Kerry Allen's Love Emporium

The address on the card led to a residential district, the sort of neighborhood Malcolm had been prohibited from entering as a child because even their errand boys weren’t allowed smudged faces and ripped clothes. If grubby little beggars had to exist, they could do it at a distance.

It was an unusual place in which to find a brothel, but if the clientele was quiet, restricted to invitation only, and didn’t fornicate on the lawn, the neighbors might be blissfully unaware. The stone wall surrounding the property afforded no privacy, as the land rose behind it like a pedestal on which the mansion stood, but the wide gardens on all sides and stone walls of the home itself lent a measure of discretion.

The screams wouldn’t carry far enough to be heard by outsiders.

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Given the nocturnal restrictions Malcolm shared with his entire crew, the logical approach to locating Reese Hershey was to hire runners to fan out and search for her during the day—forewarned, of course, that the quarry was unlikely to be found trying on bonnets at the milliner’s or sipping tea at a garden party, as well as adequately compensated for the likelihood that the unlucky bastard who found her would be gored, gutted, and left for the buzzards if she got wind of him.

At two in the morning in any city he had ever visited, men for hire for such dangerous tasks were thick as rats, and Baltimore proved no exception.

The exceptional thing was that the first half dozen candidates to whom he spoke abruptly lost interest in the job at the mention of the hellion’s name. The first broke into a sweat and left the negotiation table without another word. The second excused himself with a polite demurral of conflict of interest. The next three declined to jeopardize future employment opportunities with a woman who hired often and rewarded handsomely, and the last preferred not to be in her vicinity due to an unsettled debt of shocking magnitude resulting from a single hand of cards.

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The sight of home failed to fill Reese with the joy she expected after months away. The grounds had run wild. Panes were missing from an upstairs window. A corner of the roof sagged. How quickly neglect transformed a proud manse into a derelict ruin.

Postponing additional disappointment and the confrontation awaiting her inside, she rode her rented horse to the stable. There were no hands about, and the reason for their absence became apparent inside. The horse she sat astride was the only one in residence. Judging by the smell—more dust and mold than manure and hay—the others had been evicted some time ago.

She dismounted and checked each stall for signs of recent occupancy. There were none. Floors were bare, troughs empty. Even the tack was gone.

She lacked the sentimental attachment to animals many of her gender seemed to develop. Horses were transportation, dogs were hunting gear, cats were rat catchers, all serving a more important purpose than being cuddled and cooed at by some silly chit who served no purpose at all. Lack of sentiment, however, did not exempt her from upset at the loss. They were useful and valuable and hers, dammit. “Curse that boil of a man to an eternity festering on the devil’s ass!”

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“You have a deal. She’d have to bed you even if you were a pox-riddled, lice-infested, toothless, unwashed old codger. Is all this really necessary?”

Malcolm reached out and repositioned the mirror in front of his face for the tenth time. Billy’s inability to focus on the task of holding it steady reinforced his decision not to let the boy wield the razor. He trusted no one with a cutting edge so close to his throat—a lingering prejudice from the days when a shave so close one could see the spine wouldn’t heal—but especially not one who had yet to sprout a single whisker of his own and had a tendency to fidget.

The razor glinted against his jaw, scraping away the last stripe of lather and the rough stubble beneath it. “Your brutish disregard for the preferences of the fairer sex leads me to believe you will be purchasing any attention you receive from them. Be forewarned, however, that many whores who are not themselves pox-riddled, lice-infested, toothless, and unwashed will have nothing to do with you if you don’t show them rudimentary courtesies, such as hygiene.”

The mirror veered out of range again as Billy wiped his nose on his sleeve. “Their loss.”

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Dedicated to the vivacious and curvaceous @WookiesGirl,
whose catchphrase “fanfuckingtastic” was *this close*
to becoming Malcolm’s favorite new vocabulary word in this episode. 

She placed the knife on the desk, tip pointing at the unoccupied chair across from her. MacDougall had come and gone, delivering his second unenlightening report about the enemy ship. He had left of his own accord, not run out by the arrival of a second visitor.

The pirate was late. How quickly the fickle rogue lost interest.

She propped her feet on the desk, tipped her chair back on two legs, and smiled at the ceiling. Female distress caused most men discomfort, to which they responded by either taking measures to remove the source of distress or running for the nearest exit. Marrs removing himself would have accomplished both, but she hardly expected such a stubborn man to retreat. Under other circumstances, an escalation of dismay would have been in order, but she stopped short of wringing out a few tears because he understood her well enough that such dramatics would render the act unbelievable.

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