Page 4 of The Last Chance
She inhaled deeply and looked at him, hope glistening in her eyes. “There is another option. Someone may have kidnapped him. Taken him against his will.”
“Kidnapped him?” Aaron gave a mocking snort. “Perhaps you drank too much ratafia tonight. What would anyone want with that reprobate?” Aaron sounded like a heartless rogue, and though he did not wish to hurt her, she had to acknowledge the truth. “Have you received a ransom note? He’s been missing for months.”
She hung her head. “No.”
The urge to comfort her overcame him, but he shook it off like an itchy blanket. “It’s of no consequence now. You have a more pressing problem.”
Miss Lovelace considered him through damp eyes. “Have you ever felt like you’re sinking in quicksand, and there’s no one to pull you free?”
Aaron swallowed past the bitter memories. The first night his father dragged him to the fighting pits, he’d been beaten by a man twice his age and size. He’d received a slap on his bruised back and a shilling for his trouble and told he would fight again the following week. There was no respite from the torture. Some nights, he prayed he would die.
“Many times,” he confessed but did not mention he found the house suffocating now his siblings had flown the coop. How the air seemed so much colder. How the chill penetrated his bones. “But I’m a man of action.” Keeping busy kept his demons at bay. “Is that not why you roused me from bed in the middle of the night?”
Her gaze fell to the open neck of his shirt, and she swallowed. “I’m sorry. You have enough to deal with, but I had no one else. No one capable.”
Don’t be sorry, he wanted to say.
“You’d better show me her body. I assume you know her identity. Let’s pray her death can be easily explained, and we’re not hauled before the magistrate at Bow Street.”
Miss Lovelace frowned. “Mr Chance, the victim is a man.”
“A man?” God, he prayed he wasn’t a peer.
“Yes, or a woman posing as a man. It’s hard to identify him. He is lying face-down on the floor like a fallen statue, cold and in silent repose.” She moved towards the stairs. “You’d better see for yourself.”
He followed her and had almost forgotten Sigmund was behind him until he heard the heavy stomp of his man’s feet.
“Survey the crime scene so you can be called as a witness,” Aaron said, issuing instructions to Sigmund. “Then wake Godby and have him drive you to the Wild Hare. The innkeeper will send word to Lucius Daventry. Await his arrival and tell him what’s occurred. Be quick. We need his advice before we summon a constable.”
“Aye, sir.”
Miss Lovelace showed them upstairs. She paused outside the door before gathering her wits and escorting them into the dark, musty room.
“There,” she said, pointing to the body of a well-dressed man with a silver dagger lodged in his back.
Aaron inhaled a calming breath and caught the metallic scent of blood. He had Sigmund light a lamp and observe the body before sending him to fetch Daventry. Then he studied his surroundings.
The room contained nothing but a rickety bed and a worn armchair. The faded wallpaper was peeling at the corners. Dust marks revealed where missing paintings once hung, like ghostly imprints of a forgotten past.
“I sold everything of value,” Miss Lovelace said, as if she couldn’t wait to be rid of her father’s memory. “I doubted anyone would want the bed. My father used to rent this room by the hour.”
Aaron cast no aspersions and had once done something similar to fill his club’s coffers. “The aristocracy expects a range of services when applying for membership. When was this room last in use?”
“My ladies listen to recitals, make pretty journals, dance and drink negus,” she said, keen to rebuke any suggestion of impropriety. “What use would they have for a room like this?”
“You admitted to inviting men here so your ladies could engage in conversation.” Why Daventry had made the foolish suggestion was a damned mystery. Indeed, Aaron would demand an explanation. “Do you know what happens when a man and woman are free to speak openly to each other? When they’re not bound by the rules of polite society?”
“I’m sure you’re dying to tell me.”
“An attraction develops.”
She laughed, the sound devoid of genuine joy. “We speak openly and are not bound by such strictures, yet are forever bickering.”
Were he not so skilled in the art of subterfuge, she would see something other than a firm jaw and a stern glare. Had he the capacity to be anything but a dangerous devil, he would have taken her in his arms tonight and kissed away her fears.
“You didn’t let me finish. Flirtatious banter and physical attraction are a lethal combination.” He motioned to the lifeless body of God knows who. A body that should have been seen by the coroner an hour ago. “One of your precious wallflowers may have been attacked in this room and resorted to killing this man in self-defence.”
Miss Lovelace hugged herself like she was the victim of an unwelcome assault. “Do you know the strength it takes to stab a man in the back?”
