All I Want by Lynsay Sands Read Free Book Online

immediately, but a man is much smaller than Bessy. I do not think more than a drop or so should be used. I— Oh, Prudence, I do not think it should be used at all. This was a terrible idea. Please just give it to me and let us forget this.”
    “And shall you visit me in debtor’s prison?” Prudence asked quietly, turning to face her friend. Eleanore paused, a struggle taking place on her face, until she gave in with a sigh.
    “How will you administer it? For your plan to work, if it is going to work at all,” she added dryly, “he must receive itwhile he is drinking. He does that at the club, for the most part. You just finished regaling me with your last foray into Ballard’s. After tonight Plunkett will be on the lookout for you. Disguising yourself as a man will not work.”
    “Aye,” Prudence murmured thoughtfully, then slowly smiled. “Plunkett will never again let me through Ballard’s
front
door.”
    Turning away from the ale barrel, Prudence took a few steps, then paused to scowl down at her chest. Muttering under her breath, she balanced the tray with the single mug of ale in one hand, using the other to tug uselessly at the neckline of the white top she wore. Honestly, it was as indecent as could be, she thought impatiently, and wasted a moment wishing she had worn one of her own gowns. Of course, that was impossible. She had seen for herself that all the girls wore the same costume: the red skirt and rather blousy white top with a scoop neck. But this one seemed extremely scooped to Prudence. Her nipples were nearly showing!
    Realizing it was a wasted effort, Prudence gave up tugging at the top. She had had to work hard for the use of the indecent outfit for the night. Well, not the whole night. Pru had assured the girl she would need to take her place for only a matter of moments, just long enough to get a message to the man she loved. That was what she had told the girl. Of course, the truth was that she wanted a way to deliver the emetic to her father, but she could hardly have told Lizzy that. The servant’s gratitude for Pru’s intervention with the hawk-faced man had stretched far enough for Lizzy to agree to loan her gown to Prudence and let her briefly take her place as a servant inside Ballard’s, but she suspected it would not have done so had the girl known Pru’s true intentions.
    Prudence had salved her conscience about the lie by telling herself that it wasn’t a complete falsehood. She
did
love her father, and the emetic
was
a message…of sorts.
    Deciding it was a sad day indeed when a woman began lying to herself, Prudence moved out of the kitchen, then paused to peer around the club proper. She had waited outside the back entrance of the establishment the night before, doing her best to ignore the fact that she was standing in a dark, stinking alley as she had waited for the place to close and the workers to leave. Most of the women had left in pairs or groups. At last Lizzy had straggled out, all alone and one of the last to leave. When Prudence had recognized her as the serving woman that the hawk-faced man had been manhandling, she had pulled her cloak closer about herself and proceeded to follow. Trying to move silently, and staying in the shadows as much as possible, she had trailed the girl up the alley leading from the back of the building around to the front. She had followed Lizzy along several roads, grateful to know that Eleanore’s driver was following her for protection—even more grateful that her friend had insisted she use the coach and the family’s discreet driver for the excursion.
    Once far enough away from the club that she thought no one from it would witness the exchange, she had approached the girl with a story of true love hampered by disapproving parents and her need to get a message to her lover. Lizzy had been sympathetic, but the girl was also the pragmatic sort and hadn’t been willing to risk her job to aid in the escapade. Prudence had been