A Midsummer Night's Sin (13 page)

It was wrong to be thinking of herself while Miranda could be in such dire straits. Wrong.

Do you love life? I do. I love life.

Regina knew she couldn’t have answered yes to Puck’s question. Not last year, not last week. But for this week, she would have an answer. No matter what the future held for her, what her father planned for her, for this week, she would love life.

And the devil with the consequences!

“Regina?
Regina!
Goodness, child, don’t you hear your mother calling to you?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, Aunt Claire, I’m so sorry,” she said, hoping her face didn’t betray her recent lascivious thoughts as she hastened to sit herself down at her mother’s feet, take the woman’s hands in hers. She blinked, seeing the smile on the woman’s thin face. “Mama? You’re not crying anymore.”

It was true. Her mother’s eyes were shining but not with tears. She looked somehow younger. Happy.

“Your father will never know, will he? That’s what you said. He’ll never know. He doesn’t know. For the first time in twenty horrible years, I don’t feel the weight of his thumb on my back. I don’t have to cringe
when I hear his footfalls in the hallway. I don’t have to listen to his crudities. I don’t have to look upon his ugliness of mind and soul. He won’t tell me how stupid I am, how he will have me locked away for my own safekeeping once you are wed.” Lady Leticia closed her hands into tight fists and shook them. “Why was I crying? I won’t waste another precious moment in tears. For however long it lasts, I am
free!
”

“Oh, Mama,” Regina said brokenly as she laid her head on her mother’s lap and gave way to tears of her own.

“S
O
, M
R
. B
LACKTHORN
,” Lady Leticia said as two servants competently went about the business of presenting the final course of the meal served in the more intimate of two dining rooms in the Grosvenor Square mansion. “My daughter tells me you’ve spent some time in Paris since we gallantly freed the country from the rule of that despot Bonaparte. Is it very gay there?”

“My lady, Paris is a beautiful city. I see now that it lacked only your gracious presence and that of Lady Mentmore to make it perfection on earth. But do allow me to tell you about some of its glories.”

Regina blinked back tears, not for the first time since her mother had confessed the scope of her terror of her husband and revealed what she saw as her future once her daughter was sold to the highest title Regina’s father could afford.

She had continued her high spirits, commanding Hanks to order a bath prepared for her and then fuss
ing over her toilette, complimenting the maid’s clever way with the curling stick, choosing and then discarding three gowns before settling on a flattering butter-yellow gown of Regina’s in favor of any of her own.

Of course she would be going down to dinner. Of course she would be civil to Mr. Blackthorn; he was, after all, their host. Of course she would enjoy her meal, as she was famished, truly famished.

Good evening, Mr. Blackthorn, how considerate of you to have us as your guests. What an attractive room. Everything is beyond lovely, really. No, oh no, thank you, no wine, Mr. Blackthorn. Have you any lemonade?

Now Lady Leticia was all attention as Puck regaled her with silly stories of the vagaries of the restored ruler of France, smiling as he confided delicious
bon mots,
actually tittering behind her hand as he dared even more delicious gossip when he saw that she enjoyed hearing it.

Why, one could almost think her mama to be flirting with the man!

Once or twice Regina’s aunt had caught her eye across the table, at first looking to her quizzically, then shrugging her confusion and finally to mouth silently,
he’s very nice.

He was. Puck was very nice. No, he was beyond such a simple word. He was magnificent. He was dressed impeccably, his blond hair tied back at his nape with a black riband, the lace at his cuffs understated and elegant. But better than that, from the moment the trio of
ladies had come downstairs, he’d been attentive, witty, polite and kind.

He had apologize to Lady Leticia for having taken her unawares with his mad scheme, assured Lady Claire that he would do everything within his power to see that her daughter would soon be with her mother once more, frightened, yes, but other than that, unharmed.

Lady Claire believed him. That was obvious by the way she took his reluctant hand in hers and actually raised it to her lips in thanks.

He’d blushed then, like an embarrassed youth, and Regina had longed to hug him.

And somehow, with all that faced them, he had managed to make a party out of this first dinner together in Grosvenor Square. Why, even Lady Claire had smiled a time or two and actually added to the conversation at one point, telling a tale she’d heard from the viscount about a French actress who had nearly managed to snare, it was said, Wellington himself with her charms. Lady Claire so wanted to visit Paris, but her husband evinced no interest in anything French, save their brandy.

Regina had noticed Puck’s smile rather freezing on his handsome face for a moment when her aunt had been speaking of the “conniving actress,” but he recovered before anyone else could see, she was sure, and had quickly turned the conversation to the awe-inspiring architecture of Notre Dame.

