A Most Improper Rumor Read Free Page B

kit. “There are no secrets in our household.”
    Well, there was
one
, but he would learn it soon enough.
    “I naturally asked him why you were detained and she did give him her card.” Alicia lowered her gaze for a moment. “I was hardly trying to be inquisitive about your private affairs, but—”
    “Lady DeBrooke is not a ‘private affair,’” he interrupted brusquely. “I had every intention of telling you all about it once we had a minute alone. I think you’ll find it quite interesting.”
    “Oh?” She relaxed a fraction, though it wasn’t as if she really thought something was amiss; it was just that the woman had been accused of murdering two people, not to mention her undeniable allure was part of her infamy.
    “I think it has happened more than we even know.”
    “What has happened?” She wrinkled her brow as they rocked along, the sound of the wheels on the cobbled street making her raise her voice.
    Ben gazed at her in a very direct manner. She loved the color of his eyes, somewhere between gold and green, with small flecks of brown. “Picture this scenario, if you will. A very beautiful debutante is the toast of proper society, adored by all the beau monde, and she marries well, as we all would expect. Then her first husband dies of an attack the doctors cannot explain, but such things do happen. She respects the proper mourning period and reenters the elite circles of the
ton
, only to marry advantageously another eligible young man after being yet again a sensation. Why would she not? She is still young and lovely at twenty years of age.”
    Her lips slowly parted. “Lady DeBrooke.”
    “Thomas, Lord DeBrooke, was a friend of mine. He was definitely enamored of his young wife and I never heard of a hint of dissension between them.”
    She had to admit the synopsis of events fit quite nicely. “And then he dies in nearly the same time frame after the wedding as her first husband and from ostensibly the same disease.
    “There’s no question of suspicion of her. Of course all eyes turn her way.” Her husband lounged there, his face thoughtful. “Rather clever, actually. Diabolically so, of course, but still neatly done. If both men were poisoned, and if she is innocent, that means that someone deliberately sought to ruin the most feted young woman in society, and certainly the method was extreme and effective. Does it remind you of a recent occurrence?”
    It did. Quite chillingly, in fact. “You think the same person is behind all of this as was Elena’s abduction and the resulting scandal?” Not that long ago, Alicia’s beautiful cousin had been kidnapped and locked away with one of London’s premier rakes for almost a week, destroying her reputation irrevocably.
    “I must wonder.”
    So did she. And there was a warming feeling that touched her that he would so easily share the information. The last case he had tried to shut her out as much as possible, but Elena was part of her family and Alicia had insisted on helping when she’d discovered she was missing.
    “Murder is drastic in comparison.”
    “I think,” he said in a contemplative voice, “our opponent is flexible when it comes to the measure of the steps he will take to gain his ends. It’s about power more than anything else. The crime itself doesn’t matter. Both Elena and Lady DeBrooke were meant to suffer in the resulting scandal. Luckily, in the case of your cousin, the ploy did not turn out at all as planned and Viscount Andrews married her. Lady DeBrooke was not so lucky.”
    Quite a happy marriage at that, but Alicia was thinking more about Lady DeBrooke. “This started years ago then.”
    “If there is a connection between what happened to your cousin and my recent visitor, yes.”
    The similarities were striking; that was for certain. “Your theory works only if Lady DeBrooke is innocent.”
    “True.” His lashes lowered a small distance in a mannerism she was starting to know well. He was