If His Kiss Is Wicked

by Jo Goodman

Genres: Historical Romance

Synopsis

USA Today bestselling author Jo Goodman delivers the unforgettable story of a beautiful young woman who believes someone wants to kill her. Only one man can reveal if she's truly in peril—or if she's going mad. But will his forbidden kiss lead to a dangerous seduction? Shy by nature, Emma Hathaway usually leaves the drama to her rebellious cousin, Marisol. But when Emma agrees to meet with her cousin's secret lover to end the affair, she is pulled into a dangerous game. Now Emma is convinced her involvement in the scandal has put her life in jeopardy. The trouble is none of Emma's confidantes believe anyone is trying to harm her. As whispers of madness begin, Emma turns to the only person who might be able to help. . . The very handsome, barely respectable Restell Gardner has gained a reputation for helping people out of compromising positions. Never one to turn away a lady in need, Restell agrees to help solve the intrigue. Sensing there is more to the green-eyed beauty than meets the eye, Restell feels himself falling for Emma. But he resists succumbing to his passion. . .at least until he learns the truth about the danger that is haunting her. For if he gives in to temptation too soon, he could lose Emma forever. . .

Release date: October 8, 2013

Publisher: Zebra Books

Print pages: 384

Sample

June 1822
London

“Be a dear, won’t you, and fetch my bonnet?” Marisol looked past her reflection to where her cousin was standing at the foot of the bed. “You look at sixes and sevens, Emmalyn. It is not at all becoming. Dithering never is. You might at least occupy yourself with some small task.”

Emma knew that she had never dithered in her life, but she offered no rejoinder to refute Marisol’s observation. Experience taught her that a denial would not serve. Marisol remained firm in her views and such evidence that could be mounted to sway a less rigid mind was regarded as a nuisance.

Emma glanced at the window. The damask drapes were drawn back so they framed a rapidly graying sky above the rooftops. “You realize it is going to rain, don’t you?”

“That is of no consequence to me.” Marisol shifted her chair closer to the vanity and examined the pearl earbobs she had chosen. “Are these all the thing, do you think? I cannot decide if I prefer the studs or the ones that dangle.”

Emma did not offer an opinion. Marisol’s discourse was not truly intended to elicit a comment. Her cousin was merely speaking to herself. “Will you want the black leghorn bonnet?”

“What?” Distracted from her fashion dilemma, Marisol frowned. Her perfect bow of a mouth disappeared as she pursed her lips. She regarded Emma, exasperation and impatience bringing her eyebrows together until only a slender crease separated the pair. “My new leghorn? I should think not. Why the satin quilling would be ruined. You said yourself it is going to rain. And the feathers? They will droop to comical effect. That is not done, Emmalyn, even by you.”

At this inkling that it would be she, not Marisol, who would be stepping out in the rain, the fine, dark hairs at the back of Emma’s neck rose slightly. She touched her nape with her fingertips, gently massaging her hackles. “The satin straw bonnet, then.”

“Yes.” Marisol’s frown eased. “I confess I had been thinking of something else, but the satin straw is the best choice. You are so clever to think of it.” She turned away from the mirror entirely and looked up at Emma. “You are always so good to me, Emmalyn. I do not tell you often enough, I’m quite certain of it. I am resolved that I must tell you at least once a day how very dear you are. You’ll remind me, won’t you?”

“If you like,” Emma said, her features perfectly schooled. She hurried into Marisol’s dressing room before she surrendered to the almost violent urge to laugh.

The satin straw bonnet was several years out of fashion, although only the most slavish devotees of the Paris style would know. Marisol recently purchased a striped Barcelona handkerchief, which she used to replace the bonnet’s original blue satin ribbon. Emma had to admit it was a fetching confection—on Marisol. For herself, Emma preferred something less likely to draw eyes and comments.

Marisol had settled on the delicate, dangling pearl earrings and was admiring their effect when Emma returned with the bonnet. The pearls lightly brushed the slim stem of her neck as she twisted her head to one side, then the other. “It is the most delicious sensation to feel them touch my skin.” A small shiver accompanied this observation and she looked immediately to Emma for her reaction. When Emma merely regarded her without expression, Marisol was moved to add, “It puts me in mind of a kiss, you know, just there, against my neck. Do you know such a feeling, Emmalyn?”

