Poison or Protect
Page 6

“May I introduce you to—”
The man held up a hand. “No names, please, until we have an agreement.”
Preshea made her voice sweet. “How ungallant. You know practically everything about me. So, I am at a disadvantage.”
The man took her small hand, offered naked of its glove. “Lady Villentia, I doubt that is possible.”
Preshea looked to Lord Akeldama. “Flattery? I like him already.”
She did not like him, although Preshea ordinarily preferred elderly men. They were so set in their ways that they only saw what they wished to see. This meant she could get away with murder. Literally. But this one was frozen solid, and none of his lines were from smiling. His clothes were somber and his neck-cloth tight with Biblical starch. He was lousy with virtuous living and the kind of Christian goodness that delights in self-sacrifice. She would not be able to win easily with him. His rectitude was as much a weapon as her looks, and they both knew it.
No wonder he was loath to employ her.
He dropped her hand a little too soon.
She drew it back to her skirt and wiped it with infinite subtlety and exactly enough motion so that he could not fail to notice.
The lines about his nose deepened.
Thus we understand each other.
“Shall we?” Lord Akeldama gestured to three chairs clustered about an unlit fire.
Preshea walked over and swept her skirts to exactly the correct drape as she sat. She kept her neck long, tilting her head to show her complexion to advantage. No man would ever be allowed to forget her beauty. Especially one she didn’t like.
She directed her gaze to the vampire, because this visitor would hate to be ignored. “You’re right, of course – I was bored or I shouldn’t have come. So, why have I come?”
“This gentleman has a conundrum.”
“A not uncommon failing among gentlemen.”
That drove the man to speak his purpose at last. “My daughter has conceived of an ill match.”
“A fortune hunter? How embarrassing, but hardly unique.” Preshea made a show of binding her bleeding wrist with a handkerchief.
“I wish you to disabuse her of this notion.”
Preshea turned to Lord Akeldama. “Surely, you can find something more worthy of my skills?”
“Unhappy that you won’t get to kill anyone, my ruby?”
Preshea tightened the knot about her wrist by pulling one end with her hand and the other with her teeth. “Matters of the heart are so dull. Death is never dull, except when it is one’s own.”
The visiting lord looked away, disgusted by her tiny show of violence.
Good, I can’t allow him to think me tame. “Why should I bother, my lords? Give me good reason if you want the pot sweet and the lady eager.”
The vampire looked her over. “I believe you already have one excellent reason – you are intrigued despite yourself.”
The lord straightened. “But she just said...”
“I am not intrigued by the daughter’s ill choices, but by the father’s desperation.”
“Ah.” The visitor slumped back.
Preshea looked him over. “Saintly Duke Snodgrove. I did not think yours was a family prone to scandal.” Why allow your daughter to entertain a predator? Has she been trapped into an arrangement?
“You know who I am?”
Preshea tilted her head. “His Grace forgets, information is my trade and I’m a merchant of renown. We may not dance in the same circles, but your sketch has appeared in many papers. Punch is not always flattering. But somewhat accurate, as it turns out.”
Before he objected, Preshea continued. “I’ve heard much of your philanthropy. A nobleman who advocates for the deserving poor. You entrance me.” She leaned forward, knowing this caused the swell of her breasts to rise above the neckline of her gown. A show of force, Preshea-style.
For the first time, she saw fear in the duke’s eyes. “I’m a happily married man.”
No man is that happily married.
“And I’m not currently looking for a fifth husband. But one wonders what can be so awful about this fortune hunter that you, my lord, are driven to take congress with a woman like myself. I am, one might say, the very opposite of the deserving poor.” She leaned back.
He took a grateful breath.
She followed up her advantage. “Here was I, thinking you magnanimous towards the lower orders. Yet your generosity does not extend to your own daughter’s suitor? How hypocritical.”
“What do you want?” He flushed, a slash of color on those gaunt cheeks.
“Besides a reason?”
“Besides that.”
Preshea frowned. What did she want? After four marriages, and four deaths, she had everything in life a woman might desire: titled position, swollen coffers, the freedom to travel, and a world that accepted her because it was afraid of her.
“I suppose it is somewhat satisfying to know that even you, Your Grace, nicest man in London, have a dark underbelly of corruption.”
The man in question stood and began to pace. “I protect my family, Lady Villentia. Something with which you’ve little experience, no doubt. Do you know how many children God has taken from me? Four. And my dear Constance only recently.”
What God has taken, no fortune hunter may covet? “My condolences.”
“We did not lose her entirely. She went ghost.”
“Felicitations on your family’s unbirth, then, Your Grace.”