Chapter Seventeen
Jack shielded Lia as Stanley and two other men drunkenly wove their way toward them. Should he drag her back to the orangery? That would leave them with no exit and far from help. He likely could handle all three men, given their inebriated state, but that would still place Lia in danger.
“And how do you know these gentlemen?” he asked.
“I don’t, except for the viscount,” she grumbled. “When I ran into them earlier in the evening, he thought I seemed familiar. Fortunately, I managed to evade them.”
“You seem to have had quite a lot of bad luck this evening.”
She sighed and briefly rested her forehead on his back. “I am painfully aware of that.”
“Lendale, what a pleasant surprise,” Stanley said as he staggered to a halt in front of them. “Don’t usually see you kicking up larks at a Cyprians’ ball.”
“And you hopefully won’t in the future,” Jack replied in a blighting tone.
A befuddled expression crossed Stanley’s genial features. “Not a fan of light-skirts and orgies, are you? Then what the devil are you doing here in the first place?”
One of his companions, a tall, cadaverously thin fellow who looked vaguely familiar, cranked sideways to give Lia an oily smile. “His lordship’s reasons are obvious, given his pretty little companion. Seems like you’re following in your esteemed father’s footsteps, after all, Lendale, and bravo, I say. The man had a good eye for the ladies.”
He followed up that bon mot by digging an elbow into the side of the man who made up the third leg of their jug-bitten stool. His friend giggled but was too incapacitated to do much more than blow sloppy kisses in Lia’s direction.
“Lord Lendale is nothing like his father,” she huffed. “And you . . .” She jabbed her finger at the man blowing kisses. “Stop making those noises. It’s revolting.”
Jack swallowed a groan. He appreciated her show of support, but the blasted girl never seemed to know when to hold her fire.
“Golly, I was just trying to express my appreciation,” the fellow slurred, his expression more sad-eyed beagle than pink of the Ton. “No need to bite a man’s head off.”
Jack reached behind and grabbed Lia’s hand. “Indeed. Now, if you’ll excuse us, gentlemen, we must be off.”
“Wait, what’s the rush?” the viscount said, blocking them. His friends shuffled with him in drunken tandem. “The evening’s young, ain’t it? Besides, we’ve spent almost an hour looking for you, my little dove. It was cruel of you to run away, just when we were starting to have fun.”
“Fun?” Jack jerked his head around to look at Lia. A fiery blush crept out from beneath her mask. “Did they touch you?”
She shook her head but kept her focus on the viscount.
“I already explained,” she said, adopting a hideously nasal tone to disguise her voice, “I didn’t have time to kick up larks with someone else. You’ll have to find some other girls to make sport with because I ain’t available.”
Obviously, they’d tried to persuade her to join their sexual adventures so persistently she’d been forced to run and hide. When he thought of all the ways tonight’s events might have damaged her, fury leached like poison through his body.
He glared at the sorry specimens of humanity blocking their way and wished he could throttle all of them. Apparently, it showed, because Stanley’s eyes went wide with dismay, while his friends shared an uneasy glance.
“What sort of gentleman pursues a woman who wishes to be left alone?” Jack asked. “Rest assured, if not for my duty to this lady’s safety, I would happily illustrate exactly how I deal with cowards like you.”
“No need to be insulting.” Stanley’s expression was a nice mix of wounded dignity and fear. “We had no idea the girl was yours, Lendale. We’d have left her alone if she’d only told us so.”
“I tried,” said Lia, “but you wouldn’t listen.”
“You didn’t say it was Lendale,” protested the owlish one who’d made the kissing noises.
“And that would have made a difference? My saying no wasn’t enough?”
She was so outraged that she’d left off her atrocious faux accent. Lia’s melodic voice, with its hint of a Yorkshire accent, was distinctive. The more she spoke, the more likely Stanley would finally be able to place her.
“Let me handle this,” Jack said. “And stop talking.”
He leveled his most lethal stare at Stanley and his friends. “Let me explain in a way simpletons such as yourselves can understand. When a woman asks to be left alone, you comply. An affair such as this is no excuse to force yourself on any female.”
“Such delicate sensibilities, my lord,” sneered the one who resembled an animated corpse. “But very well. There are dozens of amenable whores floating around tonight and one’s just as good as the other. No point in wasting time on a chit that’s already bought and sold.” His gaze shifted to Lia’s bosom and lingered there. “Although I still wouldn’t mind getting a taste of what his lordship is shagging. I’d wager she’s as juicy and sweet as a ripe little peach.”
Jack sensed Lia’s temper shredding completely, so he tightened his hold on her wrist.
“You see here, you disgusting lout,” she growled, charging forward before Jack reeled her in and clamped her against his side. She snapped her head up to glare at him. “Let me go this instant.” She was in such a rage she’d lost all sense of caution.
