Page 19 of Seduced by a Scoundrel (The Spinster Society #3)

“I am not going back to school.”

Sophie attacked the fish on her plate as if it had offended her.

As if it was her brother’s big head, in point of fact.

Something that she pointed out. Loudly.

Keir had returned home just in time to slip into the dining room and take his seat as his sister came down the stairs. He did not want to have to explain his absence. And so he ate a second breakfast of good, proper tea instead of the acid Emmeline had served him, and a sweet bun.

How different this room was from the other. Here the drapes were heavy, embroidered with gold and tied with matching gold tassels. The cups were as delicate and fluted as if they were made of lily petals. His father had preferred everything to be fragile, especially when his son grew bigger and stronger than he was and struggled to feel comfortable. Crystal beads dangled from every chandelier, the candlesticks gleamed, oil paintings of renowned Montgomery ancestors glowered from the picture rail above several footmen standing at attention, should Keir find himself unable to reach for the salt. He would send half of them to Sybil this very day. Those that looked strong enough. Were clever enough. Good enough.

In contrast, Spinster House, as he was told it was called, was filled with plants and books and daggers hidden in the oddest places. The chairs were sturdy. The earthenware mug Sybil had handed him in the kitchen had made him want to propose right then and there.

Of course, he had wanted to propose when she made that little gasp when he sucked her nipple into his mouth. When she had rolled her eyes at him. When she had dragged her nails across his chest. When she paused to watch him, thinking he was asleep. Every time he looked in her direction, really. That had never changed, only now he could indulge the thought.

And now that he had granted himself permission to look at her, to want her and crave her? Now that he knew the taste of her pleasure in his mouth without rush? His need for her would not be satiated. A frozen river in his mind had shattered to pieces with the parlor window, flooding him with images of Sybil waking up in his bed, walking with him through the park, wearing his ring on her finger. Even when she was also wearing that ridiculous getup as Lord Singleton.

“You’re not even listening to me,” Sophie complained.

“I don’t have to,” Keir pointed out, pouring himself more tea. He could swear Emmeline’s coffee was still burning in his stomach. “You’ve said the same thing three times now.”

“Because you never take me seriously.”

“It’s hard to take someone seriously when they put porridge in other people’s shoes.” He wasn’t wrong, but he was also aware that he sounded like a prig. Exactly as Sybil accused him. “You have to go to school, Sophie,” he added somewhat helplessly.

“I already know my sums. I know French, a little Italian. I can dance a quadrille and curtsy when the queen requires it. I can ride a horse and embroider a pillow. And I read the newspaper every day, even though I was told it would weaken my eyes and that gentlemen do not like a lady who knows more than they do.”

He frowned. “Who told you that?”

“Who hasn’t told me that?”

“I’ll find a better finishing school,” he promised.

“If you send me away, I shall just make them send me home again.”

“It’s not sending you away.” Didn’t she realize he had no idea what he was doing? Why would she want to live in this soulless, joyless mausoleum? She was better off anywhere else.

Well, perhaps not anywhere . That headmistress had deserved porridge in her shoes, and any future teachers would know to be very, very careful with his sister. Because her wildness was no excuse for discourtesy, or worse, unkindness to her.

“You don’t have to look at me like that,” she muttered, misreading his scowl. “This is my home too.”

Not if he could help it. She deserved so much better.

“Your new chaperone will arrive any moment,” he told her, changing the subject. “Try not to make this one cry.”

“I did not make the last one cry.”

“On the contrary, she left here in tears.”

“Because she was scared of you !”

“Because you snuck away and she thought you had fallen in the Serpentine and drowned!”

“Because she was a ninny,” Sophie returned.

She was not wrong. Not that he would admit it. And arguing with her was not making him sound like a sensible man twice her age. He was grateful when Chevril appeared in the doorway. “A Mrs. Gorse for Lady Sophie, my lord.”

“Thank you, Chevril. Send her in.” Keir glanced at Sophie pointedly. “Be nice.”

Mrs. Gorse was a stout woman wearing a very lacy bonnet and a soft, nervous smile. Keir knew at a single glance that she would be no match for his little sister. Especially when Sophie stood and curtsied perfectly with a smile so sweet it rivaled a Gunter’s fruit ice. He groaned. “Good luck, Mrs. Gorse.”

