“This is a business call, Lord Newbury. No need to stand on ceremony.” She sat first, however, knowing he would not until she did.
Thomas settled, his eyes narrowing a bit in an expression that was more curious than confused. “Why are we meeting in your mother’s office?”
“It’s my office, actually. I’ve run the household for almost five years. As I mentioned at the ball, my mother abdicated that responsibility in favor of paying calls and visiting the modiste.”
“Ah,” he said, propping the cane against one arm of the chair. He opened the case and removed two sheets of paper. “That actually brings us to the reason for my visit.”
“I’ve been waiting with bated breath.”
He paused, an expression that wasn’t quite a smirk twisting his lips.
His lips. Full and sweetly kissable lips.Rose! Stop looking at his lips!She shifted her gaze to his eyes—which wasn’t much better. They were so dark it was almost impossible to tell iris from pupil, with lashes longer and fuller than any man had a right to have.
Rose!
“I’m sure you were,” he said, and for a moment Rose had to think what he was responding to. A knock on the door saved her from further embarrassment as Davis brought in the tea tray with a steaming pot and some of their cook’s finest biscuits. “Shall I pour, my lady?”
“Please do so.”
“Sir?” Davis looked at Thomas.
He nodded. “Sugar, no milk.”
Rose took her teacup and saucer from Davis. “You should really try the biscuits, Lord Newbury. They’ll make you forget your morals.”
Thomas choked on a laugh as his teacup rattled in Davis’s hands. Rose grinned at them both and reached for a biscuit. As Davis left, a slight scowl on his face, Thomas plucked a biscuit from the tray. “If we are not going to stand on ceremony, you should call me Thomas.” He took a nip of the biscuit.
Rose felt a tinge of heat in her cheeks and she tried to look neither at his lips or his eyes.Perhaps his nose.“Of course. Please call me Rose. In here. Not out there.”
Thomas nodded. “I would not dream of doing otherwise. Theseareexquisite biscuits.”
“I’ll pass your compliment to Cook. Down to business?”
Thomas placed the papers on the desk in front him, but did not yet push them toward her. He spoke in an even, firm tone—a man presenting a business proposition, not paying a courting call. It helped Rose focus. Thank God.
“My brothers and I have three primary goals for this season. Reclaim our place in Society, find wives, and protect our sister as she searches for a husband. Your goals are similar. Protect Lady Cecily and the other unmarried young women currently out in Society, and find Lady Cecily a husband.”
She nodded and he continued. “You have an information network consisting primarily of servants and vendors who help you achieve your first goal. Your second goal is obviously much easier, as Lady Cecily is this season’s finest debutante. Men will flock to her in droves, which means you and her father will have to sort through the dross to find the gold. Your information gathering will aid in this.”
Thomas took a breath but kept going. “I propose that we can aid each other with these goals. I can expand your body of knowledge about the marriage-minded men of Society by adding in information gathered by my brothers and me from the higher echelons of the male brotherhood.”
Interesting, but...“I already receive details from the top men’s clubs in the city. Even brothels have servants.”
“Yes. But nobles tell their peers things they will not dare say in front of servants. And any servant who lingers too long at one table in a gaming hell soon finds himself without a job.”
“We both knew about Broxley and Northey.”
“Yes, but you knew their reputations and that they were scoundrels with foul intentions.”
“I did.”
“Did you know that they had plotted to assault Beth specifically and were in competition to see who could do it first?”
A chill slithered down Rose’s spine. “They what?”
“They had bragged about it in a private room at one of the hells. Over a game ofvingt-et-un. They both need her dowry, and they have no fear of ruining themselves. Their goal had been to ruin her, force marriage, then leave her at her father’s house while they departed with the money for America. Northey anted up, in that he planned to get her with child before leaving. An heir.”
“That is... unbelievably despicable.” Rose felt numb. She knew men could be evil, but this was beyond the pale. “It never occurred to either of them that they would find themselves at the end of your pistol instead?”
