Page 4

True, it was a scandal to have lost my innocence in such a manner—but I was tired of being controlled by my advisors, of being told what to do and where to go and who to speak with.

For the first time in my whole life, I had done something for me.

The teapot was gently steaming on the table in the breakfast room as I came down, and I yawned as I waited for it to brew my first cup of the day. I had so much to do, and it wasn’t like I could spend all day thinking about?—

“You’re strong.”

“You haven’t seen nothing yet.”

I shivered, pulling my silk shawl tighter around me.

Time to think of anything except Mr. Markham and his delicious body, I told myself firmly. Time to?—

Something muttered in the back of my mind. For a moment, I wondered what it was. There hadn’t been any movement in the breakfast room and I wasn’t expecting any visitors—certainly not this early in the morning.

I hesitated, my gaze flickering around the room. What was it?

It took me a moment but the instant I realized, my heart sank.

Of course. Of course I had to be taken for a ride. What an idiot I was.

I rose and stepped out into the hall, glancing at the console table by the door.

The pile of my jewelry which I had placed there?

Gone. So was my reticule which had been filled with a ten pound note, a habit I’d never managed to break.

And so was the golden fountain pen on its holder by the door, and a small jade figurine.

All gone.

All stolen.

“Markham,” I breathed heavily.

Well, I’d never asked, had I? It wasn’t like you normally asked for a statement of respectability from a rake you found in Ferncombe’s and took back to your townhouse to bed you.

I returned to the breakfast table and slumped in a seat as my teapot continued to steam. “Well, damn.”

Markham

I shouldn’t have done it.

I felt the truth of it with every step, the fountain pen in my pocket along with her rings.

Lady Briar Weatherford’s rings.

Damn. What was I thinking?

It had felt so obvious. I needed money, she had buckets of it. What heiress would miss a few bits of jewelry? Lady Briar Weatherford certainly wouldn’t. She’d probably wake up, thank her lucky stars she’d been bedded by such an excellent lover, and?—

I couldn’t even fake it to myself. I continued walking along the mostly empty London streets and hated myself.

Excellent lover . I was a damned idiot. I'm almost completely fallen apart the moment I’d tugged at that gown strap with my teeth.

I hadn’t meant to lose myself like that. Try to show off by lowering her onto my throbbing manhood. Try to make her come again, and again, and succeed every time.

I’d been trying to impress a woman. When was the last time I’d tried to do that?

The streets were starting to fill. People heading out to do their jobs. People in work clothes, laborers and apprentices forced to be up early.

I probably looked as tired as them—arguably, for a different reason.

A woman approached me on the pavement, walking in the opposite direction. She was attired in that delightful sort of gown that I adored on a woman: all form fitting and highly suggestive. How anyone could concentrate passing her on the street, I did not know.

Which was precisely the point, I supposed.

She caught me gaze. She grinned.

I knew what I must look like. Clearly dressed in yesterday’s clothes, I wasn’t even sure whether Lady Briar had left her mark on my lips. Or my neck. Or anywhere else…

I shivered. The woman evidently thought that was a sign. She moved over to me.

“Want a good time?” she said in a low, delicious voice.

At least, I suppose it was. Despite her obvious beauty with a hint of blusher on her cheeks, I felt…

Not nothing. But definitely not what I should have felt.

Lady Briar’s face below me, crying out as she came for the third time, flashed through my mind.

“Hello?”

I blinked. The woman was waving a hand before my eyes. “What?”

“I said, do you want a good time?” she said, pouting slightly. Obviously I hadn’t responded in the correct way. “But I guess you don’t.”

Any other day, I would have grabbed it. A woman like that, offering herself to me? Who would say no?

But it turned out that I would. After Lady Briar Weatherford, it was hard to see any other woman without thinking of her. The warmth of her skin. The silk of her gown pressed up against me—but not for long.

“Sorry,” I said awkwardly.

I’d never been one to deny myself a new mistress. Wrong footed by a woman that I’d just stolen from? Who was I kidding?

The woman shrugged. “Wife? Or a loverboy—you know, it doesn’t matter. Have fun with them.”

I bristled as she turned to go. “I haven’t got?—”

“Tell that to your face,” she said with a grin as she approached the corner. “Have fun with them.”

Before I could tell her just how wrong she was, she’d gone.

I swallowed, shifting uncomfortably as I stood there in the cold morning air. Wife? Not a chance. Lady Briar had been an opportunity, one I’d gambled on—and lost.

If I hadn’t been so stupid as to take those trinkets, I could have called on her again. Taken her out in a carriage ride. Wined and dined her, asked her for the investment, then lost myself in her embraces again.

As it was…

I was an idiot. I hadn’t been kicked out of my friends’ club for nothing. We, the Gambling Dukes, had built something from the ground up, from nothing, and they hadn’t taken too kindly to discovering I’d been helping myself from under the counter, as it were.

No, they were well within their rights to kick me out.

I was a knave through and through. It hadn’t changed me.

I sighed as my footsteps took me onwards, approaching my townhouse. Something weighed heavy in my pocket.

A golden, limited edition fountain pen by Herbin.

“Damnit,” I muttered under my breath.

I got a few dark looks on the street, but I brushed them off as I strode along. Guilt had eaten me up so long, I barely knew what an existence was without it. The idea that I could in some way live without it was ludicrous.

This was who I was now.

As I stepped along the London pavement, I caught a glimpse on myself in the reflection of a shop window and cringed.

I looked like every stereotype you might have for a rakehell. Mussed hair, clearly hadn’t shaven in a few days, shirt rumpled. I was clearly not coming from an early morning engagement. I’d just bedded the most delectable woman I’d ever met, and taken her back to?—

Fine, so she’d taken me back to her townhouse.

