The Regency Season: Passionate Promises: The Duke's Daring Debutante / Return of the Prodigal Gilvry

A child. What would it be like to bring another being into the world? One to care for and who would follow in your footsteps? Bile rose in his throat. Not his footsteps. He forced a smile. ‘Then I am glad to relieve you of the duty and make it my pleasure. It is the only chance we have to converse alone.’

Nicky’s eyes shadowed. ‘You are sure about this, Freddy? I would hate her to marry for such a reason and be made unhappy.’

Frank words indeed. His shoulders tensed. The ice inside him spread outwards. ‘I will do nothing to make her regret our union.’ She would be a duchess, and have everything any woman could ever want. As long as she didn’t want children. Thankfully she need never know it was by design rather than accident.

Minette appeared in the doorway, bonnet on her head and sunshade in hand.

‘We are lucky it is not raining,’ she said, once they were settled in his phaeton.

‘Don’t count your chickens,’ he said, looking up at the fluffy clouds floating above their heads. Some of them had the darkness of rain in their hearts.

‘Your tiger doesn’t come with us?’

‘He will wait for our return. I assumed we needed a bit of privacy. What did Madame Vitesse have to say?’

‘I know where to find her brother. He is using the name Henry Tower and working at the docks. We can find him at an inn, The Town of Ramsgate, in Wapping, at the end of the workday.’

‘The reason you asked me to delay our drive until later.’

She nodded. ‘I am hoping we will find him there this evening.’

‘Devil take it, Minette, gently bred girls do not visit dockyard taverns. I will tell you everything when I return.’

She folded her arms across her chest and glared at him. ‘Nonsense. It’s an inn. A public place.’ She leaned closer. ‘What could happen with you there to protect me?’ She glared when she realised he was not going to change his mind. ‘Now I wish I had kept this information to myself.’

‘Wasn’t it bad enough that you came to the Paradise, without exposing yourself to the sort of men who frequent a place like the Ramsgate?’

‘There you go again, treating me like a child. Well, I’m not a child. And the taverns in France are far more dangerous than anything here England.’

She’d been a child when Nicky had left. He could well imagine what a girl left to fend for herself might have encountered. Or seen. The idea of it made his hands curl into fists. He forced himself to ease off on the ribbons before his horses did more than toss their heads in objection. ‘You are not in France now. I will meet Henry and relay what he says upon my return.’

‘Then I won’t know anything for two days. We are invited to visit some friends of Gabe’s and will leave early in the morning. We won’t be back until the day after tomorrow.’

‘It can wait a day or two.’

She huffed out a breath. ‘I hate waiting.’

The urge to laugh surprised him. In some ways she was older than her years and in others she seemed so much younger than him. Not that he would dare show his amusement. He could certainly see from the determined look on her face that she wouldn’t accept not knowing what he learned right away, and that was something he could arrange.

‘I’ll report back the moment I have spoken to him.’

Suspicion filled her gaze. ‘You promise?’

‘I swear it. Where will you be this evening?’

‘At home. Because we leave Town tomorrow, we dine there with friends.’

‘I will come when they have left.’

She frowned. ‘I don’t think Gabe will be pleased.’

‘He isn’t going to know. Leave your window open when you retire for the night.’

Her eyes sparkled. ‘You are going to enter my room through the window?’

‘Try not to give me away, would you? I don’t want Gabe calling me out.’

She shuddered. ‘Neither do I.’

He breathed a sigh of relief. Then why did the back of his nape prickle? Damn it all, why did he have the sense her capitulation had been far too easy?

* * *

Crammed between Oliver’s Warf and the alley leading to Wapping Old Stairs, the Town of Ramsgate was indeed not the sort of place a young woman of good breeding should think about entering. On the opposite side of Wapping High Street, Minette hugged the shadows of St John’s Church. Freddy was going to be furious.

And not just because she had gone against his express wishes that she wait for him at home.

She’d meant to, she really had. She’d been truly charmed by the idea that he intended to protect her, until her doubts had bubbled up. Hadn’t she also been charmed by the way Pierre had sought to keep her safe? Hadn’t she adored him and his protectiveness? Until she’d discovered it had all been a front. Freddy had never even pretended he wanted her participation in his plans. Once he had the information she had discovered, what was to stop him going off to find Moreau without her?

He could tell her anything when he visited her after his meeting.

No, she had been finely tricked by Pierre. She wouldn’t give Freddy the chance to do the same.

Two men in rough clothing wandered down the street, shoulders slumped, feet dragging. They stopped at the door of the tavern, where the light over the door lit the profile of the taller man. Her heart picked up speed. Freddy. And from his brawny build, the other man was Barker from the Fools’ Paradise. Their disguises were perfect. What would they think of hers?

They disappeared inside.

Squaring her shoulders, she pulled her ragged shawl up over her head and around her shoulders. She and Pierre had played this game often enough to make it second nature, but as always her heart beat faster and her breathing quickened, bringing to her nostrils the stink of the clothes she’d acquired, along with the dank smell of river, fish and the smoke from river coal. She forced herself to take ten deep, slow breaths to let the air become part of who she was, let poverty and hunger wash over her and then she shuffled across the street.

Inside, the Ramsgate smelled and tasted like so many other taverns she had lingered in, listening for information. For Pierre. Never guessing the use to which he had put it. The noise of men’s voices, the acrid smoke of pipes, the stench of beer and unwashed bodies were the same. Only the language was different.

Behind the bar, a grubby innkeeper thumped a pair of pewter pots in front of his most recent customers. The men took their ales to a table in the corner, Barker lighting a pipe, Freddy burying his nose in his tankard while he discreetly scanned the room.

Keeping her shoulders hunched and her face lowered, she shuffled around the room. ‘Spare a copper for a poor auld wider lady?’ she begged in quavering tones, and leaning heavily on her cane so people would see little but the top of her head. She had been practising her accent on the street sweeper on the corner since her arrival in London. A game she’d played for entertainment mostly. She had an ear for accents and she had amused Nicky and Gabe with her imitations, and shocked them, too.

One docker shoved her away fiercely. Another pressed a ha’penny in her mittened hand.

‘She’ll only spend it on gin,’ his companion observed, and turned his back.

A glance from Freddy, who sported a scar on his cheek and nose reddened by drink, flickered over her. Without recognition.

Hah! She’d spotted him right away. To be fair, she had known to expect him. Still...

She sidled up to their table, clawed hand shoved under his nose. ‘Spare a copper.’

‘Clear off.’ Barker tossed her a coin. It glinted silver as it spun on its edge on the scarred and stained tabletop. A ‘thruppny bit’, as the street sweeper called it. Threepence. She reached for it.

Strong fingers clenched around her wrist as she caught up the coin.