A Study in Scoundrels Read online

  “Maybe we should just find a knife and cut them.”

  But in the time it took him to look around the room pointlessly for a penknife or sharp object, she’d reached across his arms, taken the journal from his hands, and expertly worked the knots loose with her fingers.

  She flipped the book open from the last page, skipping backward until she found the first leaf that contained writing. The words had been scribbled in a loopy feminine hand. Sophia turned the book so Grey could read the entry.

  He thought it was Liddy’s penmanship, but she hadn’t written to him in so long he couldn’t be sure. Still, the words chilled his blood.

  He’s promised so much and bids me trust him. Trust is hard, but I’ve no wish to begin like Mama and Papa. Betrayal won’t be my way. And I don’t want a thousand lovers like my brother. I do not, will not, ever want for any other lover. I only pray he vows the same.

  We depart in two days, and patience, I’m learning, is as difficult to achieve as trust.

  “It’s dated two days past,” Sophia whispered. She’d read the words upside down, apparently.

  “Cecily didn’t say when Clive departed for Hampstead, but Liddy must have gone with him.” Grey couldn’t imagine what had taken the two to Hampstead. Perhaps it was the first leg of their journey toward Gretna Green. Only one certainty blazed in his mind. “I have to stop them.”

  Sophia flipped the book closed, and Grey turned to face her.

  “Thank you for finding the journal.” He couldn’t resist lifting a hand to her cheek. She was as warm and soft as he imagined. For once, she did not flinch from his touch. Taking her lips would be so easy. But if he kissed her, he would not wish to leave. “I must go.”

  As he started out of the room, he made himself a promise.

  He would kiss Sophia Ruthven. When he found Liddy and got her safely back to Derbyshire, he’d return and give Sophia a proper thanks for assisting him. He would kiss her until she looked at him again as she had on the front stoop. Until she touched him as she had on the pavement. Until she said his name, breathlessly, needfully, between kisses.

  Jasper Grey dashed away, and despite the sunlight pouring in through the lace at the parlor window, the room seemed dimmer without him. And there was a lurch in Sophia’s chest, as if some part of her wanted to follow. To help him solve the mystery, to see the moment when brother and sister were reunited.

  Clutching her hand, she realized she still held his sister’s journal. She rushed from the room and yanked open the front door, but he was already gone.

  “I thought tea might be in order.” Miss Cole appeared, gripping a tray before her. “If I’m not mistaken, you missed breakfast this morning.”

  “Thank you, Cate.” The woman’s given name slipped out easily. Despite all Sophia knew of etiquette, calling the woman she was beginning to consider a friend anything else seemed too formal. “You’ll join me, won’t you?”

  They had agreed to discuss the household accounts today. There were repair bills to pay and vendors to select to complete wallpaper and painting projects in several rooms too. Sophia thought her efficient housekeeper might remind her of the duties to attend to. Instead, she offered a sharp nod, a hint of a grin, and began arranging refreshments on a table between the room’s two facing settees.

  After a few moments of sipping tea in companionable silence, Cate said quietly, “I think we can breathe a sigh of relief.”

  “Can we?”

  “I don’t think Mr. Grey stayed long enough for any of the maids to fall irrevocably in love with him.”

  “Thank goodness.” Sophia smiled before insisting, “It wasn’t a proper visit.”

  “An improper one, then?” Cate ducked her head for another sip of tea, rather than meet Sophia’s gaze.

  “Impromptu, not improper. I was assisting him.” She glanced at the journal that lay on the settee beside her. “He’s lost something, and I wished to help him find it.”

  “Now you have me intrigued. This is beginning to sound like one of those detective stories you like to read.”

  “I’m attempting to write one too.” Sophia held a breath, waiting for the other woman’s reaction. She’d never confessed her writing interests or aspirations to anyone.

  “Are you? How exciting.” Cate edged forward and set her teacup on the table between them. “You must let me read it. May I?”

