“Nothing else,” Gideon said, dismissing it.
A mistake was the only sensible explanation.
Longstaffe stirred and crossed to the sideboard. He refilled his glass, then turned back looking more troubled than thirsty.
“There is one more thing,” he said. “Concerning Lady Beatrice and her society.”
Gideon’s attention sharpened. “What?”
“They meant to keep it secret,” Longstaffe said. “But I’m afraid it is not as secret as they believe.”
Gideon had considered that risk. A servant might overhear. One of the ladies might speak too freely. Still, he had decided a handful of women trained together was safer than leaving Beatrice alone in it.
“I suppose it was inevitable.”
“Inevitable,” Longstaffe said. “But concerning.”
He looked down into his glass but his expression sent a sharper unease through Gideon.
“Tell me.”
“Hobbes heard a delivery lad speaking with the cook.” Longstaffe’s mouth tightened. “A handful of gentlemen have been discussing ‘interfering women’.”
Hobbes had served Longstaffe as his batman through the war and as his valet ever since. He was not a man who mistook idle gossip for useful information, nor one who repeated it lightly.
“How so?” Blackwell asked.
“Ladies conspiring against men. Meddling in matters beyond them.” Longstaffe looked into his glass. “The Vigilance Society was named.”
“Names?” Gideon said.
“Hobbes didn’t catch any. Only fragments.” Longstaffe took a slow drink. “But one called it an abomination. Another said one of the ladies ought to be taught a lesson.”
Blackwell went still. “Lady Beatrice.”
“Probably.”
Gideon set his cup down before he broke it. “What kind of lesson?”
Longstaffe shook his head. “That, Hobbes did not hear.”
Blackwell leaned back, his gaze hard. “We’ll have to assume the threat is real until proven otherwise.”
“It is talk,” Longstaffe said. “For now.”
“Talk is where men rehearse their intentions,” Gideon said.
Neither man contradicted him.
Why the devil hadn’t Gideon predicted this obvious consequence?
Had he been so intent on watching Beatrice—admiring her nerve, arguing with her, wanting her, inserting himself into the sharp, glittering orbit of her life—that he had failed to see the danger gathering around her?
God help him.
He had thought himself vigilant.
Even now, he had been so focused on the danger behind her—the bastard from five years ago—that he’d failed to properly account for the danger that was here and now.