Mrs. Gorse began to look alarmed. Smart woman.

He paused as something occurred to him. “Wait, Sophie, where did you sneak off to?”

“I wasn’t sneaking off. I saw a friend flirting with someone unworthy of her.”

He frowned. “And how did you know he was unworthy?”

Sophie lifted her chin in that stubborn way of hers that sent a frisson of fear through him. “Mrs. Gorse, shall we start with a promenade?”

“Sophie!”

Returning the betting book to Fortingham’s was, frankly, anticlimactic.

Sneaking a look at the books of the other clubs on St. James was much more fun.

As Lord Singleton, Sybil had been relegated to gaming hells and once, memorably, a brothel. She did not have access to the gentlemen’s cubs.

Until now.

St. James was a riot of sounds and colors, from the passing carriages and snorting horses, to the music and laughter pouring from bay windows lit with hundreds of oil lamps. Sybil loved it.

She loved sabotaging it even more.

They stepped into the first club, and she tilted her head down slightly, making sure the brim of her hat shadowed her face. Keir was dressed in a greatcoat and Hessian boots, the cravat around his throat white as the snow around them. “Lord Blackburn,” he said in that marquess’s tone of his, so commanding and cold. With every expectation of being obeyed, as always.

But when he turned his head, he winked at her.

And she came very close to melting into a puddle right then and there, damn the man.

This was the Keir she remembered. Her Keir.

The one she could not keep, she reminded herself. Despite what he believed.

His eyes narrowed as if he could read her thoughts.

“And a guest, Lord Singleton,” he added. The butler bowed and moved aside with the alacrity only reserved for marquesses and dukes. Perhaps she ought to have made Singleton the son of a duke no one had ever heard of. Then she would outrank Keir. The fun she could have with that.

The club was loud and smoky and smelled of several different types of colognes. The linens Sybil had wrapped tightly around her torso to contain her bosom pinched.

She loved every second of it.

“Come on, you absolute madwoman,” Keir said as she grinned at him.

They took a turn throughout the rooms so as not to arouse suspicion by heading straight to the betting book. Sybil accepted a small glass of port from a passing footman, plucked an apple from the sideboard. Nodded to several men she did not recognize but who congratulated her on beating Chiswick in the horse race.

“Bad luck for him,” someone chuckled. “His bride never showed to the church that day either.”

“Can you blame her?”

Several hands of cards were being played, and there were two billiards tables gathering dripping candle wax from above and coins from lost games. In the time it took to cross the ground floor, Sybil saw three family fortunes lost and one duel narrowly avoided. They made it back to the table that displayed the betting book.

It was chained to the table.

A thin chain, but a chain, nonetheless.

“Are you cackling?” Keir asked.

Sybil turned the sound into a cough. A manly cough. “Of course not.”

“Mm-hmm.”

Sybil skimmed the book, taking care not to look too interested in its contents.

Keir loomed. He was very good at that.

The usual wagers were recorded: bets on the weather, horse races, betrothals.

She flipped back a few pages, angling herself so that she blocked the book as best she could. She checked again. And again.

“Not a single name with the mark,” she muttered. “Botheration.”

“After you took down Chiswick and Copperwhite? Are you surprised?”

“A little,” she replied. She paused. “This page is missing.” She ran her fingertip along the edge of the page, cut cleanly from its bindings. “Oh, now I am really annoyed.”

Outside, the snow had been cleared from the pavement, making it easier to walk to the next club than to bother with the waiting carriage. The gas lamplights created yellow pools of light in the night. Sybil pulled the folded parchment from her waistcoat, and a pencil from an entirely different pocket, purely because she could, in order to mark down the club and the fact that someone had reached the book before her. She would keep immaculate notes just in case something was useful for Priya.

And the pockets were a nice distraction from the vexation.

“This waistcoat has pockets ,” she said.

“They all do,” Keir replied, taking his good fortune entirely for granted.

“You have no idea, do you? Just how lucky you are.”

“For a waistcoat with pockets?”

