Claiming the Courtesan

“Keep your hands to yourself, sir, until you are sure of whom you are accosting!” She was an attractive piece, past first youth, but with a nice sensual mouth and flashing dark eyes. Once, he might have taken the time to soothe her temper and discover whether that shapely figure was a product of corsetry alone.

Kylemore made his excuses again, but in truth, he’d already forgotten the woman. He flicked her from his mind with no more thought than he’d give a speck of lint on his coat. Less thought, in fact. His tailoring was always high on his list of priorities.

He headed back to where he’d leaped so precipitately from the saddle. God knew if his horse would still be there.

But some public-minded citizen had tied it to a hitching post outside an inn. At least he wouldn’t have to walk all the way to Mayfair—although in his present frame of mind, it might be safer if he did.

He mounted and rode on, but his attention was focused far from the capital’s busy streets.

Where could Soraya be? He had known her six years. Something over that time must hint at her whereabouts.

With a pang he didn’t want to examine, he recalled his first sight of her. Like lightning from a clear summer sky, she had just arrived in London from Paris. Her protector then had been Sir Eldreth Morse, a rich and aging baronet who had held some embassy position in the French capital. Sir Eldreth was a bachelor with a passion for beautiful things. And by far the most beautiful thing in his famous collection was his young mistress, the incomparable Soraya.

Kylemore, frankly curious to view this creature who had set the men of the ton on their collective ear, had met her at Morse’s town house shortly afterward. He’d been unprepared for his reaction, although the level of the furor should have warned him.

Because, of course, London had seen beautiful women before.

But Soraya was…more.

One look at her across Sir Eldreth’s drawing room and Kylemore had known the same urge to possess and conquer that had raised his reaving ancestors from minor Highland lairds to dukes of the realm.

But the cool-eyed beauty’s lack of interest in him had been insultingly plain. Nothing he did or said, no material inducement he dangled before her exquisite nose could separate her from her elderly lover.

That season, every man in the beau monde seemed to scheme to steal her away. Until it finally became obvious she was, astonishingly, perfectly content to remain loyal to her keeper.

And that was when her real notoriety started.

Three young men, all bright hopes of their generation, shot themselves for love of her. There were duels, several killing matters, even though the survivors must have known their victory brought them no closer to obtaining what

they so desperately desired.

Within months of her arrival, Sir Eldreth Morse’s mistress was the most hated and most idolized and most scandalous woman in England.

Kylemore observed the chaos with increasing frustration. Surely he could do something to make her his. But all his power, all his fortune, all his attractions couldn’t shift her from her damned inexplicable devotion to the portly baronet.

Secretly, he sent investigators to France to ferret out what they could about her. But she’d been both as famous, as faithful and as elusive in Paris as she was in London.

Of course, rumors abounded, but all proved infuriatingly difficult to substantiate. Some said Sir Eldreth had rescued her from a Turkish harem—or a harem in Egypt or Syria or Persia. Unlikely heroics for the notably sedentary baronet, although the evidence of the girl’s name indicated some exotic origin.

If her name really was Soraya, which Kylemore had always doubted.

Other people believed she was a laundress Morse had picked up in the alleyways around Les Halles. Or she was a former child prostitute who had seen her chance with the rich English milord and taken it.

Kylemore always treated these tales—and even more outlandish stories he heard over the years—with skepticism. His own guess about her, if she was indeed French, was she came from a respectable family that had fallen foul of the Revolution or Bonaparte. He’d lay money that breeding lurked somewhere in her background. Her effortless self-possession outdid any fine lady he knew.

Perhaps she was English. She spoke the language as well as he did.

“Watch it, yer lordship!”

The shout wrenched Kylemore back to the present. A thickset countryman clutched at his horse’s bridle, clearly trying to save himself from being knocked down.

The famous Kinmurrie glare cowed the fellow, although Kylemore knew the bumpkin was only guilty of wandering unwittingly into his path. He forced himself to concentrate on reaching Grosvenor Square without causing damage either to himself, his mount or London’s traffic.

The moment Kylemore slammed into his town house, his mother appeared at the top of the staircase. Since their argument yesterday, he had deliberately avoided her. He wondered with distant amusement just how long she’d been hovering above, waiting for him to come back. He hoped it was hours.

“Justin, I must speak with you.”

He stripped off his gloves and handed them to the attendant footman. “Not now, madam.”