“I dare say I do.” She held out the bonnet to her cousin, then drew it back as Marisol swiveled on her stool and lifted lambent blue eyes in her direction. The expression was at once sly and curious, and Emma was made wary. A tendril of silky ebon hair fell against Marisol’s temple, and the curl lay there unmoving as though painted by a fine hand. The effect relieved the symmetry of Marisol’s countenance, but immediately made Emma more aware of the features that lent her cousin an almost doll-like perfection. Marisol’s complexion was without blemish and fashionably pale. This porcelain canvas made the pink hue in her cheeks all the more startling, and the rose blush softened or deepened with such charming results that it was as though Marisol had the knack of willing it so.

“Have you been kissed then?” asked Marisol. Her full bottom lip was thrust forward in the first stage of a pretty pout. “Why is it that you have never told me? I will have his name. I must. We are agreed there shall be no secrets between us.”

Emma could not recall that she had ever entered into such an agreement with her cousin. It would be such an uncharacteristic lapse in good judgment that it could mean only that she’d been kicked in the head by a horse. “His name was Fitzroy. Are you quite happy that you have it from me?”

“Fitzroy? What sort of name is that?”

“A fine one, I suspect. He was comfortable with it, at least it always seemed so to me.” Emma held out the bonnet again as Marisol sucked in her bottom lip. “Here. Shall I help you arrange it?”

Marisol took the bonnet, but placed it in her lap. She continued to regard Emma with some misgivings while her fingers fiddled with the bonnet’s trim. “Fitzroy. Was that his Christian name or his surname?”

Emma pretended to be much struck by the question. “Do you know, I don’t believe I ever inquired,” she said at last. “I only ever knew him to have the one name.”

“But you permitted him to kiss you?”

“Yes, of course. He was most amiable and I liked him immensely.” Emma noted that confusion set Marisol’s perfect features slightly awry. “Have I given you cause to think ill of me?” she asked. “You are frowning in earnest.”

“Then it is very bad of you to make me do so.” Having admonished Emma, Marisol effortlessly smoothed her expression and presented what might be interpreted as only polite concern. “I could never think ill of you, Emma, but it is rather surprising to hear you speak so blithely on this matter of being kissed. I feel as if I should be reminding you that it is a dangerous practice to engage in flirtation with a man to whom you have not been properly introduced.”

Emma watched as Marisol paused, blinked slowly and widely, then finally framed a perfect O with her lips. Such was her cousin’s look of dawning comprehension. The physicality of the effort never failed to fascinate Emma. “Yes, dearest,” Emma said kindly. “You heard yourself say it, now what is to be done?”

“But I was speaking of you,” Marisol protested. “You cannot hold me to the same standard that I hold you.”

“What an absurd thing to say. Why ever not?”

“The simple answer is that you are four years my senior. Still, I do not account that twenty-two is such a great age, nor eighteen an age of no consequence. The truth is that you are an infinitely better person than I am.”

Now it was Emma who blinked. Her eyes, more green than blue but with an unmistakable hint of the latter, were shuttered briefly by long dark lashes. When a cocoa-colored tendril of hair fell forward it did not lay prettily against her temple, but curled like a hook around one raised eyebrow, giving the impression that it not only had lifted the eyebrow to just that height but also held it in place. Emma thrust her jaw out and blew upward, causing the curl to flutter but failing to dislodge it. She was moved at last to impatiently brush it aside.

“A better person?” asked Emma. “You cannot possibly believe that. We are different, surely. That is a fair observation. But this other? No. You very much mistake the matter.”

“I am vain and silly,” Marisol said frankly. “Father says so, and he would know for I am like my mother in that way. Do not distress yourself, Emmalyn, casting about for some kind words to soften his remarks. Father loved Mother to absolute distraction and loves her still if the truth be known. He loves me no less, not in spite of who I am, but because of it.”

“That is not the observation of a silly young woman.”

“Yes, well, it is but the mood of the moment. Foolishness will return directly.”

Set figuratively back on her heels by Marisol’s candor, Emma pressed her lips together and wondered what more could be said.

