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As he watched her depart, her body swaying under her thin white muslin dress, he shook his head. Part of him regretted her leaving his proximity. But it was better, anyway.

As soon as she was gone, he realized he needed to investigate what she had been looking for.

She’d said the third of September 1812. He could look up any orders he’d signed for that date. Putting the folder with his father’s will down, he went to the bookshelf with the ledgers for the last year, found the one for September, and looked through the dates one by one. There was a page missing.

He looked at the door again. No, that couldn’t be right.

He looked at the whole ledger again, one document at a time, hoping perhaps it was misplaced and out of order.

But after looking through twice, it was clear to him.

The page for September 3 was not there.

Had Lady Calliope taken it?

He’d call on her tomorrow and learn the truth. As he put the ledger back onto the shelf, he realized he’d very much look forward to seeing the little fox again—seeing that gorgeous blush on her cheeks, inhaling her scent.

He picked up the brown leather folder and walked towards the door. Her scent lingered in the room, and he shamelessly took a lungful of it, craving every last drop.

4

Half an hour later, Nathaniel dismounted and, with a sinking feeling in his gut, walked his horse out the back of Roxburgh Place. Today was his twenty-ninth birthday, and the final day that would tell him if the will could be overturned and he could finally provide his sisters with the lives they were always supposed to have.

Unlike many houses even in Mayfair, which were row houses, this beautiful mansion stood separately with its own mews, an entire carriage house, stables, and even a small workshop. Also unlike the homes of his neighbors, which were well maintained, almost pristine, Roxburgh Place was in desperate need of repair. The stonework of its classic architecture was crumbling. Window frames had white paint chipping off and falling away. Some of the glass panes were missing or broken, cracks running through like large spiderwebs. He could see the holes in the roof over the three-story building, where his housekeeper-cook-maid used buckets, basins, and pots, if there were any available, to catch dripping water any time it rained or snowed.

As Nathaniel closed the heavy gates, the joyous barking of his three dogs erupted from the mews. Large paws thumped against the ground, growing closer, and then three bodies jumped on him, slamming him into the gates behind him.

Hermes, the stallion he’d won in one of his attempts to salvage his financial situation, neighed and stepped back as the three dogs licked Nathaniel’s face, stinking of hound.

“Hello, boys.” He laughed, turning his head to the side in a futile attempt to avoid Argos’s wet tongue. The black mastiff could almost reach his face, and was leaping higher to make up the distance. “I’m glad to see you, too, but…Argos, you’re going to hurt yourself. And Orion and Cerberus, you two still haven’t learned any manners, either, have you? Sit. Sit.”

Reluctantly, the three dogs let go of him and put their behinds on the ground, watching him, ears upright, tails wriggling, dust rising in small clouds from the cobblestone mews that no servants had swept in months.

Cerberus, although named after the three-headed dog guarding the underworld, as his ability to scent was as good as three regular dogs combined, was the smallest one of the trio, a beagle with one brown ear split in half. Nathaniel had found him dirty, beaten, and shivering, hiding under a carriage on a rainy October day.

The final dog, Orion, was a white mutt—some mix of setter, spaniel, and hound, Nathaniel suspected. He was medium-sized, with a body made lean and agile by the demands of street life and a gorgeous bushy tail. His floppy ears framed a face that was disarmingly expressive, capable of shifting from mischief to longing within moments. When Nathaniel had been invited to the Harmony of Roses annual soirée last year, the dog had somehow wandered right into Lady Brewster’s rose garden full of elegant ladies and gentlemen. He was shooed out of the garden with kicks and yells by the footmen, but something about seeing the poor beast being chased away like that had spoken to Nathaniel.

So he’d left the soirée and taken the mutt in.

Finally, Argos… He had a special bond with Argos. Two years ago, after Nathaniel had stumbled out of Portside where he’d fought a boxing match for money, and won, he sat leaning against the wall of the building, breathing through the pain from various bruises. He’d heard whining, and when he looked up, four thugs had been kicking and yelling at the black mastiff.

“You worthless piece of shit, you were supposed to win! You lost us all money! Why are you so huge when you can’t win!” yelled one of them as he retrieved a wooden plank and hit the dog with all his might. The dog had yelped and fallen unconscious.

Nathaniel had taken him home and nursed him back to health.

These were the three protectors he trained and cared for so that they could guard his sisters while he was away.

It was hard to keep them fed, but he couldn’t let go of the three beasts. He loved them with his whole heart. Hermes was another luxury he couldn’t really afford, and his groom, Joshua, was also the butler, valet, and footman.

“Good boys,” he said as he patted their heads. “Did the girls feed you?”

“Of course we fed them, brother,” said Hazel as she climbed down the stairs from the servants’ entrance at the back. Hazel, the eldest of his sisters, was seventeen, with Mama’s lovely brown hair.

Bustling blond twins, Poppy and Violet, followed their sister. They both resembled him, with their hair like polished gold, the only inheritance they’d received from his wretched, vengeful papa. They were identical twins but were easily distinguished by Violet’s spectacles.

“Where have you been, brother?” demanded Poppy. “Mr. Cadden has been waiting for you for one hour.” She bounced up and down on her heels, with Cerberus bouncing up and down with her, as well.

He was glad Cadden hadn’t left despite Nathaniel being so late because of his blue-eyed, document-stealing fox.