“That voice!” exclaimed the viscount. “I’ve almost got it. Say something else, my dove. Better yet, take off that silly mask and let me see who you really are.”
When Stanley made a lunge for Lia’s face, Jack yanked her back just in time, wrapping an arm around her waist and lifting her off her feet. Ignoring her protests, he trotted down the hall until he came to the nearest door. He flung it open, carried her inside, and then slammed it shut. Thankfully, there was a key, so he quickly locked the door, cocking an ear for sounds of pursuit.
“I am not a sack of grain to be hauled from one place to the next,” Lia said in a frosty tone. “Please put me down.”
He set her down but kept his attention on the noises in the hall. He heard lumbering footsteps and incoherent protests; Stanley and his fellow buffoons were still out there.
“I’m sure they’ll grow bored and leave in a minute,” Lia said. “Although I wish I could give them a piece of my mind. Their behavior has been nothing short of disgusting.”
“They deserve it, but that would be an exceedingly bad idea. Viscount Stanley seems fixated on you and he was close to figuring out who you are.”
“I suppose you’re right.” She glanced around the small room and grimaced. It was little more than an antechamber, although a comfortably appointed one. “Oh splendid. Here we go again.”
“What was that?”
“I had to hide in this room when the viscount and his friends were chasing me.”
The image of those immoral louts pursuing her sent his temper spiking and made him want nothing more than to toss them into a large heap of horse dung in the street. Because he was to be denied that pleasure, he intended to use the time to battle it out with Lia once and for all. She was a captive audience; for once she wouldn’t be able to dodge him.
The trick would be getting her to see reason, which he sincerely hoped she would because his patience was at its end. He was even starting to formulate ridiculous ideas about abducting her, spiriting her away from London. Unfortunately, that fantasy usually veered off in a direction that involved secluded country cottages and Lia tied to a bed with his cravats, wearing nothing more than her stockings and garters.
He grappled with that enticing image, finally shoving it to the back of his brain. Now was hardly the time to be indulging in lewd fantasies. He could never have Lia, and the sooner he got that through his thick skull, the better.
She wandered over to plop into the leather club chair in front of the empty grate. Sighing, she pushed up her mask and then leaned forward to rub one of her ankles, as if it pained her. The pose gave Jack an almost unimpeded view down the front of her bodice. In fact, if he moved forward just a wee bit, he would no doubt be able to see her entire—
“What a total disaster this evening has been,” she grumbled, derailing his thought. “It’s incredibly annoying, given all the trouble I had to go through to attend.”
Jack leaned back against the door, forcing himself not to look at her chest. He would not be like the Stanleys of the world, hounding women. He had vowed long ago never to follow in his father’s disreputable footsteps.
“You have a talent for understatement, pet,” he said. “And although I’m truly sorry you had to suffer insults from swinish men tonight, coming here was an incredibly foolhardy thing to do. You don’t belong in this world and you know it.”
When she took off her shoe to rub her toes he was momentarily transfixed by the delicate arch of her foot and her pretty ankle. The sharp tone of her voice, however, yanked him back to the conversation.
“Does any woman belong in a place like this? Most of what I saw tonight was, well, shocking, frankly.”
“Of course it was shocking. It’s meant to be shocking.”
She made a disgusted little snort and went to work on her other foot. “Truly, I don’t know how these poor women can bear to be touched with such lewd intent.”
He couldn’t help a rueful smile at her naïveté. “There are some women who are quite amenable, although I’m sure most would prefer not to be viewed as a commodity. But a number of the ladies—not all of them prostitutes, I might add—generally enjoy the evening’s activities as much as the men do.”
She dropped her shoe. “Really? Scampering about in public half-naked and letting men . . .” She waved a vague hand. “Well, I’m sure you know. The financial compensation hardly seems worth it.”
“For some it is. I think you already know that, given your family’s history.”
She shot upright, giving him an offended stare. “I can hardly imagine Granny or my mother participating in orgies. They have too much dignity.”
Jack had heard enough about Lia’s mother to know she’d probably taken part in more than one Cyprians’ ball in her younger years. That tidbit, however, he would keep to himself. “If you think it’s so bloody awful, what the hell are you doing here, Lia? What was the point of this misadventure?”
“We’ve discussed it a million times,” she said impatiently, “and I’m not getting into it again. Suffice it to say that I don’t have a choice in the matter.”
He dug his fingertips into the door’s wood panels. “You know very well you do have choices; we’ve discussed those a million times, too.”
Her full lips pursed, forming a pretty rosebud that nonetheless suggested a scolding was imminent. But then she blinked twice and her mouth rounded into a silent oh, as if something—an image or an idea—had surprised her.
