An Unexpected Earl

by Anna Harrington

On cue, a wailing moan of female pleasure echoed down the hall. Pearce rolled his eyes at the unconvinced look Merritt shot him over the rim of his glass.

  “Madame Noir owes me a favor,” Pearce explained.

  “Oh?”

  “Not that kind of favor,” he half growled, then immediately regretted his snap.

  But damnation, he was on edge. Had been since this morning when he spoke to Amelia—no, since before then. When he first saw her at the masquerade.

  Now he was in a brothel, his frustration not helped by thoughts of Amelia in that red dress and the sounds of wanton pleasure rising around him. She hadn’t been the first girl he’d ever kissed, but he’d been the first man to kiss her. Her first kiss, her first touch… If they hadn’t been caught that night of her sixteenth birthday, he would have been her first everything.

  He began to pace, but the room was too small, the distance between the red-velvet-papered walls too short to take more than three decent strides. None of his frustrations were helped by Merritt, who lay on the bed, calmly sipping whiskey and watching him as if he were a lion at the Tower Menagerie stalking in its cage.

  “Something’s on your mind,” Merritt called out. “If I had to guess I’d say…a woman.”

  “Not a woman.” A girl. The girl to whom he’d once given his love, even when he’d never been good enough to deserve hers.

  Orphaned tavern rats like him weren’t meant for beautiful daughters of wealthy industrialists. They might as well have tried to invert the world order as to think they could continue to be together. Even as children, they’d both known that their friendship would eventually have to end, that he would go off to work and she would marry a better man.

  Now, though, he was that better man. Fate had turned him into the kind of successful and wealthy gentleman she’d been meant for. Yet, apparently, it still wasn’t enough for her to leave the past behind and trust him again.

  The door opened. Madame Noir paused in the doorway, sliding her left arm up the jamb while her right dangled at her side and curving her body sinuously into the frame. But of course she did. The woman had distinguished her brothel from the hundreds of others in greater London by her clever use of the dramatic. Based on the diaphanous gown she wore under her open dressing robe, whose sheer material revealed every secret beneath, she hadn’t yet lost her flair.

  Or her figure.

  “Brandon,” she purred. “How thoughtful of you to visit.” Her cat-like eyes traveled slowly to Merritt, who didn’t bother getting off the bed at her arrival. “And you’ve brought a friend.” Her red lips curled. “How delicious.”

  Merritt grinned and lifted the glass to her in a toast.

  At the pair’s antics, Pearce bit back a harsh breath. “We’re here on business, actually.”

  She shrugged, and the robe slipped down to reveal a bare shoulder. “Everything in my world is business.”

  She stepped into the room and closed the door with a throaty little laugh.

  “I haven’t seen you in far too long,” she commented as she slipped past Pearce, running her fingers down his bicep.

  In truth, she hadn’t seen him at all inside her brothel. Not since he’d first returned to London after the wars ended, when he’d been forced into the life of a peer. He’d been just restless and foolish enough during those dark days to buy his way into pleasure, and Madame had been happy to oblige by introducing him to a young widow named Patrice who was discreet in all things and desperate for funds.

  But for all her beauty and knowledge about how to satisfy a man, Patrice hadn’t been able to tamp down his rising restlessness. Only those boxing matches in the East End had been able to do that.

  “And who are you, pet?” She extended her hand toward Merritt, who climbed to his feet and greeted her by bowing over her hand. She trailed her gaze over him, shamelessly lingering at his breeches. “I daresay that Brandon needs to bring his friends by more often.”

  “Merritt Rivers.” He smiled at her warmly and folded his long fingers around hers. “Barrister with the Honourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn. A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Madame.”

  “A barrister?” Her expression hardened, and she slowly pulled her hand free in disgust, as if she’d put it into filth. Her eyes not leaving Merritt, she called out to Pearce over her shoulder. “You’ve brought a snake into my henhouse, Brandon. How discourteous of you.”