Marisol glanced over her shoulder at her reflection, then caught Emma’s gaze in the mirror. “And you yourself know that I am vain. How can I not be when I have little else beyond my beauty to recommend me? You are the fiercely clever one, Emmalyn. Father says you might well have been born a man for all your clever ways.”

“I’m sure he meant that as a compliment,” Emma said dryly.

“Oh, indeed. You are like a son to him; he’s told me so. A son is better than a daughter, I think, for there are vastly different expectations. You are the son.”

“That is not so, Marisol. Uncle’s feelings for me are not what they are for you.”

“Of course they are not, but I am not speaking of his feelings, only of the fact that he thinks of you as he would a son. It does not mean that he loves me less, but that he depends on you more. It’s been that way since you came to live with us. How long has it been now? Two years?”

“Almost three,” Emma said quietly.

Marisol turned abruptly. The bonnet spilled from her lap to the floor, and she made no move to retrieve it. When Emma would have done so, she stopped her, reaching to grasp her hand. “A less vain and silly girl would not have forgotten that next month is the anniversary of your own dear parents’ death. Forgive me, Emmalyn. I spoke without thinking.”

“There is nothing to forgive.”

“You really are the better person.” Marisol squeezed Emma’s hand lightly. “Certainly more generous.”

Emma waited until Marisol released her hand, then stooped to pick up the bonnet. When Marisol made no move to take it, Emma sighed, accepting the inevitable. “It’s to be Mr. Kincaid, then? You have some message for him.”

“Did I not say you are fiercely clever? You have read my mind.”

“Hardly. I know neither where nor when, and I most assuredly do not know what.”

“Madame Chabrier’s is where you will be going.”

“The milliner’s?”

“Yes. Mr. Kincaid will meet you there.”

“That is hardly one of his usual haunts. And don’t you prefer Mrs. Bowman’s fine hats?”

“Yes. It will seem to be a chance meeting. I did not want anyone placing a different construction upon it.”

“Since you’re sending me, the chance of you encountering Mr. Kincaid seems to be…well, there is no chance at all. No one will remark on me crossing his path.”

“But I didn’t know when I agreed to meet him that I would be sending you in my place. I thought that was evident.”

“Perhaps you will want to revise your opinion that I am the clever one.”

“Perhaps I will,” Marisol said. “But not just now. It does not serve.” She glanced at the clock on the mantel. “Mr. Kincaid and I agreed on one o’clock as the correct time.”

“It is almost one now.”

“Yes, but then I am invariably late. Mr. Kincaid knows that as I took pains to explain the nuances of being late as my fashion and being fashionably late. I am striving for the latter. He’ll wait.”

“And if he doesn’t?”

“Then I shall be devastated.”

“But why? You are not even meeting him.”

“But he doesn’t know that. Really, Emma, can you not keep up? He is expecting me. I am relying on you to judge his reaction when he sees that you have come in my place.”

“Very well, and when I judge that his very correct manner is politely masking his own dashed hopes, what do I do?”

“You give him this.” Marisol reached delicately beneath the scalloped bodice of her walking dress and pulled out a folded square of lightly scented paper. “This will explain why I cannot see him any longer.”

“I see.” Emma took the note in her left hand and closed her fingers around it. “And if it appears that he is relieved that I have come in your stead?”

“Then you will give him this.” Marisol stood and lightly laid the flat of her hand against Emma’s cheek. “But you will do it with much feeling. Recall that you are delivering the insult on my behalf and you should respond accordingly.”

“I don’t think I can slap Mr. Kincaid, with or without feeling.” Emma watched as Marisol slowly dropped back to her stool, her knees folding under her gracefully until the deflation was complete. “Perhaps if I simply tell him that you do not wish to see him again, it will suffice.” Emma offered this suggestion with no hint of the exasperation she felt. “I will allow that in this instance he does not deserve the scented note penned by your hand. He would not treasure it appropriately.”

Marisol lifted her head and regarded Emma with new appreciation. “That is just my thinking on the matter. He does not merit a memento of our brief liaisons, not if he is unmoved by the withdrawal of my attentions. A slap seems just. After all, he has trifled with me.”

