Page 21 of The Rakehell's Seduction
Perdita’s brows knit, her eyes far too serious, and it only made Alex’s anxiety grow. “My brother, Thomas, he told me once about those books. Sometimes the bets are silly things, but other times they are quite serious. I’m afraid for you, Alex. If you’re the subject of a bet, that cannot be good. Usually it means a man is betting on seducing you.”
Alex swallowed hard. That would be a bad thing—a very bad thing. If men in London were plotting to ruin her, that was serious indeed. She’d heard of men going to great lengths to ruin ladies. There were always tales of desperate fortune hunters who talked young ladies into racing to Gretna Green to marry over the anvil against their families’ protestations. But that wasn’t all. She’d recently heard that a year ago a duke had abducted a young woman whose uncle had defrauded him over an investment scheme. The couple had thankfully ended up married, but the scandal had been all over London for months. Alex could imagine a man kidnapping a woman to win a wager if there was a large amount of money involved.
“You must get Mr. Worthing to tell you the particulars of the wager. We might be on better guard that way,” Perdita suggested.
Ambrose hadn’t wanted to tell her that much about the betting book earlier. Alex doubted she could convince Ambrose to do anything he did not wish to.
“Perdy, would you be able to distract Lord Darlington while he is here? I fear Lothbrook is too small a place, and whatever his intentions are, he might succeed whilst he is here.” She knew she was asking a lot for her friend to risk her own ruination by keeping a known rogue distracted, but they had little choice.
“I can try. I’m sure Mama will help us—unknowingly, of course. She is quite smitten with the idea of a match between us.”
“What?” That was news to Alex. “How do you know that?”
Her friend plucked a wildflower from the thick patch of blooms where an errant gardener had not taken care to remove them. Perdita played with the red petals and sighed.
“Mama wishes to buy me a husband, and a titled lord in desperate need of coin is easy prey. She will want to snatch him up for me. We’ve had chances before, but none of the other impoverished lords were…” Perdita blushed. “Well, Mama wants beautiful grandbabies, and she took one look at Lord Darlington and fainted. She will chase him for me if she gets a chance to convince him to marry me.”
“Oh, Perdita.” Alex’s heart swelled with sympathy, and she hugged her friend. “You won’t marry a man simply because your mother decrees it, will you?”
Perdita blinked, her eyes a little too bright. “I normally would say no, but…I confess, Lord Darlington is rather fascinating. He’s the sort of man I might fall in love with, but I am not some chit just out of the schoolroom. He would break my heart if I dared to trust him with it. I honestly don’t know what I would do if he proposed to me. I suppose I should be thankful he’s more interested in you. But then again, he doesn’t wish to marry you, likely only ruin you.” She chuckled dryly. “Alex, dear, we are in quite a spot of bother, aren’t we?”
“We are indeed.” Alex raised her chin and glanced across the vast Darby gardens and found where Darlington and Ambrose stood talking.
“What if I went to London?” she said suddenly.
“London?” Perdita let the wildflower fall to the ground. “Why London?”
“Don’t you see? I could hide in plain sight. Lord Darlington has no chance of compromising me if we are in public all the time. I won’t let my guard down for even a moment, and he won’t have the chance to ruin me. My mother is there, and she could see that I’m never without a chaperone.”
Her friend’s eyes sharpened as she considered this new plan. “Yes, yes you are right. That might work.”
Alex clasped her friend’s hands in her own. “Would you come too, Perdy?”
“Why yes, of course,” Perdita agreed. “There are a few places I wish to visit since it’s been positively ages since I’ve been to London.”
Alex grinned in the light. “Then we face London together.” She knew that despite Perdita’s mother wanting to marry her off, Perdita had avoided London as much as Alex had since they had come out in society. Neither of them had been interested in marrying simply to please others.
“Then it’s settled.” Perdita smiled back. “We flee to London.” And they both dissolved in a fit of giggles.
*****
Ambrose watched Alex and Perdita giggling and sharing conspiratorial glances at the far end of the garden. Vaughn Darlington stood beside him, brooding and silent.
How things had changed. Ambrose’s chest tightened at the thought. Years ago they would’ve been scheming together and stealing kisses from maids in the bushes.
“I suppose you’ve read the betting book at White’s?” he asked.
They had seen each other the night the bet had been written down. Ambrose wouldn’t forget watching Vaughn seated at a table only half a dozen feet from the betting book as Ambrose had listened to the low rumblings of the men discussing Alex’s fate and her future ruination. At the time it had sickened him, and now, having met her, he was filled with righteous anger. A woman had a right to enjoy lovemaking and not be the subject of a man’s cruelty. After what they’d shared in the garden, he knew she would be a good lover, and the thought of sharing her or giving her up to some brute from White’s… He shook his head again, trying to erase thoughts of Alex outside the gardens with him above her and the glorious passion that he craved all for himself. Perhaps his reasons had become selfish, but he refused to let another man have her.
“I have seen the book.”
“And you decided to take up the wager?” Ambrose asked carefully.
He had signed his name, officially taking on Alex’s seduction himself, but it was still open for any man to beat him to it. It was that thought more than any other that was gnawing away at him. Not because he wanted to win for his own sake, but for Alex’s.
“I might have.” Vaughn was watching him rather than the party guests. “And so have you, I believe.” Then Vaughn looked toward Perdita and Alex. “Does she know you are playing her false to line your pockets?”
Rage bristled beneath Ambrose’s skin. “See, this is why we are no longer friends. You assume I dictate my life choices based on my need for coin. But I’m not like you, Vaughn. I’m a friend of Lord Rockford’s, and I accepted the bet to ensure that Alex’s first time is enjoyable, not wretched as those others driven by money might make it. Unlike you, I have a heart.”
