So he nodded—one short dip of his chin. That was all ittook. A confident grin spread over her face, and the doubt in her eyes vanished.
“Is there another part of your plan, Miss Wick?” Eoin’s mother asked.
Hannah’s smile grew even wider. “Most certainly. It all begins with a distraction, and that’s where I will need your help.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Halt! You’re not allowed to enter!” The guard positioned his burly body in front of the Horse and Hen’s cellar steps.
Lizzie marched over to him, matching his stance. “I’ll give you one opportunity to step aside.”
The man snorted as he ran his gaze up and down her body, the gesture both lewd and dismissive. Hannah’s own blood steamed, and she could only imagine Lizzie’s ire. The foolish sentry had no idea the fury that he’d just triggered.
“How is a doxy like you going to stop me?” the fool chortled.
“That was your chance.” Lizzie smiled. It was not kind. The hapless watchman was still laughing when Lizzie’s fist caught him in the temple. He blinked. Once. And then he crumpled to the ground.
Lizzie glanced over her shoulder at the group of mostly female boxers behind her. “The way is clear.”
Championess Quick was the first to step around the unconscious sentinel. Lizzie followed with Hannah close behind. This time, she wore women’s clothing rather than a lad’s. Many of the women wore masks, which Calliope had provided. The Quick women, however, had chosen to enter barefaced.
Eoin’s mother marched straight past Ursus’s empty cage. When she burst into the main room, she spread her feet wideand planted her fists against her hips. She’d donned her famous Dutch trousers and plaited her hair into a braided crown about her head.
“I heard this establishment has been maligning my name!” Championess Quick didn’t even need to shout. Her deep sonorous voice boomed easily around the cavernous chamber. The men gathered for the fight jostled each other and pointed to the entranceway. Although there were a few whispered voices declaring her identity, the room grew unnaturally still as the crowd sensed an upcoming spectacle.
“Folks here have been saying that I’ve forgotten my beginnings. Worse, they are disparaging my prizefighters! They have called my people weaklings who do not have the stamina for a real fight. We cannot let such aspersions stand!” Eoin’s mother cried.
She was magnificent as she pumped her fists into the air, her biceps bulging under her white shirt. Beside her, Lizzie emitted a battle cry that rivaled those of the famed Valkyries.
“This… is highly unorthodox and unacceptable,” Jenks cried from the ring, sounding more like an aristocratic matron upset that a luncheon was ruined by bad behavior than a master of ceremonies for brutal fights.
Immediately, the crowd began to boo at Jenks. Raised voices sounded around the room as the gathered throng clamored to watch the unplanned bouts.
“Let ’em tussle!”
“I’ll bet on the Horse and Hen boxers!”
“Have you gone daft? That’s the infamous Championess Quick.”
“Let’s see how much fight the old girl has left in her!”
“You’re nothing but a coward, Jenks!”
“Lily-livered ninny!”
“Fight! Fight! Fight!”
“What is this I hear?” a new voice bellowed through the crowd. Like Championess Quick, the dark-haired man didn’t need to scream to project his words through the room. He strolled through the throng like a prince or perhaps a god, Dionysus in particular. In fact, during the last and only time that Hannah had encountered the Duke of Blackglen, he’d been wearing a Bacchus outfit at one of his famous masquerade balls. Yet the notorious rogue didn’t need to don robes and reveal swaths of his chiseled chest to evoke the sense of debauchery. Even in his more formal attire, Lady Calliope’s half brother radiated sensual wickedness. Perhaps it was the way his sculptured lips quirked just slightly at the ends, drawing attention to his sharp cheekbones. Or it could be the ever-present naughty gleam in his sapphire-like blue eyes. Then again, he had a way of seeming to stand straight yet slouch at the same time as he glided with an elegance that was both lazy and commanding.
Like at his parties, the Duke of Blackglen wore no mask. However, the revelers that he’d brought with him did. Eoin was among the legendary peer’s entourage, and so were the rest of their friends from the Black Sheep. But there were still other nobles eager to participate in what Blackglen had promised to be a grand lark.
Hannah hadn’t been positive that Calliope would be able to convince her sibling to join her scheme. Fortunately, the man had leaped at the opportunity when they’d offered him the bait: a rematch against the famed Lizzie Quick.
“I’d heard rumors that the Horse and Hen offered the most thrilling fights in London—better than any of the shiny but boring amphitheaters that are popular right now.” Blackglen spoke with a laconic drawl that, despite its slowness, or perhapsbecause of it, was utterly compelling. “Yet what do I witness when I step inside for the first time? A cumberground sniveling about something being unorthodox! What is unconventional about a challenge? I say that trying to scurry away from a match is actually what would be heretical in prizefighting!”
“Hear! Hear!” Cheers rose up as men clung one-handed from the hodgepodge of wooden support structures while they waved their other fists in the air. Among the chorus of affirmations were the whispers of people proclaiming the presence of the Duke of Debauchery.
Jenks looked around wildly, appearing as cornered as Hannah had felt when the spineless man had tried to force Eoin into the ring. Clearly, the man realized that the Horse and Hen had been invaded, but he was utterly powerless to stop it. He kept glancing up, and Hannah tried to follow his gaze. Could there be a secret space where the Purveyor could view the action similar to the room at Championess Quick’s?
