The Complete Regency Bestsellers And One Winters Collection. Rebecca Winters

has it the girls there are very young.’

      All humour fled. ‘Enough, Cassandra. You have no idea of my reasons for being there.’

      ‘Oh, I am certain I have, my lord. Do not all men have the same purpose once they set foot in such hallowed halls?’ Her temper was at full flight now, irreversible and unstoppable as years of her own loneliness and ruin came flooding in. ‘I just had expected better from you, the unwise hope of one who has made choices that come back to haunt, I suppose, and your penchant for such places makes a mockery of any history between us.’

      ‘The history of you abandoning me in Perpignan for the arms of Guy Lebansart, you mean, and staying in Paris for the whole of the next eighteen months with him?’

      ‘Who told you that?’

      ‘Nobody had to. I was there, remember, as you happily went off with him. A woman who looked as though she could barely wait to be in more than his arms.’

      She hit him then, full across the face, the sound in the carriage terrible and absolute. But he did not pull back. Rather, he grabbed at her shaking hand and yanked her forward, his mouth coming down on hers in a single frozen angry grimace.

      And he took exactly what he wanted, bearing down with a force she could not deny. One hand threaded through her hair, tethering her to him, and the other gathering both wrists, bundling retaliation into stillness. He did not hold back either, ravaging her mouth with fury, barely allowing breath. At first she fought him, and then before she knew it another feeling altogether arose and she clung to his kiss as though her very life depended on it.

      With a curse, he let her go.

      ‘I am sorry.’ He didn’t sound at all like he usually did, and the scar across his chin stood out in a raised white line. Neither did he look sorry. Rather he appeared as though with only the slightest of provocation he might act in the very same way yet again.

      Unbridled and rampant. A lord who was used to an easy domain over others and was trying now to find a normalcy that had never been part of their relationship together in order to survive.

      ‘We bring out the worst in each other.’ More of his words slung with insult, though a small edge of them held another emotion. Shame, if she might name it, for his behaviour and for her own, each marooned in a half place of regret.

      The silence was welcomed. The clip-clop of the horses, the call of the driver, the sounds of a busy London street. Normal and proper after everything else that was not. Her lips felt rough and dry, but she did not dare to lick them in case he interpreted such an action wrongly. With eyes downcast she swallowed back tears and sat perfectly still, pleased when the horses were called to a halt and the door was opened to the Northrup town house.

      The footman helped her out. Nathaniel did not touch her or look at her. It was as if three feet were a thousand miles as she climbed down onto the white pebbles.

      ‘If I hear any other news about Sarah Milgrew I shall let you know, Miss Northrup.’

      ‘I would be indebted, Lord Lindsay.’

      The polite manners of society hung across an undercurrent of weariness and then he was gone.

      * * *

      White’s was busy when he flung himself down on a leather wingchair opposite Hawk half an hour later and ordered himself a double shot of their strongest whisky.

      ‘A run in with the mysterious Miss Cassandra Northrup, I presume?’

      Nat ignored Hawk’s jibe because the whole fiasco was just too confusing to dwell upon right now. ‘Another woman has been brought out of the river.’

      ‘Lord.’ Hawk sat forward. ‘Who is it this time?’

      ‘A girl whom the Daughters of the Poor had found and given a home to. The sister of one of those dragged from the Thames last month, I am guessing.’

      ‘Was there a meeting of the Venus Club that night?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘Damn.’

      ‘But the girl had made enquiries the evening before at the Sailors Inn concerning her sister. The tavern keeper remembers her asking. I also know the name of her home town, so perhaps something happened there?’

      ‘Bits and pieces dropping into the jigsaw. God, how I love this game.’

      ‘I doubt the youngest Northrup daughter would see it in those terms, Stephen. She was furious to hear I had been at a meeting of the Venus Club.’

      ‘You did not enlighten her of your true purpose?’

      ‘And run the risk of having her poke her nose into the whole conundrum? It is getting more dangerous by the day and she seems to think she is indestructible.’

      ‘I see your point.’ Hawk leant forward and frowned. ‘Have you been in a fight? Your face looks bruised.’

      ‘Cassandra Northrup hit me. Hard.’

      Stephen began to laugh. ‘She makes you foolish, Nathaniel, and it’s about high time that one of us found a woman who managed to do that. Besides, she is your wife.’ He raised his glass and drank, his smile laconic. ‘It’s been years since you have given any woman the time of day and this one...’ He stopped as though picking his words carefully. ‘This one makes you feel again.’

      Anger. Wrath. Irritation. Frustration. Helplessness. Fear. For what she was involved in and for the risks she took. Aye, Hawk was right in his summation of strongly feeling something. Nat stayed quiet.

      ‘There is another matter that I have heard amongst the whispers of gossip, Nat, and I am not sure if this is a good time to tell you of it.’

      ‘Something about Cassandra Northrup, you mean?’

      ‘Yes.’

      Nathaniel took a breath in because by the tone of voice that Stephen was using he knew the news was bad. ‘What is it?’

      ‘She has a son.’

      The bottom fell out of his world in one dizzying and frantic sort of disbelief. Of all the things he had expected Hawk to say this was not one of them.

      ‘How old?’

      ‘Word is that she returned from Paris with him in tow.’

      Nat’s hands scraped through his hair as he tried to recover a lost composure.

      Was the child his?

      Anger filtered his world with a red haze, the beat of his heart drumming in his ears as he put down his glass. Had Sandrine been pregnant in Perpignan and not told him? His mind skirted back to the timings.

      After his behaviour in the carriage he felt it unwise to confront Cassandra with this new question, for the answer she gave back would determine everything. He wished that he could have gone then and there to her and sworn that the parenthood of her son did not matter to him.

      But he knew that it did. With care, he straightened in the leather seat.

      ‘Is it yours?’

      Stephen’s voice came through a billowing loss and for the first time in a long while Nat found himself unable to formulate even the smallest of thoughts.

      * * *

      Cassie held her son close against the night and listened to his breathing, the moon coming in between the curtains of patterned velvet, illuminating the bed with its paleness.

      Jamie came to her room in the night with a wail of worry, another dream disturbing slumber and leaving him upset and frightened. Often she instructed his nanny to let him come to her in the early hours before the dawn if he awoke for she liked sleeping with him.

      She wondered if he remembered his time in Paris, the uncertainty, the desperation. She hoped he held no recollection of her crying out for Nathanael and searching for a face that might look like his in the Place des