A memory flashed, the look on Tommy’s face when she’d guessed why he was there, searching for her. He hadn’t simply been irritated that she’d guessed her brother had commandeered him, as Adelaide called it. He’d been ashamed of it. As though he hadn’t had a choice in the matter. And then she’d made him another deal. Stolen another piece of the honor that oozed from him even as she’d bartered for that kiss that she had no business taking.

  Without thinking, she raised her hand to her lips, as though she could will the caress returned. The softness of his beard. The warmth of his lips. The crisp taste of him. The clean scent of him.

  “Imogen?”

  At Adelaide’s prompt, Imogen dropped her hand as though she’d been burned. “Hmm?”

  “What are you thinking about?”

  “More like who is she thinking about,” Adelaide teased.

  “I am not above chloroforming you two,” Imogen replied.

  “You would never.” Adelaide again. “We are far too diverting.”

  They were, but she wasn’t about to admit it.

  “Oh, dear,” Adelaide said, looking into the crowded ballroom.

  Imogen followed her gaze to find her brother bearing down on them, irritation clear on Charles’s face. He clearly did not appreciate seeing her tucked into a dark corner. She looked to her friends. “Help!”

  Duchess leapt into action. “Let’s take a quick turn and see if we can lose him in the crush.”

  They ducked behind a row of potted ferns just long enough for Charles to lose sight of them, and popped back out in the middle of a cluster of young women. “Good evening, ladies,” Duchess said, sounding positively regal. “It appears Lady Imogen has misplaced her dance card, so we’re off to fetch a new one. Do tell her brother as much should you see him.”

  The group of young women agreed instantly, their willingness growing exponentially when Duchess lowered her voice to a whisper and said, “As I understand it from an excellent source”—she tilted her head toward Imogen—“Dorring has decided to make the long trip to the altar this year. You’d best be certain to save a dance for him. Young, handsome, titled, and wealthy.”

  She paused and looked to Imogen, who immediately nodded and chimed in, “If only he weren’t my brother!”

  They pushed through the tittering crowd, Imogen smothering a laugh as Duchess grinned and said, “That should buy you a bit more time to choose your next partner.”

  “You decide.” She didn’t care for balls or whether she was the belle of them, but she had a bit of self-respect. Before Duchess could reply, Imogen added, “Someone who has a brain in his head, though.”

  Duchess looked down at her, a single blond lock falling over her brow as she smirked. “These are aristocratic men, Imogen. You might wish to lower your expectations.”

  Imogen groaned. “You’re certain faking my own death is not an option?”

  Her friend’s blue eyes went wide. “Do you have the means to chloroform yourself?”

  “In fact I do not. Charles made me leave my bag in the carriage. Something about not appearing odd,” she replied. “But I have faith that you do have a way to render me unconscious?”

  “Of course I do,” Duchess replied, looking out across the room again—tall enough to see more than Imogen could in what had become a crush. “But I’ve no intention of doing it. Interesting.”

  Imogen looked up at that, Duchess had seen enough of Mayfair over the years that she did not often find things interesting. Her friend’s attention was locked on something across the room. “What?”

  Duchess met her eyes. “I think you should choose.”

  Imogen blinked. “Choose what?”

  “Not what. Whom.” Duchess smiled. “Think on it, my friend. Anyone in London—who do you choose?”

  She pushed the answer away.

  Duchess seized it, nonetheless. “Do you have someone in mind?”

  “No.” The answer came quickly. As quickly as the image had come to Imogen’s mind.

  “No?” Duchess replied, sounding completely disbelieving.

  “No one. Of course not. Who would I have in mind?” Knowing she sounded completely nonsensical, she bit her tongue. “Certainly no one here.”

  Duchess looked down at her as they were jostled by a group of older women pushing them back, making more room on the dance floor. “But someone somewhere else?”

  No one.

  No one here, no one anywhere else. Certainly not anyone with broad shoulders to crash through doors and arms strong enough to carry her out of buildings and thighs that were . . . in a word . . . impressive. She cleared her throat. “No.”