And while he romanced the ladies—surely, there
was no other word for the magic he was dispensing with such ease—she never felt neglected. When he looked at her, which was often, it was always with a smile seemingly reserved just for her. He was a magician, an enchanter, and she was more than willing to enter into his enticing web.

He was a boy. He was a man. He looked at the world and saw good, even when surrounded by the bad. He was all that was charming, but she could sense the danger beneath the surface, his intelligence, his delicious humor, his compassion, his willingness to take risks, his thirst for adventure.

Do you love life? I do. I love life.

I will take you where you have never been, touch you in ways you have never been touched. Until you weep with the joy of it.

“Madam does not care for trifle?”

Regina looked up at the butler, Wadsworth, only then realizing that she hadn’t lifted her fork to so much as take a single nibble of the delicious-looking confection of strawberries, cake and cream in front of her.

“No, no, I’m convinced it is delicious. I simply cannot seem to find it in myself to take another bite. Thank you, Wadsworth.”

The butler signaled silently with one white-gloved hand, and a footman appeared to remove the plate even while Wadsworth turned his attention to Lady Leticia, assisting her from her chair at the foot of the table. The hostess had risen. It was time for the ladies to retire, leaving Puck to his brandy and cigar.

He was on his feet, holding Lady Claire’s chair for her, and promised to join everyone in the drawing room shortly.

But Lady Leticia waved off his statement. “I fear I have overdone, Mr. Blackthorn, and have just the touch of the headache. Lady Claire and I will take our leave of you now, in the hope that tea and cakes might be brought to us in my chamber in good time. Mr. Blackthorn, you are an exemplary host, and I thank you for your consideration.”

Puck bowed over her hand, repeated his bow to Lady Claire and then, lastly, lifted Regina’s hand to within an inch of his lips. “As soon as you can get away, please,” he said quietly. “You’ll have need of your cloak.”

Regina shot a look to her mother, who was chattering animatedly with the viscountess.

“You’ve learned something?”

“Possibly. I would not involve you except that—”

“You promised,” she finished for him. “What if you were to find her? She would need me there, to calm her. I must be with you when she’s found.”

He appeared ready to say something else, but her mother called to her, and she only curtsied to Puck and followed her mother and aunt out of the room. Looking back only once to see him, his head tipped slightly to one side, his smile deliciously mischievous, watching her as she walked away.

It was difficult not to skip the rest of the way, but she admonished herself to behave. At least for now.

H
E’D BEEN IN A FORGETTABLE
port city along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, his ship driven there to escape a storm. No more than eighteen, set loose on the world just as legitimate heirs had been sent out to complete their educations by dipping their toes into as many corners of the world as were not embroiled in war or otherwise off-limits to them.

He doubted his father’s notion of a Grand Tour included this squalid, smelly, hot as Hades scar on the world. Older, wiser, Puck might have remained in the dockside inn while repairs were completed on the ship bound for Jerusalem. But believing himself immortal or invincible or whatever young men believe of themselves, he had already abandoned his tutor on the docks of Dover and set off on his journey, eager to see and enjoy life, and this place seemed to be teeming with it.

With all the bravado and naiveté of the young and wealthy, he’d left his valet to his laundry and headed for the center of the town to a place his inn host had, in execrable English, identified as the bazaar.

The sun grew hotter, the stench thicker, the crowds bumping shoulder to shoulder, the cries from the many booths entreating him to come, see, buy. Chickens
molted in their wooden cages, parrots squawked from perches, carcasses of animals Puck was hard-pressed to identify hung from the stalls.

He delighted in the purchase of an unusual gold ring for Abigail, as it was made in the shape of a flower, and happily haggled over the price of a necklace for Adelaide, the thing fashioned of three differently colored metals hammered together rather like delicate chain mail. He looked longingly at a small carpet his father might enjoy but rejected it after considering how heavy it was and the fact that he’d have to carry it back to the inn. He did buy himself a cunningly curved knife with an elaborate hilt and similar weapons for his brothers.

The twists and turns, the buildings so close together they seemed almost to touch by the time they climbed to a third or fourth story, it didn’t take long before Puck knew himself to be completely turned around, no longer knowing his way back to the inn through the maze of streets.

Finally coming into a more open square, he’d climbed onto a sandy stone wall and, holding on to a flagpole, squinted into what he could see of the distance. He spotted a visible sliver of the clear blue of the Mediterranean and grinned in relief. All he had to do was to walk downhill until he reached the docks. His inn was there somewhere.

With the bazaar finally at his back, the crowds thinned, the jumble of foreign voices became less raucous, and he made good progress along the docks until once again he was faced with a considerable knot of
men who all seemed to have been drawn by something taking place in front of one of the larger, more ornate buildings. Clutching his packages, and with smiles and apologies and bows—and one hand clamped firmly on the purse in his pocket—Puck made his way into the crowd and was finally able to see what all the excitement seemed to be about…and for the first time in his young life felt the bloodlust that lies below the surface of any man, the primeval urge to kill.