There was an odd sort of logic to Marisol’s argument that Emma was very much afraid she was beginning to follow. “I’m certain I could use great feeling when I tell him that you no longer wish to see him.” Emma did not explain that the great feeling would be one of relief. Marisol’s assignations with Jonathan Kincaid were no secret to her. Whether or not they could remain a secret to Marisol’s father and her fiancé for much longer had been a question in Emma’s mind for some time. Mayhap her cousin had begun to question the same thing. “When I have finished speaking to him, he will comprehend that he is no gentleman and has earned nothing so much as our enmity and contempt. Is that agreeable to you?”

“Very much so. You will use your most clipped accents, won’t you? And I do not think it will be amiss if you stare at him just so.” Marisol’s light blue eyes narrowed slightly and the effect was frosty.

“I suppose I can manage that.”

“Of course you can. I learned it from you.”

“Oh.” Surprise mixed with dismay and made the single word almost inaudible. For a moment, Emma was at a loss. “I had no idea.”

Marisol’s icy glance melted as she beamed. “That is because you spend no time in front of the mirror. A sharp setdown as you do it, accomplishing the thing with only your eyes, comes naturally to you. It puts me quite in awe.”

Not so much in awe, Emma thought, that Marisol was ever restrained from speaking her mind. The fancies that flitted through her cousin’s gray matter found immediate expression at the tip of her tongue. Emma did not point this out, nor did she comment on the singular nature of what she was certain Marisol intended as a compliment. Instead, she placed the straw bonnet on her head and tied the ribbons. “I’ll get my pelisse.”

“No, take mine. If I do not mistake the change in the weather, you will need it. I could not forgive myself if you took a chill. The green one, I think. It is easily my favorite, but it will look even more appealing on you.”

“It is no trouble to retrieve my own.”

In answer, Marisol extended her arm and pointed in the direction of her dressing room. “You’ll find it in the armoire. Berry brushed it out this morning.”

Emma located the pelisse, slipped it on, and belted it just under her breasts. Her thought when she caught sight of herself in the cheval glass was that the silk-lined green muslin fell in a vertical line that was not unflattering. As invariably happened, at first glance, she was struck by her resemblance to Marisol. The impression no longer lingered in her mind as it used to, but faded quickly, resolutely pushed aside by the knowledge that it was merely a trick of the shifting light and the angle of the reflecting glass.

Marisol was standing at her vanity when Emma returned to the room. She clapped her hands together, perfectly pleased with what she had been able to bring about. “I knew it would suit you,” she said. “Come, make a turn and let me see you to full effect.”

Emma hesitated, saw nothing for it but to oblige her cousin’s whim, and did so.

“Why, Emmalyn Hathaway, you look quite lovely.” She stepped forward and smoothed one of the ruffles at the cuff so that it lay smoothly against the back of Emma’s hand. “I shouldn’t wonder that Mr. Kincaid will mistake the matter and think I am come, at least until you close the distance between you.”

“Is that part of your plan, Marisol? Are you encouraging him to mistake my identity in the hope that it will give rise to a more profound reaction?”

“Do you think it will? I confess it hadn’t occurred to me, but it can only be for the best. You will have less difficulty judging the bent of his mind. You do not want to give him my note if he deserves a setdown.”

“My brief acquaintance with Mr. Kincaid does not make me suppose there is any bent to his mind. He is rather more straightforward than that.”

Marisol communicated her doubt. “If you say so, but in my experience men possess twists and turns of thought that make me dizzy. Do you have my note?”

Emma indicated that she had slipped it under the belt. “I won’t lose it.”

“Promise me that you’ll come back directly.”

Emma knew this was not because Marisol had any concerns for her safety but was desirous of hearing the details of the meeting sooner rather than later. “The rain will encourage me to return quickly.” She went to the door, opened it, then paused on the threshold. When she looked back, Marisol was already moving toward the window. “Marisol?”

“Yes?”

“I won’t do this for you again.” Emma turned away but not before she saw that her cousin had the grace to blush.

“You have a visitor.”

Restell Gardner made no response to this announcement. He remained as stone in his bed, refusing to surrender to a single twitch that would indicate that he was not deeply asleep.