  “Interesting,” Duchess said, looking past her. Toward the entrance to the room. “I only ask because there is a new arrival who seems . . . promising.”

  Before Duchess finished her sentence, Imogen noticed a change in the women gathered around her at the edge of the ballroom. They were no longer simply watching the dance. They were . . . tittering.

  “Where did he come from?” someone whispered behind her.

  Something tumbled in Imogen’s stomach. She looked to Duchess, whose blue eyes were twinkling with an expression Imogen recognized as scheming.

  “Duchess . . .”

  Blond brows rose in pure innocence. “Yes?”

  “Who is it?”

  “Have a look for yourself.” Duchess leaned in. “Imogen Loveless, you are the bravest woman I know. It’s perfectly safe. Really. It’s not as though anything is going to explode.”

  She did as she was told, feeling not at all brave. And when she turned, it was to see that the dance floor had cleared enough for her to get a good look at the entry to the ballroom, where just inside the door, Detective Inspector Thomas Peck stood, all in black, looking like a man who had spent his life in Mayfair ballrooms.

  Duchess was wrong. It was not safe. Imogen sucked in a breath, and though it was completely impossible, it seemed as though he heard it, his gaze crashing into hers from across the damn room.

  What was he doing here? Looking like he belonged here?

  No. Not like he belonged here. He didn’t look anything like any of the simpering aristocrats scattered about the room. He looked like the antithesis of them. He looked like a man with purpose.

  What purpose? Was it her?

  It couldn’t be her.

  He set off another explosion in her chest. Tweel-pew.

  And then Duchess was in her ear.

  “I take it back. Perhaps things will explode, after all.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Tommy Peck entered the Trevescan ballroom feeling a dozen kinds of fool, like a small boy trying on his father’s too-large coat and too-large boots, clomping around the house in delight. But there was no delight that night.

  The clothes and shoes he wore fit him perfectly, though they were no less a costume. If anything, they were more of one—one with a heavier weight. Not to be stripped off and left in a pile beneath the kitchen table, forgotten until the next morning, when Father was late for work, but instead to be worn like they meant something. Like they were truth.

  There was nothing about that evening that felt like truth.

  He almost hadn’t come. He didn’t belong anywhere near the place and its people. But he’d had no choice. He’d come because of her. Everything Tommy had done in the last week had been because of her, if he was honest—from the moment he’d carried Imogen out of O’Dwyer and Leafe’s on that rainy morning.

  He’d told himself it was because she clearly knew more about his investigation than she was willing to share. Confirmed it when he’d found her at Scotland Yard. But then, the carriage had nearly taken her out outside The Place and his desire to interrogate her had become something else. A desire to keep her safe.

  That night, Tommy had gone home and attempted sleep until he’d had no choice but to hire a hack and head to Dorring House, where he’d kept watch all night, awake in the cold after taking a beating thanks to The Place’s well-reinforced door, until Imogen had exited the next morning, clean and coiffed, looking no worse for wear.

  And still, Tommy had been certain something wasn’t right.

  In his more than a decade with the Metropolitan Police, Tommy had been near death on more than one occasion, and this feeling . . . it was not the same. He saw the event again and again, over and over. Imogen, frozen in the lantern light, looking to the bend in the road. The thunder of the horses. The clatter of the wheels.

  All night long, a single thought, repeating over and over: She was in danger.

  By sunup, he’d convinced himself that what he was about to do was good sense. Yes, she was in danger—he was sure of it—but she had also collected evidence relating to the crimes in East London that he needed to access.

  What better way than to offer his services to her brother? The earl wanted his sister married? Wanted her protected? Who better to do so than the Scotland Yardsman who’d found her the night before—there was no need for her brother to know that she hadn’t really been missing.

  So, when she’d disappeared into the carriage that had taken her to the dressmaker or the haberdasher or the library or wherever beautiful young women went on Tuesday mornings, Tommy had stepped out of Berkeley Square and asked for an audience with Earl Dorring.

