Page 54 of Seduced By a Scoundrel

Derrek lost all traces of his smile as he looked Jeremy in the eyes. “I know,” he said. He sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. “I should not have insisted on keeping you at The Chameleon Club and away from your business. I should have remembered sooner that you are neither a child nor an invalid who needs my advice and guidance in all things.”

“No, you should not,” Clary said.

Jeremy sent her a quelling sideways look. He was grateful that she would be his champion, but this was something that needed to be resolved between him and Derrek alone.

“I had a lover for many years, Joseph,” Derrek explained, including Clary in the conversation as well. “He was a doctor who worked a great deal with the poorest folk in London. I did what I could to protect him, but in the end, he contracted cholera and died.” He paused and glanced down for a moment, then back up at Jeremy. “For years, I have told myself that if I had only taken greater care of him, if I had stopped him from venturing into such dangerous pockets of illness, he might still be here with me.”

Jeremy drew in a breath of understanding. Derrek had told him about Joseph before, but he suddenly made the connection between the two of them. “I am sorry for your loss,” he said. “Death is a terrible thing that robs us of what is most precious to us. But I do not think your Joseph would have thanked you for keeping him overly safe either.”

“I know,” Derrek said with a nod. “Just as I know that I would not be serving you at all by preventing you from living your life, no matter what dangers assail you. And now I can do even less, since I am no longer employed as a policeman.”

“I am sorry you were sacked,” Jeremy said. “I pray that it was not because of me.”

Derrek shook his head. “It was because of my own actions. But I believe there may be a good outcome to the whole thing.” He moved closer to Jeremy. “I have been talking quite a bit to Cecil and Austen and others at The Chameleon Club. We discussed the idea of creating a special protective force for members of The Brotherhood who might find themselves in difficulties.”

“The Brotherhood?” Clary asked.

“It is a newly formed organization of men such as us for the purpose of mutual aid and support,” Jeremy explained, though his heart was racing for Derrek too much to say more.

“I have a natural desire to protect,” Derrek said with a slight shrug. “Perhaps this way, I could put that desire to good use instead of making the one person I care about more deeply than anyone miserable.”

Jeremy’s racing heart threatened to burst. “I am not miserable,” he said stepping closer to Derrek. “I am only miserable without you.”

Derrek smiled tentatively, then took a step forward, reaching for Jeremy’s hands. “I?—”

He was interrupted by the frantic sound of footsteps coming up the stairs, and a moment later, Timothy appeared in the doorway.

“Sir,” Timothy said, his eyes wide as he glanced from Jeremy to Clary to Derrek. “You must come quick. Sir John Conroy has just arrived in the shop.”

Nineteen

After days of sulking around The Chameleon Club, sifting through the tattered remains of the life he’d worked so hard to build for himself, Derrek had finally come to the conclusion that the only way he would truly be happy was with Jeremy by his side. Not only that, after having his dove absent from his days for just a short time, he had seen the truth that Jeremy truly was his own man with his own accomplishments and needed to remain in that freedom. Like every delicate bird, if Derrek kept him in a cage, he would spoil the very thing that made his beloved dove so perfect.

Cecil and Austen had had something to do with his awakening to those thoughts, of course. They had harangued him constantly from the moment he’d gathered all of his belongings from his rented rooms, which had already been packed up and nearly tossed out when his landlord had let the rooms to someone else a month before, assuming Derrek would not return, and to move into The Chameleon Club.

“You cannot live without him,” Cecil had concluded after a debate that lasted late into the night the night before. “There is nothing for it now but to go to Wilkes and grovel.”

His friend had been right, and as soon as Derrek had awakened and gathered his nerve, he’d headed straight to Jermyn Street to do what needed to be done.

He’d been surprised to find Miss Jones there, although by the look of things, Jeremy’s friend had only just arrived herself. Derrek took that as a good omen, however. Jeremy was in lightened spirits, and Miss Jones could both hold him accountable and, hopefully, encourage Jeremy to forgive him for his stubbornness.

That was precisely the direction things had been heading in. Derrek’s heart had warmed and lightened. Even with Miss Jones in the room, he was on the verge of confessing the depths of his love for Jeremy and taking his dove into his arms for a kiss that would scandalize even the unshakeable Miss Jones.

And then Conroy arrived.

“Where is the man?” he asked in a low growl, frightening the young man who worked for Jeremy.

“He’s…he’s downstairs,” the lad answered, cowering a little and glancing from Derrek to Jeremy. “He says that he’s here to collect the suit you measured him for.”

Jeremy gaped at the lad, then shook his head. “The suit I measured him for?” he asked incredulously. “I was barely given the chance to measure him at all.”

“He’s lying then, as usual,” Derrek said, clenching his hands into fists at his sides. “He wants something else from you.”

“But what?” Jeremy shrugged and shook his head.

“There’s only one way to find out,” Miss Jones said, looking as though she would protect Jeremy as fiercely as Derrek intended to.

The three of them exchanged looks, then Jeremy blew out a breath and started forward.

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