A few streets and one turn later, the driver stopped the carriage. “Where are we going, miss?” he called over the rain. How was it that this middle-aged carriage driver was more considerate than any of the gentlemen of her acquaintance? He had waited until Mr. Broadcreek was well away from her to even ask where she was going, and now he sat in the pouring rain awaiting her answer.

She needed a man who would ruin her reputation and not want her railroad in return—one who wouldn’t force a marriage on her or take their charade seriously.

A name had been floating in her mind ever since she had declared herself in a courtship. The two of them had only met twice. He may not even remember who she was. But he was impossible to forget. Her hand shook, but she rubbed it down the side of her dress. He was simply a man like any other in London. Surely she could handle one man if the alternative was multiple men every day.

She called an address to the driver. Raindrops pounded, but the hackney didn’t move. Had he not heard her through the window? She leaned forward to call out again, but before she could, he answered, “Yes, miss.”

Based on the pause, even he must know whose home address she had given him. As the carriage jerked forward, she pinched her nose and breathed deeply. Her dress was a disaster, her bonnet ruined, and she hadn’t slept well for days.

This was not at all how she had expected to see Lord Bryant again.

Chapter 2

A knock on the door of Everton’s study at this hour never boded well. His servants knew better than to disturb him during his brandy time. And he had no family. Everton’s parents were dead, his mother and father both taken by the same disease not long after arranging his disastrous marriage. Always separated in life, it was odd they died within days of each other.

Rachel had been gone four years. Not that she would have ever knocked on his door, even if she were still alive. Their marriage had only lasted a year, only six months of which she had suffered living under the same roof as him. A long line of unhappy marriages was immortalized in portraits in the corridor just outside his study. He hadn’t had time to commission one of him and Rachel, which meant the Baron Bryant portraits would end with his. As they should. Enough misery had taken place in this home to last several more generations, but hopefully when his cousin took residence, all of that would change.

Everton stared at the amber liquid in his glass, contemplating whether or not to answer. He poured himself a brandy every night, but he never drank it. He had spent over a year drinking, but all it had given him was a headache each morning. Two years had passed since he had touched anything but the weakest of wines. It was a waste to pour a glass each night only to watch it, but he didn’t stop. Waste was something he was accustomed to, and something about the opaque nature of the liquid numbed him just by looking at it.