... Charming daughter or no, there is no doubt by this point that the reputation of Lady G— is unimpeachable. Are we to blame her for a peccadillo from so long ago? And one that has such vibrance and charm? There will always be room for the Lady on these pages. But will there be room for her in London's hearts?

... Lady M— appears positively bereft at social gatherings these days. Gone are her trio of lords, each showing interest in others. Perhaps the lady did not sell when she should? Earl H— is no doubt lining the coffers of a particular dowry even as we scribble...

The gossip pages of The News of London, April 30, 1833

He could have imagined her answering his question in any number of ways, from flat denial, to refusal to answer the question, to humor or evasion or a question of her own.

But he never would have imagined that she would tell him the truth.

Or that she might have loved the man who had ruined her.

Nor would he have imagined how much the information would bother him or how much he wished to wipe the memory of the man from her mind.

To replace him.

He resisted the thought. For a dozen years – longer – Duncan had sworn off women who requested intensity of any kind. He was opposed to anything that might end in a desire for something more than a fleeting fancy, than a mutual arrangement designed solely for the pleasure of both parties.

Commitment was not in the cards for Duncan West.

It could not be. Ever.

Because he would never saddle another person with his secrets, which loomed large and ever-threatening, always a heartbeat away from revelation and ruin. He would never leave another with the shadow of his past, with the punishment that would no doubt be his future.

It was the only noble thing he could ever do – staying himself from commitment.

Keeping himself from love.

And so, he should not care if Lady Georgiana Pearson loved the father of her daughter. It mattered not a bit to him, or to his future. The only way the man was in any way relevant to Duncan's life was if he were revealed – thus requiring column inches in Duncan's newspapers.

No, he should not care. And he did not.

Except he did. Ever so slightly.

"What happened to him?"

She did not pretend to misunderstand. "Nothing happened. He never intended to stay."

"Is he alive?"

She hesitated, and he watched her consider lying. "He is."

"You love him."

She took a deep breath and released it, as though the conversation had gone too far in a direction and she was not prepared to follow. Which, it occurred to him, was very likely the situation.

"Why don't you know how to dance?" she asked quietly, staring intently into the darkness.

The question and the way it twisted the conversation irritated him. "Why is it relevant?"

"The past is always relevant," she said simply before she faced him. Utterly calm. As though they discussed the weather. "I would like to teach you to dance."

The words were barely out when a boisterous group of revelers spilled onto the balcony, crossing paths with the group that had been there when he had found Georgiana. Making a quick, barely calculated decision, Duncan seized the opportunity for escape, clasping Georgiana's elbow and guiding her quickly and silently into the darkness at the edge of the space, where a set of stone steps led down into the gardens.

Within seconds, they had left the ball, without being seen.

He moved them around a corner of the great stone house, into the darkness, where anyone who saw them would have secrets of his own to hide.

Once there, in the shadows, she said, "How will we return?"

"We won't," he replied.

"We must. I've a cloak. And a chaperone. And a reputation to uphold. And you've promised to help do just that."

"I am taking you home."

"That isn't as easy as you would think."

"I've a carriage and I am familiar with the location of your brother's estate."

"I don't live there," she said, leaning up against the dark wall of the house, watching him in the darkness. "I live at the Angel."

"No," he said, "Anna lives at the Angel."

"She's not the only one."

The statement grated. "You mean Chase." She did not reply, and he added, "He lives at the Angel?"

"Most nights," she said, so simply that he had to bite his tongue to hold back his retort.

She clearly sensed his irritation. "Why does it make you so angry? My life?"

"Because this didn't have to be your life, nights spent on the floor of the casino. Carrying messages for Chase."

"To and from you," she pointed out.

Guilt flared. She was not wrong. "For what it's worth, I've an excellent reason for tonight's message. And I was not going to ask you to deliver it."

"What is it?"

He could not tell her that his sister was in danger. Could not bring her any closer to the knowledge that he and Tremley were more than passing acquaintances. If Chase knew how much the Tremley file was worth to him, he might hold it ransom. And Cynthia would be more and more in danger.

"It's not relevant to our discussion. My point is —"

"Your point is that you believe there was a life of tea and quadrilles waiting for me at the end of some path not chosen. Your point is that Chase has ruined me."

