Read Chapter 16: The Turf Club Expels

The Turf Club sat like a smug, stone-faced judge at the corner of St. James’s Street, its windows dark and knowing. Helena had seen it a hundred times from the outside—an institution she had circled her entire life like a mare eyeing a fence too high to clear. Today, she meant to charge it.

Julian stood beside her, his beaver hat in hand, looking every inch the gentleman about to present himself for membership. He’d offered to accompany her on the pretext of reviewing the club’s racing calendar. She’d let him believe she wanted a look at the betting book. What she actually wanted was the name of every owner who had voted to bar her father from the premises in ’09, and she knew the club secretary kept a ledger of such petty triumphs.

“You cannot go in,” Julian said, not unkindly, as a liveried porter opened the door and then blocked the threshold with his broad chest.

Helena lifted her chin. “I intend to go in, Mr. Forsythe. The question is whether you intend to let me.”

The porter’s expression did not flicker. “The Turf Club admits gentlemen only, my lady. By charter, by custom, and by the grace of the Prince Regent himself.”

“I am acquainted with the charter,” Helena said crisply. “Section three permits the attendance of female guests during the September handicap luncheon. It is September. I am a guest. Of Mr. Forsythe.”

The porter glanced at Julian, who gave a small, helpless shrug. “She has read the charter, Jenkins. I can’t deny it.”

“The luncheon is over, my lady.”

“Then I am early for next year’s.”

Behind the porter, a cluster of older men had gathered in the foyer, drawn by the commotion. Helena recognized Lord Ashcombe, whose horse had finished last at the Oaks and who had blamed the jockey, the weather, and the stewards in equal measure. She also spotted Sir Reginald Pelt, who had once tried to buy her father’s best broodmare and, on being refused, had spread a rumor about the mare’s bloodline that still cost Ashworth stables two hundred guineas a sale.

“Helena,” Julian murmured, a warning in his tone. “This will not end well.”

“It never does,” she said, and stepped forward.

The porter held his ground. She did not push him—a lady did not push—but she leaned in close enough that the brass button on his coat pressed against her reticule. “The Duke of Clarence is a member of this club, is he not?”

“He is.”

“And the Duke of Clarence is in receipt of my father’s letters, which mention, in some detail, the wagers the Duke placed through Ashworth stables during the Brighton meeting. Wagers, I believe, that the club’s own rules would deem irregular.”

The porter’s face went from stone to plaster. Behind her, Julian inhaled sharply.

“You’re threatening the Duke of Clarence with his own betting history,” he said, low enough that only she could hear. “In the foyer of the Turf Club.”

“I’m threatening the porter with the Duke of Clarence’s betting history. There’s a difference.”

The porter glanced over his shoulder at Ashcombe and Pelt, who had moved closer, their cravats bobbing with interest. A man in a dark coat—the club secretary, by the cut of his waistcoat—emerged from a side door and assessed the situation with a practiced eye.

“Lady Ashworth,” he said, with the smooth condescension of a man who had ejected many a gambler and at least one princess. “We are honored by your interest. But I must inform you that the committee voted in ’11 to restrict guest privileges to the first Tuesday of the month, between the hours of eleven and one. Today is Wednesday. The charter you have read is the earlier edition.”

Helena felt the ground shift under her feet. She had been outmaneuvered, not by Julian, but by a man who had clearly been waiting for this moment—perhaps for years, perhaps since her father’s last public humiliation.

“Then I shall return on Tuesday,” she said, keeping her voice light.

“Tuesday next is the rescheduled Doncaster meeting,” the secretary replied. “The club will be closed to guests.”

“The Tuesday after that.”

“The committee will be in session. And the Tuesday after that, I am afraid, is the club’s annual removal to its hunting lodge.”

He smiled. It was a smile that said *I have done this before and I will do it again*.

Julian stepped forward, no longer a bystander. “What is the fee for full membership, Mr.…?”

“Bartholomew,” the secretary said, his eyes narrowing. “And the fee for full membership is one hundred guineas on application, plus a second hundred on election, and the sponsorship of three existing members.”

“I will pay the application fee now,” Julian said. “And I will ask Lord Whitbury, the Earl of March, and the Duke of Clarence to sponsor me. I am aware all three are members.”

Bartholomew’s smile faltered. “You are not a member, Mr. Forsythe.”

“No,” Julian agreed. “But I intend to be. And when I am, I shall propose a motion to amend the guest rule. Lady Ashworth will be admitted to these premises, and she will be admitted as my guest, on any day of the week she chooses.”

The silence that followed was so complete Helena could hear the ticking of the great clock in the hall.

“You’ve lost your mind,” she said under her breath.

“Probably,” he said. He turned back to Bartholomew. “Is there a form?”

