One Night with a Rake (Regency Rakes) (3 page)

It didn’t take long for Nathaniel to find the Marquis of Yorkingham’s magnificent carriage in Covent Garden. It was drawing a sizable crowd of lookee-loos in the squalid neighborhood.

The solid-looking footman and the driver were doing their best to keep the riffraff from disturbing the matched pair of bays, but they couldn’t keep light-fingered wretches from breaking off pieces of the elegant gilt filigree on the back side of the coach. One enterprising crone had even reached into the windows with a pair of shears and liberated a section of the velvet curtains.

“I hear that the Marquis of Yorkingham’s daughter has wandered into these environs and I’m concerned for her welfare,” Nate said to the footman. “Can you tell me where Lady Georgette has gone?”

The fellow flicked him a quick assessing glance. Nate was glad he’d taken pains with his appearance before he went to White’s to fleece the willing yesterday. Even if his cuffs hadn’t glinted with gold, the cut of his clothing proclaimed him a gentleman. Relief sagged the footman’s shoulders.

“I’m fair concerned myself, milord. Her ladyship went down Lackaday Lane with her maid. Halfway down, red door, Mercy said. That’s where they’re bound. I’d have gone with milady,” the footman said, “but she left strict orders as I was to stay with the carriage.”

“Then you’d better do so, my good man. But be ready to go on the quick. I have a feeling the sooner Lady Georgette vacates this place, the better. Oh, and hang onto my hat and garrick until I return, would you?” Nate would have given the fellow his jacket as well since he fully expected fisticuffs at the least in the very near future, but it was far too cold to go without it.

The footman tugged his forelock in assent and Nate strode away down the fetid alley.

What
on
earth
is
the
silly
goose
up
to?

The lewd antics of the Prince Regent’s court had sparked a backlash in some quarters. Since returning to London, Nathaniel had encountered his share of moralists intent on improving everyone within earshot. Evidently, Georgette had become one of those insufferable bores.

Only a few “ladies of the night” were larks as well, but a handful had already positioned themselves by the windows in varying degrees of dishabille in order to entice new patrons. They blew kisses to Nate, and one of the bolder ones displayed her charms to him by dropping her filmy wrapper off one smooth shoulder.

He didn’t slow his pace.

Did Anne’s sister really believe she could bring an end to prostitution? Women fell into the life because it was easier than domestic service and the pay was buckets better. And men frequented light-heeled lasses because they were…well, men.

There was no stopping it.

Lady Georgette might as well try to make the sun go backward in the sky.

He lengthened his stride as he searched his memory for glimpses of her. Truth to tell, he found few of them. Maybe because it had been hard for him to have eyes for anyone else when his quicksilver Annie was about.

It seemed Georgette had always been there, on the fringes of social and family gatherings, taking part but certainly not taking the lead. A bookish sort, he recalled. Not that she was an ugly duckling. Georgette was pretty enough, in the manner of a small brown squirrel, he supposed. Simply unremarkable. He didn’t remember her ever expressing a strong opinion on anything.

When had Georgette turned into a fire-breathing crusader?

He heard a loud wail from up ahead and broke into a trot.

Must
be
the
fire-breathing crusader herself.

What a colossal waste of time. He could have told her that no bawd would sit on her hands while some “holier-than-thou” made off with her meal tickets.

When he reached the red door, the unmistakable crash of broken crockery resounded behind it, along with another shriek. Nathaniel put his shoulder to the portal and gave it a shove.

The door swung open so quickly, he stumbled into the parlor, barely keeping his feet.

“Release me at once, you beast!” came a vaguely familiar voice.

The owner of it was slung over the shoulder of a monstrous big chap. He was carting the woman up the staircase. Judging from her fine clothing and ridiculously fashionable hat, she could only be Lady Georgette. A girl with a mobcap, who was likely Georgette’s maid, hopped up and down at the foot of the stairs, yelping like a demented pup. The giant ignored her pleas and, despite Georgette’s fists pummeling his back, he continued his ascent as if she were no more trouble to carry than a goodly sized sack of yams.

“I insist you unhand me this instant!” she demanded.

“I’ll unsomething ye, missy, and no mistake.” The fellow pronounced “I’ll” as if it were “oil.” “Madam always lets ol’ Duggins prick her new girls first. Break ye in good and proper, I will.”

“That’s not going to happen,” Nathaniel said in a calm, strong voice from his position at the threshold.

Georgette’s head jerked up and their gazes met. “Lord Nathaniel?”

