by Louise Allen
‘I had lied to you,’ she said, meeting his gaze, holding it. ‘I understand.’ She hated that he had misjudged her, but she understood why, admired him for his immediate apology. A lesser man would have justified what he had thought, what he had said, but Quinn was too honest for that. Perhaps it was why she loved him, that fierce honesty.
Aunt Clara was looking puzzled at the exchange and her frown deepened as Quinn turned back to her. ‘How much do you owe Makepeace?’
‘A thousand pounds. He controls one-tenth.’
‘Would you prefer a different investor, Madam? Myself, for example? I would be a sleeping partner—I have no desire to interfere with your management of the establishment.’
‘You? Yes, of course,’ Aunt Clara said, an incredulous smile spreading across her face. ‘But how would you make him sell?’
‘You cannot,’ Lina interrupted. ‘Just think what an outcry it would make if it became known! Lord Dreycott, part-owner of a brothel? You cannot afford more scandal if you wish to re-establish yourself in society, Quinn.’
‘Why should it become known? And besides, the name of a front-company would be on the papers. It would take a determined investigation to find the truth and why should anyone bother?’
‘But how will you persuade him? He enjoys running a brothel.’
‘Gregor and I have friends who, shall we say, walk on the shady side of the street. And they have been hard at work for us for several days. It seems Makepeace has been involved in transactions that verge on the treasonous and I think he would be very glad to take a thousand pounds and the opportunity to distance himself from them if he is warned that not to do so will result in him being betrayed to the authorities.’
‘It would be a vast relief—’ Clara broke off at the sound of raised voices outside the door, then relaxed when the speakers moved on. ‘To be rid of the loathsome creature would be bliss. But this does not help Lina’s predicament.’
‘That is the next problem,’ Quinn said. ‘Is Reginald Tolhurst an habitué here?’
‘Why, yes. He seems to bear no grudge for the circumstances of his father’s death. I wish he was more prompt in settling his account, I must confess—I suspect he has not inherited much to set beside his debts.’
‘Is he here tonight?’
‘I believe so.’ Aunt Clara got up and opened the door that led to the passageway to her secret gallery. Laying a finger on her lips, she motioned to them to follow and Lina found herself once more in the familiar darkness, peeping down through the grill at the salon below. Makepeace was greeting a group of noisy new arrivals, girls flitted back and forth, for all the world like a flock of exotic butterflies and men lounged, drinking, laughing, joking. ‘There,’ she whispered, pointing and Lina stiffened at the sight of the man who had accused her.
As he stood at her side Quinn slipped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her to him. His lips grazed hers, warm, gentle, conveying trust and regret as much as any physical desire. It was so quick she had no time to react before he was leading the way back to the drawing room. Lina felt comforted, strengthened. He believed in her now, even if he would not be able to forgive her for lying to him at the beginning and embroiling him in this scandalous crime at a time when he must, surely, be wanting nothing but social acceptability for himself.
‘I need to get to know him,’ Quinn said. ‘I’ll go down now—will it be safe for Celina to stay with you, Madam?’
‘What about Gregor?’ Lina asked The thought of some time to talk alone with her aunt was bliss, but she could hardly abandon the Russian.
‘I imagine he is getting our money’s worth out of a large bed and the undivided attention of three young ladies,’ Quinn said with a grin that took several years off his age and had her laughing back at him.
‘What a fascinating man,’ her aunt observed when the door closed behind him. ‘I do not blame you for falling for him. I did not know Simon until he was a good thirty years older than your Quinn is now, but I can see him so clearly in his great-nephew.’
‘He isn’t my Quinn,’ Lina protested, but she could hardly deny that she had fallen for him, not with the way Aunt Clara understood her. ‘But I wish he was.’
‘Why is he doing this for you, if he is not?’ Clara asked. ‘I know about the old scandal—he does not need to court more trouble. Are you lovers?’
‘No. I should not say it, but I wish we were.’ What had happened between them did not count, she told herself. ‘He is angry with me for not telling him the truth from the start, for putting him in a position where he had to lie to the Runner.’
‘He does not show it. Are you sure, my dear?’
