A Spinster’s Guide to Danger and Dukes (Ladies Most Scandalous Book 3)

Lucifer?” Poppy echoed, her voice unnaturally high. “As in…”

“Old Scratch, Satan, the Devil,” Langham finished for her. He’d wondered what, aside from her family troubles, would shock the unflappable Miss Delamere. It would appear that his great-grandfather’s exploits had done the trick. “If it gives you any comfort, I suspect there was little actual glorification of the dark lord going on. From what I’ve learned it was more an excuse for licentious behavior in a novel locale.”

When he glanced over, he noted the pink tinge in her cheeks and wished anything but his great-grandfather’s exploits had put it there.

“Wasn’t there outcry from the villagers, or the Church for that matter?” Poppy asked, her sharp mind at once discerning who would be most likely to object to such activity in a rural village. “I can’t imagine they were happy to welcome such goings on in their vicinity.”

“As has always been the case, my great-grandfather’s title did much to keep them from publicly objecting. And since many members of the church hierarchy were members of other such clubs they could hardly do anything about this one. In fact, most of the members were otherwise upstanding members of the community.” Pulling the curricle to a stop, he leapt down and reached up to help Poppy down.

“So the very people who would typically be raising a hue and cry over the shocking behavior were involved?” she asked as she stepped to the edge. “Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

It was only the work of a moment to fit his hands about her waist and lift her down, but by the time he set her feet on the ground they were both a little breathless.

After securing the horses, Langham led Poppy to the path that wound its way up to St. Lucy’s. It was slightly hidden by the overgrowth, but despite the decades between his last ramble in these woods and now, he recalled the area as if no time had passed at all.

“It must have been difficult,” Poppy said as they began to push through the tangle of briars, “growing up with the evidence of your great-grandfather’s misdeeds peppering the landscape.”

“I didn’t even know about the society until I went away to school,” Langham replied, recalling just how astonished he’d been to learn that the austere man in the abbey’s portrait gallery, whose powder and lace he’d always found amusing, had been one of the most notorious men of his day. “Boys have a tendency to exaggerate, so even then I didn’t really think it was as bad as all that. Then when I was sixteen I found a cache of papers and journals hidden in a secret compartment in the library, which were Thaddeus’s records of the Lucifer Society. That was his given name—Thaddeus.”

“Were you shocked?” Poppy asked, pausing to catch her breath after navigating a steep curve on the hill.

Langham gave a bark of laughter. “Not so much shocked as delighted. I’d spent my whole life being told by my uncles, who were my trustees until I came of age, that my every move was a reflection on the Fielding name, only to find out there was very little I could do that would make as black a mark as Thaddeus had left. It was quite…liberating.”

Poppy, he noted, was watching him carefully. “What prompted him to assemble such a group in the first place? Surely it didn’t improve his standing among the ton.”

“You’d be surprised,” Langham said dryly. “Sir Francis Dashwood’s Hellfire Club boasted members from the highest echelons of society, government, the arts. It was as coveted a membership as any of the most prestigious gentlemen’s clubs. But Thaddeus, for some reason, was denied entry. So, he founded his own, had tunnels built into the existing caves, and had St. Lucifer’s constructed—though you’ll see when we get there that it’s a folly and not an actual chapel.”

“He went to the expense of having tunnels dug and a chapel built simply out of pique at being excluded from Dashwood’s club?” Poppy asked, aghast.

“He did,” Langham confirmed ruefully.

Thaddeus had depleted the family coffers to such an extent that it had taken Langham’s grandfather and father decades to replenish them through judicious investments and farming improvements.

“Even more galling,” he continued, “was the fact that the Lucifer Society was far less popular than the Hellfire Club, and thus the membership not as robust. After his death, my grandfather—Thaddeus’s eldest son—locked up St. Lucy’s and allowed it to fall into disrepair.”

“So, the chapel folly was a folly in more ways than one?” Poppy laughed. “I’m sorry to find joy in your great-grandfather’s failure, but honestly.”

“Don’t apologize on my account,” Langham assured her, matching her smile with his own. “I came to the conclusion long ago that he was the last person who deserved my admiration.”

“Didn’t…” She paused, as if she was choosing her words carefully. “Didn’t the people in the village object to a chapel—whether they knew it to be an actual place of worship or not—called St. Lucifer’s?”

Langham held back a branch that blocked her way. “There was an early Christian saint called Lucifer, but most importantly, St. Lucy’s is on the ducal estate. Whatever the townspeople thought or didn’t think hardly mattered.”

There was no arrogance in his words—he was simply stating fact—yet he caught the wince on Poppy’s face before she turned herself away from him.

“What did the dowager say about Thaddeus’s papers?” she asked pleasantly, and if he hadn’t seen her expression moments earlier, he wouldn’t have believed she’d been affected at all by his words.

