Chapter Three
Normally Gabe would wait until the morrow to speak with his mother.
As it was after midnight, there was an even chance she would be deep into her cups.
But since Miss Caddick had made a scene, it was necessary to get as much information as possible, as soon as possible.
If she truly were a political liability—and a woman who frequented whorehouses certainly was—then there was still time to end Benedict’s engagement with minimal scandal.
But they had to act decisively or risk everyone taking her side.
His plan was to tell Lord Benedict all the dirt he could uncover and dissuade the gentleman from his disastrous course. There were plenty of young ladies who would make a good political wife. A woman who dabbled at the Rose Garden was not one of them.
He knocked on his mother’s door, noting that she had managed to keep the residence despite losing her latest paramour.
The house was a neat little abode in a decent corner of London, unlike where the Rose Garden operated.
His mother had not, however, managed to keep her butler.
Her maid answered the door and, upon seeing him, curtseyed and gave him a sloe-eyed look that set his teeth on edge.
Did every woman in his mother’s world want to seduce him?
“Is she sober enough to speak to me?”
“Oh yes, sir,” she answered. “She’s entertaining in the parlor.”
Was she? That did not bode well. Either she had found a new admirer or she was spending her coin in the hopes of trapping one. Her parlor would be a busy place, and she would be loathe to leave it.
“Please sir,” the maid purred, “let me help you undress.”
“No, thank you,” he said curtly as he set aside his hat and gloves, but kept the greasy package in his hands.
It was a gift for his mother, and he would not surrender it to anyone else.
He noted that his was not the only set of gentlemen’s attire set there, nor was this maid the only one nearby with a low-cut gown and paint on her pouty lips.
They were trainees, girls who were being taught how to seduce any man, even those with unusual proclivities. Especially those, because they were the Rose Garden’s stock and trade.
When he was young, he’d indulged in the offerings that constantly surrounded him whenever he was in London. But he was a man now, and he understood that he always felt vile after one of those encounters.
“I can show you the way,” the woman said with a sultry smile.
He ignored her and went straight into the salon. Surprisingly, everyone was still dressed, and several were in different chairs.
“Gabriel!” his mother cried. “Did I not tell you that he would come here?” she said to the others in the room. “He always runs back to his mama at some point.”
He ground his teeth. He came back here when common decency required it of him. And when he needed information that only she could provide. But since he was the petitioner tonight, he played along with her game.
“Good evening, Mother. You are looking beautiful as always.” It wasn’t a lie.
She was a stunningly gorgeous woman with bright blue eyes and curling blond hair draped oh so casually across her bodice.
She reclined on a settee, a glass of brandy dangling between her elegant fingertips.
She wore jewelry, of course. Stones worth as much as he made in a year, or so it appeared.
He had no idea how much of it was paste.
He pressed a kiss onto her powdered cheek, and she coiled an appreciative hand around his biceps.
“You’re keeping fit.”
How could she ooze seduction while fondling her own child? It made his back tense as he pulled away. “I should like a word, Mother,” he said formally. “If we could take a moment in private?”
“Of course! But first tell me what you have brought for me. I do love your gifts.”
He smiled and held up a greasy package. “Sausages, mother. Just as you love them.”
“From Vienna!” she squealed in delight.
If she thought he could get sausages from Vienna before they grew rancid, she was much mistaken. But such was the nature of his mother’s mind that logistical reality could find no purchase. “They are spiced just as you favor,” he said.
“Well, it’s not French brandy, but I shall love them nonetheless.” She reached out to grab the package, but he held it aloft. He had been caught in this trap before.
“Come with me to the kitchen. Shall I cook them up for you?”
“Oh, you darling boy,” she cooed. “You know just how to tempt me.”
Indeed, he did. He’d learned, by the time he was six, that she would rather starve than figure out how to work a cookstove.
Despite his powerful father, there had been lean times for himself and his mother.
Times when no servant helped, and all their resources had gone to making his mother attractive enough to gain another protector.
Indeed, it wasn’t until she threw her lot in with Madame Florina that their finances stabilized.
The fortunes of a single mistress might wax and wane, but a whorehouse always had customers.
Ignoring the mock outrage of the others in her parlor, Gabe left the front of the house and headed for the back kitchen. His mother was a few steps behind him after making sure that her guests were well entertained by her “students.”
He stoked the fire on her stove and waited for her to join him. She plopped down on a stool with a grandiose sigh.
“I vow I am getting too old for these games.”
“Which games, mother?” He was distracted with the setting the sausages in the pan or he would have realized that was the wrong question to ask. She was looking for him to decry her age, not ask for specifics.
“What a question to ask!” she snapped. “Do hurry with those. I’m quite famished.”
“What happened with Mr. Alonso? Has he decamped back to Spain?”
“Oh, you know those foreigners,” she said lightly. “They’re here for a time to enjoy themselves, and then off they go to sunnier climes.” She flicked her hands open as a performer might. “Poof and he no longer loves me.”
Gabriel said nothing, his attention on cooking. Silence reigned until he heard the plaintive note in his mother’s voice.
“But you still adore me, don’t you?” she asked. “A son’s love never ends.”
“Of course, mother.” A lie if there ever was one. His mother’s need for adoration sapped every man’s strength, including his.
“Of course, mother,” she mocked. She knew when he was lying. “Very well. Out with it. What do you want?”
Tension eased out of his shoulders. For whatever reason, she had no interest in wheedling for more affection.
“What do you know of Miss Janelle Caddick?”
“Lord Benedict’s new fiancée? I heard you upset the girl. Is it really wise to enrage your superior officer?”
