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“Notcrimestoday,” Duchess said. “A particular crime.”
“Which one?”
“Lord Draven’s tumble at the Beaufetheringstone ball.” It was a gentle way of referring to the man falling three stories to his death. “Apparently there was a woman seen fleeing the scene,” Duchess continued. “As we all know.”
Lady Helene, daughter of the Marquess of Havistock, who hadalsobeen at the scene of the crime that had left one Lord Draven—odious, unpleasant man—dead as a doornail in Lady Beaufetheringstone’s prized rosebushes two weeks earlier.
The lady’s father hadn’t simplybeenat the scene of the crime, however. He’d been the one doing the killing. The rotten man came from an aristocratic family that had built a fortune through the mistreatment of people across the globe. In London alone, he was invested in several private prisons that boasted abominable conditions and a half-dozen factories that “borrowed” their workers from South Bank workhouses, forcing them to labor in unbearable situations.Workers. They weren’t workers. They were children—vulnerable and forgotten... considered disposable by men like Havistock.
Like many others, the Marquess of Havistock hadbeen on Adelaide’s list for years. She’d been waiting for the man to do something that would see him sent away forever, and here it was. While most of the aristocracy happily ignored the truth about how Havistock had built a fortune, they would not be able to stomach the murder of one of their own, by one of their own.
All the group needed was proof—which Lady Helene, Havistock’s own daughter, would be able to provide, just as soon as she was liberated from the gilded cage of her father’s London home.
Which was where Adelaide and the others came in. “So they think it was us who gave Draven the push.” When Duchess nodded, Adelaide added, “And it was you who made sure of it.”
“I called upon Mr. and Mrs. West last Tuesday.” Duncan West, owner of theNews of London, and his wife, who knew everyone and everything one might wish knowing in Britain. “It may have slipped that I heard that it was not one woman seen fleeing the scene, but a pack of them.”
Sesily raised a brow at that. “Surely we can come up with a better collective thanpack?” She paused. “Pride? Bevy?”
“A group of ravens is called an unkindness,” Imogen offered.
Sesily’s brows rose. “NowthatI can support.”
Adelaide laughed, but kept her attention on Duchess. “I picked Havistock’s pocket that evening. That’s when we got the accounting of his factories.” A little book, not unlike the one she’d just lifted in Lambeth, that the marquess rarely let out of his sight, with information on each of his five factories, including worker counts, schedules, funds paid to workhouses for the workers’ day labor, and more.
“And there hasn’t been a peep of that at Whitehall,” Sesily spoke up. “Havistock no doubt decided not to report our minor crime in order to stay clear of the attention of his major one. Honestly, I’m a bit offended. If we mean to be rid of someone, we do it publicly. Not by tossing someone from a balcony.”
Adelaide agreed. The group might take joy in punishing men who took joy in punishing those who held less power, but they did what they could to avoid trial for murder.
“Nonetheless,” The Duchess continued, “the papers like the story of mysterious women scorned.”
Adelaide scoffed. “As though the only way to see the truth of the world is to be scorned by a man.”
“As though being scorned makes one mysterious,” Sesily added.
“Are we mysterious?” Imogen asked.
“Not if you have anything to say about it, Imogen,” Adelaide replied.
Imogen, wild about explosives, smiled broadly. “I like to make an entrance.”
“You like to make ascene,” Duchess said. “Lucky for you, no one ever expects you can actually pull one off.” Adelaide couldn’t help the little smile that came at the words. No one ever expected women when real damage was done.
No one ever expected women, period.
“The point is,” Duchess added, “Havistock is both mad and cunning, and I don’t expect him to rest until he discovers who witnessed his murder of Lord Draven. That person—Lady Helene—is in danger. It won’t matter she’s his daughter; he will absolutely end her if he discovers what she saw. And if he discovers that she’s run off... he’ll stop at nothing to fetch her back.”
Adelaide winced at the words, shuddering at what came next. “Or silence her.”
The quartet went quiet. They’d spent years fighting the worst of London—those who misused money and power to keep those who were weak under their thumb, and during that time, they’d come up against more menthan they could count who would happily disappear their child to keep their power.
Lady Helene knew what her father was capable of and had come to them, following the network of whispers about the mysterious quartet of women who meted out justice to men who were too powerful for the regular channels.
Like dozens of other young women before her who’d witnessed horrific events, Helene had sent word through one trusted servant to another and another and another down the line to the Duchess of Trevescan, who had immediately sprung into action and ensured that the young lady would never have to sleep under her father’s roof again.
The Duchess had returned the missive instantly, instructing the lady to be prepared at precisely seven o’clock that evening. Lady Helene was to wait, bag in hand, to be removed from Havistock House.
As a diversionary tactic, Adelaide would meet with the young woman’s mother at the same time, ensuring that Lady Helene would have a touch of a lead before the whole of Havistock House came looking for her. Including her terrible father.
