Regency Rogues Omnibus (110 page)

Law could barely think, he was that upset, but his servants and all the women and male prostitutes that he’d helped in the past kept a close network of information alive. It helped him immensely in his work and also in finding proper and safe placements for the ones that he helped.

“Beat her?” he asked tightly, he could barely breathe.

“Aye. Terrible like and she was near naked.”

Law nearly bellowed then, but somehow he managed to hold it inside himself.

“But, Mrs. Todd, cannot find Lady Affinity now. She snuck out front to gather the poor girl up and take her to her friends, but Lady Affinity was gone. Then, Mrs. Todd, tried each of her friends, but she’s not there. She’s so worried about her being hurt and out on the streets,” Nell said.

“We
will
find her,” Law uttered. “Pass the word to all we know to look out for her, but especially send Bart to Sebastian. Sebastian can spread the word quickly.” Law strode forward as he issued his orders, then he entered the hallway and snagged his coat and hat hastily. “I go now to search, but have someone ask Lady Affinity’s friends if they have any clues to where she might be.”

“Aye, Sir,” Nell replied.

Law grasped Nell’s hand. “Nell, you are so much more help to me here. Now you see how well.”

“I do feel it, yer grace, like I’m needed,” Nell said.

“And you are never to forget that. Oh and, Nell, please check on the new lady and her child. We don’t want to lose her.”

Law nearly ran out of the townhouse then, as though the devil chased him. He was devastated, his heart was breaking and his past was trying to rise up and swallow him. This was too close to Magdalena, if he’d just not dallied with a good woman, if only he’d been stronger. He knew the consequences. Why is it that one always thought it would not happen to them? All his recriminations could not begin to overshadow the desperate concerns that tugged at his heart like fire. They had to find Affinity. They had to!

***

Affinity stumbled. She could barely stay upright her body hurt so badly and one of her heels was torn off. She had to hold onto the clammy stonewall of the building that she lurched beside. She could smell the sewage of London’s lower end around her. She could hear the rats scurrying. But it meant nothing. Her mind was twisted with pain, both mental and physical. Was she really a whore? She certainly had been acting like one, blindly covering it with far-fetched fantasy, when the truth was, all she was being was sexually promiscuous. Her uncle snarling, “Slut,” kept ringing in her mind, until she sobbed and fell against the wall, barely able to hold herself upright.

“Lady Affinity,” Sebastian called gently, but the woman did not appear to hear him as she leaned crumpled and sobbing against the warehouse wall. Sebastian stepped closer, lifting his hand to lightly touch the woman’s shoulder. Either way, he thought, it was a woman in need.

The woman gasped through her frantic weeping as she tried to turn away from him, but suddenly she just collapsed. Sebastian barely caught her before she slumped to the ground and when he lifted her up into his arms, he saw that it was indeed Lady Affinity. It did not bode well that he’d found her in the lower end. It spoke of her spirit being broken more than her body. He knew his intentions immediately and where he had to take her. Law was his friend, but Lady Affinity needed her friends more now.

“Senorita, we will go to, the beautiful Brevity. You must hold on to me,” he murmured. It was interesting that his friend Lawrence Fabier knew Lady Affinity. It seemed the world moved in mysterious ways.

When Sebastian reached the steps of Lady Brevity’s stylish townhouse carrying Lady Affinity, it was as though the lovely Brevity waited for him by some intuition, because Brevity threw open the door and rushed to meet him, before his foot reached the first step.

“Oh, Sebastian you have found her!” Brevity cried, with her endearing lisp. “Bring her inside quickly.”

***

“I received your message,” Law said to Sebastian as Sebastian opened the door to Lady Brevity’s townhouse. Law stepped inside, not waiting for Sebastian to move or invite him in.

Sebastian stepped back with really no choice, saying, “She is with the doctor now.”

