The Raven Prince (20 page)

Anna shook her head and glanced up. They were only a few houses down from Coral’s residence. Either her footsteps had led her back or Jock had a homing instinct.

She patted the dog’s head. “Good boy. We had better go in and start packing for home.”

Jock perked up his ears at the word
home.

At that moment, a carriage pulled up in front of Coral’s house. Anna hesitated, then retraced her steps around the corner and peeked back. Who could be calling at such an unfashionable hour? A footman jumped down from the carriage and placed a wooden step under the door before opening it. A male leg advanced, but withdrew inside the carriage again. She could see the footman moving the step an inch or two to the left; then a burly man with heavy shoulders descended. He stopped a moment to say something to the footman. From the way the servant bowed his head, it looked to be a set-down.

The burly man entered the house.

Was he Coral’s marquis? Anna contemplated this turn of events while Jock waited patiently by her side. From what little she knew about the marquis, it would perhaps be prudent if she didn’t meet him. She didn’t want to cause trouble for Coral, and she was uneasy at the thought of letting someone of quality see her at Coral’s residence. Although it was extremely unlikely she would cross paths again with a marquis, the incident the night before with the drunken bucks had made her wary. She decided to enter the house from the servants’ entrance and thus perhaps escape notice.

“It’s a good thing I’d planned to leave today anyway,” she muttered to Jock as they crossed the kitchens.

There was a great flurry of activity in the kitchen. Maids scurried and the footmen helped bring in a mountain of luggage. Anna was hardly acknowledged as she climbed the dark back stair. Just as well. She and Jock moved soundlessly down the upper hall. Anna opened the door to her room and found Pearl anxiously waiting.

“Oh, thank God you’re back, Mrs. Wren,” the other woman said when she saw her.

“I took Jock for a walk,” Anna said. “Was that Coral’s marquis I saw coming in the front?”

“Yes,” Pearl said. “Coral wasn’t expecting him for another week or more. He’ll be angry if he finds she has guests.”

“I was just going to pack and leave, so I’ll be out of his way.”

“Thank you, ma’am. That’ll make it ever so much easier for Coral, it will.”

“But what will you do, Pearl?” Anna bent to drag out her soft bag from under the bed. “Coral said she wanted you here with her. Will the marquis let you stay?”

Pearl picked at a hanging thread on her cuff. “Coral thinks she can get him to let me stay, but I don’t know. He’s awful mean sometimes, even if he is a lord. And the house belongs to him, you know.”

Anna nodded her understanding as she carefully folded her stockings.

“I’m glad Coral has such a nice place to live, with servants and carriages and things,” Pearl said slowly. “But that marquis makes me nervous.”

Anna paused with a handful of clothes in her arms. “You don’t think he would hurt her, do you?”

Pearl stared back somberly. “I don’t know.”

E
DWARD PROWLED THE
bordello room like a caged tiger denied a meal. The woman was late. He checked the china clock over the hearth again. Half an hour late, damn her. How dare she make him wait for her? He reached the fireplace and stared into the blaze. He’d never obsessively gone back to the same woman. Not once, not twice, but three times now.

The sex had been so good each time. She was so responsive. She had held nothing back, acting like she was as much under his spell as he was under hers. He was not naοve. He knew women who were paid for sex often faked an excitement they did not feel. But a body’s natural reaction could not be faked. She had been wet, literally soaked, in her desire for him.

He groaned. The thought of her wet pussy was having a predicable effect on his cock. Where the hell was she?

Edward swore and pushed himself away from the mantelpiece to resume his pacing. He’d even begun to daydream, in the manner of a starry-eyed stripling, about what her face looked like underneath the mask. More disturbing, he had imagined that she might look like Anna.

He stopped and placed the crown of his head against the wall, hands braced on either side. His chest expanded as he breathed deeply. He had come to London to rid himself of this awful fascination for his little secretary before he married. Instead, he’d found a new obsession. But had that stopped the original fixation? Oh, no. His longing for Anna had not only grown stronger, but was also mingled with lust for the mysterious little whore. He had two obsessions now instead of one, and they were tangled together in his overwrought brain.

