Page 53 of Lyon of Least Resistance

“My first memory was of living in London—a dark, wet street, on which I used to beg for coins, and”—she blinked slowly—“and pick pockets. I became adept at it, and for a while, my guardian called me his favorite little flower. But as I grew older…”

Her focus shifted, the gray of her eyes darkening to the color of a thundercloud.

“H-he said that he could earn more money from…” She gestured to herself.

“You don’t have to say it,” James said, his heart aching at the way she trembled. She closed her eyes and he sat beside her. She flinched as he placed his hand over hers.

Then she opened them again, her expression hard, and set her mouth in a firm line.

“He said he’d break me in nicely, then make a pretty penny selling me to one of the houses he frequented.” She spoke quickly, as if she wanted the ordeal to end as quickly as possible. “I lived there for some years, until I managed to free myself.”

“Free yourself?”

“The master locked me in my room, where I entertained his visitors.”

“The master?”

“We were told to call him that,” she said. “I didn’t know his name; none of us did. After the fourth year, he trusted me enough to let me entertain them with the others in the parlor.”

Sweet Lord, she was locked in a room for four years while men…

“W-were you paid?” James said, his stomach churning.

She gave a bitter laugh. “I was fed and housed. The master was paid.”

“But surely you could have…”

“Appealed to his better nature? Asked to return to my guardian? No…he visited me often, saying that he was entitled to my services for free. The master didn’t stop him.”

James opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again, shame twisting his gut. How many of his peers visited an establishment such as the one Cordelia had been forced to work in? Hell—he himself might have ended up there if he’d not had the means to visit the Lyon’s Den. What made him any different to them?

“Then, one night, during one of the”—she cringed—“the parties, a fight broke out. The master had debts all over, and when his creditors came to collect, he refused to pay. They beat him to death before our eyes. I-I saw an open door and took my chance.”

“You escaped?”

She nodded. “One of the girls was killed, but the rest of us fled and I found myself alone, on the streets, utilizing the skills I’d learned as a child. There’s plenty of drunken gentleman with full purses to be found near St James’s. But I was caught in the end and taken to a big house. I thought they’d whip me, or send for the runners…or sell me to one of the other houses. But they didn’t. This woman came, dressed all in black. Mrs. Dove-Lyon. She said that I had stolen from one of her visitors and risked her reputation, and that I must repay her ten times the amount I stole. I didn’t have it, so she put me to work.”

James shook his head. “So they sold you to Mrs. Dove-Lyon instead?”

Cordelia paused, and then, for the first time since she began her history, she smiled.

“No. Mrs. Dove-Lyon gave me a choice.”

“It doesn’t sound like much of a choice.”

“That’s because you’ve never been deprived of choice, Lord Bedford,” she replied. “Even the most insignificant of gifts is an abundance when one has been deprived of it. Those of us with no power over our lives take the power of choice where we can. Until that moment I had been the property of others, to use me as they saw fit. But with Mrs. Dove-Lyon, for the first time in my life, someone gave me a choice. I could work in the kitchens, or as a housemaid. Or…”

Or as a whore.

She shrugged and sighed, as if she could read his mind.

“Judge me if you will, but she presented me with an opportunity. To build a future. And it’s not something I hadn’t already done. Only this time, the visitors were required to follow Mrs. Dove-Lyon’s rules, and I could keep the money they paid. Less a small percentage, of course, for Mrs. Dove-Lyon’s trouble.”

Mrs. Dove-Lyon’s rules…

James recalled the contract he’d signed when entering the Lyon’s Den for the first time to purchase a night with a doxy:

Rule five: membership will be rescinded if the client 1) leaves a permanent mark on the service provider, 2) forces his attentions on an unwilling participant whilst in the building, 3) maims or causes the death of the service provider…