Heartless

loners and roves is not only custom, it is based on this fact.”

Alexia’s brain buzzed with all these new revelations, but finally the whirling settled on one thing. “Oh, lordy, Floote. Floote knew.”

“Some, yes. He was Sandy’s valet at the time.”

“Is it you who are keeping him quiet?”

Professor Lyall shook his head. “Your butler has never taken his orders from me.”

Alexia looked at the little journal again, stroking the cover, and then offered it back to Lyall. “Perhaps you will let me read it in its entirety sometime?”

The Beta’s eyes crinkled up, wincing as though he might cry. Then he swallowed, nodded, and placed the book inside his waistcoat pocket.

Alexia took a deep breath. “So, back to the crisis at hand. I suppose neither of you is currently planning to kill Queen Victoria, even in jest?”

Two almost simultaneous head shakes met that question.

“Are you telling me I’ve been on the wrong track all this time?”

The werewolves looked at each other, neither of them willing to risk her wrath.

Alexia sighed and extracted the sheaf of paper Madame Lefoux had given her from her reticule. “So this is entirely useless? No connection between the last attempt and this one. Pure coincidence that the poisoner you were going to use, Professor, happened to die in service to the OBO. And that she possibly then became a ghost who delivered a warning to me.”

“Looks like it must be, my lady.”

“I don’t like coincidences.”

“Now that, my lady, I can’t help you with.”

Alexia sighed and stood, using her parasol as a crutch. “Back to the beginning, I suppose. Nothing for it. I shall have to return these papers to Madame Lefoux.” The child inside her kicked mightily at the very idea. “Perhaps tomorrow night. Bed first.”

“A very sensible idea, my lady.”

“None of that from you, Professor, thank you very much. I’m still miffed. I understand why you did it, but I am miffed.” Alexia began making her way painstakingly to the door, prepared to climb upstairs and across the balcony bridge into her closet boudoir.

Neither werewolf tried to help her. She was clearly not in the mood to be coddled. Lyall did touch her arm as she passed. The action turned him mortal for a moment. Alexia had never had an opportunity to see him mortal before. He looked much the same as he did when immortal—perhaps there were more lines about his mouth and at the corners of his eyes—but he was still a pale vulpine man with sandy hair—utterly unremarkable.

“Are you going to tell Conall?”

Alexia turned around slowly and leveled a decided glare in his direction. It told him, in no uncertain terms, exactly how she felt about this state of affairs. “No, no, I’m not. Damn you.”

And then, with as much dignity as was possible given her condition, she waddled from the room, like some unbalanced galleon under full sail.

Only to run into Felicity in the hallway. It was like trundling full tilt into a pillar of molasses, the conversation likely to be sticky and the individual attractive only to creepy-crawlies. Alexia was never prepared to run into her sister, but on such a night as this when the chit should be fast asleep, it really was beyond.

Felicity, for her part, was bleary-eyed and wearing nothing but a highly ornamented nightgown, the excess material of which she clutched, with artful trembling hands, to her breast. Her hair was a tousle of golden curls that cascaded over one shoulder, a ridiculous pink bed cap perched precariously atop her head. The nightgown, too, was pink, a foulard with printed magenta flowers, replete with ruching, frillings, a quantity of lace trim, and a particularly large ruff about the neck. Alexia thought Felicity looked like a big pink Christmas tree.

“Sister,” said the tree, “there is a most impressive rumpus emanating from the wine cellar.”

“Oh, go back to bed, Felicity. It’s only a werewolf. Really. You’d think people never had monsters in their cellars.”

Felicity blinked.

Channing came up behind Alexia. “Lady Maccon, might I have a private word, before you seek your rest?”

Felicity’s eyes widened and her breath caught.

Alexia turned around. “Yes, well, if you insist, Major Channing.”

A sharp elbow met her protruding belly. “Introduce us,” hissed Felicity. Her sister was looking at the Gamma with much the same expression as that which entered Ivy Tunstell’s eyes when faced with a particularly hideous hat, which is to say, covetous and lacking in all elements of good judgment.

Alexia was taken well aback. “But you are in your night attire!” Felicity only gave her a big-eyed head shake. “Oh, very well, Felicity. This is Major Channing Channing of the Chesterfield Channings. He is a werewolf and my husband’s Gamma. Major Channing, do please meet my sister, Felicity Loontwill. She is human, if you can believe such a thing after ten minutes’ conversation.”

Felicity tittered in a manner she probably thought was musical. “Oh, Alexia, you so like to have your little jokes.” She offered her hand to the handsome man before her. “I do apologize for my informal state, Major.”

Major Channing clasped it elegantly in both of his, bowing with evident interest, even daring to brush his lips across her wrist. “You are a picture, Miss Loontwill. A picture.”

Felicity blushed and took back her hand more slowly than was proper. “I should never have thought you a werewolf, Major.”

“Ah, Miss Loontwill, it was eternal life as a gallant soldier that called to me.”

Felicity’s eyelids fluttered. “Oh, a soldiering man through and through, are you, sir? How romantic.”

“To the bone, Miss Loontwill.”

Alexia felt she was about to be sick, and it had nothing to do with her pregnancy. “Really, Felicity, it is the middle of the night. Don’t you have one of your meetings tomorrow?”

“Oh, yes, Alexia, but I should never wish to be rude in fine company.”

Major Channing practically clicked his heels. “Miss Loontwill, I cannot deny you your beauty rest, however unnecessary I might feel it. Such loveliness as yours is already so near to perfection it can require no further assistance in that regard.”

Alexia tilted her head, trying to determine if there was an insult buried in all that flowery talk.

Felicity tittered again. “Oh, really, Major Channing, we hardly know one another.”

“Your meeting, Felicity. Rest.” Alexia tapped her parasol pointedly.

“Oh, la, yes, I suppose I should.”

Lady Maccon was tired and out of temper. She decided she had a right, under such circumstances, to be difficult. “My sister is an active member of the National Society for Women’s Suffrage,” she explained sweetly to Major Channing.

The Gamma was taken aback by this information. No doubt in all his long years he had never encountered a woman of Felicity’s ilk—and her ilk was in very little doubt after even a few seconds of acquaintance—who would be involved in such a thing as politics.

“Really, Miss Loontwill? You must tell me more about this little club of yours. I can hardly believe a woman of your elegance need dabble in such trifles. Find yourself a nice gentleman to marry and he can do such fiddling things as voting for you.”

Rather suddenly, Alexia felt like she might want to join the movement herself. Imagine such a man as Major Channing thinking he had any inkling of what a woman might want. So condescending.

Felicity’s eyelashes fluttered as though doing battle with a very fierce wind. “No one has asked me yet.”

Lady Maccon marshaled her displeasure. “Felicity, bed, now. I don’t care one jot for your finer feelings, but I need my rest. Channing, help me up the stairs and we shall have our little confidence.”

Felicity reluctantly undertook to do her sister’s bidding.

Major Channing, even more reluctantly, took Alexia’s arm. “So, my lady, I wanted to—”