Up on a makeshift stage was a fat, bearded monster dressed in colorful robes. He was showing his large, white teeth as one of his enormous hands cupped the bare breast of a sobbing, cowering, completely nude, fair-haired woman.

All around Puck, men were shouting, laughing, holding up small leather purses.

“Bastard! Stop at once! I order you—let her go!” Puck’s muscles bunched as he took a step forward, determined to mount the stage and rescue the young woman. A burly man standing next to him laughed and grabbed his arms, holding him in place.

The man’s English wasn’t good, but it was sufficient. “If you were wise, young pup, you’d walk away. Our friend up there is trying to sell used goods and making a hash of it. If she were still a virgin, we’d never see her out here. He keeps the good ones intact for his best customers. It’s the brothel for that one. Shame. Pretty enough but without the maidenhead, she’s worth only half. Ah, see, Ahmed has bought her. She won’t last
long in his small Eden. They do things there, I hear, no good Christian like you or me should see.”

Puck watched, feeling impotent, as the girl, still sobbing, was led toward a flight of steps leading down to the ground. He could hear her calling on her God in German, begging anyone to save her.

She was almost immediately replaced on the bare selling stage by four black men of varying ages, their forearms chained as well as their ankles.

“No, got enough bucks as it is. Good day to you, sir,” the man said. He let go his grip on Puck’s arms and turned to push his way back through the throng.

“Wait!” Puck pushed and shoved his way until he’d caught up with the man. “This place. The brothel owned by this man, Ahmed. Can you take me there? I’ll pay you.”

The man smiled, showing his yellowed teeth and spit some sort of seed onto the planks at Puck’s feet. “You one of those, are you?”

“No! I mean, yes. All right, I’m one of those. Take me there.”

But then they heard the scream. And the curses.

Everyone pressed forward, the better to see what had happened. Puck punched and pushed until he was at the very front of the crowd, the packages he’d carried dropped to the ground and trampled, forgotten.

The girl he had seen only moments before lay on the dusty ground, surrounded by the bright red of her own blood. Somehow, she had managed to strip her new
owner of the knife he carried in his sash and turned it on herself.

Now, Puck’s new acquaintance told him, she was good only for the dung heap.

Puck purchased the body from the astonished Ahmed and arranged for a decent burial in a small Christian cemetery located just outside the town.

And then he asked questions. What had happened? How had the German-speaking woman come to be in this squalid place, up on that platform? He’d heard of slavery; in an abstract way, he understood the practice and even the reasoning behind it, although England had long since put a stop to the importation of slaves and warned English shipowners that it was now a crime punishable by death to carry slaves as cargo.

He’d learned that the practice still flourished in some areas of the world where the law either did not reach or was scoffed at as secondary when compared to the probable profits. He’d learned that slaves, the buying and selling of humans, could flourish in any country and not just Africa, as he had naively supposed. He’d learned that white slaves were not as valued as black slaves. They didn’t work as hard, and they tended to die faster, but there was a specialized market for virgins. The fairer the skin, the more in demand they were…and there was always a demand.

The ship had been repaired and a few days later, Puck traveled on to Jerusalem. He saw the Greek Islands. He walked the ancient lands, read the epic poems in the
shadow of history. But his education had been completed in a forgettable port in an unremembered town.

Over time, he had put the memory at the back of his brain. He’d been little more than a boy, and he had done all that he could.

Now he was a man, and fate had put Puck where it seemed to need him, both to save Regina’s cousin and the others and to at last act on the deeply buried fury and impotence of that long-ago day on the docks. That was the thing about life, as he saw it—there were often second chances. The thing was to learn from them when they happened the first time around.

Puck had been idly spinning the large globe in the study, knowing the port town his ship had been forced to stop at was no more marked on this globe than it probably would be on any map. How many places like it existed? How many poor souls had passed through them, still might pass through them on their way to the hell of slavery and degradation? How long would profit trump morality?

That the practice seemed to be flourishing right now, here in London, was not to be countenanced. England couldn’t allow it, not when it preached to the rest of the world. Certainly not when it was their own women being taken. Jack had told Puck that his orders had been to find the illicit traders and eliminate them “by any means possible.” And without word of what had happened filtering to the populace. The Crown was not to be embarrassed.

That was fine with Puck. He would give any infor
mation he had to his brother, do everything in his power to help stop this bartering of human flesh.

But not until Regina’s cousin was safe and safely out of it, her life restored, her reputation intact. Not until he, personally, confronted the perpetrators of that particular crime and dealt with them, as he had been unable to do so many years ago. That’s what second chances were all about. But it had already been more than two nights since Miranda disappeared. Would he have time?

