All in all, Rex decided, he'd had a good day, his most productive in months. He found it hard to believe so much had happened-had he truly just arrived in London this morning?-in so short a time. A jailbreak, a scandal, and a bar fight, plus finding out that his cousin had been banned from Almack's. The day was almost perfect, especially if one did not consider the sins of ogling an unconscious female or lusting after a helpless woman in his care.

Maybe he should get into brawls more often.


Her hero was a drunken brawler? His cousin was a social pariah, a troublemaker since birth, and a gambler? Amanda had heard every word between Nanny Brown and the gentlemen through the open door. Now she could not hold back her tears.

When she'd woken from her stupor to find herself at Royce House, she began to think she had a chance of living until her next birthday. She would not have made next week in prison. Why should she struggle to survive there, anyway? They were only going to hang her. The formal conviction appeared irrelevant.

At her godmother's home she'd felt a spark of hope, a tiny glimmer of optimism. Lord Rexford had seemed so competent, so confident, she had to believe he would rescue her. That flicker of faith was doused by the cold wind of reality. No one was going to be able to save her, especially not a ruffian and his unmannered kin.

She had no money, no friends or relations to call on. Only an old woman with an unloaded pistol stood as her defender. Why, she had to sleep in a borrowed nightgown. Amanda wiped her eyes with the corner of the sheet. She did not even have a handkerchief. Perhaps she'd go to the gibbet tripping over one of the countess's old frocks.

What was the point of waiting for them to hang her? She eyed the window of her room, but knew that shrubberies surrounded the entire house, thick enough to break a fall. The bottle of laudanum? She had no idea how much was needed. If Nanny Brown brought the pistol back…

The coward's way out? Yes.

A sin? Yes.

But it would be proof of her guilt, too. That's what everyone would believe, anyway. Lord Rexford would look like a fool for coming to her aid. He had come, though, so she supposed she owed him better than that.

He should have left her in that wretched cell. She'd been so close to escaping it all there, so distant from her misery, almost in her parents' arms. Now she was suffering worse, because he'd thrown her a life preserver. Her ship was sinking and sharks were circling, but she'd grabbed hold with both hands. Now the rope was fraying, and the viscount was not going to bring her to shore. She'd have done better letting the waves wash over her. Hope was gone. Hope was a demon, a devil, a cheat.

When Nanny came back into the room she found Miss Carville curled into a ball, sobbing.

"There, lambie. He'll fix it, I know he will."

Amanda looked up, checking for the pistol. "He's drunk."

"Pooh. He's a gentlemen fresh come to Town, seeing his best friend after months. I doubt they have been apart so long since their crib days. And he has burdens of his own to carry. But the boy I knew is good at heart. And nearly as wise as his father. Tonight's nonsense is nothing to fret over. You'll see."

"No," Amanda said with a sniff and another sob. "There is nothing he can do. And why should he put himself to the trouble? I am nothing to him."

Nanny handed her a handkerchief. "He will help because he is an honorable gentleman. And because his mother asked, that's why."

Amanda blew her nose and asked, "He does not like her much, does he?"

"He has his reasons, and none of them for us to discuss. It was sad times for all of the family. I doubt any of them will ever recover, but that doesn't mean his lordship won't do his duty. He served the country proud, no matter what anyone says. And that oversized oaf Daniel wouldn't hurt a fly, unless someone threatens his friends. Close as brothers they always were. Where one was in trouble, the other'd be there, too." Nanny sat by Amanda's bedside and took up her knitting. "Why, the stories I could tell about those two rapscallions."

Amanda envied the cousins that closeness. She was too much older than her stepsister to be friends, and was more of an unpaid companion to Elaine these last five years. Thanks to Sir Frederick's penny-pinching ways, Amanda had never gone to school or had a proper come-out, where she might have met girls her own age. Elaine had not even sent her a note in jail, much less a change of clothes or a coin to purchase better treatment. Amanda started weeping again.

Nanny was going on about her favorite topic, it seemed, while her knitting needles clacked. "Master Jordan was a good boy, as smart as could be. And the best rider in the shire. The best swordsman, later, too. I know he must be bothered, limping that way. But he'll be as steady as a rock. And that clodpoll cousin will prop him up if he falters, never you fear. They are good men, both of them."

If they were all she had, Amanda thought, heaven help her.

Nanny poured more laudanum and Amanda swallowed it gladly.

Chapter Eight


The primping took most of the morning. Even then, Rex was barely fit for polite company.

His hair was trimmed and his uniform was neatly pressed, but his head ached from all the liquor, his nose looked like part of a clown's costume, his bad leg had stiffened in London's perpetual damp, and his dog preferred Daniel. He felt wretched.

"I always have a roll in my pocket, or a meat pasty, that's all."

"Do not shout." Rex held his head in his hands, cringing as Daniel took his third helping of eggs and what was left of the ham from the night before. "And I am glad the mongrel is drooling over someone else's clothes for a change."

"You used to be able to hold your liquor better."

"I used to be able to do a lot of things better." Rex took a sip of his coffee. It tasted as if the housekeeper had used fairgrounds instead of coffee grounds. He shoved it aside and poured a cup of tea.

"Tea? You are acting and sounding like an old man, coz. Hell, you're not yet thirty years old."

"I will be soon."

"Three months later than I will, and look at me."

