Free Deadly Peril by Lucinda Brant Page B

explained.
    “You’ve been asked for specifically by name. That’s not the usual way of negotiatin’ the release of prisoners between kingdoms, is it? A sovereign usually decides who to send to bargain for his subjects with a foreign power. In this case it is the foreign power who has requested you. That’s either because that foreign power has a special cordial relationship with you, or—and I fear this is the case—this new Margrave has gone to all this trouble because he thinks you’ve wronged him, or someone close to him, and he’s seized upon a unique opportunity to lure you back. As you were imprisoned and managed to escape, I’d say it’s the latter.”
    “Not the Margrave—his sister,” Alec said abruptly. “The Princess Joanna.”
    “That don’t surprise me.”
    The old man’s smile only deepened the furrow between Alec’s black brows. “Doesn’t it? It should. It’s much more complicated than you can ever imagine.”
    “I’m not makin’ excuses for you. I don’t know the circumstances. But if you engage in bedroom politics, then there’re bound to be miscalculations from time to time.”
    “Miscalculations!? Ha!”
    “I ain’t just sayin’ this because I’m your doting old uncle… I might look as if I date from Biblical times, but I was a young male in my prime once, and I did my fair share of bed-hopping. Ask Olivia St. Neots—”
    “Good God, you and Olivia?”
    The old man sat tall, hands to his boney knees. “I don’t see why not!” he answered belligerently. “But no,” he added quickly. “She was a good girl and I was a Corinthian of the first order. When we were both much younger, she’d put her little nose in the air and refuse to even acknowledge I was in the same room. And it had nothin’ to do with my politics. She was wise to stay well clear of me then . ”
    “What changed her mind?”
    Plantagenet Halsey gave a bark of laughter. “You think she’s changed her mind? Still calls me caitiff when she thinks no one is listenin’! Baggage!”
    Alec hid his smile at this level of intimacy between his republican uncle and a duchess steeped in aristocratic privilege, and repeated his question.
    The old man shrugged and said simply, “You. More correctly, you changed my life. I couldn’t raise a cub and carry on with my wicked ways, now could I? That ain’t bein’ a responsible parent, or much of a role model. But it’s taken how many years for Olivia St. Neots to change her opinion of me? How old are you? So, you see, I had a reputation once, and I wasn’t backward in braggin’ about it, too—arrogant idiot that I was!”
    Alec gave a huff of embarrassment, a hand to his black curls and a look up to the plaster ceiling, before dropping his gaze to the wooden floor. He regarded his uncle with a grim smile.
    “If only it were a case of a satisfied pleasurable romp in a few beds, jealous stares from ineffectual husbands, and me swaggering about, the English diplomat lover! The only part you did describe correctly was the latter. I let hubris get the better of me and allowed myself to be flattered. And then I overstepped the boundaries of good manners. What happened after that I can blame on no one but myself. In my defense, there were sinister forces at work that I had no control over. Had I been less of a smug lothario and not allowed myself to be flattered I’d not have ended up in a predicament from which there was no escape—Damn! I’ve told you more than I intended.”
    “Don’t upset yourself. You’ve told me enough for now. At the very least, upon this return visit, your eyes will be wide open to any mischief, sinister or otherwise. That must be small compensation.”
    “There is that…”
    Plantagenet Halsey patted Alec’s shoulder and slowly got to his feet. Hadrian Jeffries had twice come through the doorway only to turn on a heel and retreat into the closet. He couldn’t let the valet do so a third time, so he returned the checklist to