He pounded his head against the wall. Perhaps he was going mad. That would explain everything.

Of course, none of this mattered to his cock. Mad or sane, it was still overeager to feel the woman’s tight, slippery sheath. He stopped banging his head against the wall and looked at the clock again. She was thirty-three minutes late now.

By God’s balls, he wasn’t going to wait another minute more.

Edward snatched his coat up and slammed out of the room. Two gray-haired gentlemen were strolling down the hall. They took one look at his face and pressed to the side as he stormed past. He ran down the grand staircase two risers at a time and stalked into the parlor where the male customers went to mingle and meet disguised ladies and whores. He scanned the gaudy room. There were several women in bright colors, each surrounded by eager men, but only one woman wore a golden mask. She was taller than the other females and stood apart, alert to the currents in the room. Her full-face mask was smooth and serene, the eyebrows symmetrical incised arcs above the almond-shaped eyeholes. Aphrodite watched over her wares with a beady eagle eye.

Edward strode directly to her. “Where is she?” he demanded.

The madam, normally an unflappable woman, jerked at his sudden question by her side. “Lord Swartingham, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Where is the woman I was to meet tonight?”

“She isn’t in your room, my lord?”

“No.” Edward grit his teeth. “No, she isn’t in the room. Would I be down here asking after her if she were up in the room?”

“We have many other willing ladies, my lord.” The madam’s voice sounded ingratiating. “Perhaps I can send another to your room?”

Edward leaned forward. “I don’t want another. I want the woman I had last night and the night before. Who is she?”

Aphrodite’s eyes shifted behind the gold mask. “Now, my lord, you know we can’t reveal the identity of our lovely doves here at the Grotto. Professional integrity, you know.”

Edward snorted. “I don’t give a bloody damn about the professional integrity of a whorehouse. Who. Is. She?”

Aphrodite backed a step, as if alarmed. Not surprisingly, since he now loomed above her. She made a signal with her hand to someone over his shoulder.

Edward narrowed his eyes. He knew he had only a few minutes. “I want her name—now—or I will enjoy starting a riot in your parlor.”

“No need for threats. There are several other wenches here who would be eager to spend the night with you.” Aphrodite’s voice held a smirk. “Ones who don’t mind a pockmark or two.”

Edward went still. He knew well enough what his face looked like. It didn’t distress him anymore—he was past the age of agonized vanity—but it did repel some women. The little whore hadn’t seemed to mind his scars. Of course, last night they’d made love in the chair by the firelight. Perhaps it had been the first time she’d truly seen his face. Perhaps she had been so disgusted by the sight that she hadn’t bothered to show up tonight.

Goddamn her.

Edward pivoted on his heel. He grabbed a faux Chinese vase, raised it above his head, and slammed it to the floor. It shattered explosively. Conversation in the room ceased as heads turned.

Too much thought was bad for a man. What he needed was action. If he couldn’t work off his energy in bed, well, this was second best.

He was seized from behind and pulled around. A fist the size of a ham hurtled at his face. Edward leaned back. The blow went whistling past his nose. He brought his own right fist in low to the man’s belly. The other man
oofed
out the air in his lungs—a lovely sound—and staggered.

Three men moved in to take the other’s place. They were the big bruisers kept by the house to escort troublemakers outside. One of them got in a roundhouse to the left side of his face. Edward saw stars, but it didn’t stop him returning with a pretty uppercut.

Several of the patrons cheered.

