The brothel was just down from the offices of Chegarre & Associates.
It too had a run-down façade and a heavy, worn door at the top of a set of cracked stone steps. Like the offices of Chegarre, the brothel had tightly closed windows that stared blankly out onto the square and the crowds that had come for the market. And like Chegarre, it gave no clue as to the business that lay within. There were no windows flung open, no gaudily dressed women leaning from the sills trying to entice business. Despite the address, Miss Winslow’s was exclusive and private, and there was no shortage of business that came to them.
Alex started up the stone steps, Angelique at his side. The door of the brothel was painted a brilliant scarlet, and as they approached, it swung open. Two men emerged, though they swayed alarmingly and seemed to be working hard to remain upright. They staggered down the stairs, and Alex saw Angelique step back and turn slightly, the hood of her cloak concealing her hair and her face.
A woman was standing in the open door, leaning on the frame, watching the men go with shrewd appraisal, but when she caught sight of Alex, she smiled.
“Mr. Lavoie,” she said, stepping to the side and holding the door open a little farther. “Welcome.” Penny Winslow was almost as tall as he was, her body made up of sharp angles and long limbs that were evident even under the well-tailored dress she wore. Even her face was angular—from her long, narrow nose to her slanted eyes.
“Good afternoon,” he replied as he entered. He was aware that Angelique was right behind him, and he turned. “Miss Winslow, this is my friend Angel.” He did not use Angelique’s full name because he had no idea how many ears might be listening just beyond. “Angel, Miss Winslow.”
Angelique smiled, and to her credit, it reflected only polite regard. She could have been entering a teahouse or an assembly room for all that her expression gave away. “Good afternoon,” she said.
“Good afternoon to you.” From over Angelique’s shoulder, Penny threw him a questioning look. In all the times he had been here to collect information, he had only ever come alone. He still wasn’t entirely sure that this was a good idea.
Penny closed the door, and Alex wandered into the entrance of the brothel. Somewhere, off the hall, someone was playing a pianoforte, a haunting, melodic tune. The scent of incense and something stronger was cloying, and as if Penny could read his mind, she pushed the long window at the front of the hall open a crack, wrinkling her nose.
“Never did like the smell of poppy,” she grumbled. “But one cannot argue with profits.”
“Mmmm.” He glanced around the sumptuous décor that hadn’t changed in years. He was guessing that the intended theme had been drawn from Arabian Nights, but the effect had a decidedly incongruous French flair. Dark, patterned curtains were pulled over the long windows, and ornate, Louis XVI settees were placed on red and black Persian rugs. Brocaded pillows, many with a fleur-de-lis pattern, were strewn over the settees. Wall sconces flickered with candles, and someone had hung long strings of glass beads from each to catch the light. There was a collection of painted canvases on one wall—mostly naked, cherubic figures shooting arrows toward more naked, less cherubic figures.
“What do I owe the pleasure?” Penny asked, leading them through the hall. Two hulking men stepped into their path as they approached.
“Thank you, boys,” Penny said easily, and the two men fell back.
“They’re working out well, then?” Alex inquired. They’d come to his club looking for work with excellent references. Alex hadn’t needed additional security but, instead, had directed them here.
“Yes, splendidly, thank you. Even the worst of the clientele are generally inclined to keep their testicles intact and can easily be persuaded to adjust their behavior to ensure it. Neither my girls nor I appreciate abuse.”
“Nor should you.”
Penny turned and entered a small room, lit by a candelabra. This room, in contrast, was almost stark in appearance. The floors were bare wood, gouged and scraped, and the walls and ceiling were plain plaster, peeling in places. A desk, chair, and a bookcase were the only furniture. It was clear where the money was being spent. She closed the door behind them.
“You have a customer here that we need to speak to,” Alex said bluntly.
From over their heads there came a crash, followed by a great deal of what sounded like drunken laughter. Penny winced. “I have a lot of customers here this afternoon,” she said, going to stand behind her desk.
“Viscount Seaton.”