“You try hanging pockets from your stays or sewing them into the lining of your cloak and then use that tone with me.”

His smile was brief, amused. “I am sure I quite beg your pardon.”

“As you should. Pocket pig.”

He laughed and looked as surprised at the occurrence as she did. She had missed the sound of his laugh. She had missed him . Even entwined together, there had been such distance between them. But last night had been different. Perfect.

“I am sure I have never been called that before,” he said.

“Not to your face.”

“Duly noted.”

“Admit it,” Sybil said. “You are having fun.”

“I am trudging through slush with snow falling down the back of my collar.”

“Like I said. Fun.”

“I would have more fun if you married me.”

She stumbled to a stop so quickly that her boots skidded on a patch of icy slush. Keir calmly caught her by the back of her coat and righted her.

“You can’t just say things like that!”

“Why not?”

“You know why.”

“I do not,” he said, firmly. “I understand that I must earn your trust.”

“You are a marquess .”

“So it says on the coat of arms.”

“And you are infuriating.”

“I’m not sure it says that. Though my Latin is rusty, I admit.”

“Keir. You cannot make light of this. You will marry someone… proper.”

“You are an earl’s daughter.”

“An adopted daughter,” she reminded him. “And far from proper. You know that better than most.”

“I don’t care,” he said stubbornly.

“You used to. And you will again. The ton thinks I am too much.”

“The ton can go hang.”

“ You once told me I was too much,” she reminded him archly.

“ I was an idiot.” When he noticed she practically had to skip to keep up with him, he shortened his strides. “The truth was, I have not been enough.”

That last splinter of ice she had nurtured to protect herself began to melt.

Blast.

Luckily, this was not the time to discuss it.

“You know what I do with the Spinsters now,” she could not help but add. “That wouldn’t change.”

“I know.”

“I’ve taken down several men, you know. Friends, maybe.”

“They were no friends of mine,” he said, affronted. He paused. “Although I admit I was polite enough with them in Society, and that… does not sit well.”

“You didn’t know.”

“I knew many of them were not good men. I’ll do better, Sybil,” he said quietly, seriously, and she believed him. “I can promise you that.”

“I didn’t know you were a member here,” Sybil said moments later, when they stopped in front of a bay window gleaming with candlelight.

“I’m not. I asked for a week-long trial this morning.”

“Do they do that?”

He shrugged. “They do now.”

“Lord Blackburn,” the butler greeted them immediately. Warmth and loud chatter enveloped them. The clubs were all the same. Where was the knife-throwing target? The obstacle course? “Welcome, welcome, your lordship.” He snapped his fingers at a nearby footman. “William will take your coat, your hats.”

“Just a tour tonight, thank you,” Keir said smoothly. If Sybil took off her hat, her pinned hair would be obvious to all. “We’ll have a wander. And a brandy, if you please.”

The footmen took off as though a race had been declared.

“The card tables are that way, and the billiards, of course,” the butler said. “The front room is generally reserved for a quieter guest. The dining room is right through there. Our chef specializes in French delicacies.”

“Naturally.”

It took some time to shake off the butler, who was very proud of the club, down to the building itself, which had stood since the time of King Henry VII. Sybil learned more about plinths and pediments and porticoes in ten minutes than she had in all her time with several governesses. Finally, he was called away by a member.

The book was like the others, leather binding well worn, spine cracked with use. Ink splatters.

And two more missing pages.

Still so many questions. Too many questions. Very few answers.

It was irksome.

Keir glanced down from where he was surveying the crowd like a captain on the deck of a ship, scouring for danger. He watched her reach for the quill. “What are you going to do?”

“I am merely adding a wager.”

Lord Singleton wagers Lord Blackburn that he weds first.

“If I can’t cackle, then you can’t growl,” she muttered at Keir.

“The hell I can’t.” He scowled. “I’m taking the bloody book.”

“You can’t.”

“I think you’ll find I can.”

“You’ll give us away. This is our only leverage.” She tried to nudge him away, and when he would not budge, she kicked his ankle. “I’m tired of waiting.”

And then, for good measure, she added three dots next to Lord Singleton’s name.