“A medic and a gamer, eh?” an Englishman called over from one of several gaming tables. “Do, do! We’ve just finished and are about to begin another.”
Across the room next to the duke’s curio cabinet, a gentleman was tying a blindfold around a laughing woman wearing only her stays and petticoats.
Hmm. Perhaps joining a game could be advantageous—both for her purse and her desire to be rid of these revelers.
“I do believe I shall,” she said, and Lord Winston grinned.
“Have a care with my medic, Perry,” he called over to the card table. “I’ll not have him taken advantage of.”
Millie glanced at him as she seated herself at the card table and realized he found this entire thing amusing.
Her new female companion perched on the edge of Millie’s chair, leaning so close that her bosom practically spilled into Millie’s face.
One of the men at the table laughed, and too late Millie realized she had leaned away.
“Say, Winston—I daresay your medic here is only too ripe for an education, both at cards and at women.” And then, to Millie, “But never fear, young lad. Mademoiselle Hélène will give you any experience you like.”
Now Millie’s face was inches from the woman’s bosom, and she was staring directly into a deep cleavage that would have had a real man salivating like a hungry dog.
She moistened her lips and hoped it made her appear at least a little bit tempted.
“I’m feeling a bit...warm,” the woman whispered suggestively in French. “Perhaps you can help me, monsieur le médecin.”
Little did she know. “Perhaps I can at that,” she murmured, hoping she sounded genuinely interested. “Only let me collect some winnings first, hmm?”
“Oh, ho!” the man named Perry laughed. “Our young medic is more confident than he first appeared!”
The men at the table laughed, clearly believing they would fleece her of every last penny in short order.
They began the game, and Millie made a few mistakes on purpose, throwing the first round. And then, slowly, she began to change her tactics.
“Tiens, Monsieur Germain,” one of the men said after a few rounds, by which time Millie had collected a sum about equal to that of everyone else at the table, “Perhaps I only imagine it, but Winston appears a trifle piqued.”
Now the one named Perry glanced at the duke, who was engrossed in conversation while a woman nuzzled his neck. “Not as well as he’d like us all to believe, eh?”
“On the contrary,” Millie said. “His injuries are progressing nicely.”
And now, like a golden egg dropped in her lap, was the opportunity she’d been looking for.
“Wears on a man, that sort of thing,” Perry said, shaking his head. “So difficult to imagine— Ho, Blanchet! Almost had her that time!”
Millie glanced over her shoulder and saw the object of Lord Perry’s amusement—a man playing a game of undress-me-if-you-can with one of Winston’s strumpets. “Exhausting,” Perry said now, shaking his head, and she realized he was once again speaking of Winston.
“Mmm,” she agreed, and played a card. “Especially with the— Well, he wouldn’t want me to speak of that.” She rearranged her hand and looked up to find Perry’s attention torn between his own cards and her little “slip.”
“Has he got something more than the injuries?”
“Forgive me. I spoke out of turn. His Grace’s conditions are a confidential matter between him and me. You understand, of course.”
“Of course.”
“Le pauvre,” the woman perched on the edge of Millie’s chair said, looking at the duke. Poor thing? Hardly. “I think I shall go comfort him.” How she would find room on the already crowded sofa was a mystery.
“That might not be...” Millie paused and shook her head. “No, I doubt he’s contagious.”
“Contagieux,” one of the others said sharply under his breath. “How could it be that a few cuts and bruises are contagious?”
“Do forgive me,” Millie said. “I should not have said anything. Please—let us not speak of it further.”
As if divinely preplanned, the duke sipped his drink and coughed—twice, three times—and all eyes at the table shot in his direction.
Millie frowned thoughtfully at the Frenchman seated to her left. “I do believe it’s your turn?”
His eyes dropped to his hand. “Oui. Bien sûr.” He played a card.
Millie lowered her voice and murmured to the woman sitting beside her, “I suppose I would be wrong not to ask...none of you young women have been...” She trailed off again, shook her head once more. “Ah, well. In any case, what’s done is done.”
Worry tugged at the woman’s carefully groomed brows. “Quoi?” she whispered urgently. “Dites-moi.”
“I’m quite sure, as long as you don’t plan on any further intimacies with him...”
“Mais, non,” the woman assured her, eyes fixed on the duke. “Definitely not.”
“I’m almost certain you needn’t worry,” Millie reassured her.
“I do believe,” one of the players said to the others at the table, clearing his throat, “that the Comte d’Anterry had an entertainment planned for this evening.”
Just then another of the duke’s friends approached the table and leaned close to Perry. “You look disturbed. Qu’est-ce que c’est?”
“It’s probably nothing.” Lord Perry looked to Millie for confirmation. Mille only raised a brow.
The player to her left leaned across the table and spoke in a low voice. “We have just learned from Monsieur Germain that Winston is contagieux.”
“Dieu.” The man straightened sharply. Glanced over his shoulder.
“It’s likely nothing,” Millie told them. “I shouldn’t have mentioned it. His Grace would be furious with me. Please—you mustn’t say a word.”
“Mais, non,” the new man said, still looking surreptitiously at Winston. “Of course not.”
One of the men at the table set down his cards and cleared his throat. “I do believe I never made proper excuses to d’Anterry. I’d best put in an appearance.”
She watched the man walk over and make his excuses to the duke—from a safe distance, of course—and exit the chamber with two of the courtesans at his side.
Within fifteen minutes, fully half the room had emptied.
Within twenty-five, the room was unoccupied except for herself and the duke. He still sat on the sofa where he’d been since she arrived. She still sat at the card table, alone now with another—albeit much smaller—stack of winnings.
“Perhaps you would be so good as to tell me,” Winston drawled, “what you’ve said to all my guests that has left me once again without company.”
“I assure you, I am just as disappointed in the company’s departure as you are. Just when I was holding out hope that the lovely Mademoiselle Hélène might be agreeable to a few moments of diversion.”
“Were you?”
“Only with Your Grace’s blessing, naturally.”
“Naturally. Perhaps we could call her back. You could tell her you were mistaken about whatever you told