  As he’d waited in the marble entryway, he’d catalogued the space—an enormous chandelier hanging from the ceiling of the first floor, which was accessed by a massive staircase. The walls teeming with portraits, ancestors of not only the humans in the house, but it seemed the horses and hounds as well. He did his best not to linger on the hallways above, knowing he would not find a sliver of jewel-toned skirts or a hint of black curl.

  Which was fine, as he had not been there to see her. He had been there to see her brother. To offer his services.

  Off hours.

  Just until the lady was married, he’d agreed with Earl Dorring. Just to make sure she was safely traveling from one place in Mayfair to another. To keep her out of harm’s way. To keep her reputation as pristine as that house in Mayfair.

  To keep her safe.

  It had all seemed simple enough until that evening, when he’d dressed in trousers and shirts and waistcoats softer and better fitting than anything he’d had before—thanks to the earl, who insisted he dress for the occasions at which Imogen would require guard.

  Tommy had ignored the roiling in his gut as he’d shaved and oiled his beard and brushed his teeth and descended from his room to the wide-eyed astonishment of Mrs. Edwards.

  And now, Tommy Peck, a boy from the streets of Shoreditch, entered the home of the Duke and Duchess of Trevescan through the main foyer and up the grand central staircase to the ballroom within. Allowed in alongside money and title and power, because he had put on the costume.

  He stepped into the ballroom, the air thick with the perfume and heat of those assembled—all of whom seemed to sense that he’d entered, as though they could smell the lack of title and money and power on him—and steeled himself for what was to come.

  Looking out over the ballroom, Tommy leaned on his instincts as a detective, tracking the space. Cataloguing its size and scope. The exits, one doorway at one far corner, leading to a dimly lit corridor. Another hidden in the wall paneling on the opposite side. The windows along one wall, black with the night beyond and reflecting the hundreds of candles within that dripped wax on those assembled below.

  He wondered how they cleaned their clothes—neither silk nor satin nor dark wool made for easy washing after wax had cooled in the threads. The thought had barely formed before he realized his folly. No one in that room worried or thought about washing their clothes. That was the purview of servants. And even then, only if these people had interest in wearing the same clothes twice.

  His gaze fell to the crowd below, with their impeccable clothes and impeccable hair and their collective unwavering gaze, focused directly on him as if to say, Imposter. Intruder.

  As though he didn’t know it already—that he didn’t belong here, with these people.

  And then he saw her.

  Her frock was the color of a summer sunset over the London rooftops, not orange, not red, not gold, but somehow all three, and somehow in constant flux, setting the sky aflame, just as she set the room aflame, making it impossible for him to notice anything else. Not the women around her, not those who tittered near him, not the liveried footman who took his invitation and passed it to another, who announced him, as though he were a valued guest and not a servant, just like them.

  “Mr. Thomas Peck.”

  His name clanged through the room, loud and discordant—when was the last time the place had heard the name of a resident of Holborn?—followed by absolute silence.

  Collective shock.

  Across the room, Imogen’s enormous brown eyes remained on his. Her cheeks flushed almost instantly, sending a thrum of awareness through him. He’d done that. He’d put the wash on her cheeks, and as he watched, the flush traced down her neck, over her shoulders, and to the pretty, smooth expanse of her chest, disappearing beneath the line of that gown . . . the one he feared he would think of whenever he saw a sunset, for the rest of his days.

  The rest of the room was cold, but Imogen Loveless was fire.

  For one wild moment, Tommy wondered how it might be if, instead of being there to watch over her, he was there to be with her. He didn’t have time to linger on the thought—which was likely for the best—as Imogen was already turning away from him, pushing through the crowd. Disappearing.

  With that, Tommy no longer felt out of place. He knew his purpose. He was there to watch over Imogen Loveless, and if she was running, he was there to chase.

  What he did not expect, however, was half of London stopping him from getting to her.

