Frovtunes’ Kiss (31 page)

“You needn't swear.” She tossed a quick glance at Mr. Paddington, another at a passing footman. What must they think? But with the warmth of Graham's lips still moist on hers, she decided she didn't much care. “Just bring your brother home.”

Within the hour she saw him off with a protesting Letty, who had had plans to take tea at the home of a friend and simply could not be persuaded to see the sense of trundling halfway across London, as she testily put it, to redeem a brother with little taste for redemption.

“He has a perfectly
good
sense of direction,” she reasoned as Graham practically pushed her up the carriage step. “He'll wander home when he's
hungry
.”

Moira placed a hand on Graham's shoulder, gone rigid with an obvious surge of temper. “Be patient with them both.”

His expression bordered on seething. “Perhaps you'd better come along.”

“No.” She smoothed the furrows across his brow. “This is your chance to show your family how much you care. Don't squander it.”

“Can't bring Shaun, either, then?”

She shook her head. “Only the footman, for protection. Anyone else will seem intrusive.”

Grim-faced, he clambered in after Letty.

Once the carriage rolled through the gates, Moira walked to the edge of the garden, where Mr. Paddington stood watching with a skeptical frown.

“Perhaps one of us should have gone with them after all.”

“He'll do just fine, Mr. Paddington.”

“It's not Graham I'm worried about.” His jet brows knotted, a tangle of censure and concern. “Letty Foster has no business being within a mile of a place like that.”

“Her brother will take care of her, to be sure. Not to mention that the footman is a rather formidable fellow. Besides, Letty Foster is of tougher mettle than her family gives her credit for.”

“By the pharaohs, you're right, Miss Hughes.” He raised a fist in the air. “She's got the fiery spirit of Artemis, that one. The Fosters scarcely appreciate her at all.”

“Well, then, Mr. Paddington, perhaps you're the man to point out all her finer qualities to them.”

What began as a twitch of his bottom lip soon broadened to a grin that declared more than Moira believed she had a right to know. Mr. Paddington's heart was his own business, yet in that instant she glimpsed the whole of it.

But she did hope he wouldn't misconstrue her last comment as mere flattery designed to persuade him to do the favor she was about to ask. She would never stoop so low. Really.

She cleared her throat. “Mr. Paddington, I wonder if you would be so kind as to accompany me on an errand?”

He was still grinning, obviously lost in agreeable thoughts of Letty. “Nothing would give me greater pleasure, Miss Hughes.”

That only increased her guilt, for once he learned the nature of this errand, he might very well regret his generosity.

“Did you find him inside? Is he inebriated? Oh, is it
quite
a den of iniquity?”

Graham winced at the enthusiasm, and the damned naïveté, of Letty's questions. Her eyes sparking with scandal, her gaze darted beyond his shoulder to continue her first-ever inspection of an establishment of ill repute. Or at least of its facade, for he had ordered her to wait in the coach while he went inside to search for their brother.

But that was about to change.

“I'm afraid you're going to find out for yourself, Letty.” He gritted his teeth and signaled to the footman posted at the rear of the coach.

What the devil had possessed him to bring Letty instead of Shaun? Shaun wouldn't have blinked an eye at their task, wouldn't have spoken a word beyond what was necessary to convey Freddy to the coach. They'd have gone in, collected the heap of arms and legs that was his brother, and made their escape wholly without incident. With Letty, however…

Even as he bemoaned his rotten judgment, he understood exactly what had gotten him into this predicament. Moira. Ah, Moira, Moira, of the dark, dazzling eyes and the velvet lips that transformed the most preposterous notion into wisdom worthy of the oracle of Amon. With a whisper the woman could undo the most vehement resolution, with a touch crumble the most ironclad oath.

He held out a hand to help Letty down. “I'll need your help coaxing Freddy outside.”

He might have spoken Arabic, given her blank stare. Then her brows shot up. “Monteith, I
cannot
walk into a
gentlemen's
club. What would people think?”

“Gentlemen's club? Are you serious? Come along, Letty, we have no choice. Our brother is little more than semiconscious, and what few wits he does possess are only proving a hindrance. He refuses to budge.”

More than that. To Graham's chagrin and vexation both, Freddy had spat at him when he suggested they make their exit. Spat! Luckily Freddy's current condition precluded taking aim with any accuracy.

“Besides,” Graham added, “I seriously doubt you'll meet anyone you know, and if you do, it's highly unlikely they'll remember.”

In truth, he deplored bringing her through that door, loathed having her see the depths to which her twin had plummeted. He'd seen places like this aplenty in Cairo, and knew what sort of men frequented them. Usually those with little to lose, less still to hope for. They were typically men who'd lost everything from lovers to limbs, whose lives essentially entailed waiting to die.

Why
should his brother be among them?

The simple act of descending the steps to the subterranean entrance was like sinking into a netherworld quite distinct from the one they inhabited. At street level the building, its bricks soot-stained but intact, appeared no more menacing than the Royalty Theater a few doors away.

With each downward step, however, the salty breezes from the nearby London Docks waned beneath a cloying perfume that seeped from the door's warped edges, an odor that reached out to claw the senses and drag the unsuspecting visitor into a languid but lethal embrace. As he opened the door, a waft hit them full in their faces. Letty emitted a choking cough. He felt his airways constrict. Even the footman quietly cleared his throat as he followed close behind.

They stepped into a dim interior relieved only by the glow of several stinking tallow candles and a gap in the smoke-browned curtains. Of illicit activities he saw no sign, just that heavy, hypnotic sweetness that permeated every cranny, every breath. The smoking apparatus had apparently been stowed away during daylight hours, not to be unveiled again until nightfall a couple of hours hence.

