Page 1 of Escape of the Scoundrel (Escape #1)

L ord Illsworth was in a foul mood.

Not only had he lost far too much money backing the wrong man in the afternoon’s prize fight, but he’d got soaking wet driving his curricle back from the fight field to the Duck and Spoon at Cartbridge afterwards. The puny coin he’d lingered at the fight to win from the idiots Dolton and Poole—aptly known as Dolt and Fool—did not make up for either of those disasters.

It all boded ill for being able to recoup his losses through card games at Lady Grandison’s party this week. Although, to be sure, there would be the welcome distraction of the delectable Lady Bab, who was surely bored with her dull stick of a husband and ripe for the plucking at last. After all, she had given him her token, even if she had asked for it back again almost immediately. There was pleasure—and mischief—to be had there.

Cheered by this thought, he walked, dripping, into the riotous Duck and Spoon Inn. And the first man he saw was Snake Bloody Sanderly.

Not that Snake was likely to attend Lady Grandison’s party, let alone defend his sister Bab’s honour, but the man was guaranteed to upset the most convivial gathering. Even now, he stood out from among the drunken young bloods and the over-excited sporting Corinthians, simply by lounging at his ease at the table next to the staircase. He was dressed with his usual quiet elegance, not a raven lock out of place, the familiar, maddening half-sneer upon his thin lips, one upward-sloping eyebrow raised at young rakehell, Lord Durward, who sat opposite him.

Another enthusiast, Wriggley by name and nature, stood before Sanderly, gesticulating wildly as he explained the fight to him, move by move. Snake’s expression was one of undisguised boredom. His eyelids were drooping in what should have been a warning.

Illsworth moved surreptitiously toward the stairs, hoping not to be noticed until he looked more presentable.

Interrupting Wriggley without apology, Sanderly addressed Durward in his soft yet curiously penetrating voice. “Is this fellow talking to you?”

“Can’t be,” Durward said. “I was there.”

Sanderly glanced up at Wriggley who had finally noticed they were talking through him. “So was I.”

Wriggley flushed. “Your lordship is a devotee of the science of pugilism?”

“Not devoted to anything, my dear fellow. But I know a man just dying to be lectured. You’ll find him...” Sanderly’s hood-like eyelids snapped fully up, revealing eyes of an intense, almost inhuman shade of blue as he glanced maliciously around the room in search of a victim.

Illsworth froze, his foot on the first step of the staircase. Inevitably, the blue, world-mocking gaze found him, taking in his dripping person, from his muddy hat—it had blown off in the wind as he rounded a bend in the road—and plastered hair, over the streams of water still running off every cape of his coat, to his squelching boots.

“Dear me,” he drawled. “Is it raining?”

Durward let out a crack of laughter. Which drew everyone else’s attention and a few grins, some of them sympathetic.

“As you see,” Illsworth said shortly. “Obviously, I don’t run as fast as you.”

He thought this a rather clever riposte, for rumour said the blackguard Earl of Sanderly, cashiered from the army for cowardice, was bolting now from English shores. Opinions varied as to why. Some said he was escaping assassins or angry husbands, others that he was just fed-up being blackballed from the best London clubs. At the very least, Illsworth’s remark should have annoyed Sanderly. It certainly won a few malicious laughs.

But the earl only smiled. “Oh, I never run. I have servants and horses for that kind of thing. Best hurry along and change before you catch a chill, Illsworth. Thank you, George.” The gratitude was flung at the innkeeper who placed a bottle and one glass at his elbow. Well, no one else would drink with the Snake.

Even this belief, annoyingly, proved to be untrue, for when Illsworth returned in dry coat, pantaloons, and boots, he found several men clustered around the earl’s table, setting up a game of hazard among several bottles and glasses.

“Join us, Illsworth?” Lord Wolf invited. He had wagered correctly on the prize fight, but Illsworth saw with predatory pleasure that he had an oddly reckless look in his eyes that boded well for his opponents.

“Why not?” Illsworth said pulling up a chair. He might even get a chance later to make use of his weighted dice and fleece everyone, including Sanderly which would be a special satisfaction.

Wolf drank steadily. So did Sanderly, though it never changed his weary expression. Durward knocked it back with enthusiasm. Illsworth smiled and almost rubbed his hands together. Then he realized Sanderly’s heavily lidded eyes were upon him and hastily conjured up a harmless reason for amusement.

“Is this a peers only table?” he inquired, for it did stand out among the chaos in the rest of the room. A few pinks of the ton with quizzing glasses were comparing waistcoats at one end of the room. At another, a convivial fellow was trying to perform a handstand on the table while his friends roared with laughter. Everyone else was milling around, some re-enacting the fight while others argued over every move and interfered to show how it really happened.