She has spent the past two years playing a part.

He would do well to remember that.

“I never told her,” he admitted finally. “At the time, I didn’t wish to call attention to the fact that my grandfather, her husband, had been the son of a villain. But I later learned she’d been told all about the Lucifer Society by my grandfather. He hadn’t wanted for them to begin their marriage with secrets between them, or so she said. Apparently, he was smitten with her and had made it his mission to rehabilitate the family name when they wed.”

“And clearly succeeded, if one goes by the quality of guests gathered at the abbey this week,” Poppy said, stooping again to slide beneath a particular thorny branch he held out of her way.

But just as she did so, she stepped on a root and lost her balance, falling against him with a gasp. “Oh!”

Poppy’s eyes met his and the moment stretched out between them.

“Careful,” Langham said, grasping her arms as he felt her hands press against his chest. In their current position, with her standing just above him on the hill path, they were at eye level, and his gaze went unerringly to her plump red lips. She smelled of roses and something else—something citrusy and clean. When he glanced up, he saw her lashes lower, and without even thinking, he tilted his head as they moved closer together, in the timeless preamble to a kiss.

“Your Grace!” came an unwelcome voice from the path below, just as their lips touched. “Your Grace, are you there? Is everything well?”

As if he were made of flames, Poppy stepped back from him in alarm, and he was forced to steady her as she lost her balance and nearly went tumbling back down the way they’d come.

“Careful,” he said again, only this time it was more of a growl. He didn’t know who the devil was coming up after them, but he would be more than happy to shake them senseless.

Poppy’s nostrils flared as she inhaled, attempting, it seemed, to get hold of her senses. Was she just as affected as he was by the attraction between them? He hoped so.

Turning, he saw that a man of middle years wearing the uniform of a village constable was fast approaching.

“Mr. Rhodes, I presume,” Langham said, glaring down at the man as he huffed his way closer.

“Indeed, Your Grace,” the other man said, glancing from Langham to Poppy and back again. “We haven’t had the pleasure, but I’d heard you were up at the abbey for the dowager Duchess’s birthday celebration, and with a betrothed, no less.”

The man glanced pointedly at Poppy, as if waiting for an introduction, and Langham bit back a sigh. “Rhodes, may I introduce you to my fiancée, Miss Poppy Delamere. Poppy, Constable Rhodes.”

Despite the interruption, or perhaps because of it, for all Langham knew, Poppy smiled warmly at the man. Which was, he thought, an odd way to greet the man who intended to lock up your sister for murder.

“A pleasure, miss,” said Rhodes, his moustache trembling as he bent over her hand in a courtly gesture. “I’d been told you were a beauty, but your looks are even more stunning than I expected, Miss Delamere.”

Poppy’s smile lit up her whole face, and to Langham’s surprise he felt an unfamiliar pang of jealousy. Which was ridiculous considering he and Poppy were barely acquainted and Rhodes was old enough to be her father.

“You’re too kind, Mr. Rhodes,” she said with a breathiness that was entirely unlike her usual no-nonsense manner. And again he was reminded just how adept she was at slipping from one role into another.

But the constable’s next words erased the smile from Poppy’s face.

“You are, I understand, the sister of Mrs. Violet Lovell, are you not?” Rhodes sounded apologetic as he asked the question, but he clearly wasn’t so remorseful that he didn’t ask the question at all. “May I ask if you are heading up to St. Lucy’s?”

Poppy took Langham’s arm with a grasp that he suspected owed only a small debt to the unevenness of the path. “We are,” she answered calmly, but Langham was certain he could hear the tremble beneath the words as she fought to retain her composure. “I wish you to know that I don’t believe my sister is responsible for her husband’s death, Mr. Rhodes. And I intend to prove it.”

Rhodes scowled and made to respond, but Langham cut him off. “We’re going up to see the scene of the crime, Rhodes. It will be a great help if you’ll come along with us.”

The way Poppy pinched his arm let Langham know that she wasn’t best pleased with this plan, but he intended to question the man and gain insight into why it seemed everyone was convinced Violet had committed the crime. It would also give Poppy the opportunity to make a case for her sister’s innocence.

Rhodes beamed in response to the duke’s invitation. “I would be honored, Your Grace. Miss Delamere.”

Then, almost as if he’d just remembered why they were there, he said, “Though I regret to inform you, Miss Delamere, that the evidence against your sister is quite bad.”

“And what evidence is that?” Langham asked mildly as he pushed aside a branch so that Poppy could go forward. “I heard something about a knife wound?” He asked the question with an air of idle curiosity, hoping to disarm the man.