Rex tried not to. His cousin's face was not as lurid as his own, but Daniel's apparel hurt the viscount's eyes. Wide yellow Cossack trousers, a turquoise and puce striped waistcoat, a peacock blue coat, with a spotted kerchief instead of a neckcloth, might have looked dashing on a trick rider at Astley's Amphitheatre. On Daniel? "You look like a hot-air balloon."

"That shows what you know. My outfit is all the rage, the height of fashion. And a deuced sight more comfortable than the fancy rig you're sporting."

There was no getting around the strangling high knot Murchison had tied at Rex's neck, or the close fit of the heavy woolen uniform coat, with its brass and gold trim. His glossy high boots aggravated his sore leg, and the knit pantaloons emphasized his limp.

"I thought I better look the proper officer if I'm to call at the War Office immediately after we speak with Miss Carville."

"Oh, I thought you were dressing for your visit to the sickroom."

"Don't be more of a gudgeon than you have to be. I am still part of the army."

"And here I thought you were still Nanny's lambikin. Since when do you march to petticoat orders? You haven't listened to Nanny Brown's nattering since you were in leading strings."

"She's old."

"And Miss Carville is young."

"I did not dress for Miss Carville or Nanny Brown." He quickly shoved the plate of sweet rolls in Daniel's direction when he saw his cousin start to scratch at the top of his hand. "I am merely trying to do my best for the lady, guilty or innocent. I think that we might need all the forces we can muster, and all the resources of the Special Section, too."

Daniel swallowed a bite of roll, then handed the rest to the mastiff. "I've been thinking, too"-he ignored Rex's snort of derision-"about what's best for the lady."

"The last time I let you think I got coshed with a bottle."

"But you got shot on your own."

That was true. "Very well, so what are the results of your mighty musings?"

"I think you should get betrothed to her."

Rex set his teacup down with a thump and a splash onto the tablecloth. "Now that is more idiotic than your usual ideas. I might have expected such rubbish from Lady Royce, seeking to shift her responsibilities onto my shoulders, or even from Nanny, but you?"

"Think on it. People will believe she's innocent if you propose. No viscount would court a killer, would he? And he wouldn't affiance himself to someone about to dance with Jack Ketch. At least it would get people wondering, instead of hanging her in the press. Public sentiment can sway a judge. Mightn't be the right way to decide a case, but it's better than trying to discredit the witnesses."

Rex blotted at the stain on the linen tablecloth without answering.

"And you know how peers get preferential treatment. You nobs get to be tried by the Lords instead of the courts. No one is going to convict a countess's daughter-in-law. Granddaughter to an earl, isn't she?"

"Something like that. But I doubt those rules apply to a viscount's fiancee, even if I were willing to go along. Which I am not."

"You wouldn't have to call the banns or anything. As soon as she's cleared of the charges, you go your own ways."

"You know better than anyone that I could not take part in a sham engagement. Lie to the courts, to the ton, to Lady Royce? My head would burst with the fireworks of color."

"Then marry her. Then she'd be a titled lady, and you wouldn't be living a lie. Yes, that is the better idea. You know you'll have to marry sooner or later anyway. Sooner, if your mother learns you undressed the female."

"I will never marry."

Daniel set down his fork. "What, never? What about the succession?"

"The Crown can have the earldom when I am done with it. The prince can reward some jumped-up industrialist with a title and an estate, in exchange for having his own outrageous bills paid."

"But your father will-"

"He will be long gone before that time."

"But why, Rex? You've always known you had to marry. It's part of the requirements for being the heir and all. Like wearing your sword into battle. Lordlings have to produce the next generation."

"This lord shall not. The world does not need another freak in its carnival show. The haut monde does not need another target for its vicious gossip. What did the earldom gain my father? Nothing but ignominy and insult for his so-called gift. My own reputation is lower than a lizard's, and yours not much better by the mere association. And if the truth were told? Royce Hall and all of its inhabitants would be burned to the ground, aye, and this house with it. The countess would be tarred with the same brush of witchcraft and devil's work. Perhaps that was why she left my father. He never said. But I will not bring another Royce male into this world, to suffer the way we have."

Daniel pushed his plate away. "Well, I still say it was a good idea."

"Then why don't you wed her?"

"Me? A onetime junior officer, a country nobody? What good would that do the female? I've got a tidy manor house and the farm, but that's all. No title, no fortune, no influence anywhere. No fit lodgings here in town, no invites to fancy parties. I doubt I'll be permitted back into Dirty Sal's. I don't have your pretty face, what once was, anyway. I'll wed when I'm ready-promised my mother, don't you know-to a plainspoken lass from the country who won't think I'm a great hulking looby like the London twits do. Your Miss Carville needs someone who can help her cause, not stumble over it."

"She's not my Miss Carville."

Then why, Rex wondered, was he so relieved when Daniel refused to marry her?


Nanny Brown had magic in her long bony fingers along with the arthritis.

Amanda felt almost alive the next morning after the old woman was finished with her. She was still slightly feverish and weak and weepy when she awoke, but Nanny would not permit her to feel sorry for herself.

"And what else should you be but blue-deviled, what with the sights and suffering you've seen?" Nanny asked. "But a bit of prettying up will make you feel more the thing, I swear."

The bath was heavenly, the shampoo sublime, and the sweet scented oils Nanny rubbed into Amanda's skin divine. What most made Amanda feel better, though, was the pampering. No one had paid her this much attention since her mother's death. She and Elaine shared a maid, but the servant knew who was favored in the house, and did as little for the poor relation as possible.