Law started immediately for the stairs leading up to the top floor of the townhouse, but Sebastian grasped his arm. “You will
not
keep me away from her,” Law said tersely. “But I am indebted to you for finding her.”

Sebastian gripped his arm harder. “Do you know your intentions, before you go up there?” Sebastian asked.

Law stopped trying to pressure his arm away from Sebastian’s grasp. “No . . . yes,” Law uttered, fighting the urge to see Affinity. Sebastian was right.

“I found her near the docks on the lower end,” Sebastian said. “She fell unconscious into my arms. I hear that her uncle called her whore, and a slut, and worse, he beat her.”

“Bastard,” Law snarled, slapping his hat against his thigh.

“A lady like she is . . . ,” Sebastian murmured, leaving the sentence hanging.

“Has been ruined,” Law said, adding one of the many sureties in Affinity’s life just for being attracted to him and loving him. Law lifted his head, staring intently at Sebastian. “Not if this man, this Duke can help it,” he said fiercely.

Sebastian nodded, patting Law’s arm. “Then, go see your woman. But I am not sure, my lovely Brevity, will let you.”

“Your lovely Brevity?” Law questioned him. “How did you know to bring, Affinity, here in the first place?”

“That, my friend, is a long story,” Sebastian replied with a humorous glint in his deep brown eyes. “And I will only tell if the ladies allow me.”

Chapter Fifteen

Two weeks later, Affinity knew that she was being courted and she was not sure how she felt about it. Her body had healed and Brevity had insisted that she could live with her for as long as she liked. Affinity had protested that it would taint Brevity’s reputation, however, Brevity would hear none of it. Not one of her friends would. They visited her each day and they all said that the motto of the Lady Rogues was through thick and thin. However, Affinity considered that not one of them realized how thick it could get. And then there was Law . . . In the first days she’d asked not to see him. But . . .

“Another love sonnet from the Duke and another bouquet of fresh flowers,” Brevity announced brightly, entering the sunroom where Affinity was sitting. Brevity carried a beautiful bouquet of flowers and set them on the table next to Affinity, then she handed Affinity the poem, hand written on lambskin paper. “Every single day for two weeks now, Affinity,” Brevity sighed.

“Do you think he is doing it out of guilt, Brevity?” Affinity asked suddenly.

Brevity sat down carefully in a chair close to Affinity and took Affinity’s hand. “That first night, Affinity, you regained consciousness, but the doctor gave you laudanum to sleep and the Duke sat beside you all that night, even though I told him you would not wake, he insisted.”

“He did?” Affinity asked in surprise.

“Yes, I was saving it to tell you at the right time.” Brevity patted Affinity’s hand. “And now, I also wanted to tell you that I must go out this evening. The trust lawyer of my parents’ estate always demands to see me regularly and I cannot put it off.”

“Of course, Brevity,” Affinity responded. “You need not worry about me, you are so kind to me already. I just pray it will not bring you ill.”

“All things have a way of working out,” Brevity lisped, sagely.

Later that night, Affinity tossed and turned in her bed, then she finally realized what the problem was.
Music.
She could hear music. How strange, and it sounded quite close. Why in fact, she thought, it sounded as if it were playing inside the house. Affinity rose slowly from her bed and tiptoed to her bedroom door, listening as the music became louder, and then she opened the door. It was softly floating music. A waltz?

“What?” Affinity murmured, but before she could take two steps she encountered a very happy dog at her feet. “Beauty!” she exclaimed, reaching down to pet the eager setter.

“You call my dog, Beauty?” Law’s voice floated up from downstairs. “My fierce, brave dog named, Warrior, and you call him, Beauty?”

Affinity could not catch her laugh. She was startled at Law’s presence, even though she could not see him. But what he said was funny. She inched toward the bannister and looked down. Her breath caught at Law’s handsome face looking up at her. He was dressed as though he were going to a ball, in superfine black pants and tailored jacket and he looked like everything that was masculine and pleasurable.

