A Candlelit Regency Christmas. Louise Allen

      ‘You can buy a ticket on the next one. They are frequent enough,’ the viscount said, stealing Mr Rivers’s unguarded tankard. The ale slid down in a long swallow, making his Adam’s apple move. His neck was strapped with muscle.

      ‘I do not have any money,’ Tess said through gritted teeth, averting her eyes from so much blatant masculinity. If she knew any swear words this would be an excellent opportunity to use them. But she did not. Strange that she had never felt the lack before. ‘I have a ticket for the boat that left at four o’clock. It arrives in Ostend with just enough time to catch the ship across the Channel. The ship that I have another ticket for. I have tickets, useless tickets. I have no money and I cannot go back to the convent and ask for more. I cannot afford to repay it,’ she added bleakly.

      ‘Ah. No money?’ Lord Weybourn said with that faint, infuriating smile. ‘I understand your agitation.’

      ‘I am not agitated.’ Agitation was not permitted in the convent. ‘I am annoyed. You knocked me down, my lord. You brought me here and let me sleep. You promised to wake me in time for the boat. Therefore this is now your problem to resolve.’ She folded her hands in her lap, straightened her back and gave him the look that Mother Superior employed to extract the admission of sins, major and minor. Words were usually not necessary.

      She should have known he would have an answer. ‘Simple. Grant and I are going to Ostend by carriage later today. You come with us and I will buy you a boat ticket when we get there.’

      This was what Sister Luke would describe as the Primrose Path leading directly to Temptation. With a capital T. And probably Sin. Capital S. No wonder they said it was a straight and easy road. Being carried by a strong and attractive man, eating delicious pastries, sleeping—next door to four men—on a blissfully soft bed. All undoubtedly wicked.

      After that, how could travelling in a carriage with two gentlemen for a day make things any worse? She wasn’t sure she trusted Lord Weybourn’s slanting smile, but Mr Rivers seemed eminently reliable.

      ‘Thank you, my lord. That will be very satisfactory.’ It was certain to be a very comfortable carriage, for none of these men, even the rumpled dice player, looked as though they stinted on their personal comfort. She found she was smiling, then stopped when no one leaped to their feet and started to bustle around making preparations. ‘When do we start and how long will it take us?’

      ‘Seven and a half, eight hours.’ Finally, Lord Weybourn got to his feet.

      ‘But we will arrive after dark. I do not think the ships sail in the dark, do they?’

      ‘We are not jolting over muddy roads all day and then getting straight on board, whether a ship is sailing or not.’ The viscount strolled across to one of the other doors, opened it and shouted, ‘Gaston!’

      ‘They do sail at night and I am taking one to Leith at nine this evening,’ Mr Rivers remarked. ‘But I am in haste, you’ll do better to take the opportunity to rest, Miss Ellery.’

      ‘I am also in haste,’ she stated.

      Lord Weybourn turned from the door. ‘Do nuns hurry?’

      ‘Certainly. And you know perfectly well that I am not a nun, my lord.’ The maddening creature refused to be chastened by her reproofs, which showed either arrogance, levity or the hide of an ox. Probably all three. ‘I am expected at the London house of the Order.’

      ‘The Channel crossing is notoriously uncertain for weather and timing. They will not be expecting you for a day or so either way. Unless someone is at death’s door?’ He raised an interrogative brow. Tess shook her head. ‘There, then. Arrive rested and, hopefully, not hobbling. Always a good thing to be at one’s best when making an entrance. Breakfast is on its way.’

      He sauntered out, lean, elegant, assured. Tess’s fingers itched with a sinful inclination to violence.

      ‘You might as well contemplate swatting a fly, Miss Ellery,’ the blond icicle remarked. Apparently her face betrayed her feelings graphically. He inclined his head in a graceful almost bow. ‘Crispin de Feaux, Marquess of Avenmore, at your service. Rivers you know.’ He gestured towards the third man. ‘This, improbable as it might seem, is not the local highwayman, but Gabriel Stone, Earl of Edenbridge.’

      Lord Edenbridge stood, swept her an extravagant courtesy, then collapsed back into his chair. ‘Enchanted, Miss Ellery.’ His cards appeared to enchant him more.

      ‘I’ll send for some hot water for you.’ Mr Rivers held the bedchamber door open. ‘You will feel much better after a wash and some breakfast, believe me, Miss Ellery.’

      Tess thanked him, curtsied as best she could to all three men and sat down on the bed to await the water. It wasn’t their fault. She knew just who to blame, but because she was a lady—or, rather, had been raised to have the manners of one—she would bite her tongue and do her best to act with grace. Somehow. As for breakfast at this hour—why, it was going to be almost noon by the time it was finished at this rate.

      * * *

      As she had suspected, the carriage proved to be very comfortable. ‘I keep this and my own horses over here,’ Lord Weybourn explained when Tess exclaimed in pleasure at the soft seats and the padded interior. ‘Job horses and hired vehicles are unreliable.’

      ‘You come to the Continent frequently, my lord?’ Tess settled snuggly into one corner and submitted to Mr Rivers arranging her legs along the seat and covering them with a rug. A hot brick wrapped in flannel was tucked in, too. Such luxury. She would enjoy what good things this journey had to offer, especially as the future seemed unlikely to hold much in the way of elegant coach travel.

      ‘We all do.’ Lord Weybourn folded his length into an opposite corner while Mr Rivers took the other. They had given her the best, forward-facing position, she noted. ‘Cris—Lord Avenmore—is a diplomat and spends half his time at the Congress and half doing mysterious things about the place. Gabe enjoys both travelling and fleecing any gamester foolish enough to cut cards with him and Grant here buys horses.’

      ‘I have a stud,’ Mr Rivers explained. ‘I import some of the more unusual Continental breeds from time to time.’

      ‘And you, my lord?’

      ‘Alex.’ He gave her that slanting, wicked smile. ‘I will feel that you have not forgiven me if you my lord me from here to London.’

      It seemed wrong, but perhaps that degree of informality was commonplace amongst aristocrats. ‘Very well, although Alex Tempest sounds more like a pirate than a viscount.’

      Mr Rivers snorted. ‘That’s what he is. He scours the Continent in search of loot and buried treasure.’

      ‘Art and antiquities, my dear Grant.’ Alex grinned. ‘Certainly nothing buried. Can you imagine me with a shovel?’

      Tess noted the flex of muscles under the form-fitting tailoring of his coat. Perhaps it was not achieved by digging holes, but the viscount was keeping exceptionally fit somehow. No, she thought, not a shovel, but I can imagine you with a sword.

      ‘I am a connoisseur, a truffle hound through the wilderness of a Continent after a great war.’

      ‘Poseur,’ Mr Rivers said.

      ‘Of course.’ Alex’s ready agreement was disarmingly frank. ‘I do have my reputation to maintain.’

      ‘But forgive me,’ Tess ventured, ‘is that not business? I thought it was not acceptable for aristocrats to engage in trade.’ And perhaps it was not acceptable to mention it at all.

      ‘Social death,’ Grant Rivers agreed. ‘So those of us who cannot rely upon family money maintain a polite fiction. I keep a stud for my own amusement and profit and sell to acquaintances as a favour when they beg to share in a winning bloodline. Alex here is approached by those with more money than taste. Gentlemen are so very grateful when he puts