“Ah. One of my best customers.” Her eyes narrowed. “The kind that pays for what he buys up front.”
“I’m sure.”
“What do you want with him?”
“A word.”
Penny crossed her arms. “You heard me say he was one of my best customers, yes?”
“I did.”
“Hmph. My customers expect a certain amount of privacy, Lavoie.” Her eyes flickered to Angelique. “Why is she here?”
It was a good question, one he had been asking himself since they had left. And suddenly, in a blinding flash of inspiration, he said, “To do your books. The Duchess mentioned you were unhappy with how far you’d fallen behind. Profits slip through the cracks like that.”
Penny’s eyes snapped to Angelique. “Ah. I didn’t make the connection. You are Mr. Lavoie’s vingt-et-un dealer?”
Angelique was staring at Penny. So was Alex, for that matter.
She caught their expressions. “I ran into Gil late last night.” She eyed Angelique. “You must have impressed her. Which is a hard thing to do.”
Angelique glanced at Alex and shrugged. “I lent a hand where I could.”
Penny narrowed her eyes at him in suspicion. “So this is why you brought her? To update my books?”
“Yes.”
“No,” said Angelique at the same time.
“Angel is indeed brilliant at numbers. She can do in minutes what would take me hours. She’ll have you up to date, and if there are any discrepancies in your accounting, she’ll correct it. And it will be done in the time it will take me to have a brief discussion with Seaton. A fair trade, wouldn’t you say?”
“Hmph.” Penny was looking at Angelique now in grudging interest.
He could see Angelique shaking her head. “I did not—”
“Do we have a deal?” Alex asked, cutting her off.
“Yes.” Penny came out from behind her desk. “But if you get blood on anything upstairs, Lavoie—”
“You know me better than that.”
She made a face. “I have new linens on the beds. Keep that in mind. And don’t break anything.”
“You have my word.”
She sighed and then strode to the door. “I’ll find out where he’s at and come and fetch you. And then I’ll get her started on my books.”
“Thank you, Penny.”
The madam gave him a long last look and then disappeared. He could hear the steady rap of her boots as she headed down the hall to the wide staircase that led up to the second floor.
“Just what the hell are you doing, Alex?” Angelique hissed the second they could no longer hear her footsteps.
“What is necessary to get us what we want.”
“I doubt Seaton is going to have much to say to you. I should be the one to talk to him.”
“Not a chance.”
“I could beg him to protect me in exchange for his stories.”
He closed the distance between them. “That’s not funny, Angel.”
“So instead, I’ll be locked down here doing the books for a damn opium den—”
“Brothel. The opium rooms are simply something new she’s trying in order to maximize profits outside of peak business hours. Don’t let any of this fool you. This brothel is exclusive and half the peers of the realm don’t have the kind of income that this business does.”
Angelique rolled her eyes. “—doing the books for this damn brothel while you interrogate Seaton?”
“God, you’re beautiful when you curse.”
“Don’t change the subject. I should be with you.”
“I have limits, Lady Angelique, and I have reached them. I brought you here against my better judgment, but I will not drag you into the same room that your former affianced is using to pass time with a pipe. And possibly a prostitute.”
“He wasn’t officially my affianced. And I’m not—”
“This is not a negotiation. I don’t want you anywhere near that man. Not after…not after everything.” He wasn’t sure if he was talking about Seaton’s involvement in her brother’s debacle or the way Seaton had once broken her heart.
Her lips compressed.
“You have a rare skill with numbers. I suggest you use it. Not only does it get us what we want, it helps out a neighbor and a friend.”
Angelique made a noise of irritation. “And how do you know Seaton will even talk to you? How do you know he will tell you anything?”
Alex heard the quick steps of Penny returning. “Don’t worry, Angel. I have my ways.”
* * *
Silently, Alex climbed the staircase and made his way down the second floor hallway. He’d never actually been up on Penny’s second floor, but the layout was the same as the second floor of Chegarre & Associates. Up here, the scent of opium was much stronger. From behind the closed doors, the occasional giggle or moan filtered through, audible over the sound of the pianoforte that still drifted up through the floorboards.