“It is no good, sir,” Hobbes said as he poured water into the washbasin. “You have warned me of this very trick yourself and begged me not to be fooled by it. So we are at odds, you see, for I am armed with the knowledge of your pretense and must act accordingly, while you will continue to lie abed and favor me with an abrupt snore to put me off. When that does not have the desired effect, you will roll to your other side and compel me to hobble around the bed to address you directly. You will, of course, continue to ignore me, forcing me to take measures that may well relieve me of my employment. You will understand, sir, that such an outcome is hardly in keeping with your promise to treat me fairly.”

At his first opportunity to be heard, Restell offered a weary observation. “Is it your plan, Hobbes, to speak at length on this matter?”

“Yes, sir.”

Restell did not open an eye. “I don’t snore.”

“I can’t say that I know if you do or don’t, Mr. Gardner, only that you’d pretend to.”

“Where did I find you, Sergeant Hobbes?”

“In the mews, sir, just behind the Blue Ruination, drinking bad gin and bemoaning the loss of my leg.”

“I don’t suppose you miss the mews.”

“No, sir. Nor the gin. Still miss my leg, though this peg has its uses right enough.”

Restell rolled onto his back and rubbed his eyes. When his hand fell away, he brought Hobbes into focus. The former regiment man was standing at his bedside—towering, really—with the water pitcher poised at a threatening angle. Restell waved him off. “You didn’t mention water torture. I’m thoroughly awake, thank you very much.”

“My pleasure, sir.”

“I was being sardonic.”

“So was I.”

Grinning, Restell pushed himself upright, stuffed a pillow under the small of his back, and leaned against the bed head. He ran one hand through his pale, sun-bleached helmet of hair, leaving it furrowed and in perfect disarray. “What was the hour when I returned?”

“Gone three. It was a late night for you, sir.”

Restell needed no reminder. It had been an age since he’d trolled the gaming hells. He could not recall that he had ever been made so weary by it. “And the hour now?”

“Not yet eight o’clock.”

“The hell you say. And I have a visitor?” He had to restrain himself from pulling the covers over his head. “God save me, it is not my mother, is it?”

“No, sir. Nor any other of your family.” Hobbes skirted the bed and went to the washbasin, his limp hardly noticeable this morning. “I understand she is female, though.”

“That alone does not account for the hour of her visit. Who is she?”

“She wouldn’t say. Mr. Nelson asked her for her card, but she declined to give one.”

“Curious.”

Hobbes nodded. “I thought the very same.” He set towels to warm at the fireplace, then began whipping lather in a cup for his employer’s morning shave and ablutions. “Do you wish to bathe?”

“Above everything. I reek of the gaming hells.”

Hobbes made no comment about this last, though it was true enough. “I’ll see to it.” He set the lathering cup down and crossed the room to ring for assistance. “Will you break your fast here or in the morning room?”

“Here.” Restell swept back the covers and threw his legs over the side of the bed. He sat there for several moments, head in his hands as though to steady it, then kicked his slippers aside in favor of padding barefoot across the cold floor to the dressing room. “Do you think she’ll wait?” he called to Hobbes.

“I couldn’t say, sir.” He picked up the warm towels and carried them to Restell. “Does it matter?”

“She is an inconvenient female. I should like the opportunity to tell her so.”

“Do you think she doesn’t know? They frequently do, sir.”

“Then they should try harder to resist their nature,” Restell said sourly. “Have you a headache powder, Hobbes? Satan’s minions are doing a gleeful dance inside my skull.”

Hobbes made sympathetic noises. “Right away.”

Restell felt marginally better after he bathed and shaved. He was returned to human form by the time Hobbes tied his stock, brushed his jacket, and the headache powder began to work. Following a leisurely breakfast and perusal of the morning paper, he pronounced himself prepared well enough to receive his visitor in the library.

He had only just begun to seat himself in the wing chair by the fireplace when Nelson announced her. It was all rather awkwardly done—the announcement because Nelson had no name for their visitor, and Restell’s rise from the chair because he unfolded in a manner reminiscent of a jack-in-the-box. Restell noted that the butler quickly exited the room, but not so fast that he missed Nelson’s lips begin to twitch.

There was no reaction from his visitor, at least none that Restell could observe. Her features were obscured by a gauzy veil secured to the brim of a leghorn bonnet. He wondered at the affectation. Clearly she was in high mourning, making it known by choosing black as the single color to drape her slim figure, but the veil was not at all in the usual mode. Did she wear it all the time? he wondered, or had she chosen it purposely for this morning call?

