Under the guise of Chase, founder of London’s most desired men’s club, Georgiana had manipulated dozens of members of Society. Hundreds of them. Chase had destroyed men and elevated them. Chase had made matches and ruined lives. She could easily manipulate Langley into marriage by invoking Chase’s name and the information he had on the viscount.
But need was not want, and perhaps it was her keen understanding of that balance—of the fact that the viscount needed marriage as much as she did, but wanted it just as little—that made her hesitate. “I am hoping that the viscount will agree that the arrangement is mutually beneficial without Chase’s interference.”
Temple was quiet for a long moment. “Chase’s interference would speed up this process.”
True, but it would also make for a terrible marriage. If she could win Langley without blackmail, all the better. “I’ve a plan,” she said.
“And if it goes to waste?”
She thought of Langley’s file. Slim, but damning. A list of names, all male. She ignored the sour taste in her mouth. “I have blackmailed bigger men.”
He shook his head. “Every time I am reminded that you are a woman, you say something like that . . . and Chase is returned.”
“He is not easily hidden.”
“Not even when you are so . . .” He made a show of looking at her feathered coif. “Ladylike is, I suppose, the word for this ensemble?”
She was saved from having to either spar with Temple or further discuss the lengths to which she was willing to go for her daughter’s future by the orchestra’s completion of the set. She pulled away and curtsied, as was expected. “Thank you, Your Grace.” She emphasized the title as she stood once more. “I believe I shall take some air.”
“Alone?” he asked, an edge in his tone.
Frustration flared. “You think I cannot care for myself?” She was the founder of London’s most infamous gaming hell. She’d destroyed more men than she could count.
“I think you should take care of your reputation,” Temple replied.
“I assure you that if a gentleman attempts liberties, I shall slap his hand.” She smiled a wide, false smile and dipped her head, coyly. “Go to your wife, Your Grace. And thank you for the dance.”
He held her hand tightly for a moment, until she met his gaze again, and he cautioned softly, “You cannot beat them. You know that, don’t you? No matter how hard you try—Society will always win.”
The words made her suddenly, unpredictably furious. She tamped down the emotion and replied, “You are wrong. And I intend to prove it.”
Chapter 2
The conversation had unsettled her.
The evening had unsettled her.
And Georgiana did not care for being unsettled, which was why she had so long resisted this moment—her return to Society and its prying, judging gaze. She’d hated it from the start, a decade earlier. Hated the way it followed her every time she dressed for Mayfair’s streets instead of the floor of her casino. Hated the way it mocked her inside modistes’ shops and haberdasheries, in bookshops and on the steps of her brother’s home. Hated the way it sealed her daughter’s fate—the way it had done so long before Caroline had drawn breath.
She’d exacted her revenge for the judgment, building a temple to sin at the center of Society, collecting the secrets of its members day after day for six years. The men who gamed at The Fallen Angel did not know that every card they turned, every die they cast, was the purview of a woman their wives shunned at every possible moment.
Nor did they know that their secrets had been collected with care, cataloged and made ready for use when Chase needed them most.
But for some reason, this place, these people, their untouchable world was already changing her, making her hesitate where she would never before have hesitated. Before, she might have lay Viscount Langley’s future out before him in terms black and plain—marry her or suffer the consequences.
But now, she knew too well what those consequences were, and she did not care for throwing another to the wolves of scandal.
Not that she wouldn’t if it came to that.
But she hoped there was another way.
She stepped onto the balcony of the Worthington House ballroom and took a deep breath, desperate for the way the fresh air tricked her into believing that she was free of this night and these obligations.
The April night was crisp and full of promise, and she moved from the ballroom into the darkness, where she felt more comfortable. Once there, she released her breath and leaned against the marble balustrade.
Three minutes. Five at the most. And then she’d return. She was here for a reason, after all. There was a prize at the end of this game, one that, if won well, would mean safety and security and a life for Caroline that Georgiana could never give her.
Anger flared at the thought. She had power beyond imagination. With the stroke of a pen, with a signal to the floor of her hell, she could destroy a man. She held the secrets of Britain’s most influential men, and their wives. She knew more about the aristocracy than they knew about themselves.
But she could not protect her daughter. She could not give her the life she deserved.
Not without them.