“What happened to you?” Lucien straightened in his chair, alarm filling his gaze. Jonathan had just entered Lucien’s study and gingerly touched his jaw. By the feel of it, he was going to bruise.

“I may have had a tussle with one of the other guests.”

“Oh?”

“Nothing serious,” Jonathan said with a wry grin.

“Nothing serious? You’re turning blue on the chin.”

“I may have been teaching a certain little sprite to defend herself. She may have gotten the better of me.”

Lucien laughed almost as heartily as Charles had.

“I didn’t tell you so you can be amused at my expense,” Jonathan grumbled.

“I’m sure you didn’t, but dammit, man, you cannot deny it is amusing.” Lucien leaned back in his chair and propped his boots up on the edge of his desk. “Anyway, I hope you didn’t come here for advice on seducing Sheridan women. Audrey is very different from Horatia. Very. My love is sweet, shy, and gentle.”

“And Audrey is none of those.” Well, that wasn’t true; she certainly had her sweet moments. Just not with him.

“So, your grand plan to wooing her is lessons in self-defense?”

“Yes, it was something she wanted.”

“I will grant you it is an original plan, but I am not sure you properly thought it through.”

Jonathan opened and closed his mouth, testing his sore jaw. “Part of me certainly regrets it. She has a bloody good left hook.”

Lucien burst out laughing again, but the sound of the dinner gong changed that to a groan.

“Lord, I do miss our intimate dinners with the League. This house party nonsense is not at all my preferred way to spend the evening. And for a week, no less.” Lucien’s despondent look almost made Jonathan laugh.

Before either of them could say more, Charles burst into the study, his face tense.

“I’m glad I found both of you here.” He lifted up a newspaper as he walked over to them. “This was delivered an hour ago. Linley saw something rather important when he was setting it out for me.” He set the paper down on the desk.

Jonathan and Lucien both leaned over to see the article Charles pointed to. The Morning Post society section typically posted about births, marriages, and deaths. One name among them stood out.

“Mr. Gerald Langley was found dead in a residence close to Twinings tea shop,” Lucien read aloud. “It is believed he took his life as a matter of honor, leaving a letter to his family. There have been disconcerting rumors for the last few months regarding Mr. Langley, which may have contributed to his action. Mr. Langley is survived by his sister, Hillary Clifford… Langley is dead? Isn’t that the fellow who Lady Society thoroughly humiliated in her column?”

“Yes, that’s the man,” Charles said. “Jonathan, I think you ought to tell Lucien about Audrey and the hellfire club.”

Lucien’s voice turned hard, and Jonathan felt the weight of his gaze upon him. “Tell me what? What have you gotten her into?”

Jonathan bristled. “I did nothing! She was the one who” His words dissolved into a frustrated growl. He understood Lucien’s fear. Horatia had been targeted by an enemy of the League before, and he had every right to worry that Audrey could be in a similar situation.

“I swear, Jonathan, if you—”

“Lucien, at ease, man,” Charles said. “Let him answer.”

Lucien crossed his arms, scowling but remaining quiet.

Jonathan took a deep breath. “The first thing you should know is that Audrey is Lady Society.”

Lucien’s eyes widened. Then he blinked, as if the words only now had truly hit him. “She…? Lady Society? The woman whose pen has poked and prodded and chastised all of us at one point or another?”

“And found wives for at least half of you,” Charles added with a wry smile.

Lucien looked to Jonathan. “The one who mocked you only a week ago?”

“Yes,” Jonathan confirmed.

Lucien shook his head. “I’d be tempted to laugh had you not mentioned a dead man and a hellfire club. Good Lord, how did things end up there?”

Jonathan tried to explain. “From what I understand, it began when Audrey took up the case of defending the Earl of Rockford’s daughter.”

Lucien nodded. “I recall the incident. That’s what led to Langley’s activities being exposed in Lady Society’s column.”

“She then somehow found out, Lord knows how, that Langley was the leader of some silly hellfire club in the Temple Bar district, and she wished to expose them before they did more harm.”

“She came to me,” Charles cut in, “looking for an escort to the club.”

“And you didn’t think to tell Cedric? Or me? You didn’t feel her brother or her brother-in-law ought to have been informed?” Lucien growled. “People who could have protected her?”

Charles didn’t flinch. “Oh? And what would you have done? Walled her away in a tower? Once that lady is bent on something, especially something troublesome, she manages to find her way into the thick of it with or without our intervention. My intention was to protect her, since she would’ve gotten there one way or another.”

“So you took her to Langley’s club?”

Charles’s face reddened. “Er… No. She sent Linley a note informing me that she’d changed her mind and wasn’t going to go.”

