“One o’clock?” Charlotte’s heart plummeted from her chest to her stomach with a sickening thud.Only one o’clock. Too early.She’d meet her friends again at the theater tonight, but that engagement was hours away.
The day loomed ahead of her, silent and empty.
Think of something else.
She yanked her skirts over her knees with an agitated jerk, pressed her nose against the window, and tried to focus on the blur of horses and carriages, the sound of their wheels against the cobblestones, the clatter punctuated by the cries of the costermongers.
But it was too late. The familiar panic rose in her throat. She squeezed her eyes closed as the dread began to claw at her—
Sarah plucked the crumpled folds of silk skirts from Charlotte’s clenched fist. “Maybe Lady Eleanor will let Miss Amelia come back to Grosvenor Square with you this afternoon.”
Charlotte turned from the window. “Won’t she—” She cleared her throat, but her voice sounded small nonetheless. “Don’t you suppose Amelia has lessons today?”
“Like as not, but you could hear how she does with her pianoforte, and then take her for a ride in the park afterwards. A little holiday won’t hurt the child.”
Charlotte relaxed her fists with an effort. “Well, it won’t do any harm to ask, I suppose.”
“No harm at all. Go on with you then,” Sarah added as the carriage stopped in front of Cam and Ellie’s townhouse and a footman appeared to hand Charlotte down. “Lady Eleanor’s note arrived over an hour ago. She must wonder what’s kept you so long.”
Charlotte paused a moment to steady her breath.
For pity’s sake, get ahold of yourself.
She fixed what she hoped was a convincing smile on her lips and swept up the townhouse stairs. “Oh, good morning—ah, that is, good afternoon, Phipps,” she said to the butler. “I’ve been summoned to an audience with your mistress. Would you be so good as to tell me where I might find her?”
Phipps bowed. “Of course, my lady. She’s in her bedchamber.”
Charlotte handed him her gloves. “Ah. The royal bedchambers. Where else? Thank you, Phipps.” She mounted the staircase to the second floor and entered Ellie’s rooms after a cursory tap at the door. “Eleanor?”
Ellie was seated on the window seat watching something in the garden below, but she turned when Charlotte entered. “Ah, Charlotte. Good morning. What took you so long?”
Charlotte studied her sister. No—there was no froth at Ellie’s mouth. A good sign, that. Some of the trapped air eased from Charlotte’s lungs. “Well, let me see.” She sank down onto a chaise, tucked her legs up underneath her, and attempted a light, teasing tone. “I had to sneak out of my bedchamber without waking my two lovers, and then I stopped on the way over here to gamble away all of Hadley’s family jewels. I do apologize for the delay.”
Eleanor raised an eyebrow. “Two lovers?”
“I think there were two. Perhaps there was a third burrowed under the counterpane at the foot of the bed.”
“My.” Ellie rose from the window seat and joined Charlotte on the chaise. “Such an excess of lovers. No wonder you look exhausted.”
Charlotte held up three fingers. “I look exhausted because Sarah forced me from my bed not three hours after I collapsed into it, and that makes three times in the past two weeks. Three times, Eleanor! Whatever can you mean, dragging me from my bed at such an ungodly hour?”
There. She’d hit just the right note of mock outrage. Now Ellie would laugh, or smile…
But Ellie didn’t laugh. Instead she began to tick points off on her own fingers. “Earlier this week it was Lord Fothergill’s rout, which, if the scandal sheets have the right of it, was not so much a rout as a high-stakes card game. Lord Essex’s son lost thousands to Lord Devon, didn’t he?”
For God’s sake.Sarah’s wagging tongue was as good as a crystal ball. “What of it? I came away from the tables a hundred guineas richer.”
Ellie ignored this and held up a second finger. “Then there was Lady Atwood’s dinner last week. I believe you attended. Quite a debauched scene, if rumor is correct. Miss Grainger is ruined beyond redemption, you know. Her family has banished her. They bundled her off to the country the very next day.”
Charlotte didn’t quite meet Ellie’s eyes. “Well, who told the chit to disappear into the library alone with a rake like Mr. Jermyn? Anyway, the rumors are nonsense. I saw Miss Grainger emerge from the library myself, and she was fully clothed—”
“That brings us to last night, and Lady Tallant’s soiree.”
Soiree. Not whorehouse. Was there a chance Ellie would let the brothel incident pass?
Charlotte forced a casual shrug. “Annabel Tallant is my friend, Eleanor. I could hardly refuse to attend her soiree.”
“Perhaps not, but you could have refused to end your evening at a west end brothel.”
