A Brazen Governess for the Duke (Dukes of Unholy Temptation #2)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

“You cannot do this!” Octavia Finch planted herself in front of the doorway and folded her arms. “I will not allow it.”

“Allow it?” Mr. Cosgrove snorted. “Tell me, Miss Finch, what it is that you plan on doing to stop me?”

“I… anything that I must,” Octavia said with what she hoped to be enough resolve to put this conversation to bed.

“I will sleep here if that is what it takes. I will set up a bedroll right here on the floor so that customers are forced to step over me. Tell me, how do you think that will be for business?”

“That’s a very interesting strategy,” Mr. Cosgrove said. “In order to keep me from firing you, you plan on disrupting my business even more than you have done. Perhaps if you set fire to my store, then I will have no choice but to change my mind.”

“At least it will attract attention,” she said with a hopeful grin. “You are always saying how desperate you are for new business.”

“I will not be changing my mind, Miss Finch,” Mr. Cosgrove sighed. The look on his face was one of despair, so that she almost believed that he was upset. “This has been a long time coming, and I would appreciate it if you did not make it any harder than it already is.”

“I do not understand it!” Octavia cried. “Please, Mr. Cosgrove, give me another chance. Nobody knows this store better than I. Nobody has made more sales – sales that were only possible because I am your best employee. You know that I am.”

“You are also my most troublesome one,” he said. “Yes, your aptitude for sales is rather… impressive. As is your knowledge of even the most obscure books.”

“Then how can you –”

“This is not about your work history,” he spoke over her. “This is about the negative effect you have had on my store since I hired you. Just last week, my front windows were smashed. The cost…” He sighed and shook his head.

“I had nothing to do with that!”

“And last month? Those thugs who spent a week straight prowling outside my store, scaring away my customers? They would still be there, were it not for the fact that I sent for the authorities to hurry them away. It has been one thing after the other, and while it pains me to do it, Miss Finch, I am left with no choice.” He looked at her plainly. “I need to let you go.”

As Mr. Cosgrove listed off his grievances, Octavia tried her best to formulate excuses and arguments for why they should not matter.

Her sales record. Her love of books. How much she had come to enjoy this job, even if she had only been employed in it for two months.

But as each counterpoint came to mind, they faded just as quickly.

He is right… as loath as I am to admit it. I am a bad bet, even if none of this is my fault. Even if by firing me, he is condemning me, not to mention my brother…

Not that he will care. Why should he? As always, I am on my own, a simple fact of life that I am all too used to by now.

“Fine.” Octavia dropped her hands and fixed Mr. Cosgrove with a glare. “If that is how it will be, I am glad that you are letting me go. I do not wish to work in a place that takes me for granted. As you have done.”

“Miss Finch, please…”

“I will take my last paycheck,” she held out her hand, “and I will be on my way, never to be seen by you again.” She scoffed. “Truly, I am glad you are firing me. This store has been failing for some time, long before you hired me, and I will not stay somewhere that I am not valued.”

He raised an eyebrow at her extended hand. “You do not truly think I will be paying you for this week, do you?”

“Of course I do!”

“The window, Miss. Finch. The cost…” He shook his head. “It is coming directly out of what I owe you. Honestly, you are lucky that I am willing to call it even, for your paycheck hardly covers the repairs.”

“You cannot do that!”

“I am doing it.”

“It’s theft! You are stealing from me!”

He shrugged. “If you truly believe that, please, send for the proper authorities and have me arrested. But I think we both know that is not an option…”

Octavia could not believe what she heard. Fury rose inside of her; anger the likes of which she had rarely known. She widened her eyes at Mr. Cosgrove, she bared her teeth, and she stood on her tiptoes as if to leer over him and intimidate the man into paying her.

I might as well pick a fight with a brick wall, for all the good it will do. He is a cheat, he is a scam artist… and he is also right.

It needed to be said that the men who broke the window of Mr. Cosgrove’s store were not associated with Octavia. At least not in the traditional sense. They were debt collectors, and the debt that they sought belonged to Octavia’s deceased father.

In a more just world, with his passing, the debt might be cleared, as she’d had nothing to do with it. However, as Octavia had learned several times in her life, the world was not just, and all one could do was whatever they could to survive.