  With an annoyed tug, she yanked her robe shut and tied it, covering both the sheer gown and the temptations beneath. She took the glass from Merritt’s hand.

  “Customers only,” she explained, all the warmth she’d shown him earlier now gone.

  Merritt tsked his tongue. “Don’t be like that. Just because I have the power under the Disorderly Houses Act to have you arrested and put on trial, your brothel closed and property confiscated, and you transported if found guilty—why shouldn’t we be friends?”

  With a dark laugh, she tossed back the remaining whiskey in the glass. “What do you want? I should warn you that if you’re looking for bribes, my business isn’t as lucrative these days as one might think.” She muttered as she refilled the glass, then kept it for herself, “Damned religious reformers think they have the right to tell the rest of us how to live.”

  “Keeps me in a living,” Merritt drawled ingenuously as he leaned back against the wall with a shrug.

  “Yes,” she purred icily, “I’m certain it does.”

  Merritt had the audacity to grin.

  “I need information,” Pearce interjected, bringing the conversation to the business that had brought them here. “A member of Parliament is selling his influence. I need to know if he’s doing it willingly or being blackmailed.”

  “How interesting,” she purred, delighted at the scandalous nature of their conversation. “That’s the second time today that someone’s asked me about blackmail. Must be a veritable plague of it gripping Westminster.”

  Pearce didn’t believe in coincidences. “Who?”

  “I’m afraid I cannot say. Discretion is my business.”

  “Odd,” Merritt interjected, looking up at the ceiling. His half-veiled threat emerged as innocent musing. “I thought prostitution was.”

  She slid a murderously narrowed glance at him but didn’t deign to reply. She turned toward Pearce and answered, “Miss Amelia Howard.”

  His blood turned cold. “What did Miss Howard want to know about blackmail?”

  “Apparently, how to do it. But the poor thing is in over her head. You really need to give her lessons, Brandon.” She gestured her glass at Merritt as an example. “After all, you’re very good at extortion.”

  He smiled tightly at that backhanded compliment. “I’m here about her brother.” Amelia would never blackmail anyone. She was too good a person. “Frederick Howard.”

  “Ah, so someone beat her to it.” She traced a fingertip around the rim of the glass. “What a shame. The Honorable Mr. Howard is one of my best customers.”

  That didn’t surprise him. “What would someone use to extort him?”

  She feigned ignorance. “What makes you think I would know?”

  “I hear Australia’s lovely this time of year,” Merritt commented to the room at large.

  “Bore!” she snapped at him over her shoulder. Then, with a long sigh, she faced Pearce and admitted, “He visits frequently and prefers small blonds with large breasts. His favorite is Marigold. You met her when you came in. She led you upstairs.”

  Yes. A very pretty and vivacious blond who asked all kinds of questions of him and Merritt.

  “Overall, his proclivities are tame and nothing unusual. I’ve heard that he likes to brag about how politically powerful he is, how well connected. How the laws do not apply to men like him. I’ve no hard evidence, of course, only hearsay, but he’s talked of questionable activities—bribery, smuggling, ba
nk schemes, fraud. If it’s true, then he’s done more than enough to be blackmailed for.” She waved her hand dismissively at the brothel around them. “But you know how most men are when they’re with women. Always attempting to make themselves seem more masculine and important than they truly—”

  “And Scepter?” Pearce pressed.

  Her face paled, her hand freezing in midair. Of course she knew about the organization. She couldn’t be in the business of London prostitution these days and not hear of it, so ubiquitous had the group become.

  The amusement she’d worn like a mask melted away. She lowered her hand to her side. “I have nothing to do with them.”

  “Does Howard?”

  “Not if he knows what’s good for him.”

  He fixed his gaze on her. “What do you know about them and their plans?”

  “Just enough to stay away,” she answered sincerely. “And I have no intention of learning more.”

