4. November, 1826

4

NOVEMBER, 1826

ST. JAMES SQUARE, LONDON

L ady Camilla had overheard many tales whispered at the edges of St. James ballrooms about the gorgeous Scottish physician who was currently the darling of the ton's bored, wealthy wives, but the man who'd been commandeered to appear for tea in her drawing room surpassed any tittle-tattle gossip he might have generated.

Good God, Dr. Hamish Douglas was delectable, and how he filled out his sensible but expensively tailored Savile Row suit. From the cut and precision, probably Davies and Son. She could not in recent memory recall any man who'd unsettled her like this one. For a fleeting moment she almost forgot herself and plied him with her infamous blue-eyed gaze from beneath long lashes. And then Camilla came to her senses. Not only was she surely older than this man's mother, but probably his grandmother as well.

The barrister Forsythe gave her an odd look. "Did you hear what I said, milady?"

She started and nodded. "Yes, of course. So pleased to finally meet you, Dr Douglas." She coughed a bit to cover her lapse and extended her hand. "I've heard many good things about your, erm, medical skills."

After he bowed and took her hand, he looked directly into her eyes and said, "I must congratulate you on maintaining your beautiful, youthful skin, Lady Camilla."

Camilla nearly giggled at the jolt that went through her. She'd have to watch this one. What an unexpected pleasure. Was he flirting with her? She squelched the dizzying feelings he elicited that she hadn't felt in years and simply acknowledged his compliment with a nod and "Thank you."

Honoria, Ath's wife, who was not visibly pregnant at the moment, had no qualms about giving the man an appreciative glance, making a show of smoothing her skirts and leaning expectantly toward the poor man.

Sythe took the cue and introduced him to Honoria as well. After they'd exchanged pleasantries, they were interrupted by the deep voice of Lady Camilla's butler, Raines. "Tea, milady?" he intoned, even as he rolled the cart laden with a huge, steaming silver pot and delicate china cups and saucers as well as a towering, four-level assortment of small finger sandwiches, pots of heavy cream and jam, buttery pastries, and decadent cakes and candied fruits crowning the top level.

When Camilla pointed a commanding, be-ringed finger toward the settee next to her, Dr. Douglas dutifully took a seat.

She nodded to Honoria to do the honor of serving, and as soon as everyone was settled with their tea, Sythe began his explanation of why they'd brought Dr. Douglas into their confidence.

"We have a very delicate matter." He raised a hand to tick off their requirements, finger by finger. We require someone with medical knowledge, diplomacy, and a willingness to protect a young woman whose life may be in peril." When Hamish tried to interrupt with a question, Sythe warned him to wait by extending his palm. "One small, further complication, however, is that she may or may not be a murderess, and your employer, who…"

Raines tapped at the drawing room door again before ushering in Derek Welkirk, Earl of Framlingwood.

Sythe looked toward the door in annoyance. "Where have you been? We told you we'd be meeting at precisely two o'clock."

"I'm sorry," Framlingwood said, sweeping his gaze around the room at everyone assembled to help him hire the latest bodyguard for one of his mistresses. "I, um, had some business to attend to with Mrs. Collins."

"Mrs. Collins? Your housekeeper?" Sythe delivered the questions with a mocking, incredulous look.

Framlingwood's face flushed a scarlet hue followed by a collective eye-rolling amongst Lady Camilla and the rest of her guests.

Hamish hoped for nothing more than perhaps a hole to form beneath the expensive Turkey carpet beneath the settee and fling him down to Hades. He was torn between abject embarrassment, anger, and curiosity. He was, after all, a well-known London physician. What made this havey-cavey lot of connivers think he was available and eager for their odd employment? However, he had to admit he was intrigued by the thought of protecting a young woman who was either in fear of her life…or a murderess. But what the hell did being a physician have to do with this bizarre charade?

The barrister leaned forward, his hands on his knees, and stared rudely. "I know you're thinking about it, aren't you?"

Hamish had barely opened his mouth to give all of them a piece of his mind when the earl suddenly spoke up. "Before you say anything, let me tell you how much I'm prepared to pay to keep my mistresses safe."

"Mistresses? Multiple mistresses?" Hamish asked stupidly.

Honoria explained patiently, as if to a child. "He has five. He's an idiot who can't bear to dismiss any of them, once he brings on a new one." She paused for a moment before continuing. "And he brings on a new mistress once a year. He keeps all of them in a huge edifice on Grosvenor Street he's turned into side-by-side townhouses. They share an army of servants, one cook…" She faltered for a moment, stared toward one of Lady Camilla's ceiling medallions, and then continued. "Oh, and one housekeeper, the aforementioned Mrs. Collins."

Hamish closed his mouth, which he feared had fallen open while Honoria had explained the full extent of the earl's mistress madness. "And how do you know these women are in danger?"

