The Mercenary Major by Kate Moore Page B

black evening coat, and Gilling stepped up to assist him. “Not headed for his sister’s then,” Jack said. The sergeant had been the least fortunate of the three friends. His uncle’s bankruptcy meant that his aunt and cousins, and the other family members who had been employed in the cloth trade, were now dependent on the slim resources of the one sister whose husband still had his farm.
    Gilling shook his head. “I tried the Swan. He wasn’t there tonight, but they know him. He’s been there often enough.”
    Jack knew that, too. The Swan had some lure for the sergeant that Jack did not fully understand. Somehow the welcome they had received there their first night in London had convinced Hengrave that the raucous tavern was the most congenial place in town for a man down on his luck.
    Jack stripped the linen from his neck and shed his waistcoat, pumps, and pantaloons in favor of the remnants of his worst uniform. It wouldn’t hurt to pay the Swan a visit himself.
    “And Bertram?” he asked Gilling. Jack had known Lady Montford’s belated welcome-home party for her son would fail in its purpose.
    Gilling gave a wry smile. He picked up the clothes Jack had discarded and began to restore them to order. “A good night, sir. Two hells, one fight, and he’s safe in bed.”
    Jack grinned. Looking out for one another was the chief tenet of the riflemen’s code, and though they were not in the hills of Spain, he and Gilling were still on patrol. Jack opened the dressing-room door and scanned the hall. In his first week with his aunt he had discovered how to come and go from his dressing room without calling attention to his movements. And tonight he needed something to do to keep his mind off Victoria Carr’s kiss, not that he was likely to hold off thinking about it for long.
    How had he come to kiss such an obviously inexperienced young woman with such a degree of passion? He had begun playfully enough, teasing her for her offended scruples. She’d been surprised and curious and unfamiliar with evasion. But for him their kiss had gone beyond the playful almost at once.
    He had wanted her and shown her his hunger. That she could not recognize how much she stirred him was the only advantage he had had in the end. He wondered how long he could hold on to that edge.
     

**** 8 ****
    V ictoria considered the charming room in Letitia Faverton’s house that was to be hers for the coming weeks. The room exactly suited her, pretty without frills, the white wallpaper as fresh as a spring muslin with a little sprig of red berries across it, the chintz curtains bordered by thin lines of the same deep-red. Her protests over the move to Letty’s had failed. Her suggestion that they stay in a hotel had been met with horror. “What would Dorward say of the expense?”
    For two days as the Favertons moved from the house on Grace Church Street to Lady Letitia’s larger home on Mount Street, Victoria endured Jack Amberly’s praises from Katie and Reg. None of the questions she raised diminished their hero’s merit in the eyes of her friends. He was a prime gun, top-of- the-trees, an out-and-outer to Reg, and clearly a prince to Katie. It was apparent, too, how much more complete his influence on her Faverton friends would be now that they were at Letty’s. Victoria tried not to think about her own shameful susceptibility to the man.
    She crossed her room again and stood at the door listening to the sounds of the household. She could hear the soft rapid murmur of Katie talking to her mother’s abigail, who had accompanied them to London, and the brusque replies of that worthy. Someone passed in the hall, a footman perhaps. Victoria turned from the door and paced back and forth, reminding herself that unconventional and immediate measures were necessary in this situation. She must do something to resolve her doubts about the man. And her best chance to act would be this first night in Letty’s house.
    It was after midnight.