Chapter 1

Genoa 1820

Malmesbury would father the heir to the Beaumont dukedom. Count Vellagio wasn't a contender. What she'd logged in her book about him this afternoon said it would be a huge mistake anyway. The same for the Duke of Southey young, certainly, but a drunk with quiffed hair and filthy fingernails.

No, Malmesbury was the best. The only. Intelligent without being painful, fashionable yet not a dandy, and retaining enough of his looks at the age of fifty not tobe outright repulsive.

Of course, it would have helped if Thomas could have fathered the Beaumont heir himself. But as he lay dead in a box in the cellar, that wasn't likely.

"Gentlemen, you know as well as I do, this is an unusual evening." Shivers ran up and down Lady Fury Shelton's spine as she stood in the center of her darkened antechamber.

With its festooned corners and gold-scrolled furniture, the carmine-walled room was the best place for such an assignation, although the tiled floor and the cool clang of evening bells snaking in through the parted shutters made it chillier than usual. The candlelight glinting on the pale oval of Messalina's face on the hanging above the bed, too. Earlier, the air had been hotter than a boiled lobster. She'd had to change twice in the space of an hour because she was too.

"Hear, hear." Southey raised his crystal glass.

Where else, but to his obviously parched lips. A toast to her? Already it was obviously beyondhis capability to sit down facing her as the other men were, with their drinks untouched on the tiny tables beside them, the epitome of good manners.

"My interviews are complete. Shortly, I will make my choice. Then, having done so, I will invite the said gentleman to this bedroom, where he will perform his duty as often as necessary."

"All in one night. I say, that's a tall order for a man. Isn't it, chaps?"

For Southey, yes, it would be. Given the state in which he'd arrived at her door this afternoon, and what he'd sunk of her amaretto and limoncello in the meantime, it was a miracle he could still stand there against the marble fireplace. Never mind anything else.

But she wasn't about to debate the subject. Maybe she was fit to snap the spine of the tooled leather book she was clutching--a pity it wasn't his throat the Moon could not look serener.

"I say, Fury, how the blazes are you going to tell right away?" Southey hiccupped. "Don't them things take weeks and weeks to find out?"

"The one chosen will be here for weeks. Those not chosen," him in other words--"will leave within the hour. I think we may be clear that at any time in the future, should any one of you breathe a word to anyone about this, I will find out. I have sufficient information in this book here to ruin each and every one of you. Make no mistake, I will use it."

"By God, Fury, you don't need to talk like that about any of us, I'm sure," Malmesbury, who had so far watched the proceedings with an amused smile, muttered. "You want to get one over on Thomas; I, for one, don't blame you. We all saw him sneaking about with that Porto Antican tart when you first arrived."

"Yes." Who hadn't?

"And do you think we're unaware what his illness has done to him? The rages? The drinking? The way he keeps you here like a pet poodle?"

That too. Thomas wasn't who she was getting one over on, but she couldn't very well say so here.

She held in her hands every dirty little secret concerning these men. All documented in the yellow, dog-eared pages of her book. The leaves also contained letters, bills, testimonies, transactions. She kept it all beneath lock and key. So they obeyed her.

In fact, she kept dirty secrets on every member of the aristocracy she came into contact with, so she was safe for another hour, another day. She was hardly about to lose that balance of control by admitting this wasn't about Thomas.

No. She could have paid a Porto Antican organ grinder to father her child and walked away, no questions asked. The one at the end of the harbor was handsome enough. But Lady Margaret would smell an organ grinder's bastard at a hundred paces. Hadn't the woman scented Fury?

Malmesbury shifted in his chair. "Where is he, by the way?"

"Who? Thomas? Thomas is visiting his father."

No lie. Had any of these men facing her in the flickering candlelight known whether Thomas's father lived or died, she'd never have chosen them.

"Even if he wasn't, Thomas wants you to know me well. That is why he's gone." She hesitated. Thomas would spare her this next lie, although there was more than one grain of truth in it now. "Sadly, it is more than he can do himself these days. Now, I must ask you all to return to your chambers and wait. My mind is almost made up. Susan, here, will call in due course for the chosen one to return. And we'll begin."

"Dash it, that's good to know." Southey thumped his glass down on the marble mantelpiece.

In addition to his drinking, his casual mistreatment of the Murano goblet, while not worth an entry in her book, made him all the more unsuitable. What careless traits might a child inherit? Besides, his odor as he staggered past her made her stomach heave. It took every ounce of her self-control to remain where she was, inhaling the fragrance of the citrus-scented candle Susan had lit to disperse the gloom.

He paused and turned toward her. "All this cloak and dagger stuff is killing, you know."

"Yes. Certainly for some."

"What if you can't you know?"

"Oh, I'm sure I can."

Malmesbury got to his feet. "I shall wait then, Fury."

There was no doubt his palms itched to touch her, but she shrank from letting him. It didn't bode well for later, but at least he didn't smell. There wasn't a single crease in his immaculate silver frock coat. And his shoe buckles not only shone, they sparkled. His valet must be remarkable, whoever he was.

Count Vellagio was silent as the crypt. Speaking limited English and not much more Italian he always was, unless it was absolutely necessary.

It was one mercy at least.