Affinity said tentatively, “I cannot believe you call him Warrior . . . this sweetheart, and he is beautiful.”

Law smiled, and her heart tripped a beat. “Well then, your Beauty has a message for you, if you will look on his collar,” he said.

Affinity started slightly, moving back from the bannister to look down at Beauty. She saw right on his collar there was a card tied by a ribbon, and when she reached to untie the bow, she saw that it was a card depicting her dance card with Law’s name on it. Not only was Law’s name written on it once, but on every line of the card. Tears sprang instantly to her eyes.

“Have you read it then?” Law called up to her. Affinity tried to speak, but her throat clutched, then Beauty barked once. “Ah ha,” Law exclaimed. “Thank you, Warrior, I will take that as a yes, therefore, Lady Affinity Redgrift, may I have this dance?”

“Oh,” Affinity gasped softly. Those words were as thrilling to hear as she had always thought they would be, and tenfold hearing them from Law. Beside herself, she rushed to the banister looking down. “Yes!” she exclaimed breathless with a sprinkling of tears dotting her cheeks.

Law’s smile widened to joy before her eyes. “Then I would come up to you, if you allow me.”

“Oh yes, Law.”

Law did not wait or deport himself with decorum, he bound up the stairs eagerly as she watched, filling her gaze with his handsome strength. All her fears about her nature and her morality fell away, while she looked into Law’s face as he approached her. Love had no boundaries and what a man and woman did privately together could never be dirty or crass, and Law wanted her . . . in fact, she saw . . .

Law gripped her by the waist twirling her into a waltz, while the music below, as if by magic, played louder. “My lady fair, your beauty takes my breath away and your dancing lightens my soul,” Law whispered against her ear as he pulled her closer to him, circling them in the flowing motions of a waltz. “What a dream coming true this is, Affinity, dancing at midnight with you in a sheer nightgown.”

Law’s hand caressed and warmed the small of her back as she pressed her body intimately to his heat and strength. “I so wanted to dance, Law. This is a dream come true for me to be dancing with you.”

“I know,” he murmured. “I read the last pages of your diary.”

“Not all of it?” she asked, looking up into his eyes as he gazed deeply down at her.

“I want to learn the rest from you,” he murmured as they floated to the strains of the waltz, melding their bodies in harmony together.

“Oh, Law, do you really mean it? Are you trying to woo me?” Affinity asked softly.

“I am. Is it working?” he asked with a slow seductive smile on his firm lips.

“Yes!”

The answer left Affinity breathless as their lips touched, then melted together warmly. Her arms wrapped around Law’s broad shoulders as his hands cupped her buttocks, lifting her upward into the heated kissing of their lips, while the dance between them slowed to a halt.

Law broke the kiss as their sultry breaths mingled between them. “Then, my love . . . and you are my love, Affinity. There is one question that I desire to ask you.”

Affinity held her breath, fully expecting Law to ask her to be his mistress. A question that she would shout, “yes,” to! “Lady Affinity Redgrift, would you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”

“Oh
my
God,” Affinity exclaimed, nearly swooning. She never expected this! Her reputation was ruined. They could not! She’d accepted her fate as a fallen woman in society and she would bear it for her love for Law, but . . . “Law, my reputation is ruined by my own hand. You cannot marry me,” she said with tears filling her eyes. “But I would be your mistress, gladly.”

“My god, Affinity, how much I love you,” he muttered, pulling her closer again and holding her tightly. “Do you trust me, sweet Affinity?”

“Yes of course, always and forever,” she said against his chest.

“Then, you will trust me when I tell you what I know. I visited your uncle the morning after his deplorable behavior. It seems he and Lord Hartley have completely changed their positions and although I would not allow you to go back to his home, you would be welcome and no one will ever hear about the incident or accusations again from those two gentlemen.”

“But, Law, how?” Affinity asked in amazement, stretching back in Law’s arms to gaze up at him with wide eyes.