  “Once I’ve finished and polished it up a bit, I’ll let you have a look.” Ridiculously, considering that she hoped to publish her story, the notion of anyone else reading the tale terrified her. “There’s so much to do before Kit and Ophelia return. Should we get started on the household accounts?”

  After gathering the bills, the household ledger, penny post stamps, and fountain pens and seating themselves around a small table in the parlor, Sophia and Cate had the accounts settled, menus sorted, and repairs planned for the coming week in a little over an hour.

  As they tidied the table afterward, Cate pointed to the envelope on the fireplace mantel. “Don’t forget the post.”

  Sophia had forgotten all about the letter. Standing to retrieve it, she saw that it was from Mr. Ogilvy. “He’s written again before receiving my reply.” She didn’t know whether to be flattered by his eagerness or bothered by the breach of etiquette.

  Slipping the letter from its envelope, Sophia skimmed the short note.

  Forgive me for writing again before the favor of your reply, Miss Ruthven. My business enterprises require me to travel, and I have the good fortune of being in London tomorrow, June 24. My intention is to call on you at home in the early afternoon as I confess myself eager to behold the face of the woman who has so fully ignited my interest with her many admirable qualities. Yours, T. Ogilvy, Esq.

  “He says he’s coming to London tomorrow.” Sophia crumpled the letter in her hand. “To see my face.”

  “And you don’t wish him to?” Cate approached to stand beside Sophia.

  “Not yet.” She pulled the unsent letter to him from her skirt pocket. “In my reply I requested that we correspond for a while to get to know each other. I haven’t yet looked at the photograph he sent.”

  Maybe she wasn’t brave enough to trust as Phyllida Grey had, but she could understand the girl’s hopefulness. They both craved a happy ending.

  “If you hurry, perhaps there’s time to send a telegram,” Cate suggested.

  “Excellent idea.” After gathering a few coins and her reticule, Sophia headed for the front door. And stopped the minute she grasped the handle. “Why am I doing this?”

  “Doing which?” Cate asked as she joined her in the front vestibule. “Delaying him or meeting him at all?”

  “I want to marry. He is eager to. Why should I avoid the man?”

  “Because you’ve never met, and he may be a madman,” Cate said solemnly, which only made her words comical.

  Sophia slanted her a grin. “That’s not my chief concern.”

  “Well, perhaps”—Cate sniffed and busied herself straightening the perfectly neat cuffs of her plain dark day dress—“you crave a bit of adventure before binding yourself to anyone in matrimony.”

  Sophia swallowed and stared at the closed door in front of her. She thought of Effie Breedlove, the lady detective she’d created in her stories. Through her, she wrote of adventures, and, yes, perhaps she did crave more experiences than her small countryside village had ever afforded. But marriage would be a new adventure, wouldn’t it? She wouldn’t shy away from it as she had so much else in her life.

  “If he comes to visit as he says he will, I will meet the man. And finally discover his first name.”

  But the moment she turned away from the front door to head upstairs and look through her wardrobe for an appropriate dress to wear, her thoughts strayed.

  Jasper Grey and his lost sister weighed on her mind. Brushing her fingers across the spot where he’d caressed her cheek, she recalled the look in his eyes. Beyond fatigue and worry, she’d glimpsed more. Attrac
tion? Desire?

  Nonsense. The man had probably never met a woman he didn’t consider seducing.

  She’d assisted him. He was grateful. Nothing more.

  More important was whether he’d reach Holden and Phyllida in time. What if the couple were already halfway to Scotland? Sophia suspected worry for both of the Greys would plague her until she got word of the young woman’s safe return.

  Seeking a distraction, she retrieved story pages from her desk and began reading over the last chapter she’d written. As she skimmed lines, she felt the outline of Ogilvy’s overturned photograph under her fingers.

  Since they were to meet tomorrow, her vow not to look at his photograph seemed pointless. Moving her pages aside, she flipped the photograph, bending over the image to get a good look.

  Dark eyes and hair. A neatly trimmed beard; short, pomaded hair; symmetrical features; and a flawlessly arranged necktie. He was a respectable-looking gentleman, serious and unsmiling. Ogilvy’s visage inspired nothing more than an interest in cataloging his features.