A single window peeked out onto the foot pavement like a toddler able to glean only knee-high glimpses of the adult world. Beneath it, three men sat at a round café table drinking tiny cups of acrid-smelling coffee. Eyes drooping from sleeplessness slid toward him and Letty with no more than lethargic curiosity, exactly as they'd regarded him the first time he'd entered their lair.

At the time, he had feared having to fight his way in and ransack the place for Freddy. He had even come armed for the likelihood, but a handful of coins had proved effective enough. The obliging proprietors, or patrons, had pointed the way to his brother at the end of a damp, narrow corridor.

He stepped now between the men's inquisitive gazes and Letty as together they proceeded around a scattering of tables littered with ashes and cups of foul-smelling dregs.

Fumbling to open her reticule, Letty pulled out a handkerchief and held it to her nose. From beneath it she whispered, “What on earth is this place?”

He hadn't explained much during the ride except to say the place emulated pastimes popular in other parts of the world. Her imagination had filled in the details, he knew, but even high-strung Letty hadn't imagined this. Not for Freddy.

He cupped a hand to her elbow and guided her toward the deepening gloom of the corridor. The footman followed, a silent but reassuring presence as they skirted a man sprawled facedown on a moth-eaten carpet. Another lay slumped across a bench, a glistening string of drool wending its way down his cheek.

Within her handkerchief, Letty stifled a snort of disgust. Graham slipped his arm across her shoulders. “Let's just get him out of here.”

A smoking sconce lit the corridor. They passed several doorways, each draped in fabric that displayed more filth than design. He felt Letty draw closer with each step, heard her breathing become labored, faltering. Once she stumbled to a halt and made a croaking squeak, pointing as some insect disappeared into a crack in the wall.

“Come, he's in here.” He lifted a curtain aside and ushered her into a chamber no larger or more appealing than a prison cell. A grating at eye level permitted light enough to reveal a pallet of rugs that filled one entire wall. Lying on his back, an arm thrown across his eyes, their brother uttered a fitful moan.

“Freddy!” Letty swept into the room. Her cry of dismay echoed Graham's own sentiments upon finding Freddy here earlier. The first time he had looked into this chamber, he almost hadn't recognized his brother, had very nearly moved along to continue searching. But a thatch of tawny hair had caught the candlelight from the corridor.

Freddy looked as though he'd been in a fight and dragged senseless through the streets. His trousers were muddied, his coat and waistcoat askew, his shirt stained and torn, and his neck cloth hung limp from an open collar.

Heedless of the packed-dirt floor, Letty gathered her skirts and knelt at her twin's bedside. “Freddy, are you ill?” Her gloved hand nudged his shoulder. “What's wrong with you? Why do you look like that?”

Freddy's arm slid away from his face. He managed a weak smile, quickly eclipsed by a groan that hinted at impending illness. He swallowed audibly, blinked, and turned bleary eyes on Graham. “Wha's he doing here?” The words were slurred but nonetheless barbed. “Thought I sent ‘im packing. Make him go ‘way, Letty.”

“He's rescuing you, you nincompoop. So am I. What
were
you thinking, coming to a wretched place like this?”

“W-wha' were
you
thinking? Shouldn't be here.”

“Idiot.” Despite her scolding, she pressed a palm to his brow and smoothed damp hairs away. Graham watched, astounded and more than a little touched to witness such tenderness in Letty. Or, at least, in the Letty he'd known since returning home.

“Can you walk, do you think?” she asked her twin in the gentlest of tones.

Freddy shrugged, coughed, moaned again. “Don't know.”

“Well, never mind, you can lean on us.”

“Wha' if I don't wanna go?” His gaze narrowed on Graham. Despite the haze in his eyes, Freddy's rancor burned clear. He rolled onto his side, his back to the room. “Think I'll just stay here. I like it here.”

“Oh, Freddy,
do
shut up.
Look
at this place. The walls are
dripping
, the floor is crawling with the most
revolting
creatures, and, good gracious, the
stench. Why
would anyone of sound mind
not
wish to leave?” She sounded more like the familiar Letty then, which oddly brought a smile to both Freddy's and Graham's faces.

Peering over his shoulder, Freddy reached back to grasp her hand. “All right, Letty. To put a stopper in your bellyaching, I'll come ‘long like a good boy.”

With considerable effort and coordination, they wrestled Freddy from the filthy pallet and onto his feet. He wobbled precariously, supported on either side by Graham and a clearly shaken Letty. The footman moved to lend his assistance, but, remembering Moira's advice, Graham waved him away.

Freddy's head sagged between his shoulders while a chorus of groans slid from his throat, increasing in volume with each step. Graham counted it a small miracle that the contents of his brother's stomach remained where they were.

With little mishap they maneuvered to the main room and headed for the street door, their shuffling feet sending bits of the previous night's debris skittering along the floor. They'd nearly achieved the exit when Freddy's knees buckled. Letty let out an
oomph
as he fell against her side. She lost her grip, and Freddy toppled over backward.

Graham's quick grasp saved Letty from falling, as well. A nearby table bore the brunt of their brother's weight and tumbled over with him, along with several porcelain cups and a spindle-backed chair. Freddy and the furniture hit the floor with a crash and the screech of shattering china.

Letty stood with a hand pressed to her mouth as she gaped at the wreckage. Graham and the footman scrambled to disengage Freddy from the table's splintered legs, hauling him to his feet and brushing shards of porcelain from the back of his coat. The sour stench of fermented spirits wafted from the fabric.

From behind him, a barrage assaulted Graham's ears, a string of epithets in a language he didn't comprehend. One of the coffee drinkers, heretofore inert and disinterested, now bolted from his chair and bore down on them with a face gone crimson. Once again, Graham foraged into his coat pocket and extracted a palm full of coins whose value he didn't bother verifying before pouring them into the foreigner's hand.