Alice had seen that smile before, across ballrooms. She’d heard ladies tittering over him, calling him swoon-worthy.
“So, what you’re saying is I was the handy vessel to rid yourself of excess—”
“I would not call you a handy vessel, Lady Alice. You are an exceptionally beautiful woman, and let no one tell you otherwise. But what I did was wrong. I behaved like an animal. I hope you can forgive me.”
He thought she was beautiful. The words left her momentarily speechless. When had anyone last spoken to her like that? She couldn’t remember a single time.
“Of course, and I was not entirely blameless,” she conceded. Honesty mattered to her.
His lips twitched at her words.
“Perhaps the moment overcame me as well. Now,” Alice said, eager to move from uncomfortable territory, “is that all that brings you to an unmarried woman’s home at such an hour?”
“Your reputation is safe. No one saw me, Lady Alice. And as for why I came, it is to ask again what I asked last night, why were you there?”
“I believe I told you my actions are no business of yours, Lord Stafford.”
He studied her, and she had the uneasy sense he saw far more than anyone else ever had. It disturbed her, but she did not look away.
“Were you there because you knew it was possible Kenneth Jackson might attend, my lady?”
Alice was an excellent actress. By sheer willpower, she kept her face composed, or so she hoped.
“Why do you ask?”
“Because a year ago, I received some alarming news about him. I have been hunting him since.”
“You’ve not seen him since Blackwood Hall?” she asked, raising a brow.
“Some men have paid for what they did to us and to others, but not Kenneth Jackson. He disappeared from our world. Once we left, we never saw or heard from him again. That changed a year ago, and I realized I wanted justice. I have been hunting him ever since.”
Hunting him?
“What news reached you?”
“News that Kenneth Jackson was still committing unspeakable acts against young children. This time at a charity school here in London.”
“Dear Lord,” Alice whispered.
“He fled the facility when confronted by one of the benefactors after rumors of his actions reached him,” Lord Stafford added.
“And someone told you?”
“I overheard a conversation,” he said simply.
They fell silent, eyes locked for long, heated seconds.
“I know your brother was a Blackwood boy, Lady Alice.”
She nodded.
“Did he speak of his time there? Is that why you wish to find Jackson?”
Emotion choked her as it always did when she thought about the cruelty Charles had suffered at Blackwood Hall, and how it had broken him beyond repair.
“Why are you asking me this?” The words emerged hoarse, stripped of her usual composure.
“I have no wish to upset you, my lady.”