“Lady Georgette.” Nathaniel gave her an elegant bow. The ridiculousness of the situation seemed to call for it. Even with her hazel eyes wide with indignation—she’d probably never admit it was fear as well—her oval face was far prettier than he remembered. “The years have been kind, my lady.”

The big chap on the staircase glanced over his shoulder and glowered at him. Georgette stared at Nate as if she still didn’t quite believe he was there.

A smile skittered across her features, accompanied by an appealing blush. Then the smile disappeared, though her high color remained, as she turned her attention back to her captor. She gave the man another thump between his shoulder blades to no avail. The bully turned around and shot Nate an evil, black-toothed grin, presenting the lady’s very shapely backside to him.

“What on earth…are you doing here…Nathaniel?” Georgette asked between repeated blows on the man’s ungiving back.

“Coming to your assistance, of course.” Nathaniel wondered if she had any idea how fetching her bum was waving in the air like that, her gown clenched tight across her hips. Even though she showed no skin beyond a fair bit of ankle and occasional calf when she struggled, Georgette was far more appealing than the lightskirts he’d seen on the way in to this den of Delilah’s.

The old Georgette would have been cringing in a corner. Now trapped in a situation that might daunt several men Nate knew, she was fighting back. And in a society where most debutants’ heads were filled with only lace and girlish dreams, Lady Georgette was at least trying to help someone else, no matter how misguided those efforts.

Somehow, Anne’s older sister had shed her unremarkable past to become…an interesting woman. Against Nathaniel’s expectations, an approving grin spread across his face.

Then she ruined his new assessment of her when she spoke with an acid tone. “If you intend to assist me, Lord Nathaniel, I suggest you do so. Quickly.”

Nate shoved past the maid, bounded up the steps, and planted his fist in the big fellow’s belly. When the man doubled over with a grunt, Nate pried Georgette from his arms and swung her around behind him. He expected her to bolt, but instead she remained on the staircase only a few steps below him, chattering something about someone named Vesta and how they couldn’t leave without her.

The big fellow recovered from Nate’s first blow to his midsection and began swinging. Nathaniel ducked and backed down the stairs, with Georgette crowding him from behind.

“Generally speaking, women who are being rescued are not so bossy,” he told her.

“And generally speaking, men who come to their rescue have a plan,” she snapped as she moved reluctantly down the stairs with him. “One would hope you had the presence of mind to bring a pistol.”

Nathaniel had had enough killing during his stint in the military. Carrying a firearm made resorting to deadly violence far too easy. “Afraid not.”

The man’s next swing barely missed Nate’s head and instead left a ham-sized dent in the crumbling plaster wall. The bully swore the air blue and shook his injured paw, but he kept advancing steadily.

“What about a sword?” Georgette asked.

“Left it in the parlor.” Nathaniel landed another punch to the bully’s chest. His chin was too high to reach since he was up a couple steps from Nate. Even if they’d been on equal footing, Nathaniel would have to move quickly to connect a solid blow to the big man’s jaw. His opponent had a serious advantage in length of arm. “Mother likes the way it looks over the mantel.”

“Surely you’ve a boot knife.”

“In my other boots.” He turned quickly to scoop Georgette up and carry her the rest of the way down the stairs since she didn’t seem to realize now would have been the right time for her to take to her heels. The bully lumbered after them. Nate was grateful that his opponent’s size also seemed to mean he was slow. “Lud, but you’ve become a bloodthirsty wench, my Lady Georgette.”

“You’ve no idea what I’ve become. We haven’t seen each other in years. And I’m certainly not your lady.” She pushed hard against his chest. “Put me down. Oof!”

He complied so quickly she barely had time to get her feet under her before he dropped her and turned back to face the madam’s henchman. Nate considered himself tall, but this fellow topped him by half a head and easily outweighed him by two or three stone.

“Here.” Georgette pulled an umbrella from the stand near the door and shoved the curved handle into his hand.

“What am I to do with this?”

“How should I know?” If she wouldn’t run away, at least she had sense enough to position herself behind him. “You’re the one who’s doing the rescuing.”

The bully put his head down and charged them. Nate sidestepped at the last moment, dragging Georgette with him, and the man barreled past them, roaring obscenities. Nate flipped the umbrella in his hand and used the curved handle to catch the bully’s ankle.

The big man fell headlong and slid across the bare hardwood, propelled by his own momentum, till his crown met the baseboard of the far wall with a loud thwack. He rose shakily on his elbows. Then he sank with a grunt and his forehead smacked the hardwood. The bully lay still as a corpse.

