We don’t know yet what’s amiss, so don’t think the worst. Might I suggest Miss Holmes go with us? Her powers of deductive reasoning are formidable, if indeed there is a body.”
“Of course, of course. Send for her, Jennings. And tell those blasted news hounds to get away from my property or I’ll call the dogs on them.”
The butler exited.
Decisively, the earl put aside his paper. “Capital idea, Perot. Miss Holmes is always a woman of unflappable practicality, exactly what we need in this situation. I make no doubt that the whole thing is a tempest in a teapot.”
“I hope so, Rupert.”
As they readied themselves for the carriage ride, Ethan remembered how ‘unflappable’ the indomitable female had been last night when, in her werewolf form, she rolled in the grass like a puppy. He couldn’t wait to see her expression when she had to pretend no knowledge of the kill she herself must have made after she disappeared into the bushes. Of the deer, of course.
And if there were a body? Ethan’s tiny smile faded in sheer horror at the thought.
No, surely she could not kill a human. And yet, she was a werewolf. Ethan’s heart began to knock against his ribs, but it was certain she was a dangerous woman to unmask, and perhaps an even more dangerous woman to pursue.
It wouldn’t hurt to goad her a bit, to test her mettle, perhaps to even hint he was suspicious of her nocturnal activities. Even before last night, he’d been determined to delve into the real Shelly Holmes. But since last night, when he’d seen how special her powers really were, he’d formed a veritable obsession with this…creature. When he’d awakened this morning after the revelation, he took with him into the daylight strange, erotic dreams. What would it be like to make love to such a creature?
Like Shelly, Ethan Perot needed stimulation, challenge. He had to thrive, not merely survive. And Shelly Holmes–in both her personas–was challenge incarnate. If he could win that secret, guarded heart by challenging and stimulating her in turn, then she would never harm him, no matter what form she took As she’d proved last night by her cautious behavior and measured, controlled transformation, incredibly, Shelly Holmes was master of her malady. If she used her unique powers to aid her clients, as he suspected, then bedding her could also only help Arielle.
He had bolted out of bed to arrive, unannounced, on the Blaylock doorstep precisely because he suspected there would be a remnant of her kill to deal with so he could initiate his sensual tease of both her personas.
And the body, if there was one?
Upstairs, in Arielle’s room, the ‘unflappable’ Shelly and her charge were arguing as their shared. maid removed the breakfast dishes. Arielle had circled an advertisement in red on a London rag sheet her father deplored. .
“But we must try this. With no written records to follow, and my father’s refusal to discuss her, how else can I understand my own mother?”
Shelly glared down at the advertisement. It read: “Mistress of the spirit world Madame Aurora invites the Distressed, the Grieving, or the Curious to join with her in a communion with their Dear Departed Ones.” And in smaller type, “Seance in your domicile for a mere ten pounds.”
“Ten pounds! What nonsense,” Shelly scoffed.
Arielle pleaded, “I know the dreams I have, the torment I feel in my mother will only be settled when I understand why she killed herself. And if this…Madame Aurora can make her spirit walk and answer questions, then I shall be at peace.”
“Or perhaps be forced to face the same demons that drove your mother mad.” Shelly shoved the paper away. “People who advertise such things are almost always charlatans preying on the grieving.”
Arielle’s blue eyes filled with tears. “I am grieving. Every day of my life I sense her sadness, her attempt to reach me from the beyond. But something stands in her way. Something I have to understand.”
When Shelly still stared at her, unyielding, that stubborn set returned to Arielle’s mouth. “I am going to do this if I have to…to rent a room somewhere disreputable.”
“And what do you think your father will say of this?”
“What he always says. No. But as usual, he will change his mind.”
Arielle sat down before her dressing table to finish her toilette herself. She made a dismissing movement with her hand. “You may go.”
Shelly’s eyes narrowed and for the merest instant, glowed greyish green in the shadows, but then she swivelled on one heel and exited. As soon as Shelly was gone, Arielle went to her closet and removed her hooded cape of emerald green lined with white silk. It was not a conservative garment, but it was the only one she had that bore a hood.
She was not going to waste time with missives or messengers.
She was going to find and engage this Madame Aurora herself. Arielle folded the cape into a square and stuffed it inside her most capacious handbag, but it was still a tight fit. On rare occasions, her father allowed her to go to the apothecary for powders to help her sleep and for beauty aids, for she’d told him she trusted no one but herself to select them. Last night, she’d poured the last of her powder into her cold tea and stirred it up, hoping a hungry scullery maid didn’t decide to partake of her dinner remains.
