Lady Charlotte Always Gets Her Man by Violet Marsh

Author:Violet Marsh [MARSH, VIOLET]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2024-06-03T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

A day later, Charlotte’s veil hid the triumphant Cheshire cat smile stretching across her face as she spied two of the hulking men she’d seen with Lord Hawley two days prior. The brutes were leaving the Black Sheep as she was walking to the entrance after being dropped off by the Estbrook coachman. Even more promising, she could not spot the viscount’s fashionable form anywhere in the vicinity.

Charlotte slipped into an alley and peered around the corner to watch the two men. They swaggered leisurely along the street, one of them whistling a tune she didn’t recognize. Her mouth quirked up as she guessed that Banshee might recognize the ditty, especially since it was likely a dirty one.

As the two came closer, Charlotte retreated into the shadows. She waited until their footsteps receded, and then she popped her head out again. She was just in time to see the men disappear down another street.

She paused, debating whether to follow. Mr. Powys had called these men dangerous, and she was not fool enough to think she could trifle with them. She would be venturing further from the tightly woven fabric of society into its frayed edges, where she could easily get twisted in the stray unwieldy strands. Her heart fluttered with almost painful quickness, but outwardly she remained serene.

Making up her mind, Charlotte scurried out of the alley, her furtive movements earning her more than one curious glance. She realized what a fool she was being. By trying to be stealthy, she was actually standing out. She straightened and almost dashed back to the Black Sheep. But something in her rebelled. The Duke of Lansberry was returning in ten days, and Charlotte needed more than an incomplete drawing of a necklace to stop the betrothal.

Her veil obscured her features even if her widow’s weeds otherwise attracted attention. She’d already learned one lesson in subterfuge. She could manage.

Resolutely, she strolled forward. When she turned down the same thoroughfare that the two reprobates had taken, she could spy their hulking forms ahead. Staying a good distance behind, she trailed them. At the slightest twitch of their bodies in her direction, she immediately tried to obscure herself behind either a heap of refuse piled in front of an abandoned building, the entrance to a narrow passage, a cart stopped to make a delivery, or anything else that looked capable of hiding her and her voluminous skirts.

As the men drew her deeper and deeper into Covent Garden, an uneasy feeling washed over Charlotte. She was beginning to sense that she was not so much chasing the ruffians as they were luring her. Just before she scurried up the stoop of a locked business, she noticed the two exchange a sneering look, their massive shoulders heaving with laughter.

Trying to steady her breathing, Charlotte pressed her back against the closed door. She could not pursue these men any deeper into the bowels of London. She’d been foolhardy to come even this far.

Peeking down the crooked passage

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