Page 78 of Her Impeccable Scoundrel
Mr. Morley might be close at hand but that was uncertain. She’d wait for Graeme, at least a few more minutes.
She was counting out seconds when the door opened and the clawlike tentacles of Madame closed on her forearm and pulled her in, slamming the door behind her.
Chapter Seventeen
“Alone?” Lord Vernon crowed from the chair where he sprawled. “You continue to surprise me, Blythe. Where is Chilcombe, your new protector? Or am I mistaken? Is it young Jarrow who has won your favors?”
His eyes glittered with what she once would have attributed only to the poison. But now she knew it wasn’t just the laudanum. There was an evil inside him that made him gloat when he thought he had a weaker creature in his grasp.
She tore her gaze away and surveyed the room. The furnishings, carpets, and curtains were of a quality that might grace a slightly shabby Mayfair drawing room. The chair where he sprawled was upholstered in faded blue damask, matching the curtains and the long sofa where another woman reclined.
Clad in a colorful man’s banyan printed with tropical flowers, her head wrapped in a turban, Lunetta Casale offered a weak smile. Jaundiced and drawn, she couldn’t be long for this world.
“Thornsby told me you called this morning,” she said, her voice raspy, yet her tone was seductive.
“Thornsby?” Blythe asked.
“That would be me,” the woman she thought of as Madame said in an unaccountably cheery voice. “And now you’re back. And Lord Vernon has deigned to call on us as well.”
Ah. The cheery tone was meant to defuse Lord Vernon.
“Alas, I am not here by invitation, sweet Blythe,” he said. “I had to inquire here and there to find Thornsby’s pied a terre, and a charming one it is. Gifted her by one of your former protectors, was it not, Thornsby? So your butler was not lying this morning when he said you weren’t at home. Slipped out without Chilcombe noticing, eh? And where was the impeccable new earl this morning?”
She held her breath, fixing her gaze on him so she wouldn’t glance at the women and give away the fact that they must have lied to him.
“I shall send a doctor to help you, Lunetta.” She reached behind her and opened the door.
Lord Vernon leapt from the chair and braced his hands on either side of her, slamming the door shut in the process. “Not so fast,” he growled. “Where is that will?”
“I don’t have it.”
“No? Lunetta said she gave it to you this morning.”
“Did she? Well, I don’t have it now.”
“Bitch.” He punched at her, but she ducked, and his fist connected with the high crown of her bonnet. She tore at the tie and spun away, her hair falling loose from its pins.
“Where is it? If you destroyed it…” He turned a glare on Lunetta. “Or, did you lie to me, Lunetta? Yes, I believe you did, or Blythe wouldn’t have returned this afternoon.”
Lunetta struggled to sit up, too weak to stand. “Go away, Vernon.”
“Why you…” He stepped closer and drew a pistol from his pocket. “Give it to me.”
“It was wrong what you did.”
“I want that will.”
“Drugging Archie so he would sign it was wrong. Leaving his lady with one pound was wrong. All so you could get your hands on her.”
The villain laughed. “The way she ignored her husband’s needs, she deserved it. I cannot wait to, as you say, get my hands on her. Blythe’s such a pleasurable handful. When she screams it’s real, not an act like you and the other whores put on, Lunetta.”
Blythe inhaled sharply and edged close to the door, groping for the knob.
Thornsby reached for a stick near the hearth, and Lord Vernon flashed the pistol her way. “Where is it, Thornsby. You of all people wouldn’t let go of something that valuable.”
“And that’s not all,” Lunetta said, drawing his attention away from her friend.
Blythe felt the knob turn under her fingers and moved out of the way as the door opened and Graeme slid silently into the room with Jarrow behind him. Both men had drawn pistols.
