by J. A. Rock
A Case for Christmas
The Lords of Bucknall Club
J.A. Rock
Lisa Henry
A Case for Christmas
Copyright © 2021 by J.A. Rock and Lisa Henry.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Edited by Susie Selva.
Cover Art by Mitxeran.
Acknowledgments
Thank you, Bridget, for all your amazing help.
About A Case for Christmas
He loves no-one and never will.
Lord Christmas Gale is a genius and a misanthrope, and, quite to his disgust, adored by all of Society for his capacity to solve mysteries. When a man approaches him seeking help in locating a lost dog, Gale rebuffs him. But what begins with a missing dog ends in murder and intrigue--two of Gale's favourite things, if it weren't for the orphan that comes attached to them. Oh, and Benjamin Chant.
He has sworn to never love again.
The Honourable Mr. Benjamin Chant isn't sure how he got swept up in Gale's mad investigation, but there's something intriguing about the man--a vulnerability that most of the world doesn't notice, but which captures Chant's interest, and his sympathy, from their first meeting. After a disastrous love affair in the past, Chant has sworn to never give his heart away again. Especially to a man who does not want it.
But it isn't just their hearts at stake.
When their investigation takes a dangerous turn and their lives are threatened, both Gale and Chant are forced into the realisation that perhaps two imperfect men might fit perfectly together--that is, if they can outwit the killer who is intent on seeing them both dead.
A Case for Christmas is the second book in the Lords of Bucknall Club series, where the Regency meets m/m romance.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Afterword
An Excerpt from A Rival for Rivingdon
About J.A. Rock
About Lisa Henry
Also by J.A. Rock and Lisa Henry
Also by J.A. Rock
Also by Lisa Henry
In 1783, the Marriage Act Amendment was introduced in England to allow marriages between same-sex couples. This was done to strengthen the law of primogeniture and to encourage childless unions in younger sons and daughters of the peerage, as an excess of lesser heirs might prove burdensome to a thinly spread inheritance.
Chapter 1
Lord Christmas Gale, youngest son of the Marquess of Shorsbury, walked along the river, hating his name nearly as much as he hated the fact that people now knew it.
The sky was a soggy, bloated-looking mass of peach and grey as the sun began to set. If he didn’t hurry home, he would miss the family carriage to the Harringdon ball. O tragedy. O despair. He needed to attend the Harringdon ball like he needed a paper knife forced up his nose—an act he was fairly certain several individuals at last night’s salon would have enjoyed. But he had promised to chaperone one of his seemingly limitless supply of sisters this evening, and while he was an absolute ass, he still retained a nominal sense of familial duty.
A young couple actually stopped in their tracks to stare at him. He cast them the darkest of glares. He had never wanted the Gazette to do that piece on him. And he had certainly never asked for the sketch that had accompanied the write-up. Rendered in pencil, he’d looked like some tormented William Blake deity, all hollow cheeked and martyr eyed. Good Lord, if that was how he appeared to the world, no wonder nobody at the salon ever offered to stick a paper knife up his nose. Or stick anything else anywhere. Disappointing, but he had his molly boys, one of whom he’d engaged in a short but invigorating encounter only moments ago. No paper knives, alas—but a rather inspired use of the crested helmet of an Athena bust.
The vestiges of pleasure had seeped away once he’d found himself back on the street, imagining that everyone who glanced his way had read the Gazette article declaring: “Lord Christmas Gale, though less radiant in looks, manner, and accomplishment than his elder brother, has discovered a means to shine this Season. The savvy investigator has just wrapped up yet another case…”
Investigator. Bah. As though he asked for the mayhem he stumbled upon every third day. And did they have to call it a case? He looked into things, that was all. He was hardly the embittered hero of some gothic novel.
Dalliances had been much simpler back when everybody looked right through him—including his own father, who often started in surprise when he found him in a room, as though he were a burglar he’d caught in the act rather than his own son. That was likely his own fault, though, as he spent as little time at his family home as possible, so Gale considered it quite probable the old man had forgotten what he looked like. With the unfortunate advent of his celebrity, Gale actually had to consider where he went and who might see him there. He’d begun using molly houses south of the river in an attempt to retain his anonymity, but that didn’t always work. Even his molly this evening—a fellow who looked as though he’d never read a news sheet in his life—had asked how he’d been so clever as to discover last month that Lady Carstairs’s diamond brooch had been stolen and replaced with a fake, and that her second son’s tutor, who was not the son of a parson as he claimed to be, was to blame.
In truth, Gale did not know the answer. He was not “extraordinary,” as the Gazette had stated. His mother rarely described him as clever, and perhaps he was not, compared to her. Nor did his father, from whom Gale seemed to have inherited a world-weary countenance without any of the man’s quick-tongued charm. Nor had his tutors, who’d found him difficult and dull. Even his belief that his thick auburn hair and the surprisingly soft eyes set amid the sharp angles of his face lent him a sort of dark appeal had proved ill-founded when the only person to dance with him at the Wilkes’s ball last Season was Miss Emily Tulk—a terribly shy, droop-eyed girl who’d looked on the verge of tears as he’d whirled her about.
