Knockout: A Hell’s Belles Novel

“You told him what?” Adelaide squawked the question the next afternoon from her place on a small settee in the back room of Madame Hebert’s shop on Bond Street.

“I told him the truth,” Imogen said, doing her best not to squirm as the modiste let out a seam on one of the many frocks Charles had ordered in his eternal quest to tempt Imogen into marriage. While the quest was going poorly, Imogen would not complain of its spoils. “That he could interrogate the entire East End until he saw himself into the grave, but that he’d gain no new information from any of them.”

“Well then,” Sesily said dryly, picking another chocolate out of the box on her lap. “I would wager Inspector Peck didn’t take that lightly at all.”

“He didn’t,” Imogen said as the modiste waved her assistant over with a box of thread. Madame Hebert peered in and selected a perfect match for the silk Imogen wore, and returned to work. “He was quite angry, I expect, though I did not linger.”

“The way Imogen came stalking off that boat,” Adelaide confirmed, “looking like a queen. The poor man didn’t have a chance. He likely felt clubbed directly over the head.”

“I do love it when they’re left flummoxed by our brilliance,” Sesily said.

“Poor Mr. Peck,” Duchess interjected from her place on a stool at the far end of the modiste’s shop, where she inspected the line of her stunning black silk in the looking glass. “He’s been flummoxed by Imogen’s brilliance since the beginning.”

“And yesterday he was flummoxed by something else of Imogen’s entirely,” Sesily said dryly.

“Sesily!” Imogen protested, her cheeks going red as she looked to the seamstress.

“Oh, please,” Sesily retorted. “It’s just us. And Madame Hebert would never repeat it.”

“Repeat what?” the modiste said with a wink before she indicated that Imogen should turn around. “I think that, in light of any flummoxing that may or may not have occurred, yesterday or in months prior, or I daresay in the weeks to come, I would like to take a second look at your undergarments.”

Adelaide and Sesily exchanged delighted looks and the modiste wandered off to fetch ribbon or whalebone or whatever it was dressmakers went looking for while their customers collected themselves.

“No one is going to see my undergarments,” Imogen protested.

“Certainly not with that attitude,” Sesily said, getting up from the settee and passing Adelaide the box of chocolates. “That color is gorgeous on you, Im. Wear that out, and you’ll gather a collection of admirers. Peck will have to fight them off if he wants to keep you.”

Imogen considered her reflection. The peacock blue was flattering, and while Madame Hebert had not hesitated to lower and broaden the neckline of the garment, she had made sure to include a long sleeve that ballooned to a fitted wrist—a perfect spot for a hidden item. The bodice was gathered and ruched, well complemented by the undergarments Madame Hebert was planning to reconsider, accentuating every one of Imogen’s curves—curves she knew were entirely out of step with the current fashion, yet had always pleased her.

The frock highlighted her softness and the way it layered over her strength, allowing her to take up more space in a world that was constantly telling her to take up less. To be less.

Imagine what Tommy would do if he saw her now.

Would his eyes go dark like they had yesterday? Would he run his hand over his mouth the way he had in the ship’s cabin last night, like she was a meal to be devoured?

She cleared her throat.

“Even if you are right, and this dress summons interest, Tommy Peck has no interest in fighting them off,” she said, forcing any hint of disappointment from her tone. “He wants me married as much as my brother does, so he can pack me off to the country and pack himself back to his desk at Whitehall.”

“Tommy Peck wouldn’t even have a desk at Whitehall if not for you bringing him two of his most lauded arrests of the past year,” Adelaide scoffed. “He ought to get on his knees and worship your brilliance, Imogen.”

“Agreed,” Sesily said around another chocolate. “And while he’s down there—”

“Sesily!” Duchess admonished with a laugh.

“I’m simply pointing out that Tommy Peck owes her for making him seem far cleverer than he is.”

“He is clever, though,” Imogen replied, searching for anything to stop her cheeks from blazing.

“Not cleverer than you,” Sesily argued. “They’re none of them cleverer than you.”

“He’s sorted out that the businesses that are being attacked have something in common—that they’re where women find safety.”

“And has he sorted out who might want those places destroyed?”

“Have we?” Imogen said, meeting Duchess’s eyes in the looking glass.

Duchess looked to Adelaide. “We think so.”

Adelaide nodded. “And you, Im? Are we close to knowing who’s setting the fires? Did you get the rest last night?”

Imogen nodded. “I’ve got the mercury fulminate, which was used in all the other bombings. I’ve the fabric fuse . . . doused in blasting oil. Frances is looking at it now to see if it’s a match.”

Sesily let out a low whistle. “So we’re close.”

Imogen nodded. “And there’s something else; when Mithra startled our man, he dropped something.”

“Too much to hope it was a calling card, I suppose,” Sesily said.

“Sadly, no.” Imogen waved a hand at her carpetbag, at Adelaide’s feet. “Inside pocket.”

