The Lady Hellion Read Free Page A

apologize to whichever lady you’ve slighted and end it.”
    “It is impossible to apologize. And why can you not be involved?”
    He placed his hands on his hips. “Many reasons. Six, to be precise. Would you like them in alphabetic order or order of importance?”
    She sighed. This was going badly. She had no one else to ask, no one with a chance of keeping her secret. And she and Quint were friends . . . of a sort. Based on their previous history, she’d thought he’d agree. That he would, at the very least, want to protect her. What could she do to convince him?
    “Fine. I shall ask someone else.”
    He quirked an eyebrow, his expression too knowing, drat him. “And whom shall you enlist in this tutelage?”
    She rapidly searched her brain for a name, for any bits of gossip she’d overheard. “Lord MacLean has been rumored in a number of duels. He must know the way of it.”
    “And he’s a rake. Burned through the entire lot of Edinburgh innocents and had to come to London just to ravish more. Your reputation would never survive it.”
    “That hardly signifies.” In more ways than one. “I merely want the ins and outs of the thing. And if you will not show me, I will find someone who can.”
    His jaw hardened, but his eyes burned into her, churning with an emotion she’d never seen before. Was it . . . doubt? It gave her pause. Quint moved about the world with ease, with no need to question himself because he was rarely wrong. Any criticisms he encountered were for matters he cared little for, such as the unfashionable length of his hair or his appalling sartorial sense.
    But this was new. He looked . . . uncertain.
    “Then you must do whatever you feel necessary,” he finally said, reaching to knead his temples with his fingertips. “I apologize I am unable to fulfill your request. Taylor will see you out.” He bowed and then headed for the door.
    She watched him go, stunned at both his rudeness and the expression on his face.
    “Quint,” she called to his back. He stopped but did not turn. “Are you all right?”
    “Never better,” he answered and disappeared into the corridor.
    “No,” she whispered into the empty room. “Somehow I think not.”

    “Well, that did not take long,” Alice said once they were on the walk back to the Barnes town house. “Did his lordship agree, my lady?”
    “No.”
    A pair of older ladies strolled near in the rare spring sunshine, and Sophie smiled politely as they passed. The streets of Mayfair were busy once again, with horses and carriages each way you turned—a sign that another Season was nigh.
    The familiar heaviness settled in Sophie’s chest. She dreaded the next few months. More dress fittings. More inane chatter. Dancing with the men her stepmama foisted on her. Pretending to ignore the pitying, curious glances.
    She had no one to blame but herself. Some mistakes could not be undone.
    Alice came alongside. “What shall you do now?”
    “I’ll figure something out. Do not worry on it, Alice.”
    Her maid made a dismissive noise. “A dangerous game your ladyship is playing.”
    “So you’ve said on more than one occasion.”
    “I wish your father had not let you sit in on some of those cases, my lady. It was not proper for a young girl at such an impressionable age to hear sordid tales of criminal behavior.”
    Sophie hid her smile. Oh, she had loved every minute. Instead of ignoring her after her mother died, her father had kept her even closer. Wherever the marquess went, so did his little girl. The quarter sessions he would oftentimes attend were her favorite.
    When she was nine, she’d told him she wanted to be a magistrate when she grew up.
    He’d laughed. My dear, girls cannot be magistrates, though you’d make a fine one. But you’re to marry and have your own family. That is what proper young ladies do.
    Sophie didn’t like to be told no, especially because “that is what proper young ladies do.” Hang propriety.
    Turning to