Free How To School Your Scoundrel by Juliana Gray

into next week.”
    “Trifles.” He folded his arms against his massive chest.
    “I suppose they’re trifles to you. I suppose you do this sort of thing on a nightly basis, God knows why, but I refuse to submit to such barbarous treatment again.”
    A pause settled into the rhythmic motion of the hackney, the close intimacy of their two bodies held together beneath the iron doors. Luisa thought of her ring, tucked inside Somerton’s waistcoat, and flexed her fingers.
    How the devil was she going to get it back?
    “In that case, I assure you, you will come to no further harm in my employ,” Somerton said quietly.
    “How on earth can you promise that?”
    “I promise it.”
    She couldn’t think of a reply to that solemn low voice, that intensity of conviction. His sleeve was next to hers; his enormous leg lay against her own, like the trunk of a hundred-year oak next to a seedling. He radiated heat, almost smothered her with his energy.
    Her father’s ring. The ring of state, the ring held by the Prince of Holstein-Schweinwald-Huhnhof, as a symbol of his marriage to his subjects. She’d kept it close to her body, as a talisman to keep her safe. What a fool she’d been. A sheltered little fool of a princess, who never thought to consider the common dangers of a London street at night.
    Luisa turned her head to watch the sooty buildings slide by, darkest Pimlico giving way to Belgravia. In another few minutes, they would be back at the Earl of Somerton’s town house, encased in safety and luxury. Another peculiarity of London, that wealth and squalor lay together as bedfellows. You were never far from one or the other.
    She had to get the ring back, before Somerton examined it more carefully. Saw the Holstein crest engraved on the band, the unique arrangement of diamond, sapphire, and ruby.
    She drew in a deep breath. Stay calm. Wait for opportunity. Emotion achieves nothing.
    Victoria Station passed quietly by. The traffic was growing, hackneys and carriages, a single late omnibus, nearly empty. The driver turned a corner, and suddenly all was stately and grand, lit by energetic gas lamps. The world she knew, through different eyes, in a different time.
    “I suppose this means you intend to keep me on?” she said.
    Somerton roused himself. “Keep you on? Yes, of course.”
    “But I didn’t pass your test.”
    “I beg your pardon. I don’t quite understand you.”
    “Your test. Your test of my abilities. The Baltic shipping list, which, as you see, I have failed to deliver.”
    Somerton rapped against the roof. The trapdoor slid open. “Pull over. We’ll walk from here.”
    “Very good, sir.”
    The hackney swerved to the curb and came to a stop. Perhaps she could fall against him when she climbed out, and pluck the ring from his pocket in the resulting confusion.
    But his overcoat remained buttoned, and the jacket beneath that. Besides, she was no trained pickpocket.
    Somerton reached inside his coat for the fare. In a moment, they would be back on the pavement, back in the house. She might not see him again until the morning.
    The cabbie took the fare. The doors fell open.
    Luisa braced her hand on the side of the hackney. “Well, your lordship? Don’t say you’re willing to overlook my failure.”
    “My dear fellow. The Baltic shipping list is neither here nor there.” He sprang to the pavement and turned to face her.
    She rose to her feet and stumbled deliberately out of the cab, sticking one hand toward the parting of his coat as if to brace herself, but Somerton’s long arms snatched and steadied her before her feet touched the ground. She looked up at his face, inches away. The lurid glare of the cab’s single lamp made him look like an apparition.
    “You have gained my trust, Mr. Markham,” he said in a low voice, almost a snarl. “See that you don’t squander it.”

FIVE

    I nside the Earl of Somerton’s town house, the lights had all been turned down, though it was only half past