Alex stopped in front of the door painted with the number four. He listened intently, but he could only hear a slight murmur of voices, the words indecipherable from where he stood. Alex knocked quietly, and the door swung open, a woman with light brown hair wrapped in a simple robe of the same color standing in front of him. She was probably pretty, but the flatness in her eyes and the hard edges to her face had taken away any warmth.
“You Mr. Lavoie?” she asked, her eyes traveling the length of him and lingering on his face where his scar pulled at his lip.
“Yes.”
“Penny said you’d be up.” She glanced at the crotch of his trousers, her voice laced with innuendo.
Alex only smiled. “I need but a moment of this gentleman’s time,” he said. “He and I have something we need to discuss.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Should have done that before he got a hold of his pipe,” the brunette said, pulling the tie of her robe tighter and stepping into the hall. “Though he didn’t take much.”
“Mmmm.” That might be either good or bad, depending how far gone he was. “Is he a regular? With the opium, I mean?” he asked.
The woman rolled her eyes. “Does a hobby horse have a wooden dick?”
“Mmmm.”
“Good luck,” she said, heading down the hall without a backward glance.
Alex watched her go for a second before stepping into the room, closing the door quietly behind him and locking it. The room was small and square, and the single window on the far wall was covered with a faded curtain. The only light seeped in around the edges. To his right, a large bed dominated the space, a collection of covers shoved to the end and onto the floor. In the center of the bed, Seaton lay sprawled, completely naked. His eyes were closed, and he was muttering something under his breath, his head lolling back and forth.
Near his feet lay a tray with an opium pipe and bowl, and the air in here was already giving Alex a headache. He crossed to the window and pulled the curtain aside, opening it as far as it would go on its tired hinges.
“That’s cold,” Seaton whined. “Close the window, Missy.”
Alex plucked the viscount’s coat from the back of the washstand chair where it had been discarded and let it drop to the floor near the side of the bed. He picked up the chair and retreated to the end of the bed, settling himself in and crossing a booted foot over his knee.
“I said close the damn window,” Seaton said, louder this time. “I’m not payin’ to freeze my bollocks off. I’m payin’ to have you do whatever I tell y’to do—”
“At my request, Missy stepped out for a moment, my lord,” Alex said smoothly.
Seaton lurched into a sitting position. “Who th’ hell are you?” He said it with the care that a drunk uses when trying to convince someone else he isn’t drunk.
“A lesser man than I might be insulted that he’s been forgotten so quickly,” Alex said mockingly, leaning forward into the light.
It took Seaton a moment before he was able to focus on Alex’s face. “Lavoie.” His pupils were mere pinpoints, and his face was slack.
“Very good, my lord.”
“Get out.” He was trying to scramble off the bed, but his movements were slow and uncoordinated.
“Mmmm.”
Seaton had managed to stand, and he looked like he was trying to find his clothing. He located his coat on the floor and snatched it up, trying to pull it on. He managed to get one arm all the way in, but the second arm got caught at the elbow, and as Seaton struggled, he lost his balance and toppled face-first back onto the bed.
The viscount lay there for a moment, breathing like a winded racehorse, before he managed to roll on his back, his arms still caught up behind him in the sleeves of his coat. He was making an odd snuffling sound, and Alex couldn’t quite tell if he was laughing or coughing.
“Whad’ya want, Lavoie?” the man asked presently.
“A conversation.” Alex considered him. Opium was a strange creature. In some, it loosened their tongues. In others, it rendered them witless. “How long this takes is up to you, my lord,” he continued. From his belt, he withdrew his knife, fingering the bone hilt. “But I feel obligated to warn you that I am not a man of great patience.”
Seaton was staring at Alex’s knife, his eyes glassy.
Alex leaned forward. “How did you find out about the necklace the Earl of Trevane had made for his mistress?”
“Jesus,” Seaton groaned.
“I find that unlikely,” Alex replied. “Try again.”
