Page 84 of One Night with a Rake

The time since he left Georgette that afternoon had been spent productively. First, he went back to his Cheapside flat to collect his mail and order the payment of several bills, including his long-suffering tailor. He’d neglected the business end of his life of late. It was soothing to do something which required only logic with no troubling compressions of his gut.

His friend Lord Rhys Warrington had sent him a letter and Nathaniel pulled it from his waistcoat pocket to reread it by the yellow light of the gas lamp on the street outside Yorkingham House. After Rhys explained that he’d married Lady Olivia Symon rather suddenly—almost by accident, really—he penned the most interesting part of the missive.

Since I married Lady Olivia, Mr. Alcock tossed me a crumb of information that could lead to our full vindication. According to Alcock, Nathaniel’s friend wrote, there is a witness who can attest to the plot to deliver fraudulent intelligence to us prior to the battle at Maubeuge. The man’s name is Sergeant Leatherby, but he took ship for Portsmouth before I could locate him.

He is willing to testify, but is justifiably concerned for his safety should he do so. If you have the ability to travel to Portsmouth to apprehend him, I urge you to do it. I am still on my honeymoon and my bride would not appreciate me playing enquiry agent at this stage in our marriage.

If I can aid you in any other matter, call on me.

Nate refolded the letter. Rhys could do nothing to help him now. But at least the information in the letter was a start toward protecting his family from Alcock’s spite.

He looked up at Georgette’s dark window.

He needed to protect her from other things. From her fearless meddling in sordid places. From the man in the tweed coat and deerstalker he’d noticed entering Sadie O’Toole’s new brothel. The gentleman moved in Georgette’s circles. Nate had seen him about town in fashionable haunts and remembered his name.

But he needed confirmation before he made an accusation.

That evening, Nathaniel had retraced his steps and revisited O’Toole’s red door, going in this time. He hired the girl with the freshest bruising on her neck for an hour. But instead of bedding her, he spent the time in her squalid chamber convincing her to tell him all she knew about the man in the deerstalker and tweed jacket.

“’Is name? Ye don’t think the gentlemen gives us their real names, do ye, guv?” the whore had asked him, casting him a jaundiced gaze. “The other girls and me, we just calls him Mr. Handy.”

“Because he’s useful?”

“No, Gawd love ye. It’s because he likes to use his hands on us, and not in a good way neither, if ye catch me meaning.” She pulled back the hair she’d let tumble around her shoulders in hopes of covering the mottled purple at her neck. “He likes to choke us.”

Her gaze dropped to her lap. “He watches, like a snake, while me eyes go dark. Then when I comes to myself, he’s got his thing inside me, pumpin’ away like there’s no tomorrow.”

Nate poured her another shot of the whisky he’d brought with him, but didn’t interrupt her tale.

“The trick is to lie still as the dead and take shallow breaths whilst he does his business, ye see,” the girl said. “It goes a lot faster that way. If ye move, he starts over by putting yer lights out again.”

The girl went on to say that the rumor around the whorehouse was that Mr. Handy had killed a girl in Sadie O’Toole’s last brothel. Maybe more than one. The whores thought Sadie must have the goods on him because he was free with the blunt every time he came to visit. Which was far too often for the working girls’ comfort. In any case, Mr. Handy was the one putting up the coin for Sadie’s renovations, so he pretty much got to do anything he wanted with anyone he wanted.

And in his own private room too.

When his hour was up, Nate told the girl about his House of Sirens on Lackaday Lane and offered her a place there if she wanted out of her current life.

The girl covered his hand with kisses and promised to present herself to Mrs. Throckmorten as soon as she could steal away the next morning.

Nate still didn’t have enough proof to go to a magistrate with his suspicions, but he’d be on the watch since “Mr. Handy” was accepted by the ton. He’d protect Georgette from him with his heart’s blood if necessary.

But most of all, Nathaniel needed to protect Georgette from himself. He would bring her only grief, only disgrace, and he couldn’t bear to taint her life with it.

Nate realized with an ache in his gut that he wanted the best for her. Georgette deserved to wear a crown. She deserved every happiness.

Even if it wasn’t with him.

That meant he had to step aside and let her match with the Duke of Cambridge proceed. When she wed the royal duke, he’d probably slip into the nave of Westminster to stand and listen to her vows echo in the soaring arches overhead. It would make him go dead inside, but making certain of her future with the royals would be the last good thing he could do for her.

Then he’d go in search of Sergeant Leatherby in Portsmouth for the sake of his friends and their happiness.

There could be none for him.

So this is what love really is.

He thought he’d known when he was betrothed to Anne. When he lost her, he’d wallowed in grief and self-pity. He’d mourned for the future he’d imagined with her, for his solitary march through the years after she’d gone.

But he realized now that it had always been about him.