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Rawley had gone missing the moment the ship docked. Given Valentine’s knowledge of Rawley’s close ties to men like Augusta and Douglass, he wasn’t surprised in the least. Valentine had hoped to pawn off the responsibility of keeping an eye on the chit to the Duke of Ashvale’s cousin, but when he’d seen Bronwyn getting into a carriage with her maid, he’d had no choice but to follow or lose track of her. Lisbeth had rolled her eyes, but told him to go. And so, here he was.
Stuck in a carriage.
Spying on a woman who was most likely having a rendezvous with a libertine.
Was she? Valentine blinked, pondering the question. It wasn’t any of his business, but he was curious. After working with a firecracker like Lisbeth who flaunted her lovers across three continents, he was the last person who would tell a woman what to do with her body. The world of theton, however, was a different story. If a lady, especially an unmarried one, dared to break the rules, she was excoriated faster than one could sayscandal.
What if she was already betrothed to someone here?
He hadn’t even thought to ask if she was.Thatnotion didn’t sit well either.
Clearly, his hunger was making him irrational. It wasgoodif she was engaged. Best for everyone. The sight of a tall, lithe figure in a bulky, dark coat coming out of the dark alley adjacent to the hotel had him sitting up, but it wasn’t her. The brim of a top hat obscured the person’s face, but from his vantage point, the figure was most definitely a man. Valentine blinked, peering at the disappearing shape of the person and a sensual gait that seemed all too familiar. Unless that wasn’t a man…
Bloody hell, it was her!
Swearing aloud, he descended from the coach and kept to the shadows until she got into a hackney a few streets away. He waved down another hansom with curt instructions to the coachman to follow her conveyance. His clever quarry didn’t go far, only a few streets north to what looked like a tavern. The wooden placket on the wall read BELL IN HAND.
“Here we are, sir,” the driver said. “McGillin’s, best place for an ale and a cottage pie. Ask for Ma or Pa and tell ’em Beckett sent ya.”
Valentine nodded and paid the man. He had no interest in food. His stomach gave a loud growl as if in defiance of that last thought, but he ignored it. First, he had to make sure that the daft chit didn’t compromise herself by meeting with a strange man alone. This wasn’t the place for aristocratic young ladies. Though maybe he was mistaken about Ashvale’s little sister. It wouldn’t be the only time he’d ever been wrong about a woman.
She’s not Lisbeth.
No, Lisbeth had been raised by strict, pious, wealthy parents, but her father had often done business in seedier parts of London. She’d given her virginity to a flashman when she was fifteen and then robbed him blind. To her, sex and seduction were tools to be used, and use them well she did. It was Lisbeth who had told him that sheltered girls were usually the most repressed, and they tended to act out when offered a modicum of independence.
Was that what Bronwyn was doing? Acting out?
Fulfilling her fantasies?
Keeping the collar of his own coat high, Valentine waited a few minutes near the entrance before shifting to an empty table with a view of the room. It was crowded and dim, but he spotted her quickly. Now that he was on to her disguise, his attention was instantly drawn to where she sat in a shadowed corner of the ale house. Facing the door, he sipped on a mug of ale, one gloved hand clasped around the tankard.
Her face still remained partially obscured by the hat brim, but he had no doubt it was her. That imperious jut of her chin and the impatient flutter of her fingers were dead giveaways. She did the latter when she was nervous. He frowned. Sitting hunched as she was and in profile, she reminded him of someone else, too, but for the life of him he couldn’t put his finger on it.
“What’ll you have, boss?” a buxom girl asked, the look in her eye stating that she’d offer a lot more than tavern fare if he was interested.
“Ale.” His stomach rumbled as he threw a few coppers onto the table. “And a sausage pie.”
“Comin’ right up. Ya let ol’ Dolly know if ya need anythin’ else.”
He nodded, never taking his eye off Bronwyn. How long did she intend to wait, and who was she meeting? The minutes turned into a quarter of an hour, and when his drink and food were delivered, he devoured them. She didn’t do anything but nurse that mug of hers, eyes trained intently on the doorway.
When nearly an hour had passed, cold air whisked past him as a strapping man stalked from the entrance straight to where she sat. Her fingers instantly stopped moving when he took the chair opposite. Valentine was sitting too far away to hear their conversation, but he could see the strain around Bronwyn’s mouth as her lips grew translucent.
“Where’s…Richard?” He couldn’t quite make out her words, but it seemed like this wasn’t the person she was supposed to meet. The man shook his head and answered something that made her hands go to her lap, her entire body much too still. Her shoulders went up into a slow shrug, that vapid look that he was much too used to coming over her face. The man’s hand slamming on the tabletop quickly put an end to whatever game she was playing.
What the hell was going on?
Valentine stood and quietly slipped around the periphery of the room to where he could better hear the conversation. It was a risky move. If Lady Bronwyn glanced up in his direction, she would see him, but she was much too focused on the man at her front.
“You’re not who I expected,” she was saying.
The man, an ugly-looking brute with pockmarked, pale skin, scowled. “Change of plans. Hand over the list.” From the sound of his accent, Valentine deduced he was American.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m here to meet a friend.”
“Stop playing games, lovey. We know you have it.”
We? At that, Valentine’s eyes darted around the tavern. Other than the man, no one else had entered, but that didn’t mean that others weren’t lying in wait. It could be anyone in there, including the barman or any of the patrons. Bronwyn’s stare narrowed, too, and then hardened as though some deeper, survival instinct was kicking in.