‘Yes,’ Lina admitted. ‘He hates lying. And liars,’ she added. ‘I should have seen that I could trust him, but I did not. He is doing this for me because I think he would never stand back and see an injustice. He bought Gregor when he was a slave, almost dead, and nursed him back to life, gave him his freedom. I think he is a very fine man,’ she added, appalled to find herself almost in tears. ‘I just do not think he values himself so much.’
‘You are in love with him. That means only heartbreak for women in our world, my dear.’ Her aunt came and sat beside her, putting her arm around her shoulder.
‘Am I of this world? I suppose I am and society would condemn us all and never see the good in you, in the girls here,’ Lina said, all the excitement of the evening, all the hope, draining away. ‘I love him. I dream of marrying him, and I know how impossible that is. And he will not take me as his lover, so I cannot even have that.’
Quinn lounged against a pillar, smoking one of Reginald Tolhurst’s inferior cheroots, and let the man talk, looking for his opening.
‘Only thing wrong with this place is that there’s no gaming room,’ Tolhurst observed.
‘You know, you’re right. What’s your game?’
‘Whist, piquet, whatever’s going,’ Tolhurst drawled. ‘I’m a fair hand at all of them.’
No, you are not, or you’d not boast of it, Quinn thought. ‘Friend of mine recommended a place just round the corner. I haven’t played there myself, mind, which makes me a trifle wary.’ He looked uncertain and saw the interest in the other man’s eyes. ‘I’m not used to town hells, if the truth be told—I’ve been abroad too long.’
Tolhurst smiled patronisingly. ‘I fancy I’m up to snuff. Why don’t we try it tonight? If you’re finished here, of course.’
‘I’ll be right with you,’ Quinn said, all eagerness. ‘Just let me go up and drop off a note for the fellow I came with.’
We both believe we’ve caught a pigeon, Quinn thought as he went upstairs and knocked on the door of the room he had left Gregor in. After a moment it opened a crack and Paulette peeped out. ‘Give this to Gregor, will you? And make sure he reads it.’ He scribbled on a page from his pocket book—Easier than I thought. Going to the hell now. Be there in two hours, send C. home in a hackney—and handed the note to the girl. Then he went to tap on Madam Deverill’s door.
When she opened it he saw no sign of Celina. ‘You’re being careful, I see. Gregor will come and collect Celina shortly and send her home in a carriage.’
‘And you?’ Celina appeared just behind her aunt. Her eyes were red, he noticed.
‘I am going to play cards with Tolhurst, who thinks he is going to rook an innocent from overseas.’ Celina’s eyes widened in alarm and he grinned. ‘I didn’t tell him I learned to play cards in the Palais Royale.’
When he saw Gregor stroll through the salon at the discreet little hell in Pickering Place, Quinn was just throwing down his hand in disgust. ‘Damnation! Well, that’s me for the evening. Good sport, Tolhurst—I hope you’ll give me the opportunity for my revenge another day soon.’
‘But of course, my dear fellow.’ Tolhurst was raking in the bank notes and coins with ill-disguised delight. It seemed the intelligence that Gregor had gathered, that the man was near bankruptcy, was correct. ‘My card.’ He handed over the rectangle
of pasteboard and accepted Quinn’s in return. ‘Goodnight to you.’
Quinn got up and went to the door to collect his coat and hat, then waited in the small courtyard of Pickering Place until Gregor came out. ‘That’s got him. He thinks I’m a pigeon for the plucking and he’ll be far less wary next time.’
‘Can he play?’ Gregor followed Quinn through the narrow alleyway and out into St James’s Street. To their left the great Tudor palace blazed with light. They turned right and began to walk uphill towards Piccadilly.
‘He’s superficial. He isn’t good at calculating odds and once he starts to lose he throws more money after it in a panic. I can have the shirt off him. We’ll give him a couple of days to convince himself that he’s better, and I am worse, than he recalls and then…’ Quinn slammed his clenched fist into the other palm. ‘We’ll have him.’
‘Celina has gone home,’ Gregor said. ‘I had a very good time with her friends—such nice girls!’