  That was much better than how being in Mr. Grey’s company provoked her.

  Wasn’t it?

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  As he stepped from the hansom cab, the driver scowled down at Grey as if he wished to memorize his face in case he heard later about some mischief committed in Bloomsbury Square.

  Grey couldn’t blame the man. At shortly after five in the morning, the sun had just begun to come up in warm pink and peach shades, and few were out walking the streets in this respectable district of London. Delivery men were about their business and street sellers had begun to move carts into place, but no fine ladies or gentlemen were out promenading in the square.

  He considered approaching the Ruthven front door, then thought better of raising the entire household at such an ungodly hour. Heading down the pavement along the row of whitewashed townhouses, he found an alley leading to a mews. Picking out Sophia Ruthven’s townhouse wasn’t difficult, but he couldn’t be sure which room might be hers.

  Someone had left a second-floor window open to let in a bit of cool evening air. Wasn’t that just what a lady used to countryside breezes and unacquainted with London’s noxious fog might do?

  A full moon poured its glow down to light his path into the house’s back garden, and Grey bent to retrieve a handful of pebbles from the gravel path next to a freshly planted row of primroses.

  On stage he’d climbed bowers, scrabbled over windowsills, and even jumped off “bridges.” He sincerely hoped he could rouse Sophia without having to risk life and limb.

  He chucked a few of the tiny stones up toward the open window and waited. Just when he ducked his head to choose another from his palm, the window sash shot up.

  “Stop it,” she whispered. “Are you mad? We just had new window glass installed.”

  Sophia’s hair tumbled over her shoulder and a baggy night dress covered every inch of her arms, chest, and neck, but Grey’s body still jolted in response to the sight of her natural and unbound.

  “Come down and speak to me.” He needed more than a conversation with her, but he’d start there.

  “Return at a more reasonable hour, and I’ll consider it.”

  Good God, did the woman think of nothing but propriety?

  “Being reasonable is the least of my concerns.” It never had been. Not for many years, anyway. And he couldn’t worry about the rules of social calls when his sister was in danger of destroying her future. “I need your help, Sophia.”

  She stared down at him a long moment and then ducked inside. He expected the window to slam shut too, but she poked her head out again a moment later. “Come around to the front door.”

  As he made his way back onto Bloomsbury Square, Grey went over what he wished to say. He had to convince her, and he practiced his words as if he was about to step on stage.

  “Hurry,” she said from the Ruthven front step, “before anyone sees you.”

  If he wasn’t so exhausted, he might have found her fussiness amusing.

  Once she admitted him to the vestibule inside Kit and Ophelia’s front door, he could see by the gaslight that she hadn’t gotten much sleep. Puffy circles had begun to form beneath her pretty eyes, and she was frightfully pale.

  With the wave of her hand, she bid him follow her into the parlor.

  “What help do you need, Mr. Grey?” She was still whispering and crossed her arms over the dark, high-necked day dress she’d donned. Chin high, back straight, she already looked irritated and defiant. He didn’t bother mentioning that she’d misaligned the buttons of her gown.

  Grey believed in diving in head first, tearing off bandages quickly, and receiving bad news straight on. He sucked in a long breath and blurted what he guessed Sophia Ruthven would take as very bad news. “I need you to come with me to Brighton.”

  For one fraught moment, she only responded with a crinkled brow. Then she tilted her head, as if she wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly. “You. Want me. To come to Brighton. With you.”

  “Precisely.”

  “I’d suspected it from the moment I met you, but now I’m certain.” Three graceful strides and she stood slipper to boot with him. She tipped her head to the side, her blonde coil of hair slipping from her shoulder onto her back. “You’re not just bad and dangerous to know. You truly are mad.”

  Byronic compliment aside, he was certain, of all the condemnations that had been hurled at him, that he was not mad. He’d tasted the edge of it once, shortly after his brother’s death. But now drink and women and indulgence usually kept the darkness at bay.