Arielle looked at the tiny address marked on the advertisement, where cheques were to be sent. It was, interestingly enough, near the apothecary. She could sneak out the back of the shop and walk there herself. Her heart beating fast and joyously, she picked up her mother’s tiny portrait and traced the vibrant features so similar to her own. For the first time in a long time she felt positive and hopeful that in healing her mother, she could heal herself.
“Mother,” she whispered. “Come to me. Show me how to help you.”
It was even easier to leave the house than she’d expected. She’d gone below to find Shelly, her father and Ethan piling into a carriage and careening out of the paved drive toward the estate’s park. With no difficult questions to answ
er, it had been a simple matter to call for the town carriage and coachman.
She was totally unaware of the massive black stallion following her from a discreet distance. Or of the glint of a looking glass trained on the carriage window, or that when the coachman stopped before the apothecary’s establishment, the black Arabian stallion also stopped. A man with a distinctive lion-headed cane exited and ducked into a doorway to watch her reach her destination.
When she entered, he entered.
As was her usual habit, she browsed the latest exciting finds from Paris and Brussels, but her selections were more cursory than normal. When, her arms laden with purchases, she went toward the salesman taking coins at the front of the shop, she stepped on the shiny black shoe of a gentleman reaching toward a top shelf.
She stumbled a bit, and the top canister of perfumed powder tipped in her precarious pile. It fell with a clatter, showering them both with scented powder. She sneezed, the packages wobbling more in her arms, as she shifted her weight accidentally on to her bad leg.
The packages were removed and her arm was braced with a free hand in a gentleman’s white glove. She looked up, way up, her eyes watering, to see a very handsome but at least familiar face. “Mr. Taub! Forgive my clumsiness, I was just in a tearing hurry and did not see you moving into my path.”
Setting the packages down on a vacant shelf, Seth Taub removed a pristine linen handkerchief, complete with the initials ST in ornate script, and used it to dust down her clothes. Gently, gallantly, avoiding her most intimate areas.
The light stroke of the fabric was still pleasurable, sending tingling heat to her nerves everywhere it brushed. She stared up at him, tongue-tied. She had been miffed at his officiousness at the ball, but secretly she’d hoped to one day see both him and his blond rival again. And here he was, patient as she virtually accosted him with feminine fripperies. Her cheeks reddened. No wonder he saw her as a child to be protected.
But he apparently saw the encounter differently. “Nonsense, my dear Miss Blaylock. had I not planted my great foot in your path, we would not both be smelling of lilacs.” He leaned down toward her, his golden eyes glinting like the sunlight winking slyly on the diamond paned windows. He sniffed very discreetly, his breath stirring the hair at her temples. “Though it smells much better on you than on me.”
He used the kerchief to brush off his own white-spattered clothes, grimacing his distaste.
This most confident of gentlemen, so confident he tended to make her feel tongue tied, was still subject to the typical male predilections such as scorn of female cosmetics. This indication that he was, despite his uncommonly powerful presence, after all, just a man, somehow tickled her own sensibilities.
She grew bold enough to tease, “You should try the bath scents next. They leave one wondrously soft and fragrant.”
His startled gaze leaped back to her face.
When she realized the suggestiveness of her innocent remark, she went magenta this time. “Oh dear, oh my, I am so mortified,” she gargled almost incoherently. “I did not mean, that is…” She trailed off with a gasp when he covered her mouth with a fingertip. When had he removed his gloves? The slight contact jolted through her like a lightning bolt, firing her lips with heat.
“Shhh…don’t apologize. The image of you in the bath shall warm me for a very long time.”
She felt totally at sixes and sevens, not sure where to look. It wasn’t safe to stare at that strong mouth with the sensual dent in the center without wondering what it would feel like pressed against her own. It wasn’t safe to fixate on his broad chest, for she so longed to feel it against her cheek. But when her gaze went lower still, imagining…she knew she must be purple now. Finally she bowed her head and stared down, since the only safe spot in the store, with such an enticing object looming in her path, seemed to be her own feet.
That masterful fingertip tilted her chin back up. He lowered his gleaming dark head until his mouth was even with her ear. “You are delectable. Every time I smell lilacs I will remember this moment.”
His breath tickled, so close did he come to kissing her.
But then he’d set her aside and wore the charming smile of a gentleman as he propped her boxes in one arm, complete with a fresh canister of powder, and offered her his other arm in support.
It was then she noticed his cane, which he had hooked over the arm carrying her packages. He led her toward the counter where the clerk was eyeing them suspiciously. She tried to lean around to see the strange cane more clearly. It looked as if the golden head were in the shape of a lion.
When he set the packages down on the counter, she saw clearly that the ornate carved head was indeed in the shape of a lion. While the clerk totted up the purchases, she ran an admiring fingertip over the carving. “Your family crest?”