Oh hell. He knew that look, too.
She folded her hands neatly in her lap and demurely tucked her feet under her skirts—or tried to; the bloody dress stopped several inches above her ankles. Still she made a game effort at looking as ladylike as she could under the circumstances.
His sweet girl was getting ready to pull something over on him.
“Of course you’re absolutely right,” she said in a cheerful tone.
“That you have choices?” he asked cautiously. “I’m glad you agree.”
She gave him a smile so indulgent it raised the hairs on the back of his neck. “Not that, silly. You’re right about not wanting me to sneak around the demi-monde searching for a protector. Not only is it a disgusting exercise, it’s not a very efficient way of achieving my ends.”
“That’s not what I was talking about at—”
She held up a hand. “Please don’t interrupt, Jack. Whether you like it or not, this is happening. And instead of putting obstacles in my way, I would be most grateful if you decided to help me. That is what a true friend would do.”
He felt sure his eyeballs had just popped out to the end of their stalks. “Help you become a whore? Are you mad?”
Her smile wobbled a bit. “There’s no need to be rude. I don’t want you to help me become a whore. I want you to help me find a protector.”
“It amounts to the same thing,” he said incredulously.
“I do not agree. A prostitute has very little control over her circumstances and life. But if I can find a suitable protector, one who is both respectful and trustworthy, I believe I can negotiate an arrangement suitable to both of us. That will allow a degree of independence and control in my life that has been missing—as well as allow me to comfortably support Granny.”
“You want to find someone who is both respectful and trustworthy? Given what I know about most of the men in the Ton who keep mistresses, I’d say you have your work cut out for you,” he said sarcastically.
“Exactly my point. I never thought of you as dense, Jack, but I’m beginning to wonder.”
“Lia, what the hell do you want from me?”
“I would like your assistance in identifying potential candidates and establishing qualifications, pointing out what characteristics I should be looking for. Of course, I need to find someone who’s plump in the purse—”
“Which rules me out, of course,” he snapped before he could stop himself.
She looked taken aback. “You rejected me, remember?”
“I’m just trying to make a point,” he said, trying to recover his footing.
“Which is?”
It was no longer a question of him possibly losing his mind. He was now convinced it had gone permanently missing. “I’m not going to waste my time trying to explain something that should be perfectly obvious.”
Her scoff indicated she was well aware of his profound mental lapse.
She studied him for a few moments with a skeptical twist to her mouth. “Jack, do you truly want me trolling events such as this one?” she finally asked. “Because that’s the only alternative I can think of at the moment.”
He jabbed a hand at her. “No, but I am not helping you find a protector.”
She jumped to her feet and stalked over to him, her lovely breasts jiggling with the force of her stride. “Then how in God’s name am I to support myself and Granny? Every other suitable avenue has been closed to me, thanks to my mother and yours.”
He winced. “Yes, I know. And I am sorry about that, which I’m sure you realize.”
“I don’t want you to be sorry. I want you to help me achieve the necessary ends.” She shook her head, looking somber. “I’m the child and grandchild of courtesans, Jack. My course in life was marked out long ago. All I want now is do the best I can in a situation I can no longer avoid.”
He dragged his hands through his hair, tugging on the ends. It was that or he might drag Lia across his knee and spank her for putting him in so untenable a position. “You really expect me to do that, as a sign of friendship?”
Studying him, she crossed her arms. God, he wished she’d stop doing that. Every time she did, he had to wrestle with the unholy temptation to yank down her bodice and feast on her gorgeous breasts.
Lia unleashed a smile that could coax angels down from the heavens. “All I ask is that you assist me in drawing up a list of qualifications and perhaps identify a few suitable candidates. You must know one or two gentlemen who would be willing to consider me. In fact . . .”
She stopped and frowned, as if already reviewing a mental lineup of potential protectors. The very notion set off a series of rapid-fire explosions in his brain.
“In fact, what?” he asked.
“Nothing,” she said with an airy wave.
“Do you already have someone under consideration? Someone like Sebastian Sinclair?” he ground out. He’d seen the way the bastard looked at her.
She blew an exasperated breath out one side of her mouth. “He’s already turned me down. It’s a bit of a shame because he’s a very nice man. Too nice to take a mistress, I suppose.”
The sizzling explosions in his head coalesced into a fireball that seemed to blow the top right off. He grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her straight onto her toes, her mouth level with his.
“You want to learn how to be a courtesan? How to seduce and control a man?” he growled.
She let out a squawk. “Jack, what are you doing?”
“Let’s start with this and see how you like it.” He tugged her mask fully off, then clamped his lips over hers in a hard, desperate kiss that breached his walls and lay him open to his worst enemy.
Himself.