Scandalous Regency Secrets Collection

“I hesitate to point this out, but you’re sounding more like a tyrant than a hero. That said, I suppose I still agree, since it’s clear you’re leaving me no other choice if you’re ever going to get on with this. That ticking clock, remember?”

“How you inspire my confidence, Miss Foster. Unfortunately, it has been pointed out to me, rather strongly, that I also have no choice where you’re concerned. You see, Miss Foster, your sister is not the only person being blackmailed. I, too, am a victim of your sister’s secret admirer.”

Dany sat down. She sat down so quickly she nearly missed the bench entirely, but grabbed on to the front of it with both hands. “I... I beg your— What did you say?”

The baron raised his eyes toward the chipped, painted ceiling of the chapel, as if running his own words through his head for a second time. “Our mutual blackmailer is extorting money from the countess for her innocent indiscretion, and from me via threats that need not concern you. That’s clear enough.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I don’t think it is. Are you less than a hero?”

“I’m not a hero at all, having only done what seemed sensible at the time. If not for those damnable chapbooks, I would be on my new estate now, learning how to grow turnips, Quatre Bras far behind me and forgotten.” He ran his fingers through his hair, probably in disgust, but Dany thought the gesture charming. “I’m sorry. There’s no need for you to know why I’m being blackmailed, other than to say I’m certain the same person is harassing your sister, and probably many more than the two of us.”

“Why would you think that?”

The baron sat down beside her once more and explained his theory, and that of the viscount, putting forward the idea that the blackmailer had cultivated an entire list of victims, and not without some help from those he may have recruited to ferret out secrets.

“Servants, barmaids, shopkeepers. His most probable allies would be establishments in Bond Street, businesses frequented by the ton.”

“Shopkeepers? In Bond Street?” Dany whispered, and shivered. “No, she was entirely helpful. Or was that too helpful? But she did hang about on the other side of the curtain, and send Mari’s maid away. And to be so handy with an answer? Oh, how could I have been so stupid!”

“Are you enjoying this conversation you’re having with yourself? Apparently not, would be my guess. I gather you’re considering a shopkeeper in particular?”

Now it was Dany’s turn to get up and pace. “I am, yes. The woman owns a small but thriving seamstress shop, and just as you said, in Bond Street. She had her ear to the curtain the whole time Mari and I were speaking in private this morning, but I didn’t think much of it at the time. She gave me the chapbook, hinting broadly that what my sister needed was a hero. You, in particular. She...she also told us Mari’s increasing.”

“Dare I even ask how the woman would know that?” the baron asked, also getting to his feet. He was all attention now, and clearly anxious to hear more.

“She didn’t. I mean, she told us she thought Mari was—although we didn’t say she was—but now we know she was right. So what if she’s in the employ of that horrible blackmailer and now he knows even more to dangle over Mari’s head. She certainly can’t be expected to suffer any more than she is now and still be healthy for the— We have to do something.” She grabbed his hand. “The shops are still open, aren’t they? Come on, we need to hurry.”

Cooper looked down at their clasped hands. “Well, that lasted longer than I thought. Possibly even a full minute.”

“What do you—oh.” Dany released her grip even as she gave him a sheepish smile. “I forgot?”

“I understand completely, Miss Foster. It’s not difficult to forget what you’d already chosen not to remember.”

“That’s not amusing. I was... I was overcome with worry, that’s all. What if I’ve inadvertently made things even worse for Mari?”

“She picked up the spade and began digging long before you were involved,” Cooper pointed out, which served to mollify Dany, if only a little.

“I suppose you’re right. I only arrived in town a few days ago.”

“Which explains your ignorance about Gabe’s birds. I’m rather glad you missed that.”

“There you go about the birds again. If they’re not germane to the current topic, and I’m certain they’re not, may we please return to the point? Mari is being blackmailed. And then there’s you, and even more if you’re correct. How many holes do you think have been dug across Mayfair?”

