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He placed a footstool made out of more purple velvet and trimmed with gold beneath Lady Frinton’s feet.

A thick but soft blanket was handed to Lottie to drape over the old woman’s legs while he placed a wicker basket on the seat opposite.

Then he directed a footman to place a rather dainty but obviously expensive lap desk next to the basket, and with a final flourish, he produced the thick stack of letters and a solid silver letter opener, which he entrusted to her.

“I shall be in the next coach with the maids in case you need me. Our first planned stop is at an inn near Potters Bar. I shall see you there, Miss Travers, unless her ladyship’s plans suddenly change…

or you throw yourself from this conveyance beforehand.

” As his mistress shot him daggers, he winked at Lottie. “Good luck.”

The door closed, the carriage lurched forward, and the silence stretched as they turned out of Grosvenor Square. Silence that, as uncomfortable as it was, was certainly not Lottie’s place to break.

Beside her, glaring straight ahead with a pinched expression, Lady Frinton huffed out a sigh.

“Seeing as you are so obviously judging me, Travers, for your information, I loathe traveling with anyone who is not in my employ. It requires too much compromise, and I am too set in my ways. I also suffer from a bad back and need my own mattress else I’ll be as stiff as a board for the duration of this trip. ”

“I wasn’t judging you, my lady.”

“Of course you were!” The old battle-axe nudged her with a bony elbow.

“And frankly, so you should. I would be very disappointed to discover, after your promising initial show of spirit, that I’d employed a spineless chit with no discernible thoughts or opinions of her own.

That said, it goes without saying that I expect you to keep your opinions about me to yourself.

I pay you first and foremost to cater to my every whim, and I shall expect you to do that with a forced smile and a polite nod no matter how tempted you might be to wring my neck. It is your most important task.”

“That indeed goes without saying, my lady.” Perhaps there was something warped about Lottie’s character, but she was already enjoying Lady Frinton immensely.

She had assumed the life of a companion would be dull and boring, but it now seemed that there would never be a dull moment with this sour old dear.

Ancient she might be, but this dowager was sharper than those samurai swords she had installed in her hallway and unlike anybody Lottie had ever met.

Still staring straight ahead, Lady Frinton adjusted her blanket.

“Your opinions and insight about others, however, are always welcome and the pithier the better.” There was that glint of mischief in those wily old eyes again, which she failed to fully disguise as she skewered Lottie with her glare.

“I like my gossip, young lady, so know that snuffling it out is your second most important task. People expect me to be the first in the know and I expect you to subtly dig for every scrap of scandal and hearsay you can find to make sure that I am.”

She looked Lottie up and down again and shook her head with disgust. “Ideally, I would prefer that you be one of those bland and insipid-looking gals who blend into the wallpaper as those usually make better spies. But as you are far too tall and far too pretty to do that, we shall have to use those attributes to my advantage. How are your flirting skills?”

An outrageously improper question when the dragon clearly expected her to use them disingenuously to “snuffle” gossip.

Yet, having used them shamelessly for years to “borrow” horses from the finest stables in Mayfair, as well as flirting for the sheer fun of it whenever her head got turned, Lottie didn’t have a problem with it.

Flirting was a delightful and harmless way to pass the time.

Especially if the fellow she was flirting with was handsome or charming and knew how to kiss.

“If I say so myself, my lady, they are exemplary. I flirt almost as well as I ride.”

The old lady’s lips twitched. “I am glad to hear it.” Then she gestured to the letters on Lottie’s lap. “Now read me my correspondence—but only the interesting letters. You can deal with the dull stuff in your room alone once I retire for the night.”

“How do I know which is dull and which is interesting?”

“By opening them, of course!” Then with another bristle she added, “Do try to use some common sense, Travers! You’ll only annoy me otherwise.”

Lottie smothered a giggle and set to work on the letters, but it soon became apparent that despite delegating the task, Lady Frinton wanted to be the one to decide which were deemed interesting or not.

Beyond the obvious bills, which she was adamant she didn’t care about, there was certainly no rhyme or reason to which she wanted Lottie to read aloud and which she did not.

They were barely down Piccadilly when she realized that the simplest way to find out was to read the signature at the bottom of the missive, and that in itself was fascinating because the old dragon did not hold back her opinions on the sender.

She straightaway refused five invitations from various society matrons because they “had fluff for brains.” Lady Arbroath bored her, as did Lord Renshaw, and Lady Peterson was apparently “still in purgatory” for some slight which was not elaborated on beyond that “it would do her the power of good to be ignored until the very last minute to teach her a lesson.” And Lord Dorchester, whoever he was, was, according to Lady Frinton, “a pompous, self-righteous, and boring arse not worthy of my time.” That missive had been snatched from Lottie’s hand, screwed into a ball, and unceremoniously tossed out of the carriage window.

Ten letters in and she hadn’t needed to answer a single one, so the dainty lap desk remained unopened.

“This one is signed only Constance,” said Lottie, frowning at the scant and cryptic contents of the eleventh. “But appears to have been sent express.”

“What does it say?” Lady Frinton was suddenly all ears.

“My dearest Almeria… You were right! The threat of a party in London was all that it needed!”

“Good heavens above!” The dowager clutched her pearls as if she were shocked to her core. “What’s the date?”

Lottie squinted at the note again. “It doesn’t say.”

“Not the date of the letter, idiot! The date today.”

“It’s the twenty-fourth of August.”

The window was yanked down and Lady Frinton practically screamed out of it. “Turn the carriage around!”

No doubt terrified of the repercussions if he disobeyed, the coachman turned on a sixpence, sending Lottie careening into the old lady hard. But rather than tear her off a strip for crushing her, Lady Frinton threw her white head back and cackled.

“Have you ever been to Kent, Travers?”