Chapter 1

1

As Lady Chastity Perrin dipped a hook needle into a bowl of spirits, she knew with a great certainty three things:

One, a lady did not come unchaperoned to the rookeries of London.

Two, an unmarried lady did not stay alone with a man.

Three, a lady most definitely did not carry clean needles across a modest but spotless surgery to an unlicensed doctor to help him with a surgical operation that involved so, so—oh, goodness!— so much blood.

“Here you go, Dr. Sterling,” she said as she presented him the needle, threaded with catgut, on a plate she had also wiped with alcohol.

“Thank you, Lady Chastity,” said Brace Sterling as he picked up the needle and glanced at his patient—a little girl of not more than three years old, with blond curls under a grimy, ragged bonnet. “Stella, this is going to hurt. I am very sorry indeed.”

The girl’s grandmother, who stood by the examination table, clenched her bony hands around the edges of a threadbare and hole-ridden gray shawl. “It’s her own fault,” said the woman in a thick accent, scowling. “Trippin’ everywhere. Such a clumsy one. Breaks plates, mugs. Who’s gonna pay for the new ones?”

Stella’s big eyes filled with tears and darted to the floor, her small shoulders hunching forward as if she were trying to make herself look smaller. Dirty, thin fingers fidgeted with the hem of her dress.

Chastity’s heart ached for her. A three-year-old should not wear such a hurt expression.

And yet, in it, Chastity recognized herself.

Though she’d been a little older than Stella—five, perhaps—when it first began, she could hear her father’s voice belittling her for unladylike behavior: hunching over a microscope, playing chess, looking through biological illustrations.

Brace Sterling, a tall and broad-shouldered man with rugged, handsome features and turquoise eyes, his blond hair tied back in a tail, exchanged a glance with Chastity. The worry in his eyes mirrored her own. The child was severely neglected.

“Mrs. Murray,” he said as he pinched the skin on both sides of a nasty gash on Stella’s ankle. “You did right to bring the child here. I know you do your best to care for her, but be kinder to her if you can find it in yourself. The tripping could be because the girl is half starved. Or simply because she is just three years old.”

The woman scowled at him, her mouth twisting in a bitter expression. “My daughter was a serving maid at Rose Enveigh in green, his gray eyes covetous; Eccess the tallest, with honey-blond hair and an orange waistcoat; Irevrence in immaculate white; and Fortyne, his long auburn-tinged hair tied back, resplendent in violet.

“The Duke of Luhst will chaperone me,” she said to Bill quickly. “Thank you for your help, Bill. I have to go, I’m afraid.” She turned to Lucien. “They can’t see me here, Lucien!”

“Not a word more.” He nodded in agreement. “Follow me, darling. My carriage is right around the corner.” Quickly, he tugged her after him towards the carriage. Luckily, he was between her and the rest of the dukes, so none of them noticed her.

When they were inside the carriage, Chastity breathed out and removed her bonnet, suddenly too warm. “Just please drive me to my carriage in Mayfair. I’ll travel to Rath Hall from there.”

Lucien chuckled. “Oh no, sweet Chastity. I’m not letting you out of my sight until I deliver you to Dorian myself.”

“You can’t do that! I can’t be alone with you in the carriage—I’ll be compromised.”

Lucien shrugged as he knocked at the opposite wall and told the driver to go to Rath Hall. “I’m sure Dorian will understand that it’s much safer for you to be in my company than walking alone in Whitechapel.”

Chastity’s throat went dry, fear prickling through her skin. The rocking of the carriage against the uneven street was unsettling, the rattle of the wheels too loud. If Dorian found out she’d been sneaking into Whitechapel for months…was alone with an unlicensed male doctor…was putting herself in danger walking alone in the rookeries…

She could say goodbye to any hope of completing the research she’d spent years on. Say goodbye to her ultimate goal of scientific recognition and making her method available to more hospitals, which would help countless people avoid infections.

She had one hour’s drive to convince Lucien not to tell her brother. One hour alone with him, in the close proximity of the carriage. One hour of being bathed in his scent of leather, cloves, and sandalwood.

A shiver of hot awareness ran through her at the thought.

This man was decadence itself.

The tall, well-muscled body. The angelic eyes of the biggest sinner she’d ever met. The golden locks that she itched to reach out and brush away from his eyes.

What on Earth was she thinking? She hadn’t been in love with him for years now.

To stop the silly fantasies, she needed to remind herself why he looked so disheveled—he’d spent all night in other women’s arms. She could smell perfume on him. Someone else—likely more than one someone—had kissed those full lips, had caressed his sharp cheekbones and the straight angle of his jaw.

Not her.

It would never be her.

“Are you going to tell him where you found me?” she asked.

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“On why you’re here.”

She clasped her arms around herself. “I can’t tell you.”

“In that case I feel obliged to tell Dorian.”

“All right! All right.” She sighed deeply, preparing herself. “I am helping a doctor in Whitechapel. I use my new hygienic methods and help him prepare for surgeries, look after patients, and so on. In return, I am allowed to record all findings to see if my method has grounds to be presented to a wider scientific society.”

“Chastity, you kind soul,” he sighed. “Of course you’d do something like that.”

Most people would probably disagree that she was kind. No doubt the majority didn’t like her, thinking her frigid and stiff.

But Lucien was not most people.

“Please don’t tell Dorian,” she said.

“You’re asking me to keep a secret from my best friend, darling.”

“I know. And yet I’m still asking.”

His violet gaze blazed. “Oh, darling, you have no idea the extent of things I’d do for you.”

His warm breath fanned her cheek, his eyes heavy on her. His very words like the stroke of a tender hand.

But, she reminded herself, he was a charmer. A seducer. Those signs of sentiment meant nothing, as he would never see her as anything but his best friend’s sister.

Still, her treacherous heart beat faster, just from his nearness.

“But you have to give me a good reason to lie for you, Chastity,” he said. “My loyalty is to Dorian. I can never betray him or my brotherhood of sin.”