“Have you been offered refreshment?” he asked. Although he had yet to hear her speak, he had it in his mind that she was a woman of no more than middling years. There was no discernible hesitation in her step, and her carriage was correct but not rigid. She was not compensating for some frailty. “Tea, perhaps?”

She shook her head. The veil rippled with the movement but remained in place. She held her reticule in front of her, at the level of her waist, and made no move to set it aside.

Restell understood why Nelson had not refused her entry, even at the inopportune timing of her arrival. She was preternaturally calm, possessed of a resigned bearing and purpose that made one suppose she would not be easily turned from it.

“Will you be seated?” asked Restell.

“I have not decided.”

“You have not decided if you will sit?”

“I have not decided if I will stay.”

Restell shrugged. “Then you will not object if I attend to my correspondence. You may stand or sit, stay or go, as the mood is upon you.” He gave her no further attention but walked to his desk and began examining the post that had arrived the previous day. He chose a letter with the recognizable seal of the Earl of Ferrin and hitched one hip on the edge of the desk as he opened it. He was peripherally aware of his visitor’s study, but he ignored it in favor of the missive from his stepbrother.

He read through the greeting and far enough beyond to be assured of the good health of everyone in Ferrin’s household before the visitor interrupted him.

“I did not think you would be so young,” she said.

“I am six and twenty. That is not the age you had in mind, I collect.”

She did not answer this directly. “You cannot have the breadth of experience I am seeking.”

“You have me at a disadvantage,” Restell said. He let Ferrin’s letter dangle between his fingers rather than set it aside. It was a subtle signal that he would remain engaged only as long as she did. “I know nothing at all about what experience you require. Perhaps if you would begin with how you came to be here.”

She hesitated, then asked, “You don’t want to know my name?”

“Would it mean anything to me?”

“No.”

“Then it’s not important. You know mine. That seems to be the salient point.”

“I learned about you from my physician.”

Restell folded Ferrin’s correspondence as he considered this information. He tapped one corner of the letter against his knee. “Might I know his name?”

“Bettany. Dr. William Bettany.”

Restell did not reveal whether or not he was acquainted with the doctor. “And what did Dr. Bettany tell you about me?”

“Precious little.” Making her decision, she backed into the chair behind her and sat down abruptly. The reticule remained clutched in her gloved hands. “That is, he was not speaking of you to me. I overheard some of what he told my…what he told someone else.”

“Might I know that name?” Her pause let him know she suspected he might have some familiarity with that person. He let it pass and went to the heart of the matter. “What manner of things did you overhear?”

“The doctor seemed to think that you had certain peculiar talents that might be helpful to someone in my situation.”

“Peculiar talents,” Restell repeated. “It’s an intriguing description. What do you suppose he meant by it?”

“He was speaking of protection. It’s a service you offer, I believe.”

“Are you quite sure that you comprehended the context. At the risk of offending you, you should know that when a gentleman places a woman under his protection it generally means—”

“He is setting up a mistress. Yes, I understand that. At the risk of offending you, that is not the sort of protection I am seeking from you. I do not believe I mistook the doctor’s meaning. He was speaking of protection from harm. That is why I have come to you.”

Restell folded his arms across his chest and regarded his visitor frankly. He did not try to penetrate her veil but took in the whole of her figure: the braced shoulders and narrow back, the quality and cut of her clothing, the stillness of her hands on the reticule. There was no glimpse of her hair and her feet were tucked modestly under the chair and hidden by her gown. She could be fair or dark or possess the olive complexion that suggested a Mediterranean heritage. She spoke in accents that were similar to his own and were influenced by years in London, attention to education, but nonetheless hinted at origins far north of the city. He could not deny that he was intrigued. He accepted that as fact. It did not necessarily follow that he was favorably disposed to taking up this matter of her protection.

“Is it shelter that you require?” he asked.

“No, not shelter. I have a home.”

“Then you are not seeking to escape it.” He saw her shoulders jerk and the brim of her bonnet lift as her chin came up. She was clearly shocked by the import of his words.

“No, of course not. I am content there.”

