“But what of the doctors who already treat you? What will they think of me?”
Both women looked at her, their expression telling her all she needed to know. The capable doctors did not treat whores. Those who did were inferior and cruel.
She leaned forward, her intellect well and truly caught now. Could there be a place in London for her? One where she did everything she wanted, and no man could interfere? She didn’t think it was possible, and yet here were two women bold enough to see that dream and make it a reality.
There had to be traps. Nothing came so easily.
“What will I owe you?”
“Rent, of course,” Madame Sabate said, her voice airy.
She knew this trick. China had plenty of cruel landlords. “I cannot pay rent for a shop that has no customers.”
“Of course not!” the lady trilled. “That is why I shall loan you the money. I’ll have to charge a modest interest rate. It’s only fair. Once the shop is established, you’ll have no problem repaying me.”
Yihui snorted. China had loan sharks, too.
And yet, for the first time since coming to London, Yihui could see Heaven’s design. This was everything she wanted—a shop of her own, customers who didn’t discount her because she was a woman, and a life that couldn’t be snatched away by a bitter man. She’d just never expected it to happen in England and without the protection of a good husband.
But that made it all the more exciting.
Yihui leaned forward. “Tell me more.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Three nights. Threedays. No news.
Max nearly put his fist through a wall. He would have enjoyed throwing a bottle of wine at someone or smashing the teapot into smithereens. Instead, he sat at his father’s desk staring at stacks of correspondence that had been completely ignored and wishing he could set fire to the entire room. Unfortunately, Westminster was not a location that could be set alight without significant pain to the country.
He bloody well didn’t care what pain it gave his father.
Three nights ago, his father had collapsed before Max could beg, barter, or beat the man for information on what he’d done to Yihui. He’d do so now if the man weren’t a furious lump of man trapped in his bed. Indeed, Max had tried, but the duke spread hatred around with equal measure these days. And that included refusing to do anything useful out of spite.
The duke was a powerful man frozen in a body that only responded to partial commands. His entire right side was sluggish at best. But what he did with his left was villainous. He threw food at people, he cursed them in incoherent screams, and he refused to interact with anyone but his valet. And that man was on the verge of quitting, despite years of faithful service.
Meanwhile, Max had scoured London looking for a Chinese woman secreted away somewhere. Anywhere. He had all his contacts looking, called in all his favors, and even paid a BowStreet runner for leads. They’d come up with nothing and he’d been furious enough to contemplate patricide.
Unable to stomach one minute more with doctors or his fretful mother, Max had gone to his father’s office in Westminster. There was a great deal of business here or so his father claimed. Papers regarding the management of the country. Treaties on the proper commerce of corn or cotton or slaves. All of it bore his father’s characteristic hard slash of commentary.
Max had come here to find any information he could about where Yihui had been taken. What he found instead lit the last flame that burned down any respect he had for his own father.
He found a haphazard pile of unopened mail shoved into a drawer. Closer inspection revealed them as reports, questions, and demands all regarding the family’s properties. Most were from their stewards, some were from solicitors regarding a legal requirement, and a few were unpaid bills that had gone neglected for months.
Max thought of all the times he had begged his father to turn over the management of the estate to him. How he’d worked to prove his intelligence, to show that he’d studied the latest farming techniques or land management theories. His father had steadfastly refused to consider turning over any management because Max was too immature to be capable, too lazy to do the hard work, or just plain wrongheaded in his ideas.
That was what his father had said. Now Max knew his father had been shoving reports into a desk drawer to gather dust. The duke had chosen to do nothing rather than allow his son any scrap of control.
A quiet knock sounded at the door. Max rounded on it with a snarl but held back the bulk of his fury. Whoever was on the other side of the door didn’t deserve what was boiling inside of him. He took a moment to compose himself, then bid whomeverto enter. And if God was smiling on him, it would be Chris with news of Yihui.
God was not smiling. Neither was the man who opened the door.
Major Gabriel Michael Lance was the bastard son of the Duke of Torbay and famous courtesan Triana Sabate. He had a blunt nose and full mouth beneath his light blond hair. And though his dark-blue eyes were always deferential, no other aspect of his body gave quarter to anyone. Except to Lord Benedict.
He was Lord Benedict’s right-hand man. If anyone could find an answer, it would be him. And since he would not normally be here, knocking on the duke’s office door at Westminster, Max felt a surge of hope.
Max immediately snapped to attention, though it was the other man who hailed from the military. “Good afternoon, Major. Have you come with news? Or does Lord Benedict require—”
“Nothing, my lord. I’m here with news.”
