But he’d no grounds upon which to exert his authority, because no one had been involved in illegal activity at the time of his arrival.
They’d been in class. Their papers in order.
But who did they think they were fooling?
When the carriage halted, Ramsay hesitated to disembark. He buttoned his long jacket over his chest and hips, waiting for his arousal to cool.
Why her? he wondered. Why now? After so many years of keeping his appetites leashed in chains of iron, why did his body seem to strain against them? For a soulless she-devil, no less?
Her and one other. Cecelia Teague.
It’d been three months since he’d last seen her, and the comely woman still often permeated his thoughts.
When he was on the bench, he’d remember her mouth sucking softly on her finger, dragging her teeth across the pad to scrape the last vestiges of chocolate. Once at a debate in the House of Lords, when men bandied insults and screamed over one another, he’d longed for someone with her gentle wisdom. If only these angry, volatile men could make a study of her respectful reprobation.
Aye, he summoned Miss Teague to his mind entirely too often. Christ, he hardly knew the woman. And she was certainly no fit companion for a Lord Chief Justice. University-educated? Opinionated and independent. While she was agreeable, she was by no means demure. And she made no qualms about her indulgences. For all he knew she could be an alcoholic or a fiend for any number of vices.
Her cherubic features could hide a deviant.
His mother had certainly carried an air of innocence about her, and she’d lived her life in such a way that she’d given the whore of Babylon a run for her money.
Or perhaps the Scarlet Lady.
Hell, they might have been friends, Gwendolyn Atherton and Henrietta Thistledown.
And then there had been Matilda. The last woman he’d been tempted to trust. Ramsay pinched the bridge of his nose as a headache bloomed behind his eyelids. What a disaster that had been.
Still … Cecelia had none of the mischief or deviousness that had sparkled in the eyes of his mother. Nor had she any of the courtly manners and skill at artifice Matilda had displayed.
She was so unabashedly charming. So smooth and soft and lovely.
Perhaps …
“My lord Ramsay?”
He started and looked to his left at the footman waiting uneasily holding the carriage door ajar.
“We’re here, my lord. And the Lord Chancellor is awaiting you in his study.”
“Aye,” he said curtly, pushing all thoughts of the troubling Miss Teague out of his mind as he disembarked the coach. Ramsay mounted the steps two at a time, eager to establish a plan of action against their new adversary.
The Scarlet Lady could not be a hydra, sprouting two heads for every one that was severed. Eventually she would be vanquished, and he needed to be the man to do it if he wanted to secure the appointment to the next chancellorship.
Christ, perhaps the current Lord Chancellor had been right to suggest Ramsay should seriously consider getting a wife. Some respectable duty-bound woman with whom to beget a brood and to further shore up his respectability.
His gut twisted at the idea, rejecting it as violently as he would a toxin.
He’d never meant to marry. And yet he couldn’t bring himself to have another mistress, not after last time.
And so he’d do what he’d always done. Work his mind to exhaustion, and then when that work was finished, he’d punish his body with exertion until he was too fatigued to stand.
As he mounted the stairs to the very top, something told Ramsay that even when he collapsed into his bed after this punishing day, a pair of crimson lips would haunt his dreams.
CHAPTER FIVE
“I cannot believe you invited him to dinner!” Cecelia’s whisper would have been a scream were her throat less constricted by panic.
She’d been in the middle of catching up the Red Rogues on the harrowing events of the day when the butler announced Lord Ramsay’s arrival. She’d yanked both the Rogues into Alexandra’s private parlor at the Redmayne Belgravia terrace just in time to slam the door as Ramsay’s wide shoulders rounded the corner.
Even the soft sages and calming earth tones of the sophisticated solarium had little effect on her as she held Alexandra in her clutches. Her fingers curled like talons on her friend’s puffed sleeves as her trembles shook them both.
“Cecil, what’s gotten into you? I’ve never seen you like this!” Alexandra regarded her with a horrified astonishment one would save for someone who’d suddenly begun to leak blood from her eyes.
Francesca stood vigil by the door, cracking it open slightly to spy upon the men gathering in the great hall. “Have you forgotten the part where your brutish brother-in-law is endeavoring to hang poor Cecil in the public square? I imagine that has something to do with her current overwrought state.”
Alexandra gently attempted to pry Cecelia’s fingers from the meat of her arms. “Well … in my defense, I posted this dinner invitation weeks ago.”
“You could have warned me he would be here!” Cecelia released the Duchess of Redmayne, putting her hand to her own forehead, then to her cheeks, not finding the fever she was certain to fall plague to at any moment.
“Until five minutes ago, I wasn’t aware of the need,” Alexandra reasoned. “As you said, he is my brother-in-law. Besides, it might have raised his suspicions were I to retract the invitation … don’t you think?”
“I’m too distraught to think.” Cecelia wrapped her arms around her own middle as she whirled to pace the room. She realized she was being hysterical, but the day’s events had rattled her composure so greatly, she’d been aching for the safety of the Rogues’ company. She’d used up her allotment of composure for the day, and she’d been relying on their collective wisdom and encouragement, expecting to take the evening to discuss her rather pressing problem and to make some decisions.
Now, it seemed, the wolf was at the door once again, and if he discovered her real identity, there was no telling what he would do.
“What are they doing out there?” Cecelia asked Francesca anxiously.
“Oh, the usual sort of masculine greeting rituals,” Francesca scoffed, her scarlet skirts nearly catching in the door as she closed it behind her. “Shaking hands, slapping backs, and comparing the standards and pedigrees of their horseflesh, no doubt.” She tossed her carefully arranged crimson ringlets in the fashion of one more used to a stable than a salon. “I’ve a mind to join them.”
“We should, I suppose,” Alexandra urged. She straightened the cameo on her high-necked gown of shimmering peach silk, which contrasted most strikingly with her neat auburn hair and warm chocolate eyes.
“I cannot face him,” Cecelia squeaked, her knees giving out. She collapsed onto a velvet chair in a puddle of overwrought curves and shimmering sky-blue skirts. “If he recognizes me, you might as well start weaving my noose.”
Alexandra placed a hand on her shoulder. “Perhaps it’s better that you see him first here at Redmayne Place. If he does recognize you, you’ll have all of us to protect you.” She stepped to the cabinet, removing a crystal decanter, three glasses, and a bottle of their most potent Ravencroft scotch. Once it was poured, Alexandra took a seat at Cecelia’s side and offered a glass.