“What th’ hell are you askin’ these questions for?” he slurred.
“Someone needs to ask them, don’t you think?” He tapped the blade on his knee. “Humor me.”
“His sister put you up t’this?”
Alex didn’t answer.
“She already begged me for help, y’know,” he said, apparently taking Alex’s silence as an affirmative answer. “But even I, with all my power, cannot save him. It’s a lost cause.”
“Mmmm.”
“Dunno what she thinks you can do that I can’t,” he muttered.
Alex examined the edge of his blade.
Seaton suddenly laughed, a slightly deranged, incoherent sound. “Y’think she’s going t’let you unner her skirts for doing this, don’t you?” he wheezed. “Well, take it from me, she’s a terrible fu—”
Alex didn’t remember moving, but his knife was now pressed against the soft flesh of Seaton’s neck. “Be very, very careful, my lord, what you say next.”
The viscount swallowed, the movement drawing a tiny bead of blood from under the blade. It would seem his sense of self-preservation wasn’t entirely obliterated. “Y’can’t kill me. Y’won’t.” He sounded like he was trying to convince himself.
“I haven’t quite decided. Do you know how much surgeons are paying for cadavers right now? And they never ask awkward questions, at least the ones I do business with. Bodies simply…disappear. In little bits and pieces, at any rate. Killing you would not only make me feel better, but make this night profitable. Even after I pay for the ruined sheets.”
Seaton was sweating profusely, despite the cool air in the room. “You’re insane.”
“On occasion.” Alex smiled. “But how you answer my next questions will determine if this is one of those occasions. Understand?”
The viscount nodded, his eyes swinging about the room, as if he were trying to focus on something.
“Now where were we? Ah yes. The Earl of Trevane. Did you send Hutton into his house to retrieve the necklace while you cowered in the bushes?”
“What? No!” Seaton gasped. “I never even knew ’bout that. I thought Hutton was there to swive the maid.”
“Mmmm.” Alex remained unconvinced. “And you never thought to go into the house yourself? Perhaps get in on the action?”
“I ’ave standards, Lavoie, even if Hutton don’t. I don’t shag the help.”
“Standards.” Alex glanced around him. “Of course.”
“Hutton couldn’t afford anything better,” he mumbled.
“And why is that?”
The viscount’s throat worked again. “He doesn’t have any money. Well, he does, but all the damn solicitors still ’ave it up their asses.”
Alex stared down at the viscount, stymied. If Seaton was lying, he was a master at it, and Alex did not think he was that good. Especially not while he was naked, inebriated, and with a knife to his throat. “So when Hutton told you he needed money last week, you did what?”
Seaton’s forehead wrinkled as if he were trying to remember. “Nothin’,” he slurred. “I didn’t ’ave what he was asking for.”
“Which is why you used your friends in Smithfield.” Alex threw that out to see what kind of reaction he’d get.
Seaton’s eyes bulged, and his mouth opened and closed twice.
Alex shifted his weight and took the knife away from Seaton’s neck, letting the tip of the blade rest at the hollow of his throat. “Your…friends are not as loyal as you might think. Everyone has a price.” Alex would let Seaton do with that what he would because he was fishing blindly here.
“Greedy bastards,” the viscount grunted. “I pay ’em plenty to look the other way.”
“Not enough.”
Seaton groaned. “What do y’want?”
“What you have,” Alex answered vaguely.
“What did Hutton tell you?” Seaton was looking around the room angrily as though he might find the man in question.
“What makes you think it was Hutton who told me anything? Did you not think others might notice just how wealthy your family has gotten over the last five years? I know your father likes to pretend that it is simply good estate management, but I think we both know better.”
Seaton thumped his head back on the mattress. “My father will kill me if this gets out. Maybe he’ll sell me t’a surgeon.” He suddenly giggled, as though the idea was amusing.
“The duke doesn’t have to find out.” Alex still had no idea what they were talking about. “I can make sure of it.”
Seaton lifted his head, and his eyes seemed to focus on Alex’s face. “Give ye five percent of the next shipment.”