“’Ey you!” someone called.
Gale hurried onward, determined not to look up. Unlikely he was the “you” being addressed.
“You there! Lord Christmas Gale!”
All right, yes, well.
He paused, sighing, and tapped his cane once against the cobblestones, then turned.
The approaching man was lumpy and grey as a bowl of porridge, his clothes filthy and a couple of sizes too large. His eyes gleamed like two snail shells as he hobbled toward Gale. Gale glanced upward and around as though hoping someone or something might rescue him from this encounter, but he was forced to turn his attention back to the man.
“I heard about you,” the fellow said. “My little girl saw your picture in the news sheet. She s
aid you was a handsome devil.”
If she bore any resemblance to her father in visage, her standards were probably quite low. But he’d take flattery where he could get it.
“I told her, you’re seven years of age, you! You have no business thinking about handsome men!” The man scratched his backside, and Gale noticed that his left hand had six fingers on it. “She can read, she can. Clever with words. Oh, she’ll make games of ’em. Run rings around me.”
The sun had sunk lower. If Gale stood there long enough, listening to this old drunk blather about his daughter, mayhap he’d miss the ball entirely. A comforting thought. Clarissa would have his head, sure, but he could buy her a book tomorrow and all would be forgiven.
“She read me the story. ’Bout you, uh… uh… exposing that charlatan parson’s son. Good on you, I say.”
“Thank you.” Gale refrained from saying anything cruel. He didn’t know why the urge to hurl barbs overtook him so strongly at times. He recalled, with a rush of humiliation and an even deeper, more visceral rush of pleasure, Teddy’s hand cupping his face one night at the salon. Their harsh, boozy breaths mingling. And Teddy had said—what was it exactly? That perhaps the fear of going through life unloved masked an even greater fear of going through life unseen. Draw blood with your words, and you’d have immediate proof you existed. In that instant, Gale had experienced a surge of the very fear Teddy described, drawn through his body like a long, cold ribbon—followed by a drunken, bubbling excitement. He’d liked what a preening idiot Teddy was, and he’d liked that Teddy was touching him. The man’s words were so simultaneously foolish and true that Gale suddenly wanted to ride the heat of that nonsense as he’d ride a prick.
But then Teddy had taken his pretentious twaddle and the swelling at the front of his breeches and gone off to stroke the cheek—and much more—of a French artiste, who, if the violent slashes of rouge on her cheeks were anything to go by, lacked even basic skill with a brush.
The man rambled on. “When I saw you just now, I could scarce believe me old eyes. What would Lord Christmas Gale be doing in these parts? Why, it’s fate, I should think, sir, that our paths should cross like this. Me out of Jacob’s Island, and you out of…” He looked Gale up and down. “Out of wherever it is you come from. Are you solving your next case?”
Gale sighed and muttered, “Please don’t call it a case.” Jacob’s bloody Island? Gale only knew of it because he made it a point to know everything. Supposedly one of the most wretched slums in all of London. A place that no gentleman with any claim to even a sliver of decency would set foot in. And this poor bastard lived there. He made a show of checking his pocket watch. “I’m so sorry, but I am running late for an engagement.”
“Right, right. I don’t mean to take up your time. The name’s Howe. I was wonderin’ if you might help me find me dog.”
“Your… dog?” Gale repeated.
“Right, well, he went missing this morning, see. I’m quite fond of the old bugger, as is me girl. I work here, you see, at the Quays, and this great hairy fellow—the dog I mean—come bounding up to me one night. Skipped right off a ship, probably!—not more than a few days past. And with no missus—God rest her soul—and the girl and me lonesome sometimes, it seemed a miracle when he came to us. So, seeing as you’re good at detecting, I thought—”
“I will stop you there, my good man.” Gale tempered his tone as best he could. “I am not available for hire. And I certainly don’t have the time to waste tracking down missing dogs.”
Well, he had to admit to himself, if he were going to embark on a new investigation, he’d certainly prefer one that involved a dog to one that involved humans. He was never sure whether to admire or pity dogs their blind loyalty. The mere idea of craving another soul the way dogs craved their masters was enough to make him sweat. But there was something touchingly simple about that love, and as he strode away, the six-fingered drunkard shouting behind him, “Wait! Don’t go!” he thought how much better off that dog must be, freed from a life with that shabby man and his daughter who could run rings around him with words.
