“Frightened all the ladies away, did I?” He squinted off in the direction of Rotten Row as if searching for one in particular.

“It is an alarmingly public place, Ravensberg,” Lord Farrington said, laughing with him. “And you were bare to the waist.”

“Ah,” the viscount said carelessly, taking his coat from his friend and shrugging into it, “but I have a reputation for wild living to live up to, you see—though I believe I must have done my duty by it for one morning.” He frowned suddenly. “What the devil are we to do with these two slumbering bodies, do you suppose?”

“Leave them to sleep it off?” Lord Arthur suggested. “I am late for my breakfast, Ravensberg, and that eye is crying out for attention. The mere sight of it is enough to threaten one’s appetite.”

“You, fellow.” The viscount raised his voice as he drew another coin out of his pocket and tossed it onto the grass beside the only one of his opponents who was conscious. “Revive your friends and take them to the nearest alehouse before a constable arrives to convey them elsewhere. I daresay a tankard or two of ale each will help restore you all to a semblance of good health. And bear in mind for the future that when milkmaids say no they probably mean no. It is a simple fact of language. Yes means yes, no means no.”

“Bloody ’ell,” the man mumbled, still holding his jaw with one hand while setting the other over the coin. “I’ll never so much as look at another wench, guv.”

The viscount laughed and swung himself up into the saddle of his horse, whose bridle Mr. Rush had been holding.

“Breakfast,” he announced gaily, “and a juicy beefsteak for my eye. Lead the way, Rush.”

A few minutes later Hyde Park in the vicinity of Rotten Row was its usual elegant, tonnish self, all traces of the scandalous brawl vanished. But it was one more incident to add to the lengthy list of wild indiscretions for which Christopher “Kit” Butler, Viscount Ravensberg, had become sadly notorious.


“I cannot tell you,” the Duchess of Portfrey had been saying to her niece a few minutes earlier, “what a delight it is to have your company, Lauren. My marriage is proving more of a joy than I ever expected, and Lyndon is remarkably attentive, even now that I am in expectation of an interesting event. But he cannot live in my pocket all the time, the poor dear. We were both pleased beyond words when you accepted our invitation to stay with us until after my confinement.”

The Honorable Miss Lauren Edgeworth smiled. “We both know,” she said, “that you are doing me a far greater favor than I can possibly be doing you, Elizabeth. Newbury Abbey had become intolerable to me.”

She had been in London for two weeks, but neither she nor the duchess had touched upon the underlying reason for her being here until now. Elizabeth’s supposed need for Lauren’s company while she awaited the birth of her first child two months hence had been merely a convenient excuse. Of course it had.

“Life does go on, Lauren,” Elizabeth said at last. “But I will not belittle your grief by enlarging upon that theme. It would be insensitive of me, especially when I have never experienced anything to compare with what you have suffered—and when I have finally found my own happiness. Though that fact in itself may be of some reassurance to you. I was all of six and thirty when I married Lyndon last autumn.”

The Duke of Portfrey was indeed attentive to his wife, with whom he was clearly deeply in love. Lauren smiled her acknowledgment of the words of intended comfort. They strolled onward through Hyde Park, as they had done each morning since Lauren’s arrival, except for the three days when it had rained. The broad, grassy expanses on either side of the path looked enticingly and deceptively rural despite the frequent glimpses they afforded of other pedestrians and riders. It was as if a piece of the countryside had been tossed down into the middle of one of the largest, busiest cities in the world and had survived there, untainted by commerce.

They were approaching Rotten Row, from which Lauren had shrunk in some alarm the first time Elizabeth had suggested they walk there two weeks before. The morning gathering was nothing like the crush of the fashionable afternoon promenade in the park, it was true, but even so there were too many people to see and—more significant—to be seen by. She had thought she would never find the courage to face the beau monde after the fiasco of last year.

Last year half the ton had been gathered at Newbury Abbey in Dorsetshire to celebrate the wedding of Lauren Edgeworth to Neville Wyatt, Earl of Kilbourne. There had been a grand wedding eve ball, at which Lauren had thought it was impossible to feel any happier—and how horrifyingly prophetic that thought had proved to be! And then there had been the wedding itself at the village church, which had been packed to the doors with the crиme de la crиme of the beau monde—a wedding that had been interrupted just as Lauren was about to step into the nave, on her grandfather’s arm, by the sudden appearance of the wife Neville had thought long dead and of whose very existence Lauren and his whole family had been totally unaware.