Illsworth’s table companions, who were indeed mostly peers of the realm, accorded his remark a cursory grin, all but Sanderly who appeared to have lost interest. His gaze was on a young gentleman limping painfully across the floor with a stout walking stick, presumably in search of somewhere to sit.

Bad luck , thought Illsworth without real sympathy. The Duck and Spoon was packed to the gunnels for the night with the rich and privileged. This rather ordinary fellow did not stand a chance of a room or even a seat. He had straight, fair hair and deep lines around his eyes and mouth but despite his awkward gait, his posture was very upright. Possibly an injured soldier back from the Peninsula. Or America.

His gaze flickered over the “peers’ table” as he passed, and his eyes widened with startled pleasure. He stopped, hobbled nearer, and thrust out his free hand. “Snake!”

This will be good , Illsworth thought with amusement. Sanderly could annihilate encroachers—his definition was satisfyingly wide—and frequently did, with no more than a raised eyebrow or two devastating words. Which was usually vastly entertaining for watchers and humiliating for the encroacher.

But to Illsworth’s astonishment, Sanderly actually smiled—not his usual sneer either, but a spontaneous, singularly sweet smile. He even reached up to clasp the proffered hand in what from anyone else would have been a warm shake.

“Jonny Berry, as I live and breathe. Join us? Budge up there, Wolf.”

Obligingly, Wolf shuffled along the bench and they made space for the newcomer, who sat down with a grunt of relief and propped his walking stick up against the wall behind him.

“Captain Berry,” Sanderly introduced his friend. “Jonny, Lords Durward, Illsworth, and Wolf.”

Everyone nodded and murmured wary greetings. After all, the man appeared to be a friend of Snake’s. One could almost forget that Sanderly had once been an army officer too, though inevitably he had been cashiered for cheating or cowardice or treason. Or all three.

“And you’re a lord yourself, now, I hear,” Captain Berry grinned, looking him up and down. “I almost didn’t recognize you! Do I congratulate you?”

“No.” A plate of beef pie was set before Sanderly who promptly ordered for the captain, too, and demanded another bottle.

After that, things settled down into a more predictable pattern. Captain Berry said little, eating and drinking rather more sparingly than the rest, no doubt overwhelmed by the august company. Occasionally, he cast odd, almost disappointed glances at Sanderly when his lordship deigned to make one of his sarcastic remarks.

“Will you play, Captain?” Wolf invited as they began a fresh game.

“If the stakes are not beyond me,” Berry said mildly, which ensured they began rather ludicrously low. Secretly, Illsworth was grateful, for he could not guarantee a large win until later in the evening when he could swap his own dice.

There were distractions, of course. An apparently impromptu cock fight was in full swing at the far end of the room, accompanied by yells of encouragement, demented clucking, rampant wagering and clouds of floating feathers. The maids—extra women had clearly been recruited for the evening—were kept busy, delivering ale and bottles, weaving between clowning crowds and avoiding groping hands and eager laps. A couple of other girls, presumably not employed at the inn, seemed to have come only for the wealthier laps, and their screeches of laughter and feigned shock mingled with the rest of the racket.

A few youths were trying to bet on a snail race, although the creatures kept being crunched underfoot. A small goat had also been introduced into the company, with the purpose of seeing who it would butt first.

At hazard, Illsworth won modestly, even when Sanderly held the bank.

Outside, the stagecoach arrived in a mad flurry of lights and activity. Luggage was thrown down from the coach roof, the blowing horses were unharnessed and a fresh team brought up ready to take their place. A stout woman with a basket alighted, followed by a gaggle of children and a ridiculously pretty girl in a dark traveling cloak and a rather squashed straw bonnet with blue ribbons.

Illsworth sat up. Surely the girl could not belong to the stout matron? He didn’t fancy the family’s chances if they dared step into the inn! But no, the stout lady sailed away to a waiting gig with her even larger husband. The delectable girl was smiling and herding the children toward the inn’s front door.

“Is she in for a shock,” Illsworth murmured with amusement.

“Bet, my lord,” Durward said to him impatiently, eyes glittering with brandy. When had he started on the brandy?

Illsworth made his bet and gazed expectantly at the inn’s front door, where two youths were dancing enticingly in front of the goat who seemed to be trying to dodge around them rather than butt either of them. The door opened and the girl sailed in alone.

“Shut the door!” yelled several voices as the goat made a bid for freedom.