“That was supposed to be kept quiet,” said the constable, irritation evident in his tone. “There are some details that we don’t like getting out for public consumption.”

“Because you don’t wish for the public to be frightened?” Poppy asked, turning to look at him.

And because she’d stopped, Langham did so as well. The constable’s face was glistening with perspiration, and his cheeks were ruddy. Clearly, he wasn’t accustomed to this much exertion.

“That,” Rhodes agreed, “but also because only the true killer will know of the knife wound’s existence. And until I have a chance to speak to Mrs. Lovell, I had hoped to keep the fact of it a secret.”

This made Langham turn to the other man in disbelief. “You haven’t spoken to her yet either? How is that possible?”

Rhodes looked sheepish. “Lord and Lady Short have refused thus far to let me interview her.” He turned to Poppy with a rueful smile, “Would you be able to help me with that, Miss Delamere?”

Poppy looked at the constable as if he had been eating opium. “Why would I help you prove that my sister murdered her husband?” she asked in a tone of disbelief. “I just informed you that I intend to prove that she did not. “

The news that Rhodes was also denied access to Violet was troubling beyond measure. Why were Lord and Lady Short so intent on keeping her from being interviewed? If they were willing to defy the law, and a duke, was there something that Violet could reveal that they meant to keep private?

“Despite the evidence I’ve already gathered,” Rhodes said as they resumed their climb, “I do like to keep an open mind. What I have thus far is only based on the word of people who have told me your sister and her husband had an unhappy marriage. And that he was not the most faithful of men.”

“Even so,” Poppy argued, “that doesn’t mean I’ll help you. There have been far too many times when the authorities have pursued the wrong person for a crime, and I intend to see to it that in this case, at least, the right person is apprehended.”

“Then help me speak to your sister,” Rhodes persisted, though his breathlessness indicated that the climb was becoming too much for him. Fortunately for the man, they were almost to the top.

As they neared the top of the hill, it became clear that Ned’s description of the path’s impassability was only accurate to a point. There were, indeed, many parts of the route that were difficult to maneuver, where he was forced to use brute force to break off branches or hold them back so that Poppy could go on.

But he’d expected there to be even more brambles and overgrowth to get through. It was obvious someone had ensured the way leading to St. Lucy’s was easily traversable despite its having been abandoned for decades.

“Oh, how lovely,” Poppy said as she looked up at the stone structure that had the appearance of being a thousand years old but had been constructed in Thaddeus Fielding’s time. There was even a faux graveyard to add verisimilitude to what was, in fact, merely the outer shell of a chapel. “But I stand by my assertion that there is no way my sister would voluntarily climb to the top of that tower.”

They all three stared up at the cupola containing the bell. “It’s not quite as lovely when you know why it was built—if you don’t mind my saying so, Your Grace. Apologies, Miss Delamere.” Rhodes glanced at Langham guiltily, as if he’d just realized who he was speaking to.

“Oh, I know all about the Lucifer Society, Mr. Rhodes,” Poppy said before Langham could respond. “There are no secrets between us, are there, darling?”

She took his arm and looked at him adoringly, and Langham bit back a laugh. “There certainly aren’t, my little cabbage.”

He pressed a kiss onto her wrist and didn’t miss the way her pulse leapt at his touch. A glance at her face showed her eyes had darkened, and she touched a finger to her lips. Was she thinking about their almost kiss just before Rhodes had interrupted them? He certainly was.

If Rhodes found their byplay suspect, he didn’t say so. Instead he stepped forward so that he could face Poppy. “It makes it easier that you know about the Lucifer Society, Miss Delamere. Because I have reason to believe this murder may be connected to it. At least in part.”

“Since the Lucifer Society died with my great-grandfather, Constable, I’d say it’s very unlikely that its members are committing murders in the present day.” Langham scoffed, wondering suddenly if the climb had affected the constable more than he’d realized.

“That’s what I meant by connected, Your Grace,” Rhodes explained. “It’s not club members who killed Mr. Lovell. Of course it wasn’t. But that doesn’t mean the club isn’t involved in his death.”

“You’d better explain yourself, man,” Langham said sharply.

Rhodes looked conflicted for a moment, then let out a heavy sigh. “I suppose since you know about the knife wound you may as well know that we found the knife a few feet away from the body.”

The duke frowned. “I suppose that makes sense. It would have been forced from the body with the strength of the body’s impact. You were able to connect the knife with the club somehow? I find that hard to believe since it’s been defunct since the turn of the century.”

“That’s just it, Your Grace. I suspect that someone has resurrected the club.” Rhodes paused, and Langham got the distinct sense the constable was enjoying his dramatic revelation. “Not only was Lovell wearing a necklace with a pendant inscribed with the crest of the Lucifer Society, but the knife found near the body is inscribed with it as well.”