The Harringdon ball was every bit as horrid as Gale had been imagining. Clarissa quickly found a couple of her friends, and they’d gone to get punch. Another sister of his, Maryanne—Hartwell insisted she was Anne-Marie, but Gale had his doubts—was in attendance, though she had come with some cousins and an aunt who was acting as her chaperone. Gale found himself stranded on the outskirts of the Harringdons’ drawing room, trying to look as though he were casually taking in his surroundings rather than preparing to be executed. But his palms sweated, and the air in the room felt very thick. And what a room it was. As though somebody had taken the most ostentatious aspects of Oriental and Gothic design and beat them together with a broken whisk. He did not know whether he was in more danger of having the ghost of a murdered bride beseech him to bring her killer to justice or of tripping and impaling himself on a truly egregious amount of bamboo. He was earning glances from people who’d never had a glance to spare for him before. He’d hoped the sheer sternness of his visage would be enough to deter anyone from speaking to him, but one by one, Society’s finest were darting in and taking bites of him, as though he were a wounded beast marked for death by a thousand cuts.
Lord Abel wished to know details of his confrontation with Lord Balfour—Gale thought it prudent to keep those details to himself as they would compromise his friend William Hartwell and the sulky little addle-pate Hartwell had wed not even a week ago, Joseph Warrington. Mrs. Crayston claimed her neighbour had been acting suspiciously, and asked if he might stop by on the morrow to investigate. Miss Karina Bellborough said he must be very brave to go around confronting jewel thieves and forgers. And Lord Thurston wondered in a low voice whether making people disappear—as opposed to finding them—was a service Gale offered.
Gale attempted an escape, but somehow found himself even closer to the dance floor where the crowd thickened. He was glad of his black coat despite the sudden heat of the crowd, for his underarms were sweating excessively.
A young lady bumped him into the path of a young man, who jostled him into a small group. He stumbled away, and two young ladies walking side by side parted neatly to pass around him. His breath became harsher. Where was Clarissa? He’d lost track of her, and it seemed at once that everyone in the room, or none of them at all, might be Clarissa. A voice behind him said, “Excuse me, I was wondering if I might ask you—”
“No,” he barked, closing his eyes as his anger reached a boiling point. “I am not going to find your sister’s missing necklace, or cleanse your opera house of its roving spirit, or locate your missing dog. I have had quite enough questions for one night, and I will thank you to leave me alone!"
Though the ton went on chattering around him, and music still played, it seemed as though his words had landed in a horrible silence. Surely the force of his anger and frustration should have cut through the gaiety of the ball. But nobody seemed to have noticed his outburst. Nobody except for the man who had spoken and whose presence Gale could still feel behind him.
He whirled, prepared to give the fellow an earful, then froze.
The man he faced was a few inches shorter than himself. Large boned and well built, wearing silk knee breeches that fit snugly, and clung wonderfully to the shape of his thighs. His black coat was well fitted, yet his cravat was tied loosely, almost sloppily, which set him quite apart from all the men here who looked as though their cravats were strangling them. Just seeing the looseness of the knot made Gale breathe a little more easily.
But it was the man’s face that truly held his attention. There were lines at the corners of his eyes, and slight furrows running from his nose to the corners of his lips as though he spent a great deal of time laughing. Personally, Gale hated laughter, but it was oddly pleasing to think that this man enjoyed it as a pastime. The fellow’s eyes caught the light of the room and held it. They were a deep blue, narrow but tremendously alive. An
d the corners of his well-shaped mouth curved upward just slightly as though he were privately amused by everything he saw. He had a sharp widow’s peak, and wore his gold hair—for that was its colour; not wheat or flaxen or ash or any such thing, but a pure and shining gold—longer than was fashionable, tied at his nape with a ribbon.
As Gale stood and stared mutely, the gentleman spoke. “I was going to ask if you would like to dance?”
Now Gale was well and truly frozen to his spot. This man actually wanted to dance with him? This man? He reminded himself sharply that the whole thing was likely a ploy. Perhaps the man had recently had a priceless family heirloom stolen or a younger brother kidnapped by bandits. Once he got Gale on the dance floor, he would request his aid; nobody spoke to Gale unless they wanted something from him.
Yet his initial shock at the request was so great, and his confusion so complete, that he dipped his head in a manner that probably looked to the stranger like a nod. It most certainly did because the stranger said, “Wonderful” as though it truly were wonderful, and took his hand to lead him onto the dance floor.
The Honourable Benjamin Chant wondered if Lord Christmas Gale planned to ask his name at any point. They did not know each other—well, Chant knew of Gale from glimpses here and there at Bucknall’s, and more recently, from the Gazette—and while he had intended to do the polite thing and introduce himself right away, he had become a bit lost in Gale’s eyes, which were soft and dark as a hound’s. He found that an absolute delight since the rest of the man was so sharp. Long limbs, bony elbows poking at the fabric of his coat, cheekbones like blades. A cravat he wore as if it were a bandage keeping his head attached to his long, slim neck. But oh, those eyes were an agony of softness. As was his hair, from the look of it. Thick, shiny. A dark red when the light hit it just right. Brown when the light couldn’t quite catch it.