  “No, Sophia. Just desperate. I’ve reason to believe my sister is on her way to the seaside with Clive Holden.”

  “When did they depart?” The furrow in her brow deepened. “How can you be sure she’s with him? Did you speak to her?”

  Grey tugged his pocket watch from his waistcoat and checked the time. They’d need to head to the train station soon, but he could see from the skepticism in her eyes that she’d require a thorough explanation before agreeing to accompany him.

  “After leaving you this afternoon, I went straight to Hampstead. At the home of Holden’s uncle, a servant advised me to seek Clive at a local inn.” What a wild goose chase that had been. “The innkeeper couldn’t recall renting him a room and kept me waiting an hour for his wife’s return, so that I might question her. I suspect that delay was a ruse to inform Clive of my presence. A coachman outside the inn told me a young man matching Holden’s description tried to hire his rig for a trip to Brighton.” Grey scrubbed a hand across his stubble-roughened chin. “He was already promised to another traveler, but Holden did succeed in hiring another coach.”

  He swayed toward her, not out of desire but exhaustion.

  “Perhaps you should sit.” Sophia remained standing and pointed to a settee. “When did they depart?”

  Grey knew he shouldn’t sit. The temptation to rest his head and doze would be too great. But he found himself slumping down with a grateful sigh. “Shortly before I returned to speak to you. Less than an hour ago.”

  “Why would they take a coach when a train would get them there more quickly?”

  “Privacy. Time alone.” The same reasons he would choose to travel with a woman via closed carriage rather than a potentially crowded train car. She’d been gone for days. Grey had no illusions about Liddy’s chastity, but he couldn’t bear to see her promised to a bounder like Holden.

  Sophia let out a distressed gasp as realization dawned. “You must go after them. But I cannot accompany you.”

  Irritation set a muscle ticking in his jaw. “If my suspicions are correct, Clive knows I’m on their trail. They will be expecting me in Brighton.” Grey edged forward, braced his elbow on his knees, and gazed into Sophia’s eyes. “Neither of them will be expecting you.”

  “No.” She shook her head, slowly at first and then more vehemently as she fiddled with the ribbon at the neck of her gown. “You can’t
honestly expect me to apprehend them.” But there was an unexpected flash of interest in her eyes. Unbidden, the image of Sophia as a fearsome lady thief-catcher arose in Grey’s mind. She’d be rule-bound and relentless, he suspected.

  “If we could separate them, that would be a start.” Grey stood, ignoring a wave of dizziness and the aching protest of his sleep-deprived body. “You could approach her, divert her long enough for me to confront Holden.”

  “I can’t accompany you, Mr. Grey.” Sophia crossed her arms and began tapping her fingers on the sleeve of her gown. Grey followed the direction of her gaze and noticed an envelope on a corner desk.

  Grey should have known his friend’s sister would be as stubborn as Kit. And it wasn’t as if Grey believed himself short on persuasive powers, particularly when it came to women. But Sophia was a unique challenge.

  He stepped away to keep from reaching out and attempting to persuade her in the way he knew best. Crossing toward the desk, he noted the name on the envelope that had snared her interest.

  “Is Mr. T. Ogilvy coming to call?” Some scoundrel’s sense told him it wasn’t a mundane social visit. “A suitor?”

  “My callers are none of your concern.” Sophia rushed across the room and snatched up the envelope.

  Grey looked down into her fierce green-blue eyes. She was close and warm and wafting her virginal lavender scent. When had stubborn spinsters become so bloody tempting? “What would Ogilvy say if he knew you’d been locked away with the Earl of Westby in his study?”

  Once the irrational red-hot flash of jealousy waned, Grey was almost as shocked by his words as Sophia. Her eyes had gone wide, and her full lips had fallen open.

  He ached to kiss her. Seduction was his way with women, not petition.

  She pivoted away and strode toward the unlit fireplace. The tangled tumble of loose honey-gold curls softened the effect of the ramrod straightness of her posture.