The Virgin Who Ruined Lord Gray - Anna Bradley Page 0,18

might have been a quick enough chase led to a race through every back alley in Westminster. She’d led him down one darkened street after another as if he were a clumsy, dull-witted cat and she—small and quick and like a shadow herself in her black clothing—a particularly wily mouse.

If there was a corner to duck into, she found it. Once she’d made it through the churchyard and onto the Strand, she stayed close to the sides of the buildings where the darkness gathered, clinging to the walls as she passed, slipping silently around London’s edges.

All the way to No. 26 Maddox Street.

There was nothing unusual about the sprawling brick building there. Nothing to distinguish it from any other Mayfair residence, but then nothing about the Clifford School was what it appeared to be, least of all its inhabitants.

There was a brass plaque fixed to one side of the front door. It was small, unobtrusive—not meant to draw the eye.

The Clifford Charity School for Wayward Girls. Lady Amanda Clifford, Proprietress. Pupils accepted by private recommendation only.

Tristan hadn’t approached the door tonight. He hadn’t ventured from the shadows to read the plaque. He already knew what it said. He’d memorized it weeks ago, after Jeremy Ives, one of Lady Clifford’s servants, was taken up for the murder of Henry Gerrard.

Ives was currently being held at Newgate. In another week he’d stand trial for his crimes, when he’d certainly be found guilty. Tristan was looking forward to his hanging with grim anticipation.

He threw the coverlet aside, rose from his bed, and made his way to the window. He shoved the drapes back to find only darkness waiting for him on the other side of the glass.

Not that the hour made much difference. He’d have no more sleep tonight.

He didn’t keep track of time anymore, but he must have stood at the window for hours, staring blindly into the darkness, because when he came back to himself the sky had lightened, and the sun was edging over the horizon.

You look like an aristocrat, rather high, I think.

An accurate guess, on her part. He hadn’t been quite so accurate, on his.

She wasn’t a thief. Or perhaps it was more appropriate to say she wasn’t just a thief.

He might have learned more if Daniel Brixton hadn’t emerged from the shadows like some kind of disembodied spirit. If he’d been in his rational mind, Tristan would have been expecting Brixton to materialize. The man had preternatural instincts, and he was a proper watchdog.

Massive, but cautious. Quiet, and clever. Above all, deadly.

Lady Clifford chose her people well.

Even without Brixton’s sudden appearance, Tristan might not have gotten anything more out of the girl. She’d been afraid, yes. He’d felt her slender body trembling against his. Fear did tend to loosen most people’s tongues, but then she, like all of Lady Clifford’s disciples, wasn’t like most people.

Not that it mattered much by then. By then, Tristan knew enough.

He’d lingered in the darkness outside the school for some time after Brixton was gone, staring up at the dark windows, fury gathering like a storm in his chest. She’d told him she’d gone to St. Clement Dane’s Church tonight to say her confession.

Perhaps she should have done so, while she still had the chance.

* * * *

“You look like death, Gray.” Caleb Reeve, Lord Lyndon, threw himself into the chair across from Tristan’s at the dining table and signaled the footman for coffee. “No use burying yourself behind that newspaper. I can see you’re a bloody wreck.”

Tristan peered over the edge of the Times. “What the devil are you doing here, Lyndon? It’s not calling hours.”

Lyndon snorted. “Calling hours are for debutantes and their marriage-minded mamas. I’m not here to court you, for God’s sake.”

Tristan set his paper aside with a sigh. “Why are you here, then?”

“I came for Mrs. Tribble’s apricot pastries, of course.” Lyndon rubbed his hands together as the footman set a plate of steaming tartlets in front of him. “I could forgive your ghastly appearance this morning if I thought you’d gotten up to a proper debauch last night, but you left White’s before ten o’clock. No doubt you were in your bed by half ten. Now then, Gray. Why so feeble this morning?”

Lyndon spoke with studied nonchalance, but Tristan heard the note of concern in his friend’s voice. He and Lyndon had been at Oxford together, and knew each other far too well to have secrets between them.

Henry’s murder, the circumstances surrounding his death, Tristan’s nightmares—Lyndon