The Rogue Not Taken (Scandal & Scoundrel #1)(14)

She dropped her gaze to his boots, eager to disappear.

That’s when she noticed that he was not wearing boots.

At least, he was not wearing two of them.

Bollocks.

The Marquess of Eversley had arrived.

And from the way he came toward her—the swagger she’d identified earlier likely due to his lacking one boot—he was about to discover that she had done the same. She did not look up at him, keeping her gaze firmly affixed on his feet, hoping he would ignore her.

It did not work. “Boy,” he drawled, coming entirely too close. Unsettlingly close.

She shifted from one foot to the other, willing him away.

That did not work, either.

“Did you hear me?” he prompted.

She moved, dropping a half inch before she stopped herself from curtsying. Even if she weren’t dressed as a man, he didn’t deserve politeness of any kind, this ruiner of women who represented everything she loathed about the Society that had so roundly turned its back upon her. This man who had turned his back upon her. If only he’d been willing to help her, she wouldn’t be in this ridiculous situation.

“Are you able to hear?” he fairly barked the last.

Straightening, she coughed and pressed her chin tighter to her chest, lowering her voice. “Yes, my lord.” The honorific was strangled in her throat.

She was saved from whatever he was about to say by the arrival of one of his comrades. “Goddammit, King, you’re f*cking fearless. I thought you were going to kill yourself on the last turn.”

She inhaled, not because of the unexpected foul language—a childhood around coal miners made one immune to profanity—but because of the unexpected voice, thick with a Scottish brogue. Her gaze snapped up, and she found herself face-to-face with the Duke of Warnick, a legendary scoundrel in his own right—an uncultured Scotsman who unexpectedly ascended to a dukedom, sending all of London into a panic. The duke was rarely seen in London and even more rarely welcome in London, but here he stood, half a yard from her, laughing and clapping the Marquess of Eversley on the shoulder to congratulate him for what Sophie could only imagine was not killing himself in the process of arriving at the inn.

Eversley matched the duke’s wide grin, all arrogance and awfulness. “Broke two spokes on my right wheel,” he boasted, the words explaining why the man traveled with a carriage full of curricle wheels. “But fearlessness begets victory, it seems.”

Warnick laughed. “I had a half a mind to run you off the road in that last quarter mile.”

“Even if you could have caught me,” King boasted, “you’re too much a coward to have done it.”

Sophie rather thought that not killing a man was more honorable than cowardly, but she refrained from pointing it out, instead easing away from the duo, eager to escape discovery by the marquess in this open space, where he could thoroughly ruin her in front of what she now realized was a collection of men who might easily recognize a Talbot sister.

The duke stepped closer to Eversley, lowering his voice to a menacing pitch. “Did you just call me a coward?”

“I did, indeed. When was the last time you were in London?” Eversley asked pointedly before he noticed her moving. “Stay right there,” he said, one finger staying her even as he did not take his gaze from the duke, leaving her no choice but to freeze in place until they finished their conversation.

She had never quite realized how rude aristocrats could be to their servants. After all, she had work to do. She wasn’t certain what kind of work, specifically, but she was sure it had little to do with staring at these two cabbageheads.

The duke tilted his head. “You would know about avoiding unpleasant locales.”

Eversley grinned at that. “I am an expert at it.”

At that, Warnick reached into his open coat and extracted a coin. “Your winnings.”

He tossed the coin and Eversley snatched it from the air, pocketing it. “I do enjoy taking your money.”

“Money,” the duke scoffed. “You don’t care about the ha’penny. You care about the win.”

Sophie resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Of course he only cared about the win. She had no doubt that the Marquess of Eversley cared for nothing but winning.

She should like to ensure that this man lost, and roundly.

Before she could enjoy her private fantasy of the marquess’s loss, however, the duke lobbed his final barb. “Not that it will get you anywhere near the cost of your missing boot. Tell me you left it as a souvenir at the site of your latest assignation.”

Sophie’s heart began to pound at the words, at the reminder of Eversley’s reputation, at the reminder of her own idiocy in turning up here, wherever they were, far from home, and with no plan to speak of.

What came next?

She was going to have to rely upon the kindness of someone in the inn to get herself home. She was going to have to beg a journey to London, which would not be easy. She would have to promise someone the funds upon arrival, and she knew how difficult that would be.

“I think the boot will be easily recovered.”

The words pulled her from her thoughts, their meaning sending her gaze flying to find his, shrouded by the brim of his cap. Was it possible he recognized her?

“Perhaps I’ll send the boy to fetch it.”

She stilled, even her breath caught in her lungs.