"She'll have to feed it," the housekeeper said brusquely. "You give it to me, Miss Chloe, and I'll get the poor scrap cleaned up, then her mother can feed her while I clean her up."

"I'll help you."

"That won't be necessary, Miss Chloe. I know what to do."

"Come, Chloe," Hugo said quietly, understanding, though Chloe didn't, that the housekeeper's sensibilities were as outraged as Lady Smallwood's by the thought of Miss Gresham's intimate attendance on a girl from the slums.

Chloe glanced down at her bloodstained hands and apron. "I'd better clean myself up. I'll come back shortly."

Hugo eased her out of the room and closed the door. Tilting her chin, he lightly kissed her mouth. It should have stopped there, but, instead, his hands slipped to grasp her head firmly and his mouth took hers, his tongue driving deeply within on a ravaging voyage of possession that surprised them both.

"Oh," Chloe said when he finally released her head. She gave him a rather bemused smile. "What was that for?"

"I'm not sure," he said. "I couldn't seem to help myself."

Chloe's smile became less bemused and her eyes held a speculative gleam. "That usually happens to me, not you." It had been such a long time since Hugo had yielded to impulse and taken the initiative in that way. Hope sparked that perhaps his period of distraction was over, and she would reassume that most important place in his life and preoccupations.

Hugo read the speculation and pulled himself up sharply. "It was a kiss of congratulation," he said cheerfully. "You did a wonderful job. Are you tired?"

The glow died out of her eyes. "No. Not particularly."

He tried not to see her hurt and disappointment, telling himself that he had no choice. "So, you still want to go to Almack's?"

"Yes." Chloe put up her chin and gave him a bright smile, pride coming to her rescue. She must learn not to give him the satisfaction of seeing that she hoped for more from him than he was prepared to give.

"Mrs. Herridge will look after Peg and the baby," she said. "I'd better get dressed for dinner."

"Before you do, Chloe, you owe Dolly an apology, and I'd have you make it without delay. You were most uncivil." The reminder was issued with calm gravity, as if the kiss had never happened.

Chloe didn't resent the reminder itself, but the timing and the manner of its delivery were like a bucket of cold water.

That night at Almack's it was impossible to keep up with her. She shone with a stellar radiance, her chiming laughter could be heard across the decorous salons, she danced with no one more than once, and the circle of men around her deepened. Hugo kept a covert eye on her. If he hadn't known better, he would think she was tipsy. But tea, lemonade, and orgeat were all the liquid refreshments offered in the Assembly Rooms, and she'd had no more than a glass of claret at dinner. There was a brightness to the cornflower-blue eyes, a delicate pink flush to the damask cheeks, a seething energy in the slight frame that set the air around her humming and infected all who came into her orbit.

Denis DeLacy was at point-non-plus. His instructions had been precise, but they hadn't taken into account the fact that Miss Gresham, for some reason, was impervious to serious lovemaking. Oh, she encouraged his flirtation and paid him a great deal of flattering attention, singling him out from among her wide circle of suitors, but it was all done with a playfulness and a laughing enjoyment that made anything more intense impossible. He knew he was making no serious inroads into her affections, although everyone else assumed he was the preferred suitor.

Somehow he had to gain her confidence, sweep her off her feet.

He listened with half an ear to Julian Bentham regaling Chloe with the tale of their activities the previous evening. "It's enormously amusing," he was saying.

"Billingsgate is such an extraordinary place… and the people, Chloe. You wouldn't believe how fascinating they are. You can't understand a word they say most of the time, and they're always fighting. We saw at least three scraps, didn't we, Frank?"

"Oh, at the very least," his friend agreed. "And nearly mixed in with 'em too." He laughed uproariously. "But the best of all is the oysters. You just eat them standing on the street. And you can buy a pint of porter to go with 'em."

"Men are so lucky," Chloe said. "Why can't women do these things? I'd love to eat oysters in a fishmarket and watch the people, with no one knowing who I was."

"Well, why don't you?" Denis said slowly, somewhat dazzled by the brilliance of his idea.

"How could I?" Chloe turned to look at him curiously.

"Come with us tomorrow."

"How?" Her eyes were sharp with interest now.

"If you dressed as a boy," Denis suggested softly, "then you'd draw no attention at all."

Chloe clapped her hands, her face alive with amusement. "What a wonderful plan. But where am I to find boy's clothes?"

"Leave it to me," Denis said. "I'll deliver them to Mount Street tomorrow morning."

"How will you leave the house?" Frank asked, lowering his head instinctively as they huddled together.

Chloe frowned. "It depends what time you go."

"Oh, not before about two o'clock in the morning," Julian said. "That's when the carts come in with the fish for the stalls and they start unloading."

Tomorrow night, Chloe thought with contrary satisfaction, she wouldn't pay her customary visit to Hugo, she would go to Billingsgate instead. And if he missed her, all the better.

"I'll meet you outside the house whenever you say," she said.

"You'll be able to escape your chaperone's eye?" Frank asked.

"Very easily," Chloe assured him.

"But what of your guardian?" Denis watched her through hooded eyes as he waited for her response.

Chloe glanced across the room to where Hugo was dancing with Miss Anselm, both of them clearly more interested in their conversation than in the waltz. They were laughing, and he seemed to Chloe to be holding his partner unnecessarily close. He had never danced the waltz with his ward.

"There won't be a problem," she said with cheerful insouciance. In fact, she had no intention of keeping this adventure from Hugo. He expected her to amuse herself with her own circle, and she would do so. And she would show him that other things could provide as much entertainment as lovemaking… that one could become bored doing the same thing every night and she was no more dependent upon him than he was upon her.

"We'll be waiting for you at two o'clock, then," Denis said. "And I'll deliver the clothes in the morning. Shall you mind if they're not very elegant?" He regarded her with a half-smile that managed to convey a degree of intimacy. "The thing is, you are rather small and I don't think anything of mine would fit. But I could borrow a suit of my brother's."

"How old is your brother?" Chloe demanded, not a whit struck by any possibly indecorous slant to the conversation.

"Eleven," Denis said with a disarming grin. "And he's almost exactly your size."

Chloe laughed and lightly brushed his hand with her own. In swift response he took her hand and raised it to his lips, saying daringly, "I can't wait to see you in such a costume, Chloe."

"That," Chloe declared with mock disapproval, "is a most improper thing to say, Denis."

"But then, you are proposing a most improper excursion," he said solemnly.

"It was your proposal, may I remind you," she bantered.

"But I didn't notice any hesitation on your part." His eyes laughed at her and her own responded. He still held her hand and she made no move to take it away.

Denis DeLacy seemed to have taken the honors for the evening yet again, her other two suitors reflected disconsolately, each of them wishing such a daring proposal had occurred to them.