The Bachelor Bargain (Secrets, Scandals, and Spies) Michaels, Maddison (libby ebook reader .TXT) 📖

couldn’t acquiesce to the woman’s wish and let Lord Daverell get away with murder. If she did, not only would she be failing Alice, but she would also be failing all of the other ladies the man was certain to compromise and ruin in the future.

No. She had to make him pay.

Having him critiqued in the gazette would ruin him and save his future bride from marrying a scoundrel and murderer. And finding Mary, and Alice’s journal, would be the key to the man’s downfall.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Sebastian rapped his knuckles on the front door of number twelve Cummins Lane and found himself unaccountably unsettled. He hadn’t seen his half sister Charlotte for about six months, and the prospect of seeing her again filled him with happiness and trepidation.

His sister was the spitting image of their mother, and every time he saw her, it brought back sharp and painful memories of how Sebastian had been too late to save her.

That had been over eleven years ago now. But Seb would never allow himself to forget that it was his fault Charlotte had been without a mother since she was a girl of seven. His fault that his mother had been kidnapped and then killed in the most horrid of ways, all because of a rival gang seeking to take over his territory and teach Sebastian a lesson.

In the end, though, it was Sebastian who had taught Edward Flintock a lesson the man had had to live with ever since. If one could even call what the man did living. More like merely existing and serving as a warning to others to never touch what belonged to Sebastian Colver.

The door swung open and Charlotte stood there, her jaw dropping open in shock. “Sebastian!” she squealed, launching herself into his arms. “What are you doing here? Don’t get me wrong, it’s lovely to see you, but such a visit is completely unexpected! Everything is all right, isn’t it? You are well, aren’t you? Oh goodness, here I am talking my head off when I should be showing you in. Please, do come in.”

“Why isn’t the butler answering the door?”

“Because he is having a rest out the back. The poor thing is suffering with terrible arthritis of late, and I was eager to see who was visiting,” she exclaimed. “And I’m so glad I did, for what a wonderful surprise!”

Charlotte dragged him into the entrance foyer, her constant chatter something he hadn’t realized he’d desperately missed. She looked as lovely as ever, with her chestnut brown hair pulled back from her face in a bun, and her steel gray eyes, identical to his own, flashing in excitement. And, as usual, her blue gown—and if he wasn’t mistaken, the side of her nose too—had splatters of ink on it, after a morning obviously spent studying and taking notes in her journals.

“You’re not still studying all those medical textbooks, are you?” He was referring to the pile of medical journals and anatomy tomes her father had in his study that she’d been obsessed with since she was a young girl.

“Can you tell?” She laughed, wiping at some of the smudges of ink on her cheek as she led him into the sitting room. “You know I’m determined to be accepted into the London School of Medicine for Women and follow in the footsteps of my idol Elizabeth Garett Anderson and become a female doctor.”

It was a pipe dream, he was certain. Once his sister experienced the luxuries of Society, she would change her mind. “We shall see.”

“I’m determined to, Sebastian. There are so many people I wish to help in this world.”

“You’re a dreamer, Lottie.” He leaned over and ruffled her hair, like he used to do when she was six. “And you believe the best about everyone.” It was a fact he sometimes worried over, but was mostly proud of, because he’d made damn certain that the horrors he’d experienced in childhood never visited her.

He’d gone so far as to set up her father in this house and pay for a surgery just down the road, to get them both out of the Rookeries. And though his stepfather had at first been reluctant to accept any of Seb’s charity, his fear of losing his daughter after having already lost his wife because of Seb was enough to eventually convince the man to accept Seb’s money and move Charlotte away from any of the darkness that surrounded Seb’s life.

Seb had wanted to set them up in Mayfair, but his stepfather was a stubborn old man and would agree to move only as far as Cheapside, determined to live and work in an area where there were still those he could treat, who could not afford care. At least Cheapside was not the Rookeries, and Charlotte hadn’t grown up where Seb had.

Yes, he was proud to have made sure Charlotte’s childhood had been so different from his own. A childhood filled with love and security, which had helped turn her into the confident and caring young woman she was today.

Though Seb did worry she was too trusting of others and would one day get her heart broken. But perhaps it was a lesson one could learn only through experience. A lesson that hopefully Charlotte need never go through, as her positive outlook on life and her enthusiasm for everything was slightly contagious. Even Seb, who was rarely enthusiastic about anything, always felt happy in her presence.

“Father’s at his surgery.” Charlotte continued chattering away as she dragged him over to the settee. “He shall be so disappointed to have missed you though! But I’m eager to find out what brings you here. It must be something rather urgent for you to visit during the day.”

Generally, Seb visited Charlotte and her father twice per year in the cover of night, much to his sister’s disappointment. But over the years she’d gotten used to Seb’s edict that no one must find out they were related, or else