Always a Rogue, Forever Her Love (Scandalous Seasons #4)(8)

Juliet drew to a sudden, jerky halt. Her chest heaved up and down. She might be unable to locate her misplaced guardian or stop her fool brother from taking part in obscene wagers, but one thing within her power she could do was speak to the bloody bounder.

“What is it?” Lillian said on a beleaguered sigh, having clearly known Juliet enough to recognize the determined glint in her eyes.

Yes, she’d find the gentleman, which shouldn’t prove a difficult task. The papers reported on his whereabouts with shocking regularity. He could be found most evenings at a handful of gaming hells, and…and houses of ill repute. Her cheeks warmed, but she ignored her polite sensibilities.

“I need help.” And she needed it now before Lord Williams awoke and before her brother discovered the other man had been clouted over the head and locked up like a thief in the bowels of Newgate Prison.

“Anything, miss.”

Juliet folded her arms across her chest, with determination thrumming through her being. “I need a hackney.” She pointed to the armoire. “And my cloak. The sapphire muslin one with the deep hood.”

Yes, it shouldn’t be at all difficult finding this Earl of Sinclair.





Chapter 3


For the better part of the evening, Juliet had sat in the cramped confines of the too-small hackney. Her lower back ached from the hard contours of the scratched bench. She’d spent the better part of her pin money from the past two months on the hired conveyance as she’d waited for the Earl of Sinclair to leave his townhouse. She had instructed the driver to follow the gentleman to his clubs, which had only brought them deeper away from the earl’s respectable Grosvenor Square district and into the seediest parts of London.

Juliet peeked behind the edge of the frayed black curtain that covered the window for surely the thousandth time that evening. She’d expected once the earl had entered his clubs he’d take his leave a short while later. Having lost count of the minutes she’d ticked off in her head, all she knew was that the afternoon sun had dipped and soon ushered in the night sky. Now, uncharacteristic stars dotted the London night sky, and the faint glow of a half-moon bathed the disreputable establishment in an eerie glow.

What had she expected of a man who spent his days and nights gaming and…and…with those string of mistresses as her brother had earlier mentioned?

No, he was probably fully soused by now, and would be little good to her in terms of a calm, rational conversation.

She gripped the edge of the curtain and rumpled the worn fabric. He had to be. He had to be reasoned with. Since Lord Williams’ attack that morn, she’d come to appreciate her precarious position in this world, and the loss of Rosecliff Cottage would only indicate her fall into a world in which her brother exercised total control of her.

She swallowed back a blasted lump of emotion. She’d not feed that weak sentiment. If she were to give in and have the good cry she’d been longing to since Papa had died, she feared she’d dissolve into nothing more than an empty puddle of weak despair.

The doors to the Hell and Sin Club, an aptly named gaming hell for a fiend like Lord Sinclair to attend, opened.

She leaned forward in her seat, as the two foppish dandies garishly attired in gold and orange satin breeches staggered outside. Their raucous laughter filled the otherwise quiet streets. Juliet’s frustration emerged on a swift exhale as she sat back.

What if he intended to spend the evening? After all, after what she’d read of these types of gentlemen, they would often spend all hours of the evening at their clubs, well into the morning hours. Only now did she begin to fear those were the earl’s intentions for this evening.

The club doors opened again, and a sinfully dark gentleman stepped outside. The moon’s glow cast his devilishly handsome face in a pale light. Her breath caught, and she forgot what had brought her here this day. She forgot the hours upon hours she’d sat in this uncomfortable hack, in this dangerous part of London. He was far more handsome than a gentleman had a right to be. With a crop of thick, black curls he looked more like that fallen angel Lucifer. Even with the distance between them, she detected a faint glittering in his eyes. Then he presented his tall, broad back to her and continued down the street, and she registered too late that he made for his carriage.

Panic bubbled up from her chest. She’d not waited all day for sign of the gentleman, and spent all her pin money to throw it away for naught. Juliet shoved the carriage door open and pulled her cloak close. She leapt to the ground then cursed as pain radiated up along her long-ago injured leg and shot up to her hip. She careened forward several steps. “Wait for me,” she called up to the hackney.

The young man yawned, having clearly grown as tired of waiting as she herself had. He nodded and tugged on the brim of his cap.

The driver forgotten, Juliet surged ahead, damning her leg that slowed her steps and damning the earl for his long strides that carried him onward to his carriage. The earl’s driver scrambled from the top of his perch, his murmured greeting lost in the distance between Juliet and the pair. “You there,” she called impulsively. Imprudently.

A figure stepped into her path, and she tipped her head back at the leering fop with curls cropped in the Brutus fashion “You looking for me, sweet?”

She made to step around the reed thin dandy, but he countered her movements. Juliet cursed. “No, I’m looking for another,” she bit out and peered around his slender frame. The earl had a foot up into his carriage.