Lauren had come to London this spring because she could no longer bear to be living at the dower house with the dowager countess and Gwendoline, Neville’s sister, while Neville and his Lily lived at the abbey a mere two miles distant. Unfortunately, there had been few avenues of escape. She had grown up at Newbury Abbey with Neville and Gwen after her mother married the late earl’s brother and went off with him on a wedding journey from which they had never returned. She had read Elizabeth’s letter of invitation, then, with enormous gratitude. But she had come on the assumption that since Elizabeth was increasing, they would not be taking part in any of the social activities of the Season. She was right about that, but Elizabeth did like to take the air.

“Oh, goodness,” the duchess said suddenly as they topped a slight rise in the path and came within sight of Rotten Row, “I wonder what the reason is for that crowd. I do hope no one has been taken ill. Or been thrown from a horse.”

There was indeed a large gathering of horses and people on the grass beside the path, directly on their route to the Row. They were mostly gentlemen, it appeared to Lauren. But if someone had indeed been hurt, the presence of ladies might be welcome. Ladies could be far more practical in emergencies than gentlemen. They both increased their pace.

“How absurd of me,” the duchess said, “to be remembering that Lyndon went out riding this morning. Do you suppose . . .”

“Indeed I do not,” Lauren said firmly. “And I do not even believe there has been any accident. They are cheering.”

“Oh, dear.” The duchess touched Lauren’s arm to slow her down again and sounded suddenly on the verge of laughter. “I do believe we have stumbled upon a fight, Lauren. I think we must walk on past as if we had noticed nothing untoward.”

“A fight?” Lauren’s eyes widened. “In such a public place? In broad daylight? Surely not.”

But indeed Elizabeth was quite right. When they drew closer Lauren confirmed it with her own eyes before she could avert them and hurry decently by. Although the crowd of men and horses was really quite dense, one of those inexplicable gaps appeared for a moment, allowing her a view of what was happening in the hollow center of the square. A shockingly clear view.

There were three men there, although she thought there might have been a fourth too, stretched out on the grass. Two of them were dressed decently, if shabbily, in the clothing of laboring men. But it was upon the third that Lauren’s eyes riveted themselves for a few startled moments. He was crouched ready for action and was apparently taunting the other two by beckoning with both hands. But it was not his actions that startled her as much as his state of dress—or rather, his state of undress. His supple top boots and his form-fitting buff riding breeches proclaimed him to be a gentleman. But above the waist he was quite, quite naked. And very splendidly and alarmingly male.

Before she looked sharply away in blushing confusion, Lauren became aware of two other details, one visual and one aural. He was fair-haired and handsome and laughing. And the words he spoke to accompany the beckoning hands fell unmistakably upon her ears despite the hubbub of voices proceeding from the many spectators.

“Come on, you buggers,” he said without any apparent shame at all.

She hoped fervently, even as she felt the uncomfortable heat of a blush spread up her neck to blossom brightly in both cheeks, that Elizabeth had not heard the words—or seen the half-naked man who had uttered them. Rarely had she felt such embarrassment.

But Elizabeth was laughing with what sounded like genuine amusement. “Poor Lord Burleigh,” she said. “He looks as if he might have an apoplexy at any moment. I wonder why he does not simply ride on by and leave the children to their play. Men can be such foolish creatures, Lauren. Even the slightest disagreement must be settled with fists.”

“Elizabeth,” Lauren said, truly scandalized, “did you see . . . ? And did you hear . . . ?”

“How could I not?” Elizabeth was still chuckling.

But before either of them could say more, they were distracted by the appearance of a tall, dark, handsome young gentleman, who stepped onto the path before them, bowed with hasty elegance, and offered an arm to each of them.

“Elizabeth,” he said, “Lauren. Good morning. And what a lovely morning it is too. It bids fair to being unseasonably warm later today. Allow me to escort you to Rotten Row and earn the envy of every other gentleman there.”