Georgette’s pink mouth formed a perfect O and her face went white as paper. “You’ve killed him.”

“Better him than me.” Nate bent to take a closer look at his downed foe. The man’s ribs expanded and contracted with deep breaths. “But no such luck. He’s just senseless. When he wakes, he’ll have a headache from Hades.”

Georgette folded her gloved hands before her primly. “There’s no need to be vulgar.”

“My lady, I’m exercising extreme discretion. You have no idea how badly this situation calls for me to be vulgar.” Nate grabbed her hand and led her out the faded red door. By the time they reached the wretched cobbles, squeals and shrieks erupted behind them as the madam and her girls discovered the inert body of their protector. The little maid Nate had noticed earlier followed hard after them as if her pantalets were on fire.

Georgette tugged against his grip, planting her feet. “No, we have to go back. We don’t have Vesta.”

“What you don’t have, milady, is sense.”

The maid outpaced them, knees and elbows pumping, and fled past, yelling for someone named Reuben.

“But you don’t understand—” Georgette began.

“No, you obviously don’t understand the peril you’re in.” Behind her, an older woman in a blue dressing gown a decade out of fashion appeared in the doorway and shook her fist at them. Nate figured she must be the proprietress. Then the madam and half a dozen of her girls came barreling after them.

“Now pick up your skirts and fly, Georgette,” Nate ordered. “Or I’ll carry you over my shoulder like a piglet on its way to market.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “You wouldn’t dare.”

I must have a sign on my forehead that reads “Please cart
me away in the most undignified manner possible,”
Georgette thought crossly.

The cobbles blurred as she bumped along. Twice in the last quarter hour, Georgette had found herself in this same ridiculous position, arms dangling, head down, bum to the sky. Only this time, she could scarcely draw a breath since her chest thumped Nathaniel’s back with each pounding stride.

Her bonnet ribbons came loose, and the cunning little capote flew free. She tried to catch it, but the long strips of satin slipped through her fingertips. The delicate lacy confection landed in the rivulet of yellowish slime, settling to float like a little boy’s paper boat on the Thames.

At least my slippers are
safe this time.

Sounds of pursuit echoed through the narrow canyon of leaning structures, and intellectually, Georgette admitted Nathaniel was right about the need for haste.

But blast the man, he was
not
right about the way he manhandled her. And she’d tell him so.

As soon as she managed more than half a gulp of air.

“Quick, my lady,” Mercy shrieked from somewhere ahead of them.

As
if
I’m in control of how fast I go.

They burst out of dingy Lackaday Lane into the brighter sunlight of the wider street. Nathaniel shoved her through the open door of her carriage with no gentleness at all and clambered in after her.

“Close the door, Reuben!” Mercy ordered from the seat she’d taken next to the driver.

The coach door slammed so hard, its hinges rattled.

“Drive,” Mercy commanded in her best cockney screech, and the horses leaped into a jolting canter as the mob from Madam Bouchard’s spilled into the street after them. Georgette wondered if there had been enough time for Reuben Darling to leap onto his customary place at the back of the carriage or if he’d been engulfed by the sea of ragged silks.

Her heart hammered and she dragged in a sweet lungful of the lavender-scented air inside her father’s carriage. She
had
been in danger. Only now did Georgette allow herself to realize how much.

“That’s a very capable lady’s maid you’ve got there,” Nathaniel said as he sprawled on the opposite squab. By rights, he ought to have been as out of breath as Georgette, but instead the infuriating man merely spread his arms across the tufted back of his seat and cocked a brow at her. “You should listen to her more often.”

“And you should have listened to me. Do you realize that now I shall have to go back?”

“For God’s sake, why?”

“Because we didn’t even have a chance to speak to Mercy’s friend before we were set upon by the bully.”

“Who’s Mercy?”

“My maid. The one with whom you’re so impressed.” Georgette let her gaze flick around the small interior, not trusting herself to look directly at Nathaniel.

She’d often imagined what it would be like to be alone with a man in an enclosed coach. In her mind’s eye, the imaginary fellow would spout sonnets and gaze at her admiringly. At the end of the idyllic ride, perhaps he’d ask for one of her gloves as a memento.

Perfectly
correct. Perfectly honorable.

She sighed. Like all her romantic fantasies, the one about being alone with a man in a coach always left her with a satisfying rosy glow in her chest.