“You might say that.” He offered the cane to her. She examined it. “You like it?”
“Yes. I love cats.”
“I’ve heard that about you. So do I as a matter of fact.”
They shared a smile so warm the clerk had to clear his throat–twice–to get their attention. After Arielle paid the bill she asked the clerk to keep her purchases behind the counter until she returned for them.
Then, looking outside to be sure the coachman still awaited atop the carriage, she offered her hand to Seth Taub. “It was most enjoyable seeing you again. Please excuse me, but I have another errand to run.”
“May I assist you?”
“Oh no, this is something of a rather private nature.”
He raised a curious brow at that but was far too well bred to probe. “At least let me walk you to your destination.”
She hesitated. She saw no harm in him walking her to the flat, which was very close by. She nodded.
Offering his arm again, he turned toward the entrance, but she tugged on him, leading him to the back. “My coachman is out front.”
His brow went even higher at this. “I apprehend you don’t wish to be seen by him entering this…this…
“Flat. I wish to retain someone’s services.”
“Someone not necessarily respectable. This would explain your caution.”
The quickness of his brain, especially encased as it was in such a handsome form, was both appealing and off putting. Removing her hand from his arm, she exited before him, finishing evenly, “She lives close by at 221 Drury Lane.”
They stepped outside the back door into a narrow street that stank of garbage. Two urchins digging into a refuse pile turned to look at her. Their faces were wan, hungry, their eyes old far beyond their years. They flinched back as if from a blow as she and Seth approached.
Arielle tried to force herself to walk by, knowing she had just enough money to pay Madame Aurora for the seance. She had heard London was filled with such waifs, children with no parents, no homes, and no hope. But this was the first she’d seen of them. Being a recluse had its advantages, as she was beginning to realize.
A gentle tug on her arm stopped her. Seth pulled several bills from his pocket and walked slowly over to the waifs, his movements deliberate and unthreatening. “Here, lads, eat well tonight.”
They warily looked from the money, to him, to the pretty lady, and down both ends of the alley, as if suspicious of the price of such beneficence. Two dirty paws reached toward the bills. A noise down the alley startled them and they jerked back, but it was only the closing of a door.
Seth smiled gently, and for the barest instant, Arielle thought she saw moisture haze his magnetic golden eyes. “Come lads, it’s not often you get offered good English pound notes. I promise not to bite.”
Startled, Arielle looked more closely at the money. Indeed, he held out to them a pound apiece, probably more money than they made in half a year. Snatching the bills, they bolted, obviously afraid he’d change his mind.
But then, safely out of reach, they both stopped, dipped a little bow as they tugged greasy, bedraggled forelocks, and then they were gone, lost among
the invisible poor.
Arielle felt a great rush of admiration for this strange man. She tried to imagine any other male of her own acquaintance being so kind, even her own father. Her mind boggled. When he offered his arm again, leading her out onto Drury Lane, she found her voice huskier than was usual. “Why did you give them so much?”
“Because they have so little.” Golden eyes beamed down into hers, as golden as the sun, and for an instant, she felt a stab of familiarity. She’d seen these eyes before, in a way he’d never portrayed at the dance. He’d been so austere and proper then, very different to the way he was now, beaming down at her with a warmth and humanity that drew her like tide to moon.
The memory teased at the back of her mind as they stopped outside a bleak, unmarked flat, but since he’d been counting the numbers, she knew this must be right. “I’ll only be a moment,” she murmured, filing that disturbing familiarity into the back of her mind for later perusal.
But when she rapped the tarnished brass knocker, he only held more tightly to her other arm. “I am not going to allow you to enter this place alone.”
Arielle stiffened. “I do not recall asking your permission.”
“You are an innocent. You know nothing of how cruel the world can be.”
“You, sir, do not strike me as a protector of innocents.”
“Oh yes? Do you see anyone else showering orphans with pound notes?”
They were talking about very different types of innocence. Arielle didn’t know much about this man, but she’d heard of his reputation with women. And any man who could ooze charm one minute and danger the next was not a fitting protector of women of good character.
However, he might be an excellent protector of women of good character off on foolish quests. Arielle eyed the grimy windows and the generally disreputable flats around them. She nodded shortly. “Very well, you may accompany me,” she said loftily.
“Thank you, your highness.”
Her gaze jumped back to his face. Oddly, there was no sarcasm in his tone. He gave her the title as if she’d earned it. Long ago in a past she didn’t remember, it was almost as if he had called her highness and she had worn a crown. That familiarity tugged at the back of her mind again, harder this time, but she could not give it precedence until she’d accomplished her goal.
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