"As a matter of fact, it is."

She laughed at that. "Then you have forgotten what it is Society does to young women in my particular situation."

"You could have survived it," he said.

"No. I couldn't have." The words were so matter-of-fact, it was almost as though she weren't the victim of fate at all.

"You could have done this ages ago. Married."

She raised a brow. "I could have, but I would have hated it." She paused. "What would you say if I told you that this was my choice? That I wanted this life?"

"I wouldn't believe you. No one chooses exclusion. No one chooses ruination. You have fallen victim to a powerful man who has kept you in his pocket for too long, and now refuses to release you fully."

"You're wrong. I chose this life," she said, and he almost believed her. "Chase saved me."

Hatred flared at the words, the words of a woman in too deep. A woman who cared too much to see the truth. A woman who —

Christ. Was it possible that she loved him?

On the heels of that thought came another.

Was it possible that Chase was Caroline's father?

Anger flared, hot and devastating. He could ask her, but she'd never confess it if it were true. And it would explain a great deal – why she chose this life, why she lived at the Angel, why she protected Chase with all she had.

He didn't deserve it, her protection.

He deserved to stand in the sun and be judged like all the rest of them.

He swore, harsh and wicked in the darkness. "I want —" He stopped himself from completing the sentence.

She wasn't having that. "What do you want?"

It might have been the dark that made him finish the thought. Or it might have been the moment, earlier in the evening, when another man, who wielded his unwelcome power all too similarly to the one they discussed, had managed him. Whatever it was, he did finish the thought. "I want to tear him apart for the way he treats you."

She stilled. "Chase?"

"The very same."

"But you are... friends."

Everything inside him resisted the words. "We are nothing of the sort. We simply use each other to get what we want."

She was quiet for a long moment. "And what do you want?"

I want you.

He did not say it. While it was the most pressing answer to her question, it was not the one she sought. "I want to sell newspapers. What does Chase want?"

She hesitated. Then, "Why would I know that?"

"Because you know him better than anyone. You speak for him. You carry messages to him. You..." You love him. "Christ, you live with him."

"Anna lives with him," she repeated his words from minutes earlier.

He hated them. "She's not real."

"She's as real as any of us," she said, and he wished he could blame the alcohol for the statement. But he couldn't.

"How can you say that? You created her. When you live her, you do not live the rest of your life."

She met his gaze, all seriousness. "When I live her, I live all of my life. Without hesitation and with pleasure."

She was a lady. The daughter of a duke. The sister of one. She was so much more than he was. So much more than he could ever have. And yet she sold herself short, accepting life under the thumb of a powerful coward.

"It is entirely my pleasure," she said, and the air changed between them, thickening with her words, nearly liquid with promise.

He let her lean in, enjoying the feel of her as she came closer. The heat of her, even as he resisted her lure. Even as his anger at her words threatened to overflow.

"I don't think you know pleasure," he said, knowing the words would rankle. Wishing them to.

Her eyes went wide, and she turned Anna, all seductress. "You think I do not understand it?"

He resisted the urge to pull her closer. "I think you are used to giving it. And I think it is time you see that when it comes time... when I am in control, I intend for you to do very little but receive it."

He watched the words run over her, the way her gaze widened and her lips parted on a breath she hadn't expected to require. He reacted to that expression with every fiber of his being. The honesty in it made him want to roar his desire. His power.

He did not give her time to reply, instead lifting a hand and running his fingers over the silken skin of her cheek. "Would you like that?" he whispered, "Would you like it if I took control of your pleasure? If I wrapped you in it? If I gave it to you over and over, until you could not bear it? Until you ached for my touch above all others?"

Her breath caught in her throat as he stroked the column of her neck, and he leaned in, slowly, pressing his lips once, twice to the soft, pale skin at the underside of her chin. "Tell me," he whispered there, and the sound of her exhalation nearly shattered his control.

"Tell you..." She hesitated, the wine and the sensation making it difficult for her to think. He cursed the wine, even as he waited for her to finish. She swallowed, and he felt the swell of it beneath his fingertips. She cleared her throat. Tried again. "Tell you what?"

"Would you like it?"

"I would," she answered, the words more breath than sound.