The secretary produced one from the inner pocket of his coat—a pristine sheet of cream paper, as if he had been expecting a different kind of application. Julian took it, borrowed a pen from the porter’s stand, and wrote his name in a bold, swift hand. He handed the form back without reading it over.

“You’ll want to witness that,” he said. “The Duke of Clarence will confirm my signature.”

Bartholomew took the form with two fingers, as if it might burn him. Ashcombe stepped forward, his face red. “Forsythe, you cannot seriously—this woman’s father was ejected from this club for cheating.”

“He was ejected for winning too often,” Helena said coolly. “There is a difference, though I would not expect a man who loses to a female cousin at whist to understand it.”

Ashcombe’s mouth opened and closed. Pelt tugged at his sleeve, muttering something about discretion, but Ashcombe shook him off. “You’ll regret this, Forsythe. Allying yourself with the Ashworth name—it will follow you into every committee room in London.”

“Then I shall be in good company,” Julian said. He offered Helena his arm. “Shall we, Lady Ashworth? I believe I owe you a glass of something scandalous.”

She took his arm, because to refuse would be to lose the field, and they walked out of the Turf Club together into the weak September sun. The porter did not follow. Bartholomew did not call after them. The door closed behind them with a soft, final click.

They crossed the street in silence. Only when they had rounded the corner and entered a narrow alley that smelled of hops and coal smoke did they stop.

Julian turned to face her. His expression was strange—half exhilarated, half appalled. “I have just paid one hundred guineas to join a club that will likely blackball me at the first ballot.”

“Yes,” Helena said. “That was remarkably foolish.”

“It was,” he agreed. “I don’t know what came over me.”

But she thought she did. She thought she knew exactly what had come over him, and that was the most dangerous thing of all—because it meant that whatever game he was playing, she was no longer certain she was the only one keeping score.

“I should not have tried to force my way in,” she admitted, surprising herself. “I knew the charter was outdated. I was hoping to catch them off guard.”

“And I was hoping to catch you,” he said, then looked away quickly, as if the words had slipped out without his permission.

Helena’s heart performed a small, traitorous leap. She suppressed it ruthlessly. “The Morning Post will have this by evening. ‘Lady H. Denied Entry at Turf Club—London Investor Resigns His Cravat in Protest.’ They will make us a laughingstock.”

“They will make us a spectacle,” Julian corrected. “There is a difference. A laughingstock is forgotten by Thursday. A spectacle is remembered through the season.” He smiled, and for just a moment, she saw the man he must have been before London got its claws into him—the boy who had watched his mother lose everything and resolved that he would never lose anything again. “And I find I do not mind being a spectacle, if it means I am your spectacle.”

The alley was dark and cold, but Helena felt suddenly, unaccountably warm. She pulled her shawl tighter. “That is a very dangerous thing to say, Mr. Forsythe.”

“I know,” he said. “I meant every word.”

He offered no explanation. He did not try to take her hand. Instead, he produced a small flask from his coat—silver, engraved with a crest she did not recognize—and uncorked it. “To scandal,” he said, and drank.

She took the flask from him, not because she wanted to drink, but because she wanted to see the crest. It was a running horse, front legs extended, caught mid-leap over a fence. Beneath it, a motto she could not quite read in the dim light.

“My mother’s family,” Julian said, watching her study it. “They bred steeplechasers in Derbyshire. Before the bankruptcy.”

She handed the flask back. “You have never told me how your mother lost her fortune.”

“No,” he said. “I have not. And you have not told me why your father was actually ejected from this club, beyond winning too often.”

The air between them sharpened. He was testing her again—always testing, always circling, always leaving her with more questions than answers.

“I will tell you mine,” she said slowly, “if you will tell me yours.”

Julian considered this for a long moment. Then he smiled—a real smile this time, without calculation. “Deal. But not here. Somewhere neutral. Somewhere neither of us can claim an advantage.”

“Vauxhall,” she said, before she could stop herself. “Tomorrow evening. We are already expected there.”

He raised an eyebrow. “You wish to conduct a confession in a pleasure garden, surrounded by torchlight and fortune tellers?”

“I wish to conduct it where we are neither of us on our own ground,” she said. “And where the rumor that we are courting will protect us from being overheard. No one listens to a couple billing and cooing.”

Julian laughed, a low sound that rumbled through the alley. “Very well. Vauxhall it is. But I warn you, Lady Ashworth—I do not surrender easily.”

“Neither do I,” she said. “That is what you are counting on, isn’t it?”

His smile didn’t waver. But he didn’t answer. And as they walked back toward the main street, Helena realized that for the first time since she had met him, she was not afraid of what he might do next. She was afraid of what she might do first.