Page 8 of A Relentless Rake

“My lord, you must wake.”

Alec opened one eye and squinted at Thompson as the valet leaned over him in bed. “No.” He snapped his eye shut, rolled over, and turned his back to the man.

His head ached from both lack of sleep and from where one of the men in last night’s fight had caught him by surprise. He knew without having to check in the mirror that a nasty bruise had formed there.Damned chit.Forcing him to follow her into the City on a wild goose chase, nearly getting herself raped or killed—nearly gettinghimkilled when he’d had to jump in to save her—

Thompson threw open the heavy window drapes. Sunlight exploded into the room.

Alec let loose a string of curses as the light blinded him. “Close those curtains and get out!”

“Sir, I wish for nothing more.” Yet Thompson moved to the next window and tossed open its drapes.

Alec shielded his eyes from the second blast of sunlight by shoving a pillow over his face.

“But you have a visitor waiting in the drawing room, sir.”

A visitor?Good lord… “What time is it?”

“Just shy of ten o’clock.”

“In themorning?” He threw the pillow to the floor and sat up. How dare anyone come calling before noon? And how dare Thompson risk both his position and his life by rousing him so damnably early to tell him?

The valet’s eyes slid sideways to the bright day beyond the tall windows, and he answered dryly, “I believe so, yes.”

Alec bit back a sleep-deprived snarl. “I have half a mind to fire you for this, Thompson.”

“If I were you, sir, I certainly would.” The man walked into the dressing room to fetch a set of clothes, unperturbed by the usual barrage of empty threats that occurred whenever he had to rouse Alec from bed before noon.

Thompson was one of the best valets in England, not so much for his dressing skills but for his discretion about his employers. His quick grab of the black mask from the floor without so much as a lift of an eyebrow proved that.

Alec would never fire the man. He would be lost without him, and they both knew it.

But ten o’clock…God’s mercy.Nothing good ever happened this early in the day. “Tell whoever is waiting that he can shove his calling card up his—”

“Lady St James is in the drawing room, sir.”

His mother?His head pounded even harder.

“I told the countess you were…under the weather,” Thompson called out from the dressing room, emphasizing the usual euphemism for mornings when Alec was unfit from a night of too much carousing. “But she insisted on seeing you.”

Biting down a groan, Alec tossed back the velvet coverlet and pushed himself out of bed. He still wore the black trousers and tunic he’d donned for last night’s watch for Henry Everett at the school, only to end up following his sister halfway across London and back when the silly gel decided to go into the City and get herself attacked.

He ran a hand across his chin to rub at the night’s growth of stubbly beard as he crossed to the washbasin. Olivia Everett… What the devil was a respectable schoolmistress doing in a dark alleyway at midnight? And what exactly did she know about her brother’s involvement with Scepter?

Alec had no bloody idea. He also had no good reason in the first place why Henry Everett’s name would be scrawled on the half-burned slip of paper that connected him to the bombing. And no possible answers.

“Damned hard to question a man about treason when he’s vanished,” he muttered to himself as he stripped off the tunic and bared his body from the waist up. Then he poured cold water into the basin, took a deep breath to steel himself, and plunged his head into the bowl.

He was tired, sore, and now incredibly frustrated at the lack of leads in their mission. Robert Jenkinson, Earl of Liverpool and current prime minister, was an old family friend. Hell, he’d been more of a father to Alec than Rupert Sinclair had ever been. If Liverpool’s life was in danger, Alec would do everything he could to protect him.

But he had to do it soon before another assassination attempt was made. Time was not on his side.

He threw back his head and flung water across the room. Cold rivulets ran down his bare back and chest. He wiped the towel over his face and grimaced as Thompson returned with a suit of clothes draped over his arm.

“Just a shirt,” Alec ordered.

The valet looked as stunned as if Alec had just admitted to seducing the queen. “But you won’t be properly dressed to receive the countess!”

Alec smoothed back his wet hair. “If my mother has the audacity to come calling this early in the morning”—he winced at the mere thought of it—“then she deserves what she gets.”