“She would have loved you.” The answer was instant.
She shook her head, closing her eyes. Wanting to believe him. “She didn’t even name me.”
“She would have. She would have named you, and it would have been something beautiful.”
The certainty in his words had her meeting his gaze, sure and unyielding. “Not Robert, then?”
He didn’t smile. Didn’t laugh. “She would have named you for what you were. For what you deserved. She would have given you the title.”
Understanding dawned.
And then he whispered, “Just as I would do.”
Everything stopped. The rustle of leaves in the canopy, the shouts of his brothers in the stream beyond, the slow creep of the afternoon, and she knew, in that moment, that he was about to give her a gift that she’d never imagined she’d receive.
She smiled at him, her heart pounding in her chest. “Tell me.”
She wanted it on his lips, in his voice, in her ears. She wanted it from him, knowing it would make it impossible for her to ever forget him, even after he left her behind.
He gave it to her.
“Grace.”
Chapter Two
London
Autumn 1837
“To Dahlia!”
A raucous cheer rose in reply to the shout, the crush of people in the central room of 72 Shelton Street—a high-end club and the best kept secret of London’s smartest, savviest, most scandalous women—turning in unison to toast its proprietress.
The woman known as Dahlia stilled at the bottom of the central staircase, taking in the massive space, already packed with club members and guests despite the early hour. She offered the assembly a wide, glittering smile. “Drink up, my lovelies, you’ve a night to remember ahead of you!”
“Or to forget!” came a boisterous retort from the far end of the room. Dahlia recognized the voice instantly as that of one of London’s merriest widows—a marchioness who had invested in 72 Shelton Street from the earliest days, and loved it more than her own home. Here, a merry marchioness was afforded the privacy she never received in Grosvenor Square. Her lovers, too, received that privacy.
The masked crowd laughed in unison, and Dahlia was freed from their collective attention just long enough for her lieutenant, Zeva, to appear at her side. The tall, willowy, dark-haired beauty had been with her since the earliest days of the club and managed the ins and outs of the membership—ensuring that whatever they wished was theirs for the taking.
“Already a crush,” Zeva said.
Dahlia checked the watch at her waist. “About to be more of one.”
It was early, just past eleven; much of London only now able to sneak away from their boring dinners and dances, making their excuses with megrims and delicate constitutions. Dahlia smirked at the thought, knowing the way the club’s membership used the perceived weakness of the fairer sex to take what they wished beneath the notice of society.
They would claim that weakness and play to it: all while summoning their coachmen to the rear exits of their homes; while changing from their respectable fashions to something more exciting; while peeling off the masks they wore in their world and donning different ones, different names, different desires—whatever they wished, out of Mayfair.
Soon, they would arrive, filling 72 Shelton Street to the gills, to revel in what the club could provide on any given night of the year—companionship, pleasure, and power—and specifically for what it delivered on the third Thursday of every month, when women from across London and the world were welcome to explore their deepest desires.
The standing event—known only as Dominion—was part masked ball, part wild revelry, part casino, and entirely confidential. Designed to provide club membership and trusted companions with an evening catering entirely to their pleasure . . . whatever that pleasure might be.
Dominion had a single, driving purpose: Ladies’ choice.
There was nothing Dahlia liked more than providing women access to their pleasure. The fairer sex was not treated fairly in the slightest, and her club was built to change that.
Since arriving in London twenty years earlier, she had made money in scores of ways. She’d sculleried in dingy pubs and dank theaters. She’d minced meat in pie shops and bent metal into spoons, and never for more than a penny or two for the work. She’d quickly discovered that daytime work didn’t pay.
Which was fine with her, as she had never been suited to daytime work. After chamber pots and meat pies turned her stomach and metalwork left her palms sliced to ribbons, she’d found a job as a