And then after that, things became muddled. Many of the spectators appeared to be sporting men who thought the odds uneven. They joined the brawl with tipsy enthusiasm. Girls frantically scrambled over settees, shrieking and upsetting furniture in their haste to get out of the way. Aphrodite stood in the middle of the room, shouting orders that no one could hear. She stopped abruptly when someone shoved her headfirst into a bowl of punch. Tables flew through the air. An enterprising demimondaine began taking bets in the hallway from the men and girls who had flooded the stairs to view the commotion. Four more bullies and at least as many men from the upstairs rooms joined the melee. Some of the guests had clearly been interrupted in their entertainment, as they wore only breeches or—in the case of one rather distinguished-looking old gent—a shirt and nothing else.

Edward was enjoying himself immensely.

Blood ran down his chin from a split lip, and he could feel one eye slowly swelling shut. A smallish villain clung to his back and hit him about the head and shoulders. In front of him, another, bigger man tried to kick his legs out from under him. Edward sidestepped the attempt and brought his own foot up to shove against the man’s other leg while his weight was off balance. He went down like a colossus.

The imp on his back was becoming a nuisance. Grabbing the man by his hair, Edward swiftly rammed himself backward into a wall. He heard a
thunk
as the man’s head met the solid surface. The man slid from Edward’s shoulders and landed on the floor along with a good deal of the plaster from the wall.

Edward grinned and glared around through his good eye for more prey. One of the house thugs attempted to sidle out the door. He looked wildly over his shoulder when Edward’s gaze settled on him, but there were none of his brethren to come to his aid.

“’Ave mercy, milord. I don’t get paid enough to be beat bloody like you done with the rest of the lads.” The thug held up his hands and backed away from Edward’s advance. “Why, you even did Big Billy in, and I ain’t never seen a man faster than him.”

“Very well,” Edward said. “Although, I can’t see out of my right eye, which evens the odds. . . .” He looked hopefully at the cringing bully who smiled weakly and shook his head. “No? Well, then, I don’t suppose you know of a place where a man can get properly drunk, do you?”

Thus, a little while later, Edward found himself at what had to be the seediest tavern in the East End of London. With him were the house thugs, including Big Billy, now nursing a swollen nose and two black eyes but no hard feelings. Big Billy had his arm around Edward’s shoulders and was attempting to teach him the words to a ditty extolling the charms of a lass named Titty. The song seemed to have a lot of rather clever double entendres that Edward suspected were lost on him since he’d been standing drinks for everyone in the room for the last two hours.

“W-who was the whore you was looking for that started all this, milord?” Jackie, the thug asking, had not missed any of the rounds of drinks. He addressed the question to the air somewhere to Edward’s right.

“Faithless woman,” Edward muttered into his ale.

“All wenches are faithless tarts.” This bit of masculine wisdom came from Big Billy.

The men present nodded somberly, although it caused one or two to lose their balance and sit down rather abruptly.

“No. S’not true,” Edward said.

“What s’not true?”

“All women faithless,” Edward said carefully. “I know a woman who’s as p-pure as the driven snow.”

“Who’s that?” “Tell us, then, milord!” The men clamored to hear the name of this feminine paragon.

“Mrs. Anna Wren.” He raised his glass precariously. “A toast! A toast to the most un-un-unblemished lady in England. Mrs. Anna Wren!”

The tavern erupted in boisterous cheers and toasts to the lady. And Edward wondered why all the lights went out suddenly.

H
IS HEAD WAS
coming apart. Edward opened his eyes, but then immediately thought better of that idea and squeezed them shut again. Carefully, he touched his temple and tried to think why the top of his head felt like it was about to explode.

He remembered Aphrodite’s Grotto.

He remembered the woman not showing up.

He remembered a fight. Edward grimaced and gingerly probed with his tongue. His teeth were all intact. That was good news.

His mind strained.

He remembered meeting a jolly fellow. . . . Big Bob? Big Bert? No, Big Billy. He remembered—Oh, God. He remembered toasting Anna in the worst hellhole he had ever had the misfortune to drink watered-down ale in. His stomach rolled unpleasantly. Had he really bandied Anna’s name about in such a place? Yes, he thought he had. And, if he recalled correctly, the whole roomful of disreputable rogues had bawdily toasted her.