  To punctuate that, she set down the empty glass on the side table with a soft thud.

  The mask returned as easily as her smile. “Now that we’ve concluded your business, is there anything I can do to help you find pleasure?”

  “Yes.”

  Her eyes lit up hopefully.

  “Leave Amelia Howard alone.”

  She stiffened territorially. “I won’t pass up a good business opportunity, no matter how small.”

  “And the bracelet you told her I gave you?”

  “Bracelet? I said no such—Oh, that. I never said you gave it to me.” She laughed at the misunderstanding. “But truly, though, I only have it because of you.”

  Merritt’s brow inched up.

  Pearce bit out, “You and I have never—”

  “What a shame that is, too.” Another long sigh, this time accompanied by her hand going to her bosom and toying with the fold of the robe lying between her breasts. “I’d bet that you would be utterly magnificent.”

  At that, Merritt’s brow nearly shot off his forehead.

  Christ.

  “In fact, I have bet on you—which is how I got that bracelet. I bet on you to win a fight about six months ago.” She ran her fingers up his arm. “I came across the bout quite by accident, but there you were, stripping down and stepping into the square. Of course, I had to linger and watch.”

  “Of course,” Merritt echoed earnestly.

  Pearce tightened his jaw in aggravation.

  “No one else knew who you were, but I did.” She squeezed his bicep, and the hard muscle tensed beneath her fingertips. “How could I not wager every ha’penny I was carrying that you’d win?”

  “I might have lost.”

  “Not you,” she purred knowingly. “You never lose at anything—or anyone. Do you, Brandon?”

  His breath hitched. She didn’t know about Amelia. Couldn’t possibly have known what had happened between them all those years ago and was so carefully covered up by Gordon Howard. Yet the irony of her comment bit into him.

  He stepped back, putting his arm out of her reach.

  She let her hand fall away with a soft laugh of victory that she’d pricked him.

  “Unless there’s something else I can help you gentlemen with—” Her gaze traveled back to Merritt and teasingly lingered at his crotch as she reached down to slowly unfasten her robe and let it fall open again. Like a shop merchant displaying her goods in a window to entice customers to buy. “Anything at all.” She decadently licked her lips, then turned away with a disheartened sigh at the futility of what she was offering. “Then I must return to my business. You may see yourselves out.”

  “Madame Noir.” Pearce’s call stopped her as she opened the door. “Thank you.”

  “This conversation never happened, do you understand?” Her hard gaze moved between the two men. “If anyone asks, you paid me to service both of you, which I did eagerly and with so much relish that you felt generous enough to leave an extra sovereign.”

  She lifted her chin in challenge.

  Pearce grudgingly tossed her the coin. She certainly knew extortion, all right.

  “And if Amelia Howard ever asks to borrow another dress from you,” he warned, “you’ll tell her that you’ve nothing in her size.”

  Madame’s eyes glinted with amusement. “Of course.” She palmed the coin and sashayed from the room. “It was a pleasure doing business with you.”

  She left with a throaty laugh, and for several long seconds, the two men stared after her, saying nothing.

  Then Merritt drawled, “Amelia Howard, hmm? Frederick Howard’s sister.”

  Pearce grunted noncommittally.

  “Borrowing dresses from a brothel owner. And you upset about it.” Merritt slid a sideways glance at Pearce. “Do I even want to know?”

  “No.”

  Wisely, Merritt let the subject drop and asked instead, “Do you want me to assign men to follow Miss Howard?”

  “No, I want you to put them on her brother.” Pearce strode from the room. “Amelia is all mine.”

  Nine

  Amelia did her best to pretend that she was listening to Frederick as he paced the rear room of her shop, and directly behind her as she was attempting to work at her desk in the slant of afternoon sunlight falling through the window. But sweet Lord, he was bothering her to no end! And right when she was so terribly busy, too, with inventory to take, window displays to arrange, a plan to formulate for convincing Charles Varnham to overlook whatever Freddie had done, and Pearce to avoid at all costs.