Framlingwood raised his head sheepishly. "I'm being blackmailed, and the rum cove is threatening to harm the women if I don't keep paying him. He's already made attempts on two of them."

"Why blackmail you? Surely you're not the only aristocrat in England with more than one mistress." Hamish sat back and took a deep draught of his tea.

"He threatens to destroy all of them if I don't give up the one who's a murderess." Framlingwood hung his head after that admission.

"So which one of them is the culprit?"

"We don't know," everyone said in unison.

"And you expect me to guard a woman who could be a murderess?"

"Saida is an apothecary, wrongly accused of poisoning the wife of one of her customers." Framlingwood smiled as he described her. "But I can't believe she'd hurt anyone. She's an extremely talented midwife and herbalist. You could move into her townhouse on the pretext of sharing some of what you know of formal medicine..."

Hamish gritted his teeth. "How in the name of Zeus do you expect me to take on a job like this?"

"For an obscene amount of money," Framlingwood said, without pause and shrugged his shoulders.

Hamish settled back onto the settee, looked around the room and carefully finished his tea before setting down his cup. He leaned forward toward the earl. "I accept your offer, Framlingwood. I'm your man."

Barrister Forsythe quietly moved to the tantalus in the corner of the drawing room. He poured a generous tot of whisky into an elegant crystal glass and walked the libation to Hamish. "You're going to need this when we tell you the rest of the story."

Hamish refused Barrister Forsythe's offer of a carriage ride back to his office and residence. "I need to walk to clear my brain and somehow come to grips with what I've agreed to do for money."

"There is no shame in succumbing to filthy lucre," Forsythe assured him. "I myself serve some of the blackest hearted, most disgusting denizens of London, because, first of all, someone has to represent these poor, unredeemable wretches. Otherwise, how else would justice be served in our society? And then there's the inescapable truth that I have to earn a living as much as the next man."

At that, he'd tipped his hat toward Hamish, and his carriage had disappeared into the growing dusk of a late fall night in Mayfair.

When finally alone with his thoughts, Hamish started walking back toward his modest townhouse on Finsbury Square, far east of the wealthiest Mayfair neighborhoods. He knew he had to maintain a brisk pace for the at least hour-long slog ahead of him. But he was grateful for the time to think.

He couldn't help dwelling on what Framlingwood's generous infusion of cash would mean to further his dream to escape his father's clutches and move back to Inverness to serve the people of his mother's impoverished clan. He'd grown up in his father's household, the coddled brother of four loving sisters. He'd never known his natural mother until he'd left home to attend medical school in Edinburgh. His mother had somehow managed to travel all the way by public coach down to where he'd shared quarters with several other medical students.

When her note had arrived, explaining that she was his mother and begging to be allowed to meet with him just once, the initial shock was followed by disbelief. At the end of her carefully penned note, she'd promised she'd never bother him again if he'd grant her just one hour of his time. She'd described the birthmark inside one of his ankles that he'd carried all his life, a reddened skin irregularity that was shaped oddly, like a small star.

For a week, emotions ranging from anger to grief and finally curiosity had deviled him until he'd penned a response he'd had sent to her return address. From her crude penmanship, he'd expected an ignorant, stooped country woman. Instead, he found himself seated across from an obviously once-beautiful, surprisingly young woman staring back at him with his own dark eyes and deep ginger brows.

Her hair was a glorious auburn bound into a tight bun at the back of her neck. However, the severe hairdo failed to keep stray curls from springing out in the damp Edinburgh night. He realized with a leaden lump in his stomach that his father must have forced himself on a very young woman and then left her to fend for herself after taking away her child. She'd been quick to explain that she'd been in service in a grand house when she'd met his father. She also assured him she'd willingly sent him with his father knowing she'd have no way of keeping him with her.

"Twas a bad thing I did, and I've missed my sweet babe every day. Can you ever forgive me?" Those sweet words had somehow broken the dam of anger he'd harbored ever since receiving her note. From that time on, he'd met her for supper each Sunday evening, courtesy of the generous allowance from his father. She'd found a position as a housemaid to a widow in Edinburgh so that they could spend her half day together.

Over a year of Sundays during his final studies at Edinburgh, she'd spooled out the story of her family, now his as well, and how they'd been reduced to subsistence living after the clearances near Inverness. With the enclosure, or privatization, of the land they'd farmed for generations, they now were reduced to mostly fishing and working at odd jobs at the periphery of Inverness. Hunting on the huge, now private estates was considered poaching and punishable by either death or transportation.

In the years since then, he'd felt like a fraud accepting the life his father had set up for him, but had kept the dream that one day he'd save enough to escape to the Highlands and help the side of his family he barely knew. Lately, at night, after several brandies to help him forget the futility of his aimless practice, he'd berated himself for settling into a complacent, comfortable, but meaningless existence.

Now, after all these years, his dream was nearly within reach. All he had to do was guard a woman who was either in danger…or a murdering poisoner. What could possibly go wrong?