St. Clare had to let her go, of course. Not an hour later, in the foggy, bronze-streaked minutes before dawn, he bundled her into a hackney and accompanied her back to Green Street.

It was for the best. The two of them had enough to worry about without tempting scandal in the bargain. If he and Maggie were to have any kind of future together, their courtship must proceed as properly—and as publicly—as possible.

He returned to Grillon’s alone, where he cleaned his wound and went back to bed. The sheets smelled of her. Of soap and lavender water, and the sweet-scented pomade used to style her thick tresses for the ball.

It made for a restless sleep.

Rising some while later, he bathed and changed before making his way to Grosvenor Square, resolved to face the full force of his grandfather’s ire. Instead, he found an empty house.

“His lordship has gone out,” Jessup said.

“To where? His club?” St. Clare handed off his hat, coat and gloves to the butler.

“I couldn’t say, my lord. He left in something of a hurry.”

St. Clare scowled. He was in no mood for vagaries. His head was throbbing from too much brandy the night before, and the bullet wound in his arm ached liked the devil. “This isn’t the time to make a mystery of things, Jessup. If something’s happened to upset my grandfather, you may as well spit it out.”

Jessup gave a discreet cough. “If I was to hazard a guess, sir, I would say it had something to do with the copy of Bell’s Weekly Messenger he was reading at breakfast.”

St. Clare closed his eyes for a moment. Bell’s Weekly Messenger was a scandal sheet—one of the many his grandfather had fallen into the habit of reading since their arrival in London. It came every Sunday morning like clockwork and was presented to the earl along with his coffee.

“Fetch it for me,” St. Clare said as he strode into the library. “At once.”

Jessup brought it directly. It was folded over on a report about Lady Parkhurst’s ball.

St. Clare leaned back against the edge of his grandfather’s desk, the newspaper in his hand. He skimmed the small black print. It began with the usual drivel—who had attended and what they had been wearing. From there, it advanced to rumor and innuendo.

His fingers clenched on the paper as he read the offending passage.

Questions about Lord A—’s mysterious heir abound. While we have been reluctant to intimate anything nefarious, we can now confidently convey that the prevailing rumors place his origins not in Italy, but squarely in the West Country. Can that be the cause of his animus toward a certain Somerset squire? And, too, for the attention paid to a certain Somerset beauty?