Captured By the Cruel Duke (Duke Wars #5)

Chapter 1

TEN YEARS LATER

“Marjory? Marjory! Where are you?” Amelia hissed, clutching her reticule tighter to her chest.

This was the sort of place where one might lose one’s reticule—and indeed one’s life—by setting foot in the wrong alleyway.

And I should know of the dangers. I live here.

This was most certainly the wrong place for a woman of any description to set foot, but the fruit-seller on the corner had been quite clear about seeing a girl of Marjory’s description scuttle along this way.

Marjory was not, of course, as distinctive as her older sister, being of middling height and a good deal thinner, but she was still noticeable.

The Holt girls were all blessed with relatively good looks.

In Amelia and Marjory’s case, their looks were coupled with thick red-blonde hair and large brown eyes, whereas little Nancy was going to be dark, like their mama.

Being pretty was not, in Amelia’s experience, a useful thing. A man sprawled on the floor of the alley, tucked behind a pile of rubbish, and he whistled drunkenly as she hurried by. She made it only a few steps before pausing and reluctantly turning back to the drunk.

“Excuse me, sir,” she ventured, poised to flee should he drag himself to his feet and lunge at her. “I was wondering if you had seen a young girl of about fifteen run through here. She is wearing a rather threadbare blue cloak and last Season’s bonnet.”

The man blinked slowly at her. “You think I’d recognize any Season’s bonnet?”

That is a fair point.

“No,” she conceded. “Have you seen any girl rush through here?”

He sniffed, shifting. “About ten minutes ago, yes. Pretty thing, she was. Like you, only not so tall. I bet you’re taller than all the men, eh?”

“Many of them, yes,” Amelia responded tartly. “Did she look distressed? Upset? As if she were fleeing from something?”

He hiccupped. “Nope. Just excited. She was scribbling something in a notebook.”

“Of course she was,” Amelia muttered darkly. “Just wait till I get my hands on her. Thank you for your help, sir.”

“Sir?” he echoed, chuckling. “Proper little lady, you are. What’s a fine high society beauty like you doing in a place like this?”

Amelia pressed her lips together. “I am not a lady, as it happens, and I am certainly no part of Society, high or otherwise. Excuse me.”

She hurried off, and the man made no move to follow her, content with chuckling to himself.

The alleyway led to another back street, this one a little larger but equally unpleasant and full of rubbish. Amelia found herself at a loss, turning this way and that, desperate for a glimpse of her sister.

It would, of course, have been safer to hire a cab, if only to provide a little shelter from the heaps of rubbish and the people skulking among them. But cabs were expensive, and their drivers seemed to possess a sixth sense for passengers in acute need—and would raise their prices accordingly.

Movement at the far end of the street caught her eye, a flash of an old blue cloak disappearing into yet another alley.

Brightening, Amelia hurried in that direction, rounding the corner in time to find a young girl poised to haul herself up onto a broad windowsill.

The latch of the window was a little cracked, suggesting that it could be jimmied open.

It was already open a few inches, begging to be pushed open entirely.

“Marjory!” Amelia hissed. “What are you doing!”

Marjory let out a yelp of panic, releasing her grip on the sill and stumbling backward. She landed on her bottom in a filthy puddle and scrambled up at once. Of course, the dirty water had already soaked through the material of her cloak and dress.

Amelia’s heart sank, imagining the scrubbing that awaited her. Marjory simply did not have the patience or determination to scrub stains out of anything.

“You startled me,” Marjory huffed, dusting off the front of her dress and ignoring the wet patch behind her.

“So I should. Were you about to climb through that window? That is breaking in, you know. People get transported for less, especially if the owner of the house decides that something is missing and you have stolen it. What are you doing?”

Marjory flushed. “I am chasing a story, if you must know.”

Amelia groaned loudly, burying her face in her gloved hands. “I regret the day I let you sell gossip to those awful scandal sheets.”

“I am a writer!”

“To be sure, and a skilled one. But surely your skills ought to take you beyond repeating the tittle-tattle you hear in our shop to the publishers of scandal sheets. Don’t you want to write proper stories?”

Marjory flushed, tossing back her head. “This is how it begins. Besides, what you consider gossip, the rest of the world considers vital information.”