Adelaide fished out a gold disk, no larger than a ha’penny, and embossed with a haloed man, robed and holding a sword and shield. At the bottom of the oval, hammered Latin. Quis ut Deus.

“A saint,” Imogen said. “But which one?”

She looked from one friend to the next. Sesily laughed. “You cannot imagine I ever paid attention on Sunday mornings.”

“My experiences in church inevitably ended with someone getting stabbed,” Adelaide said.

Duchess considered the medallion for a long moment. “We require a man of the cloth, it seems.” She winked. “Never a dull moment for the Belles is it?”

Madame Hebert returned to consider the back fastenings of Imogen’s gown as she replied, “And so? When we have all the proof? What then?”

Duchess met her gaze, all serious. “If it’s Parliament and the Yard together? There’s only one option.”

“We take it to the people,” Imogen said, watching as Adelaide returned the medallion to her bag.

“I don’t think Imogen’s detective will be thrilled with that.” Sesily shot from her seat, circling the fitting room, fiddling with bits of ribbon and lace, before peering through the curtain that separated the room from the shop itself.

“He’s not my detective,” Imogen said instantly.

“Mmm.” Sesily humored her for a moment before turning back with a look of absolute delight on her face. “Tell me, do you think that we have developed special powers of some kind?”

“Why, is it a vicar?” Duchess said, fiddling with a bow at the base of her spine. “Do we think this is too much?”

“It’s 1840. Nothing is too much. Why are you even wearing black, Duchess?” Adelaide said. “Are you planning to be widowed?”

“One must always be prepared.”

“Everyone, do listen to me,” Sesily said, her attention on the front room of the shop. “I’ve made a discovery.”

“What kind of discovery?” Adelaide asked, eating another chocolate from Sesily’s box. “Is it a vicar?”

“It is not a vicar,” Sesily said. “And don’t eat all those chocolates. He’s here.”

“Who’s here?” Imogen said, turning her back to Madame Hebert, who was now considering the inside placket of the dress.

“Your detective.”

The modiste took that moment to yank on the ties of her stays, and Imogen let out a little squeak of surprise, summoning the attention of everyone in the room.

“Interesting,” Duchess said.

“What do you mean he’s here?”

“Interesting that she didn’t deny that he’s her detective that time,” Adelaide said.

“Yes, I noticed that, too,” Sesily replied, turning back to the front room.

“He’s not my detective.”

“Too late.” Sesily opened the curtain a touch more, and the modiste indicated that Imogen should move to a more private space. “Good Lord, look at the size of the man. Do you think he believes he’s unassuming?”

“He absolutely does not believe he’s unassuming,” Imogen grumbled, stepping out of the gown to allow the modiste to work on her stays. “Where is he?”

“Across the street, leaning against the milliner’s and glowering.”

Imogen knew that particular glower well. “I expect people are doing their best to avoid him. Do you think he is waiting for me?”

Silence fell and she turned to face her friends, who were staring at her in disbelief. Duchess began. “Imogen. The man practically took you on the docks as the whole placed burned last night.”

She blushed. “He did not.”

Adelaide’s brows went up in a silent question.

“He didn’t!” Imogen protested. “It was a kiss! That was all!”

“Have you forgotten that I’m the one who found you in the library at the Trevescan ball?”

Imogen opened her mouth to argue, and then closed it.

“Well, I for one am not thrilled with Scotland Yard following us all over London,” Duchess interrupted, making her way to stand next to Sesily. “It will only summon more attention. Do you think he will leave?”

“I don’t, as a matter of fact,” Sesily said, watching him through the window. “Do you think we ought to invite him in?”

Imogen’s brows shot up. “In here?”

“It is where we are,” Sesily pointed out. “He could wait in the front room. Perfectly aboveboard.”

“Absolutely not,” Imogen said.

“Hmm,” Duchess said, not sounding at all convinced.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Only that I’m not sure you have a choice in the matter.”

The bell rang at the front of the shop and Imogen’s chest tightened immediately. “Is that—” She came to stand next to Sesily, holding her dress to her body, her back bare to the fitting room.

He was inside.

Her brow furrowed. “No! Absolutely not!” She made to approach him, but Hebert was there now, working on the buttons, unbothered, as though policemen big as trees frequented her shop every other day.

“Good afternoon, Lady Imogen,” he said, the words deep and rich. “Duchesses. Mrs. Calhoun.”

“Do come in,” Adelaide said, sounding thoroughly delighted by the way the afternoon was shaping up.

“No. Do not come in,” Imogen said. “You cannot simply wander into a dressmaker’s shop on Bond Street, Tommy. This is not done.”

Everyone looked to her.

“It’s not!”

“Well, no,” Sesily said. “But since when have you worried about such things?”

Never. But she was considering starting now, even as Sesily turned to Tommy. “Are you looking for Imogen?”