  Especially avoiding Pearce. He’d already come far too close yesterday to learning the truth. At one point, she’d almost capitulated and told him everything, a part of her longing for the protection he’d offered. The thought of being able to confide in him stirred a comforting warmth in her belly, a familiarity of being with him that colored memories of her childhood and made her ache once again for that same closeness. And that was dangerous, because she still didn’t know if she could trust him with her secrets.

  But all that Frederick could think about—

  “It’s a turnpike, for God’s sake!”

  He paused in pacing to smack his hand in frustration against the desk where she was attempting to update the account ledgers. Her quill jerked and streaked a line across the page.

  She bit back a curse, heaving out an irritated sigh instead, and reached for the blotter to clean up the mess.

  “How could Sandhurst not be interested? The man should be turning cartwheels of joy that I’d suggested it to him.”

  “You met with him yesterday,” Amelia reminded him. For over an hour. She knew because she’d kept herself carefully hidden in the dining room the entire time, hoping to overhear important information as Pearce left, but garnering nothing except his parting appreciation for Freddie’s choice of cognac. Now she feigned disinterest when the voice inside her head screamed for details. “What did he say, exactly?”

  “Nothing. I couldn’t pin him down. All he did was ask questions—who the trustees will be, why I chose them, why I would want a turnpike trust in the first place…” He scowled. “Damned suspicious, if you ask me.”

  “What ulterior motive would Lord Sandhurst possibly have for delaying?” she murmured as artlessly as possible, not daring to lift her eyes to look at him.

  “I don’t know.” He turned hopefully toward her. “You two had a moment alone together in the entry hall before I arrived. Did he say anything to you about not wanting be part of it—anything at all?”

  “Not one word.” The God’s truth. He hadn’t said anything to the contrary…but only because she’d been the one doing all the talking. If Pearce had any compassion in him, he would find a way to continue to evade a concrete decision until after Parliament ended. If only for her sake.

  “Are you certain?”

  “It’s all new to him. He jus
t needs more time.” To string you along until the blackmailer is no longer a threat. “You’re asking the man to place a large chunk of his property into someone else’s control for what could be uncertain profits.” And asking me to hand mine over for a complete loss of control and no profits at all. “Give him time to consider it.”

  “We don’t have time.” As he began to pace again, he gestured in frustration in the general direction of Westminster. “The session’s going to end in less than a fortnight.”

  Dear God, she hoped so! Yet she calmly reminded him, “But the trust will remain viable, that’s what matters.” Knowing she would never be able to figure the last of the columns with him here, she patiently put down her quill and closed the ledger. “You might have to wait until the next session before the act can be passed, but whoever is forcing you to make these appointments knows it, too. The blackmailer will give you the time you need to put forward the bill next session.”

  He slowed in his pacing, only to shoot her an aggravated grimace.

  “Pearce will be less likely to decline because he’ll have the chance to think it through thoroughly.” And then decline it.

  Frederick faced her. “Do you truly think Sandhurst will be persuaded?”

  “I believe so.” Persuaded to decline. She wasn’t certain at all, but every ounce of her soul prayed for exactly that.

  She stood and crossed to the worktable, where she fussed with several yards of cream-colored silk that the women who worked in her shop had hand-printed with wooden blocks and paint, the way the silk weaver in Spitalfields had taught them to do. They’d picked up the skill quickly, creating lengths of beautiful silk that could be used for all kinds of projects—wallpaper, pillows, bedding… Amelia could barely keep the fabrics in stock because the society ladies who shopped at the Bouquet Boutique snatched them up as fast as they could be produced. This one of a red damask rose was particularly exquisite and—

  “I want you to charm him.”

  The fabric slipped through her surprised fingers and piled on the table. “Pardon?”

  “Sandhurst. You and he were once quite fond of each other, as I remember.”