Restell thought it a peculiar expression of sentiment, but he did not comment on it. “You will have to tell me more. It would be a good beginning to tell me why you need protection.”

“I’m not sure that I do. That is a matter for you to determine. I thought I heard Dr. Bettany say that you make discreet inquiries. I am as interested in securing your services toward that end as I am in protection.”

Was it too early for a drink? Restell wondered. He glanced past his visitor’s shoulder to the drinks cabinet and actually considered removing the stopper from the decanter of whiskey and taking his fill. “Did you not just say you weren’t certain you needed protection?”

“I’m not certain I need it for myself,” she said. “I believe perhaps my cousin is the one who requires it.”

“Your cousin. I don’t suppose I might know her name.”

“In time, I think. You can understand that I must be certain that engaging you is the right course of action.”

One corner of Restell’s mouth lifted slightly, hinting at both mockery and amusement. “I understand you think the decision is entirely yours.”

“Isn’t it?”

Restell did not respond immediately. Unfolding his arms, he picked up the letter opener on the tray at his side and lightly tapped the end of it against the palm of his other hand.

“No, in fact it ultimately rests with me,” he said at last. It was just a fancy on his part, but he imagined that behind her veil she was frowning deeply. “I do not accept everyone who applies to me as my client. Conversely, I might choose to offer my services to someone who does not formally engage me. Once you announced your intention at the door to have this interview and stubbornly waited when I gave you sufficient time to think better of it, you surrendered your prerogative to decide the outcome. Whether you like it or not, I will determine how we go from here.”

“But you don’t even know who I am. If I do not hire you, you will never know it. You cannot offer your services to someone whose name you don’t know.”

“God’s truth, you cannot be so foolish as to believe I will not discover it. If my peculiar talents do not extend so far as that, then why would you entertain any notion of engaging my services? It defies any sort of common sense. Have you so much in the way of cotton wool between your ears?”

Restell replaced the letter opener and stood. “Are you taking exception to my words? I hope so. If you are completely cowed, then there is no hope for it but that I will have to show you the door.”

“I know where the door is,” she said. “And sense enough about me still to get there on my own.”

Restell permitted himself a small smile as he turned his back on her and skirted the desk. He dropped into the leather chair behind it and set his long legs before him at an angle. “How did you find me?” He did not miss the way she subtly shifted in her seat. The question surprised her.

“But I have already told you. Dr. Bettany.”

“That is how you heard of me. I inquired as to how you found me.”

“You are not the only one who can make discreet inquiries. I had it from a member of your family that you were temporarily using your brother’s London residence.”

“I sincerely doubt that someone in my own family characterized my stay here as temporary. All of them know I am quite satisfied with the arrangement; indeed, that I enjoy the distinct benefits of making this establishment my home. I will not be easily dislodged, even if Ferrin should raise some objection. The earl is my stepbrother, by the way, although we do not make too fine a point of it. I merely mention it so you will know that he possesses a generous nature that I frequently admire and regularly take advantage of but do not necessarily share.”

“You are the poor relation, then.”

The half smile that frequently lifted one corner of Restell’s mouth now became a fulsome one, engaging his clear blue eyes and deepening the creases of twin dimples on either side of his lips. “Some would say so, yes.”

“You do not seem to mind.”

“I hadn’t realized that I should.” He shrugged, dismissing this line of inquiry. “So you had it from some member of my family that I could be found here. Dr. Bettany wouldn’t necessarily know that, you see, which is what made me curious. I was yet living on Kingston Street when I made the acquaintance of the good doctor.” Restell laced his fingers together and tapped his thumbs as he considered his visitor and all that she had not told him. “Are you yet prepared to share the whole of why you’re here? I’ve had little enough sleep these three nights past and find I am weary of wondering. In truth, I am all for crawling back into my warm bed.”

Restell had learned that silence was often the key to confession. When she did not respond immediately, he waited her out. He continued to study her as though he had long ago penetrated her veil and knew the nuances of her every expression, and when he had the urge to break the silence, he cautioned himself to wait that bit much longer.

In the end, he was rewarded for his patience.

She lifted the veil.