Reality, by contrast, made her insides jitter. Nathaniel Colton was too big, too hawkishly handsome, too
real
to be so near in this confined space. And his fixed gaze, while definitely admiring, could not be counted either correct or honorable. Something about the way he looked at her, as if her clothing were suddenly transparent as wet muslin, made her skin flush with unaccustomed heat.

“What possessed you to stray down Lackaday Lane in the first place?” he asked.

This was safe ground. Georgette chattered nonstop through Leicester Square and Piccadilly about her goal of improving the lives of fallen women. By the time the carriage slowed in the wider, blessedly familiar streets of St. James’s Square, she was building to an impassioned finish that would have done credit to a country vicar with Methodist tendencies.

“My maid Mercy is a prime example. When offered the opportunity for change, she took it. So you see,” Georgette said, lacing her gloved fingers together, “I’m convinced that many of these young women want to leave their lives of shame for something better.”

“And that something better is learning to empty your chamber pot?”

Georgette drew her lips into a tight line. That
was
one of Mercy’s responsibilities, but certainly not the defining duty for a lady’s maid. Besides being indelicate for him to bring up such a thing in polite conversation, it was hardly fair to single out that demeaning little chore as an example of Mercy’s new life.

“Her domestic duties aside, my maid’s situation is much improved since she came to work for me instead of Madam Bouchard,” Georgette insisted. “Mercy is very clever. I’ve even been teaching her to read.”

“Careful. You may tread on some self-important toes,” Nathaniel warned. “There are those who deplore education for the lower classes.”

“More shame to them.”

“But you can see their point, can’t you? If a maid knows how to read as well as her mistress, it takes all the fun out of emptying her chamber pot.”

Georgette balled her handkerchief in her hand. The man was beyond exasperating.

“You’re missing
my
point entirely. Mercy didn’t have to become my maid. With the proper education she can become a shop girl, or a milliner if she has talent in that direction, or whatever she jolly well chooses. The point is, she has options.” Georgette leaned forward to lend weight to her argument. “Mercy was trapped in an existence filled with debauchery. She has exchanged it for a life of respectable work. What woman in her position wouldn’t make that choice?”

“Depending on the
position
”—he lifted a suggestive brow—“it’s been my experience that some women enjoy a little debauchery.”

Georgette gasped in surprise and that confounded flush started in again, heating her neck and creeping upward. “That’s the most deplorable thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Truly? Your conversations must be deadly dull, then. You really must get out more.”

“Of all the cheek!” What had her sister ever seen in this lout? Besides his wickedly handsome face and cobalt eyes, of course. “It’s that sort of debasing attitude that keeps women down, that keeps them from developing their God-given potential. The fault is not in our gender that our place in the world is smaller than a man’s. It is in lack of education. Women are kept in the most shameful state of ignorance and—”

Without warning, he reached across the small space, cupped her cheeks with both hands, and covered her mouth with his.

Her eyes flared in shock and she would have pulled back, but he was so much stronger than she. After all, he’d just carted her down the street in full flight without raising so much as a bead of perspiration on his brow. Any protest she might make over this kiss would be as fruitless as when she pounded on the bully’s back.

Besides, a secret part of her didn’t want to protest. That rebellious bit inside her wanted to revel in this exciting new sensation, devil take what was proper.

His eyes were closed as he slanted his mouth over hers, deepening their kiss, but Georgette kept hers wide open. Her heart hammered so hard, she felt each pounding beat in her ears. Nathaniel’s hands were firm, but his lips were surprisingly supple, conforming, melding to hers.

The tip of his tongue traced the seam of her mouth, and a wicked little thrill rippled over her. Her lips parted softly and he drew all the air from her lungs in a swoosh. Then he replaced it sweetly with his own and followed the warm breath with his tongue. He tasted of coffee, bracing and strong. When his tongue pulled back, she felt strangely bereft.

Mercy had complained of an ache in her “nethers” earlier. Now warmth pooled in Georgette’s. A soft, liquid sort of heat she’d never felt before.

Then Nathaniel’s eyes opened and he released her mouth. He was still close enough that his warm breath feathered across her lips. She suddenly realized that the carriage had come to a stop, but neither of them moved.

“Why…did you do that?” she whispered. Her stays were definitely too tight. She could scarcely breathe.

He gazed at her for several heartbeats, his expression questioning, as if he’d never seen her before. Then he leaned back in his seat and exhaled noisily.

“I honestly don’t know,” he admitted. “At the time, it seemed the best way to stop you from talking.”