Amelia sniffed. “Well, yes, if by the rest of the world you mean a small section of people in fashionable London. Why are you breaking into this house anyway? Whatever gossip you’ll uncover cannot possibly be worth it.”

Marjory’s eyes flashed with a horrifyingly familiar glee. “That is where you’re wrong. Do you know what this place is?”

Amelia glanced up at the building looming over her and bit her lower lip with a twinge of nerves. “I do not.”

“It’s part of the Orion clubhouse. You must have heard of the Orions.”

Amelia bit her lip. “Well, of course. That silly rivalry between the Orions and the Ton’s Devils, or whatever their names are.”

It was easy to lose track of the countless clubs in London.

For gentlemen, especially, it was considered rather important to be a member of at least one famous club.

White’s and Brooks’s were amongst the most famous, but there were many others.

The Athenium, for example, for those who really liked Latin.

For gentlemen with wilder tastes, for whom Brooks’s was not sufficiently liberal, there were other options. Enter the Orions and the Ton’s Devils. A man’s choice of club—and the fervor with which he embraced its rivalries—was meant to speak volumes about the sort of person he was.

As far as Amelia could tell, the latter two clubs had more of a grip on London Society than was considered proper. For example, they encouraged all kinds of libertine practices and even more shocking ideas, such as women receiving a proper education.

She had heard tales of members of these clubs swaying Society into accepting or rejecting a person.

For example, there had been a story in one of Marjory’s newspapers about a man, Sir Horace something or other, who had a nasty habit of beating his wife rather badly, flaunting various mistresses in front of her, and refused to grant her a divorce.

His wife’s brother, being a member of the Ton’s Devils, brought the full weight of the club against the man.

The fellow’s confidence and swagger began to fade when he realized that his debts were being called in all at once, that he was not being invited to important parties, and that doors were slamming shut in his face almost as quickly as his opera-dancer mistresses were leaving him.

Last she had heard was that his house, mortgaged to the hilt, was now owned by one of the founding members of the Devils, and that his wife was now living with her brother.

She supposed there was something to admire about these clubs, after all.

“Those clubs,” Amelia said at last, trying to stay as calm as she could. “Are not for the likes of us.”

“You mean, women?”

“I mean, our social standing, too. Why should we care about the Orions?”

“Because Society does,” Marjory explained with evident delight. “Everybody knows who runs the Ton’s Devils, but nobody knows who runs the Orions. That’s what they call him—Orion.”

“So, he is anonymous?”

“Yes. And if I can discover his identity—or her identity—what a scoop that would be. Then I’ll be paid for it. Handsomely.”

“What on earth for?”

“Don’t you understand?” Marjory breathed, turning to face her sister. “This fellow—Orion—is the one who started it all. He founded the Orion specifically for those who are not accepted anywhere else.”

“You mean second sons and men in debt?” Amelia responded wryly.

Marjory puffed out her cheeks. “No. Let me explain. There is a Mr. Askew in the Orion’s member list, and rumor has it that he was originally Miss Askew.”

Amelia paused. “I don’t understand.”

“Well, this… this person wishes to live as a man and does so. To the horror of Society, of course.”

“That sounds inconvenient,” Amelia sighed. “And the Orions do not know?”

“They do know. They accept him. That is Orion’s thinking, the man who began it all. The Orions came first, just before the Devils.”

“Ought they not be friends, then, instead of engaging in this rivalry?”

“Oh, the rivalry is just for show, everybody knows that,” Marjory responded, waving a hand dismissively. “But if Orion’s identity could be known, everybody would be interested. This man has shaped London Society, and nobody even knows who he is.”

“Marjory…”

“No, listen to me, please,” Marjory said, darting forward and seizing her sister by the shoulders.

“I hate to see you slaving over your work at that wretched modiste’s.

You are two-and-twenty years old, and Mama always wanted to see you enjoying yourself.

You ought to be happy. I don’t want you to be a seamstress. ”

“I am a dressmaker,” Amelia corrected.

Marjory sighed. “If I discover who this Orion is, I will earn enough money to keep us comfortable for a year. Think of that, Amelia. All of our bills, paid.”

Amelia sucked in a breath. “Surely this piece of gossip cannot be worth quite so much.”

“Oh, it certainly is,” Marjory responded, dropping her arms.

“So you planned to break into a clubhouse? At nine o’clock in the morning?”