A lazy grin crept across my face as I started toward home. I could never have imagined that Lady Briar Weatherford of all people frequented that gaming hell—and though it had been difficult not to show any recognition, it had benefited me in the long run.

Dear God, what a woman.

Someone jabbed me in the chest. I groaned as I looked up at the face. “I don’t want to talk to you.”

“The feeling is entirely mutual,” came the dulcet tones of my friend Georgiana, the Dowager Duchess of Cartice. “But I have to. Hence this impromptu visit.”

“Visit?”

“You weren’t at home,” she said darkly. “I knew it would only be a matter of time before you returned from whatever woman’s bed you’ve crawled from. We need to talk.”

“I thought you’d rather get it all in writing, to protect yourself,” I shot back as I tried to ignore the curious glances of passersby. “Isn’t that more your style?”

I could almost hear Georgiana roll her eyes.

That was the trouble with close friends, I had once told her. We know exactly how to annoy you.

Yes, you do, Georgiana had shot back. But only you choose to do it.

The remark had hurt at the time. Well, there were four of us in the Gambling Dukes. I couldn’t be the worst of the bunch, could I?

“I'm going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” said Georgiana, Chief Legal Counsel of our club and the world’s greatest rule follower. “Because yes, I would rather have everything down in writing but not…not this conversation.”

Now that was interesting. “Why?”

“Because I'm going to say something that I shouldn’t,” came Georgiana’s crisp reply. “You need to get your life in order.”

I smirked as memories of Lady Briar begging for my fingers surfaced in my mind. “I'm not sure about that.”

“Your life is out of control, Markham. I’ve seen the loans you’ve taken out,” said my friend sharply. “I know you’re massively overdue on your bills, and I know you’ve taken out a third loan. What did you think you’re doing?”

My shoulders tensed. “You shouldn’t have seen?—”

“You put my name down as collateral, you dolt!”

I winced. Fine, perhaps that wasn’t the smartest idea in the world. Not after it was Georgiana’s new husband, a Mr. Fynn Monroe, who had discovered I was the one stealing from the club. Stealing from Georgiana, Kineallen, Lilah…all three of them.

It was a miracle Fynn didn’t go straight back to his boss with the story. It was an occupational hazard, your friend marrying a journalist.

“Look, I probably shouldn’t have done that,” I said quickly, my pace increasing as my heartrate rose. “It’s just—I had this idea, and?—”

“I am not going to bail you out, Markham,” interrupted Georgiana, her voice cold. “You lied to me. You lied to all of us. You betrayed us, cut us deeper than I think you know.”

I swallowed down the regret. I was the black sheep of the family—always had, always would be. What was the point in fighting it? “That’s the past, Georgiana. It’s my future I'm thinking about?—”

“Oh, I'm glad you can think of nothing but yourself,” came her snapped tones as I turned a corner away from the crowd of gawkers. “Markham, for anything you could think up, you’re going to need serious money. Where are you going to get that from?”

As I walked, I could feel the heavy jade figurine I’d stolen from Lady Briar in my pocket. That had to be worth at least thirty pounds, right?

That would be a start.

“I’ll make some friends,” I said cheerfully.

My friend’s scoffing was painfully loud. “Don’t give me that, Markham. You never made a friend you couldn’t use. What, are you going to gamble someone else’s money?”

Christ. She always knew how to see right through me. It was a wonder I’d been able to keep my stealing from her for so long.

“Look, Georgiana?—”

“No, you look,” she said firmly. “Take my name off your loan requests and either stop spending money like water, or find some damned employment, won’t you?

Perhaps marry a girl you won’t lie to within five minutes.

Just…just sort your life out, Markham. And don’t expect to see me again. We don’t want to see you.”

“You’re the one who accosted?—”

Georgiana had already turned, stepping into a carriage which had been waiting for her. The driver hardly waited a second before she had snapped the door shut before pulling away.

I looked at the back of the carriage. In that sat one of the few people who actually knew me: knew Peregrine, Duke of Markham, and liked him.

At least, she had.

Biting my lip, I turned on my heels and kept walking. Well, I couldn’t go back to my friends for help, and the little money I had had run out. I needed an investor, or to marry extremely well. And as soon as I got home, I’d start going through Society to find one.

The bulk of my stolen treasures weighed heavy in my breeches.

Well, at least I would never have to worry about her again, I thought as I turned the corner onto my street. Lady Briar Weatherford could swiftly go back to being that name I saw in the papers, usually because one of her decisions had gone terribly wrong.

And I could keep those memories to myself. Memories of her gasping for more, of her pushing me up against that door, pulling my shirt off, of?—

Damnit. My manhood was hard again, and it was damned hard to walk with a heavy manhood throbbing between my legs.

I turned the corner onto my street and thanked God I was almost home. My townhouse may not have the trappings of luxury anymore, as I sold furniture piece by piece to keep the roof over my head, but it would at least give me the privacy to sort myself out.

There was no way that I could go through my day like this without?—

I pushed open the gate leading up to my townhouse. Lady Briar Weatherford was standing on my doorstep.

I blinked. No, it was a trick of the light. It was because I was thinking of her—because I felt guilty. The woman just liked like Lady Briar.

The woman who looked identical to Lady Briar caught my gaze. A look of fury covered her face as she strode forward.

I halted, heart hammering. There was nowhere to go. She was feet from me.

Lady Briar stopped inches from me, hands on her hips. “Markham. The Duke of Markham—the disgraced duke. I should have known.”