Jonathan knew to take over now. “Linley didn’t believe it, though. He found me as I left Berkley’s and told me his concerns. So I went after her. She was damned lucky I did too. The whole thing was a trap.”

Lucien remained silent, still watching Jonathan, still brooding.

“I fought Langley and the rest of his club. We were able to escape out a window, and I took Audrey safely home, but I feared Langley might have seen her face. He probably knew her identity.”

Charles stared at Jonathan in horror. “You didn’t…” He mimed shooting an invisible pistol with his hand.

“No, of course not!” Jonathan reassured him. “Last I saw Langley, he had gone after Pembroke and Audrey’s maid, Gillian.”

“Pembroke was there?” Lucien cried out. “How the devil did he wind up with such…devils!”

“Not so different from how I did. He is enamored with Gillian and was there to rescue her.”

Lucien’s brows rose. “He’s in love with a lady’s maid?”

“Stranger things have happened,” Jonathan reminded him. “And I think we know better than to judge people harshly on matters of the heart.” After all, Jonathan had been in no better a position than Gillian until last year. “Pembroke doesn’t know Gilly is a maid, by the way, so I wouldn’t mention it if I were you.”

“Another of Audrey’s schemes?” Charles asked, grinning.

“What else?”

Lucien frowned. “Isn’t that doing Pembroke a bit of a disservice? The man deserves to know.”

“I believe Audrey has a plan,” said Jonathan. “I would trust her on this.”

“Seems like she’s toying with him, if you ask me.”

“Gillian’s circumstances aren’t as simple as they seem at first glance.” In defending Gillian, Jonathan felt like he was defending his own position within their ranks. “Audrey believes they belong together, or at least a chance to be. And in the end what should matter are their feelings for one another, not what society deems to be an appropriate match.”

“Hear hear!” said Charles. “Let love go where it may, for those who care for such things.”

Lucien sighed wearily. “I suppose that explains why Horatia told me to call her Miss Beaumont and not to be surprised that she was joining us at meals like the other guests. They said something about a play, but to be honest, I stop asking questions after a certain point.” He paused and then sobered. “Do you think Pembroke murdered Langley?”

“No,” Charles said. “That man is the best of men, better than any of us. He’s not a killer. He would have punched Langley, certainly, bound him for the authorities if he could, but he would not have killed him.”

“Do we really believe Langley killed himself?” Lucien stroked his chin. “I don’t know much about the man.”

Charles glanced down at the paper. “He certainly didn’t care about his reputation, but there comes a point where any man can see no salvation for their situation and see hell as an improvement over their time left on earth.”

“That’s true.” Jonathan remembered the fire in Langley’s eyes. That coldhearted black fire didn’t belong to a man who understood shame, but he could recognize an unwinnable situation. The man was about to be exposed for running a hellfire club. Whatever indignities and difficulties he had suffered from Lady Society’s initial exposure would be nothing compared to that. That alone could have driven even the worst man to end his life.

The three of them were silent a long moment.

“Still, it’s also possible someone helped him pull the trigger,” Charles said at last.

“Perhaps,” Lucien said. “But who would kill him, and to what end?”

Jonathan couldn’t shake a bad feeling in his stomach, like he had left something undone or unremembered. Something important.

“Perhaps he had other uses,” Charles suggested. “And those uses had come to an end. Or perhaps, once Audrey had exposed him, he had been living on borrowed time. A man like that could have men all over England waiting to deal with him.”

“Someone did us a favor then,” Lucien mused. “But that rarely happens. I think this bears watching. Jonathan, it seems your unusual wooing technique will serve a greater purpose. I want you to be Audrey’s shadow, day and night. We all remember what happened to Horatia in this very house, abducted from her room and…” He left the rest unsaid.

And almost murdered. Jonathan knew that was a day which would haunt Lucien forever. Friendships had been fractured and loyalties strained. Though those involved had made amends, a fissure still lay hidden deep within the bonds they had formed.

“Will you be her shadow, Jon?” Lucien asked.

“Of course. She will hate me even more for it, though.”

Charles slapped Jonathan’s shoulder. “That’s when you know you are doing the right thing.”

Jonathan assumed his friend meant to comfort him, but the words had the opposite effect. If he had to be Audrey’s shadow, he was going to be put in an impossible situation.

“I’ll see to it that you are seated next to each other at dinner,” Lucien promised.

“We had better go. The gong rang several minutes ago,” Charles reminded them.

“True. We can’t have Horatia fretting. Not in her condition.”

Jonathan followed them out into the corridor. A flicker of movement at the end of the hall caught his eye, and hairs rose on the back of his neck. Had someone been listening at the door? Perhaps Lucien was right.

Starting tonight, Audrey would have him as her shadow, whether she liked it or not.