Page 3 of The Confessions of a Lady
One day, I will learn my letters. When Mother’s safe, and I’m settled in a fine house as a lady’s maid.
It was a fond dream, much like Constable Sweet and his wife’s marriage. They almost gave Penny reason to believe in romance. Almost. But sacrificing personal autonomy on the altar of matrimony seemed too great a risk. It certainly hadn’t worked out for her mother. Penny’s father took more than her mother’s heart with him when he died in the Middlesex House of Corrections. He took her chance of ever having safety. Security. Freedom. Penny learned young and well the only person she could depend on was herself. Her wits, work ethic, and cunning.
Wits, work ethic, and cunning she needed to employ with far more vigour. She would find the letters linking Lord Renquist to the Devil’s Sons and their horrific crimes. She would turn them over to Constable Sweet and collect her reward. Then she would free her mother and get her settled into a common lodging until Penny could afford better. She would find her dream job as a lady’s maid in a wealthy house, a position paying significantly higher wages than those of a simple house domestic. She would finally be at peace.
I was a good lady’s maid. Even if I only worked for Lady Drake a short time.
Constable Sweet’s connections helped secure her a place in Major General Beaufort Drake’s household a month after her mother’s imprisonment. She worked for his then fiancée, Miss Millicent Whittenburg. The young lady wasn’t what Penny had expected. Resourceful, courageous, and ever so kind to Penny. It was a shame the whole job had been a ruse. Still, Miss Millicent – now Lady Drake – had been so pleased with Penny’s work, she wrote a glowing letter of recommendation despite being upset ather maid’s departure. Penny would have stayed if she could, but that was impossible.
Her job as Millicent’s maid was the first she’d taken with an ulterior motive. To find evidence against the Devil’s Sons. Constable Sweet cooked up the idea and helped place her in Major General Drake’s household, granting Penny closer proximity to Lord Reynard Renquist, the Marquess of Stoneway’s younger brother. Reynard was rumoured to have ties with the Devil’s Sons despite his friendship with the honourable Major General Drake.
She was close to proving Reynard’s connections, but her investigation into the matter was rudely interrupted by the man’s untimely – and in Penny’s opinion – highly suspicious death. Unfortunately, coming close to proving something didn’t mean sixpence to stitches. Reynard was dead and Penny hadn’t been able to connect him to the Devil’s Sons. If she had completed that mission, the reward money would already be hers and Harriet would be sleeping in a warm bed with food in her belly and clean clothes on her back.
But Penny had failed, and her mother suffered the consequences.
Her new mission was the brother. Major General William Renquist, Marquess of Stoneway. By all reports a much more wily adversary. It only made sense Reynard’s older, more dangerous, more mysterious brother was likely a member of the Devil’s Sons. He must have paved the way for Reynard’s admittance into the filthy fraternity despite the younger brother’s lack of wealth or power… two things William Renquist held in abundance. Two things the Devil’s Sons demanded from their members.
‘Constable Sweet, I know I failed in our first mission. After everything you did to get me my position in Lord Drake’s household – and now what you’ve done to place me here – I’mforever in your debt. I won’t let you down. I’ll find evidence against this wretched man. I swear it.’ Her voice shook with the weight of her determination. Evidence against a member of the peerage as high as a marquess – only one step beneath a duke – would gain Penny her much-needed blunt and allow Constable Sweet to rise in the ranks of the Metropolitan Police. They already agreed Constable Sweet would present any evidence she found and give her the reward money while he took the prestige of discovery. It was a fair trade as Penny had no desire for notoriety and Constable Sweet was in no need of the money.
‘Never you mind about what I’ve done. None of it matters if I can’t keep you and your mother safe. Lord knows you’ve suffered your fair share.’ Constable Sweet lowered his gaze and shook his head. ‘No little dove deserves to grow up in a prison.’ He and his lady-wife had never been blessed with children and he’d often likened Penny to the daughter he’d never had. He hunched into his coat, pulling a woollen scarf higher around his ears. ‘You best be getting out of this cold and back to your room before that Mrs What’s-’er-face catches you. The last thing we need is for you to get dismissed.’
She nodded. ‘I was able to sneak away after bedtime two nights past, but the confounding woman caught me just as I was leaving the servants’ quarters.’ Penny almost had her ears boxed, but quick thinking saved her, as it usually did. ‘I told her one of the other maids had left her penny dreadful in the kitchen and was too scared to come down and retrieve it, so I offered to do so. Mrs Harding sent me back to my room and told me if she found the novel, she would toss it in the fire where it belonged.’Lovely woman, Mrs Harding. A delicate flower caught by whimsy and wrapped in maternal instincts.Penny almost snorted at her own joke.
‘Go on with you, little dove. Get inside where it’s warm.’
Penny’s lips twitched into a soft smile. ‘I’ll never forget everything you’ve done for me, Constable Sweet. If it weren’t for you…’ She let the sentence die.
‘Stuff of nonsense. What have I done that any other blighter wouldn’t have? I’ve known you since you were a wee mite. I’ll always do best by you, dove.’
A light caught Penny’s attention through the wavering glass of the kitchen window. Someone was coming down the hall.
‘Quick now! Off you go. We can’t have Mrs Har-ser-what’s-it catching you out ’ere with the likes of me.’ Constable Sweet pushed on the latch to the kitchen door and scooted Penny inside. She watched him scuffle into the darkness before swiftly turning to face the dreaded Mrs Harding.
Penny needed an excuse. Fast.
The lantern light grew brighter as heavy footsteps echoed on the wooden floor.
2
William Renquist was filthy, tired, and ravenous. It had been a hard, eight-day ride from Holly House, his country estate in Cheshire. He should have stayed at another coaching inn to split the last leg of his journey, but after more than a week of sleeping in vermin-infested beds at various country inns and posting houses, drinking watered-down wine and eating spoiled beef, it seemed wiser to push onward.
After all, the Queen had finally commanded his presence, and one did not make her majesty wait if one cared about their long-term health.
Liam couldn’t believe the fates and their twisted sense of humour. When he promised Queen Victoria upon his return from the Anglo–Afghan war – almost four years prior – to join her secret band of vigilantes should she ever need a man with his particular skills, he never guessed his brother’s death would be the catalyst for her call.
Queen Victoria didn’t require his immediate services after learning the news of Reynard’s tragic end. She granted him three months to mourn his brother’s death. But the Devil’s Sons were only becoming bolder in their crimes. More women had gonemissing. More country girls lured into the city, drugged, and sold into the flesh markets of Europe. And it wouldn’t stop until the evil bastards orchestrating the operation were destroyed. It was time for Liam to come back to London.
I should have returned the day Reynard stepped off the boat from France. Perhaps I could have helped him. Stopped him. Saved him.
But Liam thought Theodore had needed him more. And so, he had stayed in the country.
In the end, it didn’t matter. I couldn’t save either of them from their demons.
The Renquist legacy of evil. He shook his head, disgusted with his entire male line. But Liam wasn’t ready to give up the fight against the darkness plaguing his soul. The Queen needed him. And he needed this mission. A chance to redeem himself while also seeking absolution for his brother’s sins by dismantling the secret society of sick bastards Reynard had joined. Perhaps unleashing his beast on monsters worthy of the violence simmering in his blood would bring him some measure of peace.
Unlikely.
But saving the innocent women these diabolical lords wished to destroy might. He hadn’t been able to save his brothers from their own depravity, but he would do everything in his power to ensure he didn’t fail the girls being so horrifically exploited.