"What would you like?" Now he was teasing her. He knew she couldn't think, but the proof of it was making him feel more a man than he ever had before.

"I would like you to..." She hesitated.

He ran his teeth along the column of her neck, nipping at the soft skin of her shoulder. "To —?"

She sighed. "All of it. I would like it all."

He couldn't see the color of her eyes in the darkness, but he recognized their intensity. One of her hands came to his neck, fingers curving and sliding into his hair. She did not release his gaze, and for a long, breathless moment, he wondered if, perhaps, she would be in control after all. "Do it," she whispered, those gorgeous pink lips licking around the words. "Please."

"Do what?" They were close now, nearly kissing. He'd never wanted anything the way he wanted this woman.

"Do it all." Her fingers slid further, pulling him down to her. "Show me everything."

She leaned up. Or perhaps he leaned down. It did not matter, except for the fact that they were kissing, and she was in his arms, and he wanted nothing more than to explore every inch of her glorious, perfect body. Her arms were wrapped around his neck, and he was lifting her, turning her, pressing her against the side of the house, giving her everything for which she asked.

She sighed into his mouth and he caught the beautiful sound, pulling her against him. Her lips, soft and sweet and warm, parted in perfection, and he could not stop himself from claiming her with tongue and teeth, nipping along her full bottom lip before chasing the bite with a long, slow lick that made her groan with anticipation. Or perhaps it was he who groaned.

She had him on fire. He gathered her closer and deepened the kiss, changing the pressure. He delved deeper, stroked more firmly.

And she met him at every single stroke, finally using her own teeth to tease and tempt and punish, and he groaned, grasping one long thigh in his hand and lifting it, spreading her open and pressing into the soft core where he so desperately wanted to be. He rocked against her, giving both of them a small, unbearable taste of what they might have if it were a different night.

Of what they would have when it was a different night.

The thought tore him away from her, and he ached at the way she clung to him, as though she'd forgotten for a moment who she was and where they were and why they couldn't have each other... this... now.

He was the same way, leaning back in, taking her lips once more, firmly, thoroughly, without hesitation.

He released her thigh and her lips at the same time, pressing his forehead to hers as they both caught their breath. When he finally spoke, it was in a whisper only for her. "I will show you everything. But not tonight. You've had too much to drink for me to give you all I intend for you to take."

Her retort was instant. "I haven't had too much to drink."

She wanted him. He could feel it in the pulse beneath his fingertips, in the breath against his neck, in the fingers that clung to his coat. "Yes, you have."

"It doesn't matter."

He turned her so that she could see his face, handsome and serious. "It matters a great deal. You see, I intend for every bit of ecstasy, everything you've never felt before, everything you will ache to have again." He took a step toward her, his words wrapping around them both like sin. "I intend for it all to be because of me."

She opened her mouth to argue.

He stopped her before she could speak. "Me alone. Without question, Georgiana."

She closed her eyes at the name, capturing his hand with hers, tightly, as though she needed to steady herself. "You don't want Georgiana. You want Anna. She's the one who knows about passion."

"I know exactly who I want," he said, leaning forward, dipping his head to the place where her neck met her shoulder, where she smelled of vanilla and Georgiana. The scent was intoxicating and dangerous. And hers alone. He continued, letting his tongue lick along the spot. "I want Georgiana."

She turned to him and kissed him, as though the words were unexpected and desperately desired. He caught her against him and gave her a full, sweeping kiss before a thought whispered through him, and he pulled back, meeting her gaze.

"Caroline's father..."

She looked away, suddenly, remarkably looking like the girl she'd once been. "It's rather an inopportune time to discuss him, don't you think?"

"I don't, actually," he said. "Now is the perfect time to tell you that he was a fool."

"Why?" she asked.

It wasn't a search for a compliment. There was no artifice in the question. So there was no artifice in his answer. "Because if I had a chance to have you in my bed every night, I would take it. Without question."

He regretted the words almost immediately – the meaning in them. The power they gave her over him. But then she leaned into him, as though the words had pulled her to him. He caught her, the feel of her too welcome to resist.

When she spoke, she was all seductress. "You have a chance for it tonight, and you are not taking it."

