Talk of the Ton (Free Fellows League 5)

“Like Lord Davies.”

“Like Lord Davies’s son-in-law,” Jonathan corrected. “And he’s depending upon my prompt return for reasons that have nothing to do with retrieving the parcel from Plum Cottage.”

“I see,” Lady India said softly. “You don’t wish to assume responsibility for delivering me to London because I’m the parcel.”

“I had already assumed responsibility for delivering a parcel to London,” Jonathan replied. “But, Lady India, you are not a simple parcel, and if it becomes known that I accompanied you to London without benefit of a chaperone, you’ll be ruined in London society.”

“I’m already ruined in London society,” she reminded him.

“I’m not,” Jonathan said. “And if it’s all the same to you, I’d like to preserve my good name.”

India gave an unladylike snort. “If it’s all the same to you, Lord Barclay, I’d like to preserve my neck. If it comes to losing my reputation or losing my life, I’ll gladly forfeit my reputation and yours, too, if it’s necessary. I don’t have a choice. Gold has already changed hands. If you leave Plum Cottage without me, Mustafa will—”

“I’ll take care of Mustafa,” Jonathan vowed. “He won’t hurt you.”

“Mustafa will kill me,” India said. “Unless you keep him from it and—”

“By this time tomorrow, Mustafa will be on his way to Istanbul.”

“Can you be sure he won’t bribe someone to let him go? That he won’t come back here and strangle me once you’re gone?”

No, he couldn’t. He couldn’t be sure of anything except that his life was about to change. But he didn’t know if it would be for better or for worse. “I thought you said he’s eager to return to Istanbul.”

“He is,” she confirmed. “But not until he fulfills his obligation to the sultan. And after what we just did to him . . .” She shuddered. “You don’t know Mustafa. He’s more afraid of failing the sultan than he is of you. If you don’t relieve him of his duty now, he’ll find a way to come back and kill me. Or pay someone to do it.”

“How long have you been alone here with him?”

“A week.”

“And he didn’t harm you. . . .”

“He had no reason to harm me then,” she explained. “Now, he does.”

“What reason?”

“You,” she said.

Jonathan groaned.

“And me,” she added. “Mustafa hates women, hates traveling, hates being bested, and hates me.”

Jonathan closed his eyes and thought back to the newspaper articles he’d read about the taking of the HMS Portsmouth and the murders and abductions of her passengers and crew by the gang of Barbary pirates who owed their allegiance to the dey of Algiers. “Why does he hate you?”

Lady India didn’t answer.

Jonathan tried again. “How long have you known him?”

“Nearly five years,” she answered. “He took charge of me the day I arrived at the Topkapi. We didn’t get on well. And I’ve lived in fear of him ever since. . . .” India shuddered again as the memories of that horrible day came rushing back. She looked at Jonathan. “He was every bit as ill-humored then as he is now.”

“Who chose him to accompany you? And why would he agree?”

“The sultan chose him,” India said. “And neither Mustafa nor I had a choice. The sultan’s insistence that a bodyguard accompany me was included in the terms of my release. And as the sultan’s most trusted and highly regarded eunuch, Mustafa was the sultan’s obvious choice.”

Jonathan wasn’t sure he’d heard her correctly. “Highly regarded what?”

“Eunuch,” India answered matter-of-factly. “Mustafa is the chief eunuch of the harem. He resides in the women’s quarters and presides over the harem. He has the power of life and death over all of us.”

“Lud!” Jonathan swore, eyeing the giant with a kind of newfound and grudgingly wary admiration. No wonder the giant smoked tobacco and weighed over twenty-five stone. Food, drink, tobacco, and the hookah were the only pleasures of the flesh left to him. “I’d be ill-humored, too, if a sultan forcibly removed my . . .” Jonathan remembered he was in the presence of a lady and caught himself in time to choose his words more carefully. “If I had to live surrounded by women twenty-four hours a day and was unable to pleasure any of them.”