A shame that such a thing was becoming next to impossible for someone in her situation… a most dire one indeed.

“Fine,” she hissed at Mr. Cosgrove. “If that is how it must be…” She turned on her heel and strode from the store.

“I do wish you the best,” he called after her. “Truly, Octavia, if you ever find your feet, you are always welcome back here.”

On the street, she turned and snarled. “You will never see me again, Mr. Cosgrove! And as for your bookstore…” She looked over the front of the store with vehemence and hatred. “I pray that with my leaving, it does not go the way of the dodo!” She scoffed. “Good luck.”

She fixed the outside of the quaint bookstore with one final look of perceived hatred.

It was hard to do, as Octavia had loved working there, and until five minutes ago, she might have said it was the best job that she’d ever had.

No small compliment either, as Octavia had worked more jobs than most did in three lifetimes.

Yet here I am again. No job. No idea what I am going to do. Utterly, hopelessly without options…

A final look for the outside of the store was spared, and then, with nothing else to do and not wanting Mr. Cosgrove to think that she was lingering so that he might feel sorry for her, Octavia turned and walked away.

It was early in the evening, the sun just now disappearing behind the city skyline. Octavia had never much liked London when it turned to night because, in her experience, that was when the undesirables of the city came out to play. Certainly not a place for a young woman like herself to be found.

With that in mind, she wrapped her shawl around her shoulders, put down her head, and hurried through the deserted streets.

While she did not have a permanent home, Octavia and her eight-year-old brother were currently staying at a local townhouse, a home to many people in a similar circumstance to her own – not destitute, but certainly not able to afford permanent lodgings.

If I do not find another job soon, destitute is exactly what I will be. Why did Mr. Cosgrove have to fire me now? A few more weeks and… and what? It is not as if things will suddenly improve.

She walked quickly, cutting through alleys, doing her best to mind her own business and appear invisible. Typically, as was Octavia’s way of late, she had no such luck.

“When one wants to find a street rat, all they need to do is look to the gutter…” The voice was mocking, and it was joined by a chorus of laughter.

Octavia froze. She recognized that voice… oh, how she did, just as she had hoped she might never hear it again. A chill ran through her bones, one that had nothing to do with the cool wind that whipped down the alley, and she forced herself not to turn and flee.

Fleeing would come soon.

“M – Marcus,” she stammered as she eyed the man who had spoken. “Isn’t this a lovely surprise.”

Marcus was one of three men who wandered down the alley toward Octavia.

He was short of stature, wiry of frame, and with features that were ugly and brutish.

The two men with him were large by comparison, arms like tree trunks, necks just as thick.

They were each dressed poorly; she could smell them at a distance, and the look they wore on their faces was one that struck fear into her.

Rightly so, as they were members of a debt collection agency known as the Butch’s Boys, and as far as they were concerned, Octavia owed them a lot of money.

She did not owe them money, nor had she ever. Her deceased father was the one who owed them a debt, but in their eyes, she was now responsible for paying it. For years, they had been hassling her, chasing her, making her life a misery in all the ways that they could.

By the looks of things, the snarl in Marcus’ beady eyes, they were just about done being patient.

“It is for us,” Marcus said as he strolled down the alley, his muscles flanking him on either side. “You’ve been avoiding us, Octavia. Butch ain’t too happy about it.”

“I have not been.” She searched the empty alley, knowing there was no way that she could possibly dodge past them. “Nor do I owe you anything.”

“Your loser of a father did,” Marcus snarled. “Which is the same in Butch’s eyes. Now, it seems like a silly question to ask, but do you have what’s owed? Or do we need to remind you of what happens when we ain’t paid?”

They came slowly for her, their shadows flung down the walls of the alley like ghouls slowly closing in so that she could hardly breathe. She was no threat; they knew she could not escape, so they saw no point in hurrying.

That’s their mistake…

“Of course I have your money,” Octavia sighed as she feigned reaching into her dress.

Marcus came to a stop and blinked. “You do?”

“Yes,” she said sharply. “Just let me –” She turned and ran.

“Oi! Get her!” Marcus’ cry rang out behind Octavia.

Octavia ran as if her life depended on it. In many ways, it did. She hitched up her skirt, she tried her best to keep her shawl from flying free, and she put her head down as she charged ahead.