If He's Sinful. Hannah Howell

with Radmoor. It is the futures of his siblings and the comfort of his mother and aunts.”

      “Pen! That fool what got hisself betrothed to the bitch is here! And he has brought four of his friends.”

      Penelope stared at Artemis in open-mouthed shock as that blunt announcement bellowed out in young Paul’s choirboy voice echoed throughout the house. She recognized the words as her own but how had Paul heard them? Then she realized that Lord Ashton had undoubtedly heard them as well and groaned. After giving Artemis a fierce scowl for laughing, she buried her face in her hands.

      “Pe—ne—lo—pe!”

      “I will be there in a moment!” she yelled back. “Show them into the parlor!” She then looked at a cackling Artemis in horror. “I just bellowed like a costermonger.”

      “Stiffen your spine, sister. Clean the flour off yourself, set up a pretty tea tray. And go to greet your guests.”

      “But—”

      “If you feel any embarrassment creep up on you, do try to remember where you last saw that rogue.”

      “Oh.” She thought about that for a moment and then shook her head. “Not a good idea.”

      “Why not?”

      “Because he was naked.”

      After glaring at her brother, who was laughing so hard he was in grave danger of falling off his chair, Penelope hurried to clean up and prepare a tea tray. Five gentlemen were waiting in her parlor. This, she thought, was probably going to be very embarrassing.

      Ashton stared at the angelic-looking little boy who had opened the door. He could swear that the child’s bellow was still echoing through the house. The badly muffled laughter of his friends told him he had not been mistaken in what he had just heard. When the child yelled out Penelope’s name and the woman yelled back, Ashton was still too shocked to be surprised.

      “Come in,” said the boy. “I am Paul, cousin Orion’s by-blow. The parlor is this way.”

      Following the boy, Ashton closely studied his surroundings. It was a spacious house and very clean. The furnishings in the parlor the boy led them into were of a good quality, but slightly worn. Ashton recognized two of the boys who had rescued Penelope playing chess at a table in the far corner of the large room. The looks they cast his way were not friendly ones even though their murmured greetings were very polite. Over his head he could hear what sounded like a small army moving around.

      “You know them,” the boy said and pointed at Stefan and Darius, “but I do not know you.”

      Ashton introduced his friends to the boy as they all found seats in the room on what proved to be surprisingly comfortable settees and chairs. They were the type of seats that were often banished to the attics and replaced by spindly, dainty chairs a man had to sit in with great care. He looked up from examining the once expensive but now worn rug beneath his feet to find the little cherub named Paul sitting on the table set between the facing settees, looking at him with an unsettling intensity.

      “Did they really see you naked in a whorehouse?” Paul asked in his sweet voice, his dark blue eyes wide and filled with innocence.

      The heat of an unaccustomed blush warmed Ashton’s cheeks. He did not even bother to send a repressive frown toward the two other boys, knowing it would do nothing to stifle their laughter. He did, however, glare at his friends, who were doing a poor job of hiding their amusement. Facing the little boy again, Ashton wondered if the child was truly as sweet as he appeared to be. There was a glint in the child’s beguiling eyes that made Ashton think Paul might not understand the full implications of what he was saying, but knew enough to know it was appallingly audacious.

      “I was not expecting company at that time,” he said.

      “Are you really as big as a horse?”

      “Paul!”

      Penelope marched over to the table as all the men stood up. Paul hastily jumped off it and she set down a tray full of biscuits, fruit, and small cakes. She silently thanked the Fates for inspiring her to indulge in a frenzied bout of cooking. This visitation was going to be awkward enough without having been caught out with nothing to offer her guests. She then frowned at Paul, who was looking far too angelic, a sure sign that he was causing trouble. Considering what she had just overheard him say, however, she decided to reprimand him later. It was not a conversation she wished to have before five gentlemen of the ton.

      “If you boys would be so kind as to leave us now, I would be grateful,” she said. “And tell the others not to trouble themselves in sneaking down here. I intend to shut the door.” She could tell by the way all three boys frowned that they knew any chance of eavesdropping was gone. The parlor doors were very thick.

      “Did you give them all the cakes?” asked Paul.

      “Nay. Now, please, away with you.”

      A quick glance toward the doorway showed Penelope that the other boys were already downstairs and peering around the edge of the door, obviously having slipped free of their tutor Septimus’s guard. She was just about to tell them to leave when Artemis made them scatter. He brought in the pots of coffee and tea, bowed to the men, and then left, herding the other three slow-moving boys in front of him. The moment he closed the doors, she urged the men to sit down and busied herself serving each man some tea or coffee, hoping the mundane chore would calm her before there was any attempt at conversation.

      Each man introduced himself, bowed, and kissed her hand before seating himself, and accepting his refreshments. Penelope became more and more alarmed with each introduction even as she attempted to note one thing about each man in order to remember him. Cornell Fincham, tall, fair-haired, and handsome, whom she knew to be the third son of a royal duke. Brant Mallam, the earl of Fieldgate, a nearly beautiful man with dark hair and dark eyes. Whitney Parnell, the baron of Ryecroft, an apparently flirtatious and jovial fellow until one looked into his steel gray eyes. Victor Chesney, the baron of Fisherton, who looked almost bland with his brown hair and hazel eyes, until he smiled. And then, of course, Radmoor, the viscount who made her heart clench with want. Five handsome bachelors all seated in her parlor. The matchmaking mamas of London would hang her if they ever learned of this meeting.

      By the time she took the only place left available near the table, Penelope’s stomach was tied up in knots. The fact that this seat was next to Radmoor only made it worse. After all, he had seen her very nearly naked and she had seen him gloriously naked. The rules of polite society she had been taught did not cover such a situation. Nor had it instructed her in how to carry on polite conversation with five men who knew she had been tied to a bed in a brothel.

      Ashton finished a delicious lemon cake and noticed a few smudges of flour in Penelope’s hair and on one sleeve of her gown. For reasons he could not begin to understand, he thought such dishevelment only made her more adorable. “Did you make these?” he asked, waving a hand toward all the teacakes and biscuits and trying to break the weighted silence they were all locked into.

      “Ah, aye. I mean yes, I did,” she replied. “I like to cook. It helps me think. A cook I know well made the raspberry tarts, however. She is always sending food here, but the people she works for do not know that. They will not miss what she sends,” she hastily added.

      “The secret is safe with us,” said Lord Mallam as he helped himself to another raspberry tart.

      “Why have I never seen you at Hutton-Moore House?” Ashton asked, unable to play any more polite games, suddenly desperate for some answers to all the questions swirling in his mind.

      Penelope silently repeated every curse she knew, knowing she would be ashamed later at how long that list was. It was apparent that Radmoor now knew exactly who she was, but she grasped at the very small chance that she could still persuade him that he was wrong. “Why should you have?”

      “Your last name is Wherlocke.”

      “How do you know that?”

      “It