‘Yes.’ Quinn felt a jolt of guilt. He had been avoiding thinking about it, but there was no escape from the fact that he had not believed Celina when she told him that she had been forced to go to Tolhurst. She had accepted his apology with grace, which was like her, but he suspected he had wounded her deeply and that disturbed him.
The fact that he had taken her virginity was even more of a disaster now. He had not simply reduced the value for which she could sell herself, he had ruined her. When the shadow over her was lifted and she was cleared of the theft, then, with the legacy from old Simon, she could establish herself respectably. But if a man came into her life, courted her, wanted to marry her, what did she tell him? Did she lie and hope her husband did not notice that he was not the first or did she tell him the truth when he proposed and have him almost inevitably leave her?
‘She does not belong there,’ Gregor said abruptly. ‘Those are nice girls, but not good girls. Celina is a good girl.’ The sideways look he gave Quinn was as close as he had ever come to a criticism.
‘I spent the night on the chaise with her,’ he said, trying not to sound defensive. ‘She was having a nightmare.’ Gregor was silent. ‘Hence my hands.’ He did not tell him about the night that Inchbold came.
They stopped at the kerb, the traffic in Piccadilly heavy, even at that late hour. ‘A thousand pounds is a fine dowry for a young lady, I think,’ Gregor remarked.
‘Yes.’ Quinn strode out into the road, ignoring the shouts of the hackney-carriage driver who had to steer round him.
‘That is good.’ Gregor caught up with him as he turned into Old Bond Street. ‘Will you find her a husband?’
‘Certainly not,’ Quinn snapped. ‘Do I look like her mother?’
‘No,’ the Russian agreed. ‘But you pick up stray lambs, do you not? And she is one.’
‘I picked you up, and you are not a lamb, are you?’ You appear to think you are my conscience, damn it.
‘No,’ Gregor said. ‘I am a wolf, and you are my friend. So what are we going to do about the lamb?’
‘Nothing,’ Quinn said, meaning it. ‘This is not the Mani, or the middle of Anatolia or the backstreets of Constantinople. We prove her innocent and that is that.’
He dug in his pocket as they reached the steps to his front door and pulled out the key. Gregor dogged his heels in through the front door.
‘We sort out Tolhurst,’ Quinn said over his shoulder. ‘I continue to acquire invitations to polite gatherings until I get in a position to corner Langdown and then I fight the duel. After that—’ He turned and found himself face to face with Celina, still dressed in her youth’s clothes, but bareheaded.
‘You do what?’ she demanded.
Chapter Seventeen
Over Quinn’s shoulder Lina saw Gregor beating a hasty retreat. The front door slammed, leaving them alone. ‘I’ve sent the staff to bed,’ she said, blocking the way to the stairs. ‘Why on earth do you want to fight a duel? Who with?’
‘Langdown, Sheringham’s son,’ Quinn said. She thought for a moment he was going to pick her up bodily and set her aside; instead he turned into the drawing room. Lina followed.
‘After ten years?’
‘It is a matter of honour. I wanted to fight and he would not. I was left with the choice of staying in England, branded as a seducer of an innocent young lady, or leaving the country. They took my good name, spat on my honour, tore up my career and my plans with as much conscience as they would have in swatting a fly. Now I will challenge Langdown and he can refuse and be branded a coward or he can give me my satisfaction.’
‘He might give you your death,’ Lina retorted. Her stomach felt as though she had bolted ten of Mr Gunter’s ices one after the other. How could he risk everything like that?
Then she made herself think about him, and not about how she felt, and understood the gnawing anger and shame of that old scandal. This was a man for whom truth and honesty were vital. His instinct was to protect women, to care for the weak and defenceless, and he had been branded a man who would ravish an innocent and abandon his own child.
‘I am too good for him to kill me,’ Quinn said arrogantly, glaring down his nose at her.
‘He might be better,’ she pointed out, unable to let it go.
‘I doubt it.’ He walked away to the sideboard and splashed brandy into a glass. ‘Forget that, there is something more important. I am sorry. I should have believed you when you told me you had no choice but to go to Tolhurst.’
