Free Never Resist a Rake by Mia Marlowe Page B

you’ll embark on a hunt of your own.”
    â€œWhy, Hartley, you’ve a positively devious streak I never suspected.”
    â€œI’ve always heard it’s the quiet ones people ought to worry about,” he said with a grin. “As for inviting the rest of the Daemon Club, no matter what the Barrett family may have to say on the matter, they are my friends. If a man doesn’t stick by his friends, he’s not much of a man.”
    â€œBut if I may? A word of advice as you prepare to mingle with the fashionable set. It doesn’t do to greet the world with too open a heart.”
    A shadow passed over his face. “Don’t worry on that score. My heart is safely tucked away where no one can touch it.”
    â€œI just mean, don’t be too trusting. Even…” How could she tell this fresh-faced young man that the ones he thought of as his friends would sooner laugh at him than with him? “Be careful, will you?”
    â€œI can take care of myself, my lady,” he said, bowing over her proffered hand as he prepared to take his leave. “Don’t let the shiner fool you. Several of the other fellows looked much worse.”
    After Hartley left, Blackwood came out from his hiding place. “Seems as if I should be going too. I wouldn’t want to miss my invitation to Somerfield Park. What a bag of moonshine. This is going to be a golden opportunity to make a proper bumble-broth of everyone involved.”
    â€œHartley believes you’re his friend. Have you no conscience at all?”
    â€œNone, and neither do you.” He ignored her offered hand and leaned in to buss his lips on her cheek instead. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t be considering young Lord Hartley for husband number five.”
    â€œWho said I—”
    â€œNo one had to. I could tell from the way your voice went all soft and squishy-sounding while you spoke with him.” He pitched his baritone into a breathy falsetto. “‘It doesn’t do to greet the world with too open a heart.’” Then he laughed. “What rubbish. But good luck to the pair of you. The sooner you wed that bumpkin, the sooner you can take me as your lover.”
    She whacked his shoulder. This time it was not at all playful.
    â€œGood day, my lady. See you in the country.”
    Blackwood strode from her parlor, leaving a cloud of his strong cologne hovering in his wake like a bergamot-and-musk-scented ghost.
    Chloe sank back onto her settee. “John Fitzhugh Barrett,” she mused.
    She hadn’t been considering him as husband material before, but now she mulled over the possibility. He was on the youngish side, perhaps five years or so her junior.
    That would bode well in the boudoir. And Hartley struck her as the sort who could be trained to give her what she needed.
    She’d heard the Somerset estate had been on shaky financial ground, but from all accounts, the younger Barrett son, Lord Richard, seemed to be taking those matters firmly in hand.
    Besides, money was not her immediate concern. Her collective late husbands had left her comfortably well off. She’d simply have to have her solicitor draft a contract that allowed her to retain control of her own funds even after she married.
    But the real strawberry in the situation was that someday, Lord Hartley would become Lord Somerset. Chloe would be a marchioness. She’d take precedence over all but a duchess.
    No matter how sordid her marital history might be, the ladies of the ton who shunned her now would be toadying up to gain her favor then. Countesses would curtsy deeply to her. Baronesses would plead with her to come to their teas.
    She’d be able to destroy any of them with a single withering glance.
    Her decision made, she rang for Wilkenson. Despite his hunched posture, her butler appeared with surprising speed.
    â€œHow may I serve you, my lady?”
    â€œSend Suzette up to my chamber to pack.