"It is not your pleasure," he retorted, her words infuriating him. It was Chase's pleasure. It was the pleasure of any number of men she'd been with since she began this charade.

The words had the desired effect, desire pooling deep in him. "That is because I am a gentleman."

Her lips made a perfect moue. "A pity. I was promised a scoundrel."

He kissed her once, quickly. "Tomorrow night, you get one." He spoke low and quiet at her lips before pulling away. Any more, and he would be desperate to have her. He had promised Temple he would take her home. "We must go."

"I don't wish to go," she said, and the honesty in the words was more tempting than he could have imagined. "I wish to stay here. With you."

"In the gardens of Beaufetheringstone House?"

"Yes," she said, quietly. "Anywhere that the light doesn't come through."

He paused. "You have a problem with light?"

"I have a problem with things that do not thrive in the dark. I am not comfortable with them."

He understood the words and the sentiment behind them, more than he was willing to admit. In fact, the way they resonated so unsettled him that he was suddenly quite desperate to get her home and away from him, before her liquid honesty inspired his own – drink or no. He took her hand. "We cannot stay here. I have things to do." She ignored him for a long moment, looking down at their hands, clasped together. Finally, he said, "Georgiana."

She looked up. "I wish we were not wearing gloves."

The thought of their hands, skin to skin, tempted him beyond reason. "I am very glad we are wearing them, or I might not be able to resist you."

She smiled. "You know just what to say to women. You might be a scoundrel after all."

He met her smile with his own. "I told you I was."

"Yes, but scoundrels are notorious liars. So I had no way of knowing if I should believe you."

"A great logical conundrum. If one tells the truth about being a scoundrel, is he scoundrel at all?"

"Perhaps a scoundrel with a gentlemanly core."

He leaned in and whispered, "Don't tell anyone. You shall ruin my reputation."

She laughed, and the sound gave him immense pleasure. He was sad when it was gone, stolen into the dark gardens on a breeze. After a long stretch of silence, she said, "You said you had a message for Chase."

Chase.

Duncan had avoided asking for Tremley's file for a plain, simple reason. It was stupidity on his part – she was bound to Chase in ways he did not understand and he could not stop – but it did not change the fact that he didn't want her near the founder of The Fallen Angel if she didn't need to be there.

He didn't want her near him if she did need to be there.

He'd get the file another way. Without using her. "It doesn't matter."

"I don't believe that," she said. "I saw your face when you sought me out. Tell me. I'll..." She hesitated, and he wondered what she meant to say. Before he could ask, she said, "I'll pass Chase your message. Give it to me."

He shook his head. "No. I don't want you involved in this."

"In what?"

In his mess.

In Tremley's threats.

It was bad enough that his sister was in danger, but he could protect Cynthia. He had less control over Georgiana. And he couldn't be certain that Chase would care for her if need be.

She had to remain clear of this.

He shook his head. "It's time you distance yourself from him."

"From Chase?" she asked. "If only it were as easily done as said."

He hated the words and the sadness in her small smile. "I shall help." He'd do whatever he could to get her away from Chase and his unfettered, unreasonable power over her.

She nodded. "Your papers will help. Anna will have to disappear once Georgiana is married."

He would help, papers be damned.

But she did not need to know that now.

The following morning, Georgiana sat at her enormous desk at The Fallen Angel, attempting to focus on the work of the casino, as Cross placed a parcel at the edge of her desk.

"From West," he said. "Delivered from his offices this morning."

She looked to the parcel, wondering for a fleeting moment if West had packed it himself. Before she could stop herself, she reached for the paper-wrapped parcel, her fingers toying with the string that kept its contents secret from prying eyes at his offices and hers. If he'd tied it himself, he'd had to have done it without gloves. She stroked down the ridge of one loop of the string. Just as she was without gloves now.

Just as she would be this evening, when he made good on his promise. And she made good on hers.

Realizing that she was being a cabbagehead, and that Cross was staring at her as though she'd grown a second head, made of cabbage, she snatched her fingers away. "Thank you," she said, affecting her greatest tone of dismissal.

She ignored the look of amusement on his handsome face. "A note arrived at the same time. For Anna."

