Lady Lyte's Little Secret. Deborah Hale

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      Chapter Three

      If she thought she could get rid of him that easily, Lady Lyte had better think again!

      As Thorn Greenwood rounded The Circus, he cast a glowering glance at the darkened windows of the New Assembly Rooms, long since deserted of ball-goers. After the mauling his pride had taken over the past two days, he was tempted to curse the place where he’d first set eyes on his troublesome mistress.

      Where would he and his sister be now, Thorn wondered, if he hadn’t let Ivy coax him out to that first ball of the Season?

      If some magical being from a nursery tale had suddenly materialized and offered him the chance to go back and relive the past two months differently, Thorn wasn’t certain whether he would accept or refuse.

      True, it had vastly complicated his life and it had all ended on a sour note. While his affair with Felicity Lyte lasted, though, it had been very sweet indeed.

      “Quit your mooning, man,” Thorn muttered to himself. He must think about raising the blunt he’d require for a journey—all the way to Scotland if need be.

      His steps slowed from the indignant stride that had carried him away from Royal Crescent. A mild night breeze wafted up the gracious hills of Bath from the River Avon. It carried the aromas of fine cooking from the kitchen windows of many a fashionable town house, as well as the music and laughter from a number of private parties winding to a close. The air of conviviality and careless wealth mocked Thorn’s predicament.

      Refusing to entertain regrets, he studied the problem with the same resolve he’d brought to bear on the calamity of his family’s fallen fortunes. If one thought hard enough and ruled out no potential solution as too difficult or distasteful, almost any dilemma admitted of a solution. Thorn had more experience than most men of his age and class in learning how to salvage something satisfactory from the bleakest of prospects.

      As he wandered down Gay Street and turned onto George, Thorn mulled over the problem in his deliberate, methodical way. Raising one possible solution after another, he weighed each in turn, discarding the unworkable, then proceeding to the next.

      He still had a few items of value he could part with to finance his journey, though most would be worth far more to him in sentiment than to a prospective buyer in gold. As his footsteps echoed on the cobbles of Milsome Street, Thorn cast that idea aside. The pawnshops on this busiest of commercial thoroughfares would be locked up as tight as all the other places of business. If he did manage to rouse some broker at this hour, the man would hardly be disposed to cooperate.

      Reason counseled Thorn to go home, assemble his valuables, get what sleep he could wrest from the night then set out in the morning. The thought of Ivy and young Armitage gaining a greater lead spurred him to action now, as did the notion of Felicity trundling along dark and deserted highways in a fine carriage with only an ancient driver and a juvenile footman for protection.

      Thorn cast his mind upon another prospect.

      “Of course.” He chuckled to himself when it finally occurred to him.

      He might be short of cash, but he was still comparatively wealthy in a man’s most precious asset—friends. If only he could get word to his brother-in-law. Merritt Temple had horses, carriages and funds he would have put at Thorn’s disposal in the blink of an eye. Unfortunately Merritt’s country estate lay many miles to the east. A detour in that direction would result in an even worse delay than waiting for the pawnbrokers to open in the morning.

      Surely there must be a friend in Bath to whom he could appeal.

      Weston СКАЧАТЬ