  It began easily enough, with the Earl of Dorring meeting his eyes from across the room and offering a quick nod—Tommy had no qualms about avoiding conversation with the man—but within seconds, someone else called out to him, stopping him in his tracks.

  He couldn’t very well ignore Commissioner Battersea.

  “Sir,” he said, accepting the firm handshake that drew him closer to the group of men assembled.

  “Can’t slip past me, my boy.” The man laughed heartily despite not having made a jest. “Come, come. Everyone wants to meet you—the brightest star in the Yard.”

  Tommy gritted his teeth and shoved the promotion to the forefront of his thoughts as Battersea made introductions. The trio of white men with the commissioner—a marquess, and two earls—were known throughout London as powerful, vocal members of the House of Lords. They were trotted out every time a reform bill was even whispered about in the news—workers’ rights, women’s rights, immigrants’ rights, compulsory education—to shout down the truth and drum up anger from any who would listen.

  Tommy had been at more than one gathering-turned-riot incited by the trio. Seeing the commissioner with them did little to change Tommy’s view—entitled toffs.

  “I confess—it’s not every day we see a Scotland Yardsman in a Mayfair ballroom!” Lord Oakham said.

  After a round of harharing, Earl Leaving added, “Indeed! A bit like inviting a horse to dinner!” He clapped a hand on Tommy’s shoulder, and it took all Tommy had not to smack the touch away. “A jest, Peck! A jest! You’re the cleverest horse in the field!”

  “Clever enough that he must be back to the race, gents,” Battersea interjected. “As I understand it, Mr. Peck is on the job.” He leaned in. “Dorring’s sister needs minding until she finds a man to do the work for free.” He lifted a chin toward Tommy. “Peck has offered his skills for the task.”

  “Good man,” Leaving said. “Odd thing, the Loveless girl.”

  “Loveless is right—can’t imagine anyone wishing themselves saddled to her,” Oakham agreed. “Bad enough I was required to heave her about the ballroom tonight.”

  Tommy’s jaw clenched; any one of these men would be lucky to have Imogen Loveless. But they wouldn’t, because Tommy had no doubt that the woman wouldn’t give them a second look. There was no way Lady Imogen was marrying anyone even in the same universe as these men.

  He’d stop the fucking wedding himself, and take immense pleasure in ending the goddamn groom.

  “You ought to take care,” he said, drawing the sharp attention of the quartet with the quiet threat he could not keep from his tone. “It is my job to keep the lady safe, and that includes silencing those who disrespect her.”

  Collectively, the men blanched, trading nervous looks as they attempted to assess whether Tommy was serious.

  “Watch your tone, Peck,” Battersea blustered, having no choice but to attempt to control Tommy and prove his worth to the assembled lords. “You’d do well to remember this isn’t your place.”

  “I assure you, sir,” Tommy replied, his words like steel. “I could not possibly forget that.”

  Battersea narrowed his gaze as Lord Haverford jumped in. “Nonsense, Battersea. He’s just doing his job. Not that he needs to play the watchdog with us.” He waved a limp hand at the room beyond. “We’re all of us throwing hats in the ring. Proximity to Dorring’s name and fortune is worth . . . making an effort . . . for the girl.”

  A false chuckle from Oakham. “Certainly. All we are saying is that she’ll need a firm hand from a husband.”

  “Spare the rod, spoil the wife, isn’t that how it goes, Haverford?” Leaving said, the implication in them turning Tommy’s stomach.

  The group laughed again—fucking ghouls—and Tommy imagined what it would be like to take a rod to the lot of them. His hand clenched at his side. He wouldn’t need a rod. His fists would do just fine.

  A growl sounded low in Tommy’s throat as he considered the full repercussions of putting a fist into the man’s face, turning the Trevescan ball into a brawl, and ruining his career.

  Battersea must have heard it, for the nervous look he cast in Tommy’s direction. “Alright, Peck. You are released. Be sure to give the ladies the full show—we need them telling their husbands to vote for additional Home Office funding, eh?”