He set the crisp ecru square on top of the parcel, and she resisted the urge to tear open the envelope, instead turning her face back to her work – a movement that both made her look exceedingly busy and hid her flaming cheeks from her business partner, who would no doubt tell all the others if he suspected her embarrassment. "Thank you."

He did not move.

She willed the blush away.

It did not work.

"Is there something else?"

He did not reply.

She had no choice. She looked up. He was trying not to laugh at her. She scowled. "I am not above turning you out on your ass."

His lips twitched. "You and which army?"

"Is there something else? Or are you simply being a pillock?"

Cross grinned. "The latter. I'm curious about that package. Temple says you're after him."

"Temple is married. Of course I'm not after him."

He laughed. "You think you're very clever."

"I am very clever."

"Temple says that you made a fool of yourself last night. When was the last time you drank champagne?"

"Last night," she said, crossing one buckskin-covered leg over the other and reaching for the package, pretending not to think on the evening that loomed ahead. Pretending not to seriously consider calling for a case of champagne to prepare for it.

She opened the package, knowing Cross would not leave until she'd done so.

He'd sent her the paper. If one could refer to Duncan West's gossip rag as "the paper."

The week's edition of The Scandal Sheet had arrived at The Fallen Angel two days before it would land on breakfast tables across London. Except it wasn't for her. It was a gift to the man known only as Chase.

No, not gift. Service. As requested.

"Scandal Becomes Salvation," the headline on the front page read, followed in smaller text with "Lady G— Rides Through Ton, Wins Aristocratic Hearts."

Cross laughed, craning his head to read the page. "Clever. I shall tell you – I know you did not like that cartoon, but the reference to Lady Godiva makes for excellent reading." He took the paper from the desk to read more carefully

She pretended not to care, opening the note that accompanied Chase's package. "Lady Godiva was protesting outrageous taxation."

Cross looked up. "No one remembers that bit. They just remember the nudity."

"How is that to help me land a husband?"

He grew serious. "Trust me. Nudity helps."

"You used to be the one I liked best."

"I am still the one you like best." He leaned forward. "The important thing is when West makes an arrangement, he delivers. Look at the amount of attention he's devoted to you." He turned back to the page and read. "Lauding your grace and charm."

The lauding was not free, however. He'd sent Chase a note with the paper. A request for payment.

The girl receives her attention.

You owe me the earl.

The missive was written in thick black scrawl, so confident that there had been no need for Duncan to sign the note.

Her gaze flickered from the note to Tremley's file on the edge of her desk, waiting for delivery, to Cross, still reading, "He regales the reader with the number of titled men and women who have accepted Lady G— into their hearts and minds and world!" He looked up. "It's a pity it's not true."

"It does not need to be true. I am only interested in one suitor."

And she should thank her maker that Lord Langley was willing to at least consider her as an option. The lack of invitations and notes indicated that Georgiana remained too scandalous for the men of London.

"Langley." Cross did not hide his disdain for her plan.

"You take issue in Langley choosing me for his lady?"

"Not at all. Except he's not interested in choosing a lady."

She met his gaze. "We don't discuss his file. Ever. This will be the last I say on the subject: His interests are not a concern, as I've no need of being courted."

"Then what's the hope for West?"

She wouldn't allow herself a hope for West. Nothing beyond their simple arrangement. Pleasure. Carefully. Until he made good on his promise and she was matched. "You cannot imagine that I'm angling for West's attention."

He leaned back in his chair. "I don't know what to imagine. But Temple seems to think —"

"Temple is addled from too many rounds in the ring."

Cross raised a brow, but did not reply.

She took a breath. Released it.

"West is —" She stopped, searching for something to say that would make sense of the moment. Of the way her entire, carefully constructed world seemed to come unraveled every time the man appeared. Of the fact that that his impact on her world did not make her wish he was far from her.

Of the fact that it somehow made her wish he was nearer.

There was an irony in that, she supposed, that he remained such a gentleman around her despite knowing her secrets. The evening before could have been full of scandal. Of more.

And he'd resisted her.

As though it had been the easiest thing in the world.

As though the kisses they'd shared hadn't moved him at all.

As though they hadn't been thoroughly earth-shattering.

She felt her cheeks warming again.

"West is complicated," she said.