“Twenty.”
The viscount’s legs twitched. “It’s not bleedin’ pepper we’re tradin’ to the Chinese; it’s raw product. D’ye know how many people take a cut? Yer not so special that you get to swallow that much of our profit.” He was blinking rapidly. “Ten percent of the next single shipment of trade goods for you t’keep your damn mouth shut.”
Alex suddenly understood. The illustrious Duke of Rossburn and his son were covert players in the opium trade. They would be financing the ships and their crews—a high-risk investment to be sure, but one that offered extravagant spoils if it was done right. It explained the sudden, secretive wealth that the duke and his family had come to possess. It explained the mysterious investment opportunity that Seaton had offered to Hutton. And it explained what Hutton and Seaton had been doing in Smithfield talking to corrupt customs agents who were being paid to look the other way when one of their ships came in.
But most of all, it convinced Alex that George Fitzherbert had nothing to do with whatever had happened at the Earl of Trevane’s house.
Alex pretended to consider his offer. He was quite certain that a man such as the Duke of Rossburn would rather be drawn and quartered than admit his wealth came from trade.
“Very well,” he said slowly. “Ten percent.” He let his lips draw into a smile. “I’ll send someone up before I leave here with the appropriate paperwork for you to sign. I do like to have something in writing whenever possible, don’t you?”
“Now ye sound like Burleigh,” Seaton sighed. “He writes everythin’ down. Everythin’. Prob’ly find a receipt for ev’ry whore he’s ever had if ye wanted it.” He giggled again before he frowned. “Maybe he should start dealin’ with the damn agents, ’stead o’ me all the time.”
That caught Alex’s attention. Had the middling baron also invested with Seaton and his father? Alex considered his next words carefully. “Only a fool does not ensure his fortunes are accounted for.”
“Tha’s what he’s been sayin’ for five years. Ev’ry time he loans us capital. Ev’ry time he buys a goddamn ship,” Seaton garbled. “But shhhh. Don’ tell anyone.”
Alex made sure his face remained blank, not that the viscount would notice anyway. Angelique had told him that Burleigh’s family was not wealthy. Certainly not wealthy enough to buy a ship. Or ships, as Seaton implied.
He knew nothing about Burleigh, other than what Angelique had told him, and he was cursing himself for it now. He knew nothing about his finances, knew nothing about the man himself. His favorite color, his favorite food, his favorite whore. Knew nothing about the things that motivated him, knew nothing about his ambitions or dislikes.
It was possible that there was a completely reasonable explanation. It was possible that Angelique simply wasn’t aware of Burleigh’s wealth. She herself had said that she didn’t know him well. It was possible that Burleigh had simply scraped enough capital together and invested early and through good fortune had ended up richly rewarded. And that he had reinvested with even more good fortune.
Or it was possible that there was something else entirely going on here.
But what any of it had to do with Gerald Archer, or any of the Huttons for that matter, was still beyond him. Except…
Five years. Alex did not for one second believe that the timing was a coincidence.
“Saved you from getting married.” It was a guess. But a good one.
The viscount had closed his eyes, and Alex thought he might have fallen asleep, but at the sound of his voice, Seaton’s eyes popped back open.
“What?” He was blinking in confusion.
“Whatever money Burleigh gave you to fund your initial investment. Replaced what you would have gotten from Hutton as dowry money to prop up the sagging Rossburn fortunes.”
“Burleigh has a big mouth.”
“I’m a smart man, Seaton. No one had to tell me anything.”
“That betrothal was never off—official,” Seaton sneered sloppily. “I’s never wanted to marry her. Never gonna marry ’er. But gave ’er what she wanted ’fore she could figure that out.”
Rage shot through Alex with a force that nearly caused him to stagger. A red haze danced at the edge of his vision, and he recognized that his judgment was slipping, giving way to base emotion. Very carefully he sheathed his knife, afraid that he might geld the bastard where he lay. But while that would make him feel better, it would accomplish nothing practical.
And it would definitely ruin the sheets.