Before Liars Loved (Before Series, Book 3)

Damien

↫Mischief in Mayfair↬

Did you hear that our queen also graced the ballroom floor last evening? Her Majesty arrived on the arm of her handsome prince charming. It was noticed that the consort did not leave her side for the entirety of the evening except for when he allowed Queen Adelaide to share a dance with a select few gentlemen. Oh, wait. How silly me, readers. Of course that is not true to say. A queen simply does not require permission from her husband as the rest of us might. It would seem that Her Majesty herself must have decided to stay along the frays of the dance floor.

-Madame Mischief

As soon as Leo had left the parlor, Scarlett stared down Damien, Lord Eades. Her friend picked the wrong time to pay an unexpected visit.

Damien shot a glance toward the doorway. When it appeared that the coast was cleared, he said lowly, "The bet is back."

"What?"

"Last night after the ball, Lord Symons was feeling overly confident and revived the bet. Five hundred pounds that you would be his mistress next."

Scarlett dropped her head into her hands. She wasn't ready for this right now, not with the way her health had been in the past week. Besides her attacks, she'd also been feeling...overwhelmed. It always felt as though an elephant was sitting upon her chest. Not that Scarlett had ever seen an elephant, but she heard they were quite large. And the one thing she knew about what was on her chest was that it was enormous.

"I know, Lettie," Damien said, putting a hand on her arm.

She sat back up. "No wonder you acted like the cat had your tongue when you came in here."

He at least had the decency to look sheepishly around. "Sorry. I simply was not expecting to see bloody Farrington in here."

"What do you mean, bloody Farrington."

Damien appeared taken aback by her forceful reaction.

"You know very well that the man has a certain reputation," Damien said lowly.

"So do I," Scarlett pointed out. "And you know very well that it isn't true."

Damien rolled his eyes and threw off his coat in irritation. He was wearing a simple woven waistcoat beneath it. "I can imagine why you'd want Farrington to be different than the others, Lettie. But he's not."

Scarlett bristled at that. "You aren't acquainted with him as I am, Damien." She busied herself with pouring another cup of tea and stirring in two cubes of sugar. "He was here this morning to check on me after he saw me have an asthma attack last night at the ball."

Damien frowned and paused his movements as he'd been adjusting his cravat. "You had an episode at the ball? How do you fare now?"

She nodded. "Dr. Abbott came over this morning as well. He wants me to double my daily dosage of laudanum."

"That's a lot of laudanum," Damien said in a near whisper.

"I know," Scarlet replied quietly. "I am not sure what to do."

"Isn't Dr. Abbott worried that you'll become dependent on the drug?"

"He did not mention that as a concern."

Damien looked skeptical. "I know it is a concern," she added, "I am purely saying that Abbott did not bring it up."

He frowned, hesitated, and then said, "Lettie..."

It was very clearly a warning of some kind. But Scarlett wished he wouldn't use her childhood nickname; she was not even close to the girl she used to be.