"Well, then he's a terrible match for you, as you are so very simple." She smiled at the teasing in the words, grateful that Cross, somehow, blessedly, had not pushed her to elaborate. Instead, he brushed a speck from his trouser leg and said, "The men have not found anything on him."

A whisper of guilt came with the reminder of her earlier demands for information on Duncan. Before she'd met his sister. Before she'd propositioned him. Before she'd desired him quite so much. She pushed the unwelcome emotion aside. She'd made the mistake of trusting another so long ago and been left destroyed. She would not make that mistake again.

She ignored the way her reply unsettled. "Tell them to keep looking."

He nodded, quiet for a long moment before he leaned forward. "Do you remember how you found me?"

"Of course." Neither of them would ever forget the night he'd been tossed out of another gaming hell, beaten black and blue for counting cards and running the tables one too many times. Georgiana had known the moment she'd heard the story that Cross was the fourth for which she'd been searching. They'd found him drunk and on the brink of destruction – at his own hand.

"You saved me that night."

"You would have saved yourself."

"No," Cross shook his head. "Without you, I would be dead or something far worse. Bourne and Temple would be dead in an alleyway in the East End. You saved us all in one way or another." He paused. "And we are not the only ones. Every person employed by The Fallen Angel. Most employed in our homes... they're all yours."

"Do not paint me a savior," she said. "The color does not suit."

"Nevertheless, it is what you are. Every one of us, saved by Chase." She did not reply, and he did not stop. "But what happens when it is Chase who needs saving?"

Her gaze snapped to his, the words coming quick and unbidden. "I don't."

He leaned back. Waited for a long moment. When she said nothing else, he said, "Perhaps not. But do not doubt that we will not stand idly by should hell freeze over."

He stood, brushing his hands down his trousers. "Pippa would like you to come to dinner next week." He paused. "You and Caroline."

She raised a brow. Cross's wife was the least likely person in London to invite someone to dinner. He smiled, seeming to understand her surprise, the love he had for his wife lightening his face, setting something off deep in Georgiana. "It's not a dinner party. It's dinner. And will likely end in all of us covered in dirt."

It was not a metaphor. The Countess Harlow was a renowned horticulturalist. Events at Harlow House often culminated in some kind of gardening. Caroline loved it.

Georgiana nodded. "With pleasure."

She returned her attention to the desk, her gaze falling to the second note, the one for Anna that tempted her from the edge of the desk. She wanted to open it quite desperately, but knew better than to do it with Cross in attendance.

He seemed to understand. "Don't hesitate on my account," he said, all amusement.

She scowled at him. "Why are you so interested?"

"I miss the days of clandestine messages ending in secret assignations."

The words grated. "It's not clandestine if it comes at eleven in the morning."

He smiled, and she marveled at the openness in the expression – something that was never there in the old, haunted Cross. "It's clandestine if it has to do with activities that are traditionally associated with eleven in the evening."

"It doesn't," she said, tearing open the envelope in a desperate attempt to prove him wrong.

There, in the same black script in which the note from Chase had been written, were three lines of text, again, unsigned.

My town house. 11 o'clock.

Come well rested.

And sober.

The blush returned with a vengeance.

Cross laughed from his place by the door. "It doesn't, does it?"

He closed the door on her curse.

Alone once more, she let herself consider the words, the square of rich paper that seemed far too luxurious for such a message. Or perhaps it was precisely as luxurious as it should be.

He seemed the kind of man who would not hesitate to be luxurious.

She lifted the paper to her nose, imagining she could smell him there, sandalwood and soap. Knowing she was being silly.

She tapped the paper to her lips, loving the way it brushed against them, soft and lush, like a kiss.

Like his kiss.

She dropped the note as though it was on fire. She could not allow him to consume her this way. Her proposition was not intended for him to reduce her to some quivering, ridiculous mass. It was not designed for him to consume her. Or control her.

It was designed for her to have a taste of the life she'd pretended to live all these years – the one she'd been accused of having – before she gave herself over to a new life that included marriage to a man with whom she would never have passion.

Passion.

It was not something that she lacked with West.

But she would be damned if she gave him all the control as well.

She reached for her pen.

I may be late.

He replied within the hour.

You won't be late.