“In fact, I am. As you know, I have been asked to look after Lady Imogen’s safety for the time being.”

“Hired, no?” Duchess corrected, the cool disdain in her voice marking her rich and fearless even before she added, “Parliament loves to put Scotland Yard on a lead, do they not?”

He had the grace to look slightly uncomfortable. “I wouldn’t describe it that way.”

“But what’s important is that you tracked her here,” Sesily said, raising her voice so Imogen would clearly hear. “How very clever of you.”

“Oh for heaven’s sake,” Imogen muttered, wishing she were wearing literally anything but the half-open dress Madame Hebert had left her in. “Is it your belief that I might find trouble here, Mr. Peck? Shopping for ribbons and silks?”

“I would never presume to think you couldn’t find trouble wherever you wished it, Lady Imogen,” he said, and everyone tittered.

Everyone but Imogen, who wished she was closer to her carpetbag.

“I do like him,” Sesily interjected. Of course Sesily liked him. Sesily liked anyone with a quick tongue. And if they were beautiful, all the better.

“Mmm. Too bad he’s a Peeler.” Duchess, on the other hand, was a woman of sense.

“Well, you’ve sorted it,” Imogen said, meeting him dead in the eye, and trying very hard not to be embarrassed by her state of half dress. Or, rather, full dress but half fastening. “There is no trouble and we’re not in hiding. We’re on Bond Street.”

She watched him for a long moment, disliking the way he dwarfed the large room with his broad shoulders and his thighs, which were . . . not insignificant. And his hands. In Imogen’s experience, men never knew what to do with their hands in situations such as this. They were always holding gloves or hats or walking sticks. But not Tommy Peck. He simply . . . stood there. Like he was perfectly comfortable waiting for her and would do so, forever.

Which was odd, if one really thought about it, considering he was standing in a room with four women he knew to be, at best, mayhem, and at worst, vigilantes.

Narrowing her gaze on him, Imogen said, “Last I checked, you had more than one unsolved crime to sort out. Hard to believe you’ve chosen nursemaiding a spinster happily on the shelf over actually . . . inspecting.”

His brow furrowed. Good.

And then he said, “I don’t think it’s difficult to believe at all, actually. You see, Lady Imogen, if I had any faith that you could keep yourself out of trouble, perhaps I would have left you alone. But I don’t have faith in that, even a little. And so, here we are.”

They stared each other down for a long moment before she repeated him. “Here we are.”

With that, she turned, revealing her still scandalously open back to him, returning to the little platform where she’d been standing. At which point, she realized he had followed her into the room. Clutching the bodice of the dress to her, she said, “I am not finished, Tommy. You may wait in the front room.”

“If it’s all the same, I’d rather not, considering how quickly you are able to give me the slip—particularly when you’re in the company of this lot.”

“I beg your pardon, this lot?” No one spoke with such accusation as Duchess.

“Do you deny your keen ability to disappear from beneath the noses of most people, Your Grace?”

A pause. “I do not, as a matter of fact, Detective Inspector. And the only reason you will survive referring to us as this lot is because you spoke of that ability with deference.”

“I would never dream of anything less.” He sat, folding his enormous frame into the spindly little jewel-toned chaise in the corner. “It’s only because of my admiration for your quick reflexes that I am choosing, as a serious man with a serious job, to sit in a fitting room and wait for Lady Imogen.”

“Well, Lady Imogen has had quite enough,” Imogen said. “You cannot stay here. It is not appropriate.”

Sesily snorted at the word.

“You’ve three married women and a modiste playing chaperone. What could possibly happen that is inappropriate?” Tommy asked.

“You’d be surprised,” Sesily said slyly.

“Sesily!” Adelaide protested. “You’ll embarrass the poor man.”

“Oh, please. Look at him! This is not a man who is surprised by where people . . . get mussed.” Sesily looked to Tommy. “Are you, Mr. Peck?”

He wasn’t looking at her. He was looking directly at Imogen, one dark brow raised in a perfect dark slash. “I am not.”

Imogen’s cheeks were instantly aflame and she was suddenly very aware that the dress she wore was unfastened to the waist and she had nothing into which to change, and not ten feet away was Thomas Peck, who, not twenty-four hours earlier, had his hands in her skirts.

In other things, too.

And suddenly, it was not only her cheeks flaming, it was the rest of her, too, as though the temperature in the whole place had gone up.

“What are you here for, then, Tommy? It cannot be to protect my reputation.”

A beat, and then he said, “I’m very glad you asked, my lady. You see, I am here for your bag.”

Silence fell in the room.

She looked toward him instantly.

This infernal man.

She’d been wrong before. He wasn’t simply sitting on a ludicrously small chaise in the corner, looking tall and strong and handsome and . . . stupidly perfect.

He was sitting next to her carpetbag.

And then, as they all watched, he reached down and lifted it without hesitation, as though it weighed nothing.

“And I thought you might like to take a drive.”