She made a low growl in the back of her throat and demanded that Reuben open the carriage door. Then she turned back to glare at the man across from her.

He
ought
to
be
thankful
that
looks, indeed, cannot kill.

“Do not fret yourself, Lord Nathaniel. You will not be subjected to the sound of my voice for one moment longer.”

The carriage door opened and Reuben handed her down.

“It wasn’t the sound I objected to,” Nathaniel said as he climbed out after her. “It was the words. Have you considered that men wish to protect women from harm and that’s why you’re kept in ignorance about certain things? Your risky sojourn into Covent Garden is a case in point.”

If he was angling for a thank-you for carting her from Madam Bouchard’s, he was destined to drown that worm. He’d treated her as if she weren’t a thinking, rational being. As if she were a child.

Except
for
that
blasted
kiss…and even that was to keep me quiet!

“I may be safer here in St. James’s, but how can I remain willfully ignorant of the circumstances of my less fortunate sisters in other places?” She strode toward the door of Yorkingham House.

The irritating man matched her pace.

“If you want to do good, no one is stopping you,” Nathaniel said, “but there are other ways besides risking your pretty little…neck.”

She decided to let his unspoken indelicacy pass, but part of her wondered what he found pretty about her. Besides her neck. “How do you suggest I help those women while sitting on my hands here in St. James’s?”

“You might take on a partner.”

“Are you offering?” She laughed mirthlessly. “You forget that your reputation precedes you, Lord Nathaniel. I rather think you’d be more likely to invest in a brothel than try to shut one down.”

Reuben trotted ahead and opened the door to Yorkingham House for her. Nathaniel Colton followed her in as if she’d invited him. After closing the door behind them, she knew Reuben would nip back to the barouche. He and Mercy would ride it around the block and down the alley to the rear of the town house in order to use the servants’ entrance off the kitchen.

She’d heard some folk with democratic tendencies objected to that separation between the help and the family they served. If Nathaniel objected to Mercy emptying a chamber pot, he was probably a secret subversive when it came to maintaining distinctions between classes.

Oh, bother the man and what he may be!
He had no right to make her feel defensive about what she was trying to accomplish with Mercy and any of her friends they could rescue.

Georgette’s soiled kid soles swished on the marble entry and she avoided her reflection in the grand mirror that hung above the Chippendale hall table. One gilded calling card glared up at her from the silver tray.

“Oh, blast!” she said as Humphrey, the house steward, helped her off with her pelisse and politely offered to take Nathaniel’s garrick and hat as well. Lord Nate’s coat was spotless while the hem of hers would never be the same. Her newest bonnet was now floating down a little stream of slime while his beaver hat was flawless. Even his dark hair rumpled in waves Byron would envy while she was sure her tumble-down coiffure more closely resembled a lady-of-the-night’s than a lady’s.

Truly, there is no justice in the world.

“You’re frowning at that card as if it were the embodiment of the Seven Deadlies,” Nathaniel said. “Something else vexes you more than my presence, my lady?”

She picked up the gilt card. “Lord Winthrop, the Duke of Cambridge’s emissary, has already been here today and obviously found me ‘not at home.’”

“Ah, yes, I believe I heard you’re in the running for the Hy—”

She shot him a warning glare and he very wisely brought his lips together. If he’d said “Hymen Race Terrific” in her hearing, she’d have been obliged to box his ears. The vulgar characterization of the royal duke’s attentions toward her was a sore spot. Obviously, journalists at the
Times
and its poorer cousins, the ubiquitous scandal sheets, had far too much time on their hands and too little serious news to report.

“If Winthrop came to see you this early in the morning, he ought not to be surprised to be turned away,” Nathaniel said, still standing in the foyer as if he expected to be asked to stay for tea.

Didn’t the man realize he was also far too early for a polite caller?

“While it’s true that ‘not at home’ could well mean that I’m simply not receiving at that hour”—
or
this
one, for that matter!
—“one is never ‘not at home’ to the royal duke’s representative.”

She tugged off her gloves in irritation. Even though she was rarely expected to speak at those little enclaves with His Highness’s minion, she
was
required to present herself with every appearance of meekness. The farce of her supposed mildness was her mother’s idea. Lady Yorkingham was so certain it would clinch the royal match, Georgette hadn’t the heart to dissuade her.

“I’m sure Lord Winthrop knew I was truly not in residence and will wonder where I was.”

“I take it His Royal Highness, the Duke of Cambridge, disapproves of your noble intentions toward the city’s lightskirts,” Nathaniel said.