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to find a flushed Nicholas waiting in the lobby. There was no sign of the bluestocking.
    “Allow me a night at Ashworth?” his friend grinned sleepily. “I can smell her on my skin, and I have no intention of bathing or having this coat cleaned until the morning. My mother has been haunting the hallways late at our estate and my elder brother has returned to visit. They will know in a moment that I am in love.”
    “Get a hold of yourself, man,” Elias said as much to himself as to Nicholas.
    Dryden waited in the outer barroom and a rented hackney waited outside.
    “What will you tell
your
mother?” Nicholas asked as the steadfast valet closed the carriage door.
    “Hmm?”
    “What will you tell your mother when word gets back to her that you follow a courtesan around like a trained pup?” Nicholas grinned.
    Elias’s expression did not change to match his feelings. “I am a grown man, Nicholas.”
    “Presumably,” he snorted.
    “What are your intentions with Crimson?” Elias asked, deftly turning the conversation back to his companion. “You must know that she will begin to expect something more.”
    “I am grooming her for my mistress, is that not obvious?”
    “You said you loved her.”
    “Lennox,” Nicholas laughed, “I will be a marquess. It’s not as if I can marry the girl.”
    “And if she refuses a position as your
chère amie
? If she does not want you to marry another?”
    Nicholas pointed his eyes in accusation.
    “You are very interested in Sally’s welfare suddenly. Are you not considering the same thing with the bluestocking?”
    Though he was not conscious of it when the questions were coming out of his mouth, it was true, he
was
now interested in Sally’s welfare. He would not have thought about it much before reading Josephine’s cursed book. Josephine had put a needling statement into his mind, too: “If oppressors just instinctively realized their mistakes and felt empathy, there would be no oppression. This is why voices are needed.” He remembered the damn introduction word for word, the harridan.
    “There is nothing between us.” When Nicholas didn’t answer, he went on. “She is addlepated and irresponsible. It is amazing she has not gotten herself killed or jailed by now. That aside, the bluestocking is not a puzzle for me to solve.” Even as he spoke the words aloud, they rang untrue. “She holds me in disdain, as she plainly announced to the whole room when she cut me. I needn’t muck around in a brothel to find a willing woman, and I have more important things to do, regardless.”
    All the same, he should send a note tomorrow along with the bill of sale from her books, something to put an end point on the whole misunderstanding.
    “Not that she isn’t tempting,” he amended aloud. “Quite the opposite. Perhaps that’s part of the problem. I have thought of little else since I met her. She does not shrink in conversation; she extends that regal neck as if we were in court, not a whorehouse. She refuses to listen to reason, even when I am endeavoring to protect her. She has a most vexing collarbone. Should I have noticed that? I keep forgetting that she is not a lady. I saw her smoke, Nic, smoke! She drank her winein two gulps. She belongs in Bedlam where she can’t cause any trouble. Or maybe I do. Do I sound mad, Nic?”
    Nicholas was asleep, openmouthed, against the window. He had to be carried into Ashworth and Elias was deeply jealous of him.

C HAPTER F OUR
----
    “The D. of L., known as the Uncatchable, has reportedly himself caught a bluebird at the infamous S.D. The ladies will be relieved to know that he is not made of stone.”
    —F ROM A L ONDON SCANDAL SHEET , M ARCH 1832
    Josephine stared into her morning coffee. Thank goodness she had told Mother that she had family business that would take her away from the Dove for a few nights. She needed the time to get her head together. The duke had turned her life on its end in a day’s time; like