If you’ve already read the first chapter of A Lady Most lovely here, I hope you are as excited as I am for the book’s release on September 24! If you’d like another sample, here’s an excerpt from a point early in the book where Tom observes some disreputable looking men forcing their way into the London town home where Margaret lives. He is trying to get information from the cab driver who has just brought the men.

The cabbie looked at him expectantly. No doubt he’d precisely assessed Tom’s financial bracket from the fine tailoring of his riding clothes. He would probably be more forthcoming if he were to find some silver in his hand.

Tom pulled half a crown from his pocket. “Where will you take them?” he asked, dropping the coin into the man’s palm, which was suddenly in a convenient position to receive it.

“Well, how would I know that?” the cabbie said, galling him with a cheeky grin. “I ain’t taken ’em there yet.” He started to put the coin in his pocket, but Tom reached out and grabbed his hand.

“Guess,” Tom said fiercely, giving his arm a wrench.

The cabbie met Tom’s gaze steadily, assessing him. Plainly, in his years on the streets he’d dealt with even tougher customers than Tom. But Tom didn’t back down. “I said guess,” he ground out again, gripping the man’s hand more tightly and giving it a small twist.

The cabbie blinked, and Tom knew he’d won. “I have a notion,” the little man said with a slight cough, “that it might be in the vicinity of Pedley Street.”

Tom knew that place. It was a haven for moneylenders—the most vile, disreputable kind imaginable.

He dropped the cabbie’s hand without another word and raced up the steps to Margaret’s house. He might have no right to interfere, but he fully intended to do so anyway. If she was receiving calls from moneylenders, then something was seriously wrong. A woman of her means would never consort with such people.

Would she?

He was going to find out.