His brows rose. Gossip flew fast in London. He’d only left the ball an hour ago. And they’d only announced the engagement a few hours before that. “Who told you about that?”
“Leo and Andre came from there.” She grabbed a bottle of some kind of tincture from a nearby shelf, dabbed the liquid on her hands, then rubbed it into her throat.
It was a lotion of some kind for fair skin, removal of wrinkles, or some other female nonsense.
She always had something nearby. Her store of perfumes could keep a glass maker in business for a year.
“The young bucks enjoy something fun after one of those tedious affairs.”
Or they knew she would value gossip about her only son. “Not everything is as it seems.”
“It seems you tried to scold a girl you’d just met and now are looking for dirt on her so as to defend yourself to Lord Benedict.”
Very well. Things were exactly as they seemed. He turned with pan in hand, ready to serve a hot sausage to his mother. She had already grabbed a plate and was clearly happy for the treat, but he held back.
“I know she was at the Rose Garden this afternoon. What is her predilection? Does she watch or participate?”
His mother stared at him a moment, obviously startled. Then she abruptly laughed, a cascading sound that had mesmerized many a gentleman. “Don’t be so dramatic, boy. Now give me those sausages!”
He used a fork to scoop one out, but he didn’t give it to her. “What does she do there?”
“Nothing! Dear boy, what would a slip of a country girl do at the Rose Garden? I dare say she doesn’t even know the place exists.” She held up her plate, her eyes on the hovering sausage.
“I saw her there this afternoon.”
Frustrated, his mother grabbed another fork and stabbed it into the pan before pulling out a fat prize. “What were you doing there?”
“You asked me to go, remember? To see if the roof truly needed repairs or if Madame Florina was being bamboozled.”
She looked up with a hopeful expression. “And was she?”
“No.”
“Well, that’s disappointing. It’s going to cost the earth to fix.”
He set the pan back on the stove. “The building has been hard used and needs several repairs if you don’t want it coming down on your customer’s…ears.” He purposely left the space before that last word, knowing she would appreciate the off-color joke.
She did, chuckling in that throaty way she used to captivate men.
It set his teeth on edge.
“Oh,” she cooed, “if only the walls could talk, what tales they would tell.”
“The walls do talk, and they sound like rats.”
She shot him an annoyed look, then applied herself to her food.
She used a knife to cut delicate slices, eating as neatly as if she were sitting with the king of England.
His nose twitched at the excellent smell, but he knew better than to join her at table.
She would eat every one of the sausages or share them with her guests.
She knew the power of appearing to be generous with potential protectors.
Gabriel, however, was not a potential anything to her. He was her son, and she used her place as his mother as far as he would allow.
“Do you know someone,” she asked shyly, “who could repair the roof without too much fuss?”
He knew several, but that’s not what she meant. She wanted to know if he knew anyone who would do it for free as a favor to him.
“I do not.”
“Gabriel—”
“And if I did, why would I extend myself to help you when you won’t be honest about Miss Caddick?”
Her eyes widened. “What nonsense are you spouting?”
“I know she was there.”
“You know no such thing. Gabriel Michael Vance, whatever has gotten into you? Miss Caddick has never been to the Rose Garden. On that you can be certain.”
He nodded slowly. “The thing is, Mother, you told me that everyone has a scandalous side.”
She took another bite, then grinned over her fork at him. “That’s because they do.”
“Indeed, you revel in leading the innocent down the path to debauchery.”
“Even you, for a time,” she said as if it were an achievement to introduce one’s son to depravity.
“For a time,” he agreed, working hard to keep disdain out of his voice.
She returned her attention to her sausage, cutting another slice before popping it into her rosebud mouth. “I do not force anyone,” she said primly. “I merely—”
“Offer and entice. It’s not your sin if they make the choice.”
“Exactly.”
“So why discard the idea that Miss Caddick had visited? Or that you could introduce her—”
“Introduce Lord Benedict’s fiancée to the Rose Garden? Your superior’s fiancée? As if I would!”
She would. She absolutely would. But she hadn’t offered it, nor had she suggested that the lady might have been there or that Madame Florina might know more.
His mother was a mistress of hooking a man and drawing him ever deeper into her clutches.
But rather than entice him into further inquiry, she had tried to end the conversation.
“Mother,” he said, using a tone she knew brooked no defiance. “Tell me what Miss Caddick was doing at the Rose Garden.”
She threw up her hands in disgust. “Absolutely nothing, you stupid boy.” Then she pushed up from the table and whirled away in a dramatic flounce.
“Jonathan, darling,” she called as she headed back to the parlor.
“Do come into my kitchen for some of these fabulous sausages. They are simply divine.” Her voice dropped to a seductive purr.
“Shall I feed them to you? Bite by glorious bite?”
That was Gabe’s cue to leave. He did not want to see his mother infantilize another man. He couldn’t fathom why so very many gentlemen enjoyed it.
It was sheer peevishness that prompted him to grab one of the sausages out of the pan as he left. The thing was still hot and scalded his fingers, but it did taste wonderful. He ate quickly, and though he savored every bite, his mind was on something else.
His mother was an accomplished seductress who occasionally dipped into blackmail.
She would likely take some secrets to her grave, but there were not many.
At least not many that she could keep from her son.
But she’d been uncharacteristically silent about Miss Caddick, and all his tricks to get a hint had failed.
Could he be completely wrong? He’d only seen the mysterious woman for a split second. But the more he chewed on it, the more he examined the lady’s behavior and his mother’s, the more certain he became.
Something about their reactions didn’t feel right. Miss Caddick felt duplicitous. And now he was more determined than ever to ferret out her secret.