The girl shut the door and leaned against it, her eyes widening with clear astonishment.

Her gaze was fixed not on any of the gawping young men who had fallen silent in appreciation of the beauty before them, nor even the blood and feathers of the cockfight across the room, but on the little goat, bleating piteously.

“I say ,” Durward murmured appreciatively.

One of the lap girls seized the dropping jaw of her drunken swain and turned it forcibly back toward her.

The young woman at the door raised outraged eyes to the innkeeper, who was hurrying toward her with some alarm.

“What is that poor creature doing in here?” the girl demanded, her accent unexpectedly refined.

“Butting me,” claimed the nearest wagerer proudly.

“It never touched you,” disputed his friend. “It’s about to butt me .”

“Its mother will butt you both,” the girl said, scowling at the innkeeper. “The poor little thing is terrified. Please take it back to its mother now.”

“Of course, miss, of course,” the innkeeper said in somewhat surprising capitulation, for the foolish young gentlemen had already spent considerably more than this pretty specimen of genteel poverty ever would. “Tom, take it back to the pen.”

Obligingly, the tapster put down his tray of ale and swept the little goat up under his arm, marching out the door with it, much to the vocal disappointment of its tormentors.

“How can I help you, miss?” the innkeeper asked through these protestations.

The noise increased again and Illsworth lost the beginning of the conversation until the girl’s voice rose too. “I bespoke a bedchamber and a private parlour!”

“Huzzah!” cried most of the young men across the room.

The girl spared none of them a glance. Her eyes remained rivetted to the innkeeper’s face.

“You don’t want to stay here, miss,” he said, shocked. “Not tonight. You’d hate it!”

“I will hate it,” she agreed. “However, I shall hate seeking shelter beneath a hedge even more.”

“The other thing is, miss, there’s no rooms free.”

“But I wrote to you reserving the rooms a fortnight ago!”

“Before the fight was arranged,” Wriggley said wisely. “Can’t have known we’d all show up.”

“Then my rooms were reserved first, and I insist on the bedchamber I was promised. I am prepared to forgo the private parlour.”

“Come and be private with me,” said one of the goat wagerers, sidling over to her lasciviously, much to the loud amusement of his friends, one of whom stepped to the girl’s other side and slipped his arm around her waist.

Several men laughed and whistled. Illsworth couldn’t see what happened next, but the youth suddenly dropped his arm with a strangled grunt. Someone shoved him aside and took his place. Others pressed closer.

“You see how it is, miss,” the innkeeper said helplessly. “My hands are tied, and you and your family’d be a sight safer under that hedge. Look, there’s a smaller house only two miles down the road. Mrs. Harbottle’ll look after you there.”

“We’ll look after you better here,” shouted Durward, always one to stir the pot for a pretty face.

“I am not walking two miles in the rain with all our baggage,” the girl exclaimed. “I insist on having the room I was promised!”

“Huzzah!” cheered the crowd once more.

The goat wagerer flung an arm around her and kissed her cheek, then dodged back as if avoiding a boxing hit. The room roared with laughter. Illsworth allowed himself a tolerant smile.

Sanderly sighed and stood up.

“Sirs, let the lady be and go back to your ale,” the harassed innkeeper said as Sanderly strolled across the room and the men began shoving each other out of the way to crowd closer to the girl. Somehow, though, a path cleared for Sanderly. The girl, who was now clutching her battered carpet bag very tightly indeed, finally saw him.

She glared repellingly, tilting her chin as though recognizing a more dangerous animal than those nearest her who, like a pack of curs, were egging each other on with lewd barks and nips.

“Give her a squeeze, Snake!” some wag encouraged to more raucous laughter.

Snake did more than that. He stood very close to her, and she could not retreat for the surrounding men. He placed one finger under her chin, almost as though he were about to inspect her teeth, then pounced, fastening his lips to hers. His free hand held her by the nape to keep her head steady.

The men began to stamp in appreciation, though those nearest were objecting vociferously that they were there first.

Snake raised his head in a leisurely fashion. “Why, yes, you shall share my room,” he announced, then, as she seemed about to spit with fury, “No, darling, you shall thank me in the morning.”

The girl’s eyes widened. She closed her mouth, staring at him, but he was already walking away from her. A gurgling breath escaped her, which, astonishingly, sounded like laughter. Hardly a flattering response to Sanderly’s kiss, or his highly improper invitation, but Sanderly’s only reaction was the faintest twitch of the lips.

“Have Mrs. George see to it,” he said to the innkeeper. “I’m playing dice.”