My Lady's Choosing: An Interactive Romance Novel(62)

As the manservant hurries out, Lady Evangeline whispers to you in urgent tones.

“This is again Delphine’s work. She must be stopped!” Her eyes are afire with righteous anger, so much that you half fancy her to be Sekhmet, ancient Egyptian goddess of war, in her ferocity and loveliness.

“Oh no, my lady!” gasps Kamal from your lap. “Delphine St. Croix is dangerous, and the road to her is fraught with peril!”

“Exactly. My favorite type of road.” Evangeline smirks. “Still, I would have been content to leave the foolish woman in peace had she not come after my friends.” With that, her spine straightens, and a beam from a nearby window, as if sent from heaven, suddenly illuminates her fierce golden beauty. Your jaw drops with desire and admiration.

She turns to you, at once serious and businesslike.

“However, my dear, Kamal is right. I don’t expect you to follow me into danger, peril, and possible dismemberment. Please, feel free to rest here with him. I have adventured solo before, and it is no matter for me to do so again.”

She reaches out and strokes your cheek gently. You thrill to her touch, and also the thought of danger the likes of which you have never faced before.





It’s decision time.

Do you throw caution, decorum, and all other respectable nouns to the wind in order to follow Lady Evangeline into the unknown? If so, turn to this page.

Or do you value your limbs still being attached to your body and decide to sit this one out? If so, turn to this page.





The journey to London is long. Outside the carriage, the darkening sky is already filling with stars.

You, however, are grateful that the ride has gone some way toward calming your frazzled nerves. By the time you are nearly there, you almost feel like yourself again.

Lady Evangeline laughs. “I cannot believe I’m heading all the way back to London, in secret, in my own carriage, with my aunt’s companion—”

“And a half-full flask of brandy,” you interrupt. “Don’t forget that.”

“How could I? The half that’s missing is half of the reason we’re here. How much longer, Hugo?” Lady Evangeline calls up to her driver.

“The rest o’ the evening, my lady,” Hugo answers in a booming but warm voice that somehow softens the edges of this clandestine adventure.

“Where in London are we headed, Lady Evangeline?” you ask politely. “Drury Lane?”

“Not exactly,” Lady Evangeline says. “Suffice to say, I do find many other houses of ill repute more welcoming than Drury Lane. And since we are far gone now, I may as well fling the rest of the skeletons out of the closet and into the danse, as it were.”

“Oh?” You raise a limber brow.

“It is improper to say,” Lady Evangeline titters, “but I do know that after her scandalous affaire with the late Sir Granville, Mrs. Caddington made many associates not precisely befitting a respectable woman. She was part of a fast set who knew they couldn’t act as they wished in open, proper society, so they carved out their own sort of…secret one.”

“You speak as though you were a member of this secret society yourself,” you say with a smile.

“I am a member of my own society, you devil,” Lady Evangeline says, smiling in turn. You note that technically she hasn’t said yes or no. Fine woman.

“Anyway,” she continues, “I do know that the company she kept still keeps its company. I think they are a better target for your inquiry, if you don’t mind advice from the lady in the carriage.”

“As it is your carriage,” you reply, “I welcome it! Let us go to this haven you speak of. Wheresoever is it located? Must we wait till morning?”

“Oh, no!” Lady Evangeline falls to giggles. “Where we are going is open around the clock. In fact, should we arrive to them at half past three in the morning, we will find it livelier than that same hour of the afternoon.”

“Tell me!” you beg, and for a moment you are nothing more than two young ladies on the ride of your lives. “Where are we going?”

Lady Evangeline’s smile is knowing and slow. “Hugo!” she calls to the driver. “Set your course for the Rose & the Smoke.”



* * *





You feel as though a devil’s age has passed since you first fled the soirée at Manberley and set out for London. You are rocked gently awake by the hubbub of the carriage, pulling into whatever street the Rose & the Smoke must be located on. While you slept, you dreamed of handsome men and lovely women, snakes cutting a path through high grass, and castle walls being held by great teams of faceless defenders working together to weave a pattern of protection. You also dreamed of Benedict’s gaze burning into your own.

The carriage hits its final lurch, and you wipe the dreams—and Benedict—from your eyes.

“Here we are.” Lady Evangeline smiles, pats her hair into place, and exits the carriage with an expression of barely concealed glee.

You expected the Rose & the Smoke to be, perhaps, a secret dining hall by a well-known restaurant. Maybe a clandestine meeting space within a progressive dressmaker’s boutique. A salon in a wineshop, even. But you never expected this. You never expected— “Gin Lane!” you hear yourself shout. Lady Evangeline glares back at you. “Gin Lane!” you repeat, quieter this time, but no less shocked.