As apologies went, Lina thought, pushing aside her fear about the duel, she had heard more gracious ones. He was probably tired; although he hid it well, he seemed to have his head filled with a half-dozen intricate plots all at once and he was not used to having to apologise for anything. Timid Lina of a few weeks ago would have been grateful for the expression of regret and would not have dreamed of challenging a man about his plans.
This new Lina threw herself down in a big winged chair and curled up, momentarily distracted by how comfortable the loose trousers were. ‘You had your preconceptions about me. It doesn’t matter now.’ But it did, and the fact that it had taken her aunt’s words to make him realise the truth stung. She was probably being unreasonable—after all, she had lied to him about who she was, what she was, why she was there—but she did not feel in the mood to be fair.
She tipped her head back, shook her hair straight and began to plait it into one heavy braid; it gave her something to do with her hands other than hitting him, or dragging him to her for a kiss. Quinn was silent while she worked, brooding into his brandy glass as he leaned against the sideboard. Lina tied the end of the plait with her handkerchief for want of anything better.
‘You want to begin your return to society with a scandal?’ she demanded.
‘It has a pleasing symmetry to it. I left it with one, after all.’ He knocked back the brandy in one gulp and put the glass down. ‘I will deal with Reginald Tolhurst by the end of the week. Makepeace, too. When that is straightened out with the authorities you can emerge as Miss Shelley once more, so it is probably best if you are not seen with Gregor or me. My courtesan idea is not a good one, not now I realise the truth of your situation.’
‘I stay here, hiding away while you two superior males deal with the situation?’
‘Yes.’
‘And then what am I supposed to do?’ Lina demanded.
‘You can hardly go back to The Blue Door, not now your circumstances have changed, so you had better return to Dreycott Park for the remainder of the six months and then you will have your thousand pounds and can do what you want.’
A few weeks ago that would have seemed like a miracle. Now the prospect made her miserable because Quinn would be here, living his new life, far away in every sense of the word, and she wanted to be with him, always. Which was impossible. He was a baron who was about to recover his reputation, provided he survived this insane duel he was plotting; her only hope of respectability was to retire to some out-of-the-way market town and trust that her cheque
red past never caught up with her.
‘Thank you,’ she said blankly.
‘What is the matter?’ He came and stood in front of her as she sat there, curled up in her exotic boy’s clothes. ‘I told you everything will be all right. Your name will be cleared, we’ll get Makepeace out of your aunt’s life and you will have your own money.’
Lina shook her head. What could she tell him except the truth, that she loved him? Even the new, braver woman that she was baulked at that. Quinn would want to run a mile—he was not a marrying man, beside anything else. Perhaps one day he would fall in love, but she thought it far more likely that he would find a complacent wife to give him his heir, keep his house and leave him free to do exactly as he pleased.
‘It is the other night, is it not? When I took you.’ She saw the way his eyes darkened, just thinking about it. She winced. Took you sounded so brutal for something that had been, for a few moments, so wonderful.
‘I do not consider it,’ she said. There I go, lying to him again.
‘Then you should do. It is going to be damned awkward if you want to marry.’
‘Why? I can always deceive him,’ she said, feigning lightness. ‘I am sure the girls can tell me all the tricks I would need to use.’
‘You would lie to your husband?’
‘No,’ she admitted. ‘Not if I loved him.’ I will never find another man I can love, so that does not matter.
‘Hades,’ he swore, turning away. She watched him, enjoying the sight of his lean elegance, the masculine strength of him, even as she struggled with the misery that threatened to sweep over her. He turned back, intent on her expression. ‘Well, there is only one thing I can see that would square this circle. Marry me.’
Lina felt the blood drain out of her face. ‘No. Absolutely not. Impossible.’ Quinn opened his mouth, but she swept on. ‘You are a baron. Even before all this, I was simply Miss Celina Shelley from an obscure country vicarage. I cannot possibly marry you—with your history you need a wife of the utmost respectability, not a nonentity who has lived in a brothel, been accused of theft, was found in a naked man’s bedchamber… Oh, yes, and not only is my aunt a courtesan, so was my mother, although I do not believe my father ever discovered that.’