“Puck?”

He shook himself out of his thoughts and turned to see Regina standing in the doorway, a dark gray cloak folded over her arm. She had removed her jewelry, and her hair had been taken down from its pins, so that its length was now only tied back loosely at her nape. Her gown was modest in cut, and black, clearly not one of her own.

She looked so beautiful, apprehensive even as she attempted to appear otherwise, and he could feel himself succumbing to her on a whole new level. She was so courageous, even as she was clearly frightened. He coveted her beauty, her lush body and had from the start. Now he adored her mind and determined fearlessness, her willingness to dare anything in order to save her cousin. He’d never met her like and doubted he ever would again.

Puck bowed in her direction. “And to whom do I owe the pleasure?” he asked, causing her to smile, which was what he had hoped. “Ah! A moment! Yes, I recog
nize that smile. It is she, Miss Hackett. What a delightful surprise.”

“You make a game of everything,” she scolded, although he could tell her heart wasn’t in the insult. “The gown is Hanks’s best and the cloak, as well. And these,” she said, putting out her right foot to show the jean boot, “belong to one of the housemaids. If we are called upon to run yet again, they’ll be much more serviceable. Now, where are we going?”

“Not to Carleton House, surely, adorably lovely as I find you at the moment,” he told her, speaking of the Prince Regent’s residence. “And you won’t be leaving the coach, in any event. You and I and the estimable Davy Tripp will be riding about the area of Covent Garden, on the hunt for someone by the name of La Reina, although I doubt that’s the name the man was born with. Shall we go?”

Regina took his offered arm. “That’s Spanish, isn’t it? It means the queen. What an odd name for a man.”

“The man performs an odd job,” Puck told her, wondering how thorough an explanation he could safely render and then deciding on complete truth. Life was also an education. But first he’d attempt the more oblique approach. “According to Davy, La Reina works for one of the men who…manage ladies of the evening.”

She shook her head as she walked with him through the kitchens, also taking time to wave at the cook and a few other servants who had been relaxing over cups of tea and had quickly leaped to their feet in surprise. “No, I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

“Gloves off, then?” Puck asked her.

She turned to him as one of the footmen put down the steps to the coach. “I’m afraid anything less wouldn’t help.”

Once they were settled inside the coach, Davy up on top beside the coachman, and they were moving off down the alleyway to the street, Puck tried again.

“Ladies of the evening, those who are not so fortunate to have found a single gentleman’s protection and are forced to…ply their wares on street corners, take their customers into alleyways to complete their transactions and often share their earnings with men, who in turn…watch out for their best interests.”

“Oh,” Regina said, shocking Puck to his heels. “You mean they use the services of a pimp. A male procurer.”

“You shouldn’t know that word. Any of those words.”

Regina looked down at her hands, which she had primly folded in her lap. “My father has a copy of Mr. Frances Grose’s
Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue
in his study. He ordered all the books at once, although I doubt he’s opened any of them. Mr. Grose was, I understand, an antiquarian of some note at one time, before his fortunes forced him to publish whatever he could, and I thought the volume would be educational.” She sneaked a look up at Puck through her eyelashes. “It certainly was.”

“You read it all? You didn’t realize what it was and quickly put it down? Worse, it would appear you’ve committed some of it to memory.”

“I’m not invited to as many social events as Miranda. I had the time.”

“And the inclination,” Puck teased, feeling certain that if it were not so dark in the coach, he might see her blush.

“I blame Grandmother Hackett. Kindly do the same, please. And tell me more about this man, this La Reina. I do not shock as easily as I should, Puck.”

“It would appear, however, that I do,” he said, grinning at her as the coach made its way through the darkened streets. “Very well, I’ll tell you everything Davy told me. You already know that there have been other disappearances, other women taken, some of them right off the streets.”

“Yes, you told me. Shop girls, maids.”

“And prostitutes. La Reina is employed by a pimp in a neighborhood very close to the location of what is now the infamous masquerade ball. He is, according to our new friend Davy, a slightly built fellow, although very good with a knife, if pressed to use it. In order to protect the pimp’s entourage, as of late, the man has been fitted out as a woman of negotiable virtue, spending his working hours on those same street corners, should one of his employer’s ladies encounter a problem with any of her customers. Where the sight of a burly man might keep customers away, La Reina appears as no threat to them. After all, everyone still has to make money, no matter the potential danger.”

“That’s…rather ingenious. La Reina must make a tolerable female?”

“If we locate him, you can be the judge of that. His appearance was clearly enticing enough to have a few men attempt to snatch him up off the streets very late Friday evening as he walked alone, as a man would be more prone to do than an unaccompanied female. They let him go when they realized their mistake and once introduced to the man’s talented blade.”