Someone to Watch Over Me (Bow Street Runners #1)(2)

To Grant's amusement, theton had taken him to its bejeweled bosom, clamoring for his presence at their social functions. It was said that a ball's success was assured if the hostess was able to write "Mr. Morgan will attend" at the bottom of the invitation. Yet for all his apparent popularity with the nobility, it was clear to all that he was not one of them. He was more a figure of entertainment than an accepted member of the high social circles he frequented. Women were excited by the notion that he was a potentially dangerous character, and men wanted his friendship in order to appear more brave and worldly themselves. Grant was aware that he would never be accepted except in the most superficial way. And he would never be trusted by theton...He knew too many of their dirty secrets, their vulnerabilities, their fears and desires.

A gust of frosty air whirled around him, making the woman in his arms moan and tremble. Clutching his unwieldy burden more tightly, he left the embankment and crossed a cobblestoned street coated with mud and manure. He strode through a small, square court filled with stagnant water barrels, a fetid pigsty, and a cart with broken wheels.Covent Garden was littered with courts like these, from which dark, winding rookeries spread out in disease-ridden webs. Any gentleman in his right mind would be terrified to venture in this area of the city, rife with thieves' kitchens, whores, bullies, and criminals who would kill for a few shillings. But Grant was hardly a gentleman, and theLondon underworld held no terrors for him.

The woman's head lolled on his shoulder, her weak, cool breath hitting his chin. "Well, Vivien," he murmured, "there was a time I wanted you in my arms...but this wasn't exactly what I had planned."

He found it hard to believe he was carrying London's most desirable female past Covent Garden's tumbledown booths and open stalls. Butchers and peddlers paused to stare curiously as he passed, while prostitutes ventured from the shadows. "Here, laddie," a sunken-cheeked scarcrow of a woman called, "got a nice fresh cream pot for ye!"

"Some other time," Grant said sarcastically, ignoring the whore's eager cawing. He crossed the northwest corner of the square and reached King Street, where the decaying buildings turned abruptly into a row of tidy town houses, coffeehouses, and a publisher or two. It was a clean, prosperous street with bow-fronted houses inhabited by the upper class. Grant had purchased an elegant, airy three-story air town house there. The busy headquarters at Bow Street was only a short step away, but it seemed far removed from this serene location.

Swiftly Grant mounted the steps of his town house and gave the mahogany door a resounding kick. When there was no response from within, he drew back and kicked again. Suddenly the door opened and his housekeeper appeared, spluttering with protests at his cavalier treatment of the polished wood paneling.

Mrs. Buttons was a pleasant-faced woman in her fifties, kind of heart but bottled-up, steel-spined, and possessed of stern religious convictions. It was no secret that she disapproved of Grant's chosen profession, abhorring the physical violence and corruption he dealt with as a matter of course. Yet she tirelessly received the wide assortment of underworld callers who came to the town house, treating all with equal parts of politeness and reserve.

Like the other Bow Street Runners who worked under the direction of Sir Ross Cannon, Grant had become so immersed in the world of darkness that he sometimes questioned how much difference there was between himself and the criminals he pursued. Mrs. Buttons had once told Grant of her hopes that he would someday step into the light of Christian truth. "I'm beyond saving," he had replied cheerfully. "You'd better direct your ambitions toward an attainable goal, Mrs. Buttons."

As she beheld the dripping burden in her employer's arms, the housekeeper's normally unflappable face went slack with amazement. "Good Lord!" Mrs. Buttons exclaimed. "What happened?"

Grant's muscles were beginning to tire from the strain of carrying the woman's limp weight so far. "A near drowning," he said curtly, pushing past the housekeeper as he headed for the stairs. "I'm taking her to my room."

"But how? Who?" Mrs. Buttons gasped, making a visible effort to recover herself. "Shouldn't she be brought to a hospital?"

"She's an acquaintance of mine," he said. "I want her seen by a private doctor. God knows what they would do to her at a hospital."

"An acquaintance," the housekeeper repeated, hurrying to keep pace with his rapid strides. It was clear she was burning to know more, but wouldn't presume to ask.

"A lady of the evening, actually," Grant said dryly.

"A lady of the...and you've brought her here..." Her voice reeked with disapproval. "Sir, once again you have outdone yourself."

A brief grin crossed his face. "Thank you."

"It was not a compliment," the housekeeper informed him. "Mr. Morgan, wouldn't you prefer to have one of the guest rooms prepared?"

"She'll stay in mine," he said in a tone that quashed further argument. Frowning, Mrs. Buttons directed a housemaid to wipe up the puddles they had left on the inlaid floors of the amber marble entranceway.

The town house, with its long windows, Sheraton furniture, and English hand-knotted carpets, was the kind of place Grant had once never dared to dream of living in. It was a far cry from the crowded flat he had occupied as a small child, three rooms crammed with the eight offspring of a middle-class bookseller and his wife. Or the succession of orphanages and workhouses that had come later, when his father had been thrown into debtor's prison and the family had fallen to pieces.