“Dozens would be my guess. Perhaps several dozens. Not that we can approach anyone and ask.”

“That would be rather difficult, I agree. ‘Good evening, my lord. Are you by chance looking so down at the mouth because you’re being blackmailed to keep your wife from learning you’ve replaced her diamonds with paste?’”

Cooper smiled. “I can’t think of a swifter way to get my nose relocated to the back of my head.”

“And Mrs. Yothers, the dress shop owner? We can’t approach her, either?”

For a heartbeat, no more, it would have seemed the baron had been turned into a statue. “Did you say Mrs. Yothers?”

“I did,” Dany returned, tipping her head as she looked up at him. “Why? Do you know the name?”

“I’ve heard it mentioned, yes. Quite recently, as a matter of fact. I suppose that settles the thing—there’s no getting out of it now. I was going to suggest we leave, but I think you’d better sit down again.”

“Really? No getting out of what now? And we’ve already been here a good quarter hour. Even a sad country looby like me knows we’ve overreached at least a few bounds of propriety even by being here in the first place. Do you think it prudent to stay longer?”

“Under the circumstances, I’m no longer concerned, no.”

“What circumstances?”

“Damn it, Dany—sit down.”

“Well,” she said, positively grinning at him, “since you asked so kindly, I suppose I probably will.”

Oh, how wonderfully and darkly green his eyes went when he wanted to throttle her. He was so sweet...

CHAPTER SEVEN (#u25973cb7-38b6-5eee-b0b0-28ad01a1b954)

COOP WAITED UNTIL she had seated herself, neatly arranging her skirts around her and then folding her hands in her lap, as if he might be about to tug on some imaginary bellpull and the old man would immediately appear, bearing a tea service and cakes.

Some, he imagined, might see this as acquiescence. Even this early in their relationship, Coop was certain acquiescence was not in Daniella Foster’s vocabulary.

Her action was not an eagerness to please, but what she probably believed the shortest route between what she wanted to know and what he would say, a curiosity that would soon turn to—what? Shock? Outrage? Lord help him—amusement? Certainly not meek acceptance, of that much he was certain. He’d known her for less than a day, less than a few hours actually, but he’d already realized that another thing he could count on with Miss Daniella Foster was her unpredictability.

He wandered across the small chapel, either to put a safe distance between them or in search of some sort of inspiration in the faded fresco he stopped in front of, he wasn’t sure.

He wasn’t accustomed to feeling so helpless, so under the control of circumstances.

He didn’t like the feeling.

If it weren’t for the woman, for the Prince Regent, Coop would have ignored the blackmailer’s threat to call him out as a despoiler of innocent women and much worse, and damn the consequences. But he’d passed beyond that option the moment he’d accepted Prinny’s offer in exchange for his silence.

Even if refusing that offer, he’d realized at the time, meant he would have most likely suffered an unfortunate fatal accident within hours of leaving Carleton House. He wouldn’t have been invited to the Prince Regent’s residence at all, but simply and quietly dispatched, had not the man wanted the reflected light of the hero of Quatre Bras shined upon him, to bolster his own reputation among an increasingly hostile populace.

Coop’s mind went back to the conversation he’d had earlier with his mother and Darby. Neither knew now more than they’d previously known about the happenings at Quatre Bras, except that the Prince Regent himself would not be best pleased if the blackmailer penned another chapbook that would reveal “Shame That Rises to the Highest Reaches of the Crown Itself.”

But Minerva did now know about the Countess of Cockermouth’s predicament, about Daniella Foster...and her bedchamber...and after that, well, everything his mother and Darby hatched between them had become a bit of a blur in Coop’s mind.

He just knew he’d agreed to do what they said. For his sins...

They’d convinced him to agree to this current mad course of action, or at least he’d allowed them to think they’d convinced him. He’d kept the hope alive that there could be another way, even as he’d drawn the bays to a halt in front of the chapel.

Inspiration had not struck.

But the hour soon would.