Restell had seen men leave the boxing ring after three rounds of rough sparring with fewer bruises than this woman had. The evidence of her beating had faded, to be sure, but there was color enough remaining to determine where the blows had landed. Beneath both eyes she sported deep violet shadows, proof that her nose had been broken if not completely smashed. Her complexion was suffused with the yellow hue associated with jaundice. In her case it was further confirmation of the fists she had endured. Her left cheek looked to be more tender than her right one; faint swelling was still visible across the arch. A thin cut on her lower lip had not healed, most likely because when she spoke it was laid open again. He could make out the faint line of bruising along one side of her neck. The high collar of her walking gown obscured what had been done to her throat, but Restell imagined mottled thumbprints at the hollow between her collarbones as testament that she had been choked, probably within a single breath of her life.

Restell took in the whole of her countenance in a single glance, then sought to see beneath it. The contusions obscured her features almost as well as the veil. Restell had to peel back every distended layer of bruising to find the true shape of her face.

She had a fine bone structure: a pared nose that had been set straight by a firm and skillful hand, a high arch to her cheeks that was made more prominent by the hollow beneath, a slender jaw held firmly—perhaps painfully—in place. Her eyes had a vaguely exotic slant to them that Restell supposed she could use to great effect if she lowered her lashes even a fraction. What she did, however, was hold his stare directly and give no quarter. The consequence of such forthrightness was that Restell only noted the color of her eyes upon his second appraisal.

“I had not imagined you would be so young,” he said, echoing her earlier observation. “I am generally a better judge.”

“Ah, yes, but you can see for yourself that I have recently garnered considerable life experience.”

“Yes,” he said, dipping his head in acknowledgment. “Yes, you have.” Restell sat forward in his chair. “This was not done by someone you know?”

“No.”

“Are you quite certain? Your father? Brother? Someone you do not want to reveal just yet. A lover, mayhap?”

“Why do you persist in thinking it is someone I know? I would tell you if that were the case, else why would I come?”

“Precisely. But many women do not tell it all, at least not at the outset. Fear, I suspect is the reason for it. Some are afraid of their tormentor; others are afraid to hope that anything can be done. Even when I explain that it is better that I know the whole of it at the first interview, the truth seems to reveal itself over time.”

“A consequence of learning to trust you, I shouldn’t wonder.”

“You may well be right. Perhaps I expect too much.” He shrugged and leaned back again, crossing his legs at the ankle. “Why hasn’t anyone approached me on your behalf? You said you overheard Bettany discussing my talents with someone. Why hasn’t that person followed where the good doctor pointed?”

“I can’t be sure. I didn’t ask.”

“You must have wondered. What are your thoughts?”

She pressed her lips together, frowning slightly, then released her reticule long enough to press the back of her fingers against her mouth. She examined her glove for evidence of blood. Before she could find her handkerchief, Restell was standing before her, offering his own.

“Thank you.” She dabbed her lower lip with the linen. “It will never heal if I persist on worrying it. I cannot seem to break myself of the habit.” She withdrew the handkerchief, saw that she had stemmed the bleeding, and began folding the linen into a neat square.

“You may keep it,” Restell said, returning to his chair. “I will not be put off my questioning and will give you cause to have need of it again. Now, tell me why you think no one save you has applied to me.” He watched her take a steadying breath while he held his own and waited to see what she would do.

“I think it is because it’s believed the danger is past, or rather that the danger existed only because I presented opportunity for it.”

“You will have to explain the last.”

“I mean that if I had not been just where I was no ill would have befallen me. I have thought a great deal about that.”

“I see. So you are at fault for what happened.”

“At fault?” Her eyebrows lifted in tandem. “No, I do not accept that. I am responsible for being where I was and that is all.”

“So the thinking of your family is that this assault was random, one of opportunity rather than deliberate design.”

“I have supposed that is their thinking. As I mentioned, I didn’t ask.”

“I do not recall reading an account of any assault such as you experienced in the Gazette. Did it happen here in London?”

“It began here. It ended in Walthamstow. Are you familiar?”

“I know where it is. Waltham Abbey is not far from there, I believe.”

“Yes.”

“Are you telling me you were abducted in London and taken to Walthamstow?”

“Walthamstow is where I was able to get away. I cannot say how long they meant to remain there.”

“They?”

“There were two men, though sometimes it seems to me there was a third.”

Restell kept his gaze steady, taking in t. . .