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Hobbs dropped to the ground, nursing his crushed fist.
    “Here, Mr. Hobbs, you don’t want to be an enemy of Earl Harding!”
    Hades groaned inwardly. It was just his luck that a few young men that he knew vaguely by sight from the ton balls would be in this mixed bag of people. They fancied themselves high up on the Corinthian stakes and sported neckties that couldn’t even make their necks turn easily. He nodded to them quickly and swung back upon his horse, God he couldn’t bloody function with all the coughing going on around him.
    He fell back in his saddle as he trotted through the gates to Hyde Park and reined his horse into a slow walk. If Melissa was the Viper she would be killing people with her medicine instead of curing them.
    And that was just it. Uncomfortably Hades shifted in the saddle. Just that morning he’d received the disturbing news that the man who had passed him the information about the Viper meeting in St. Giles had just been fished out of the Thames with the same look of agony on his face as the rest.
    But Melissa hadn’t been able to send any messages, until the first one to the Hobbs, and even that had been delivered after Hades had received the news of the murdered informant. Surely she was still the Viper?
    There was no other explanation for his magnetic need to keep an eye on her.
    His stallion jerked and sidled sideways. Hades looked down at his reins where his hands showed white across the knuckles. He needed to calm down. Perhaps he should buy some more books for his study? He shook his head and loosened his hands on the reins. The prospect of a new find in the Temple of Muses bookshop did not excite him as much as it normally did. Jerking sharply at the reins, Hades set the stallion off in a gallop across the parkland.
    He avoided the shouts of greeting that followed him as he sailed across the bridle paths. A group of enterprising mothers attempted to block his path with their ancient landau, but he swiftly changed direction, pushing the horse faster and faster. They never seemed realize that he didn't want anything to do with their kind.
    A tantalizing expanse of white skin shimmered across his memory. Gods , his fingers had ached to touch her back as he had done up the buttons and hooks, all the way to the neck. The gown had obviously been that for a young chaste girl fifty years ago, but what Melissa didn’t realize was that it just screamed to be taken off, to reveal more of the expanse of cream within.
    Hades bit down on his tongue and leaned into the horse’s neck. She was only the second woman to have got passed his defenses, and made him feel emotions not on his own terms. And he was damned if he was going to let it happen again.
     

CHAPTER 6
     
    Melissa smoothed her hands down the green dress and examined her reflection in the mirror. It revealed a severely-dressed young lady with an earnest look covered by silver spectacles. Grimacing, she pulled up her skirts and shuffled to the door. He really could not accuse her of seducing him now.
    Stepping lightly down the stairs, she chose the first door on the right, the study.  It was gloomy and smelled of old books, male cologne and, Melissa sniffed appreciatively, coffee. The chair where the earl had sat was still in the same position, a half-opened book on a table next to the worn leather chair. To her relief, the uncomfortable library chair that she had been made to sit on was drawn back into the corner of the room.
    Blinking in the semi-darkness, she walked to the table and traced a finger against the leather bound edge of the book. ‘ Letters to Atticus’ by Marcus Tullius Cicero did not sound like a riveting read, but the book was still well thumbed.
    Shivering a little in the coolness of the room, Melissa picked up some iron tongs that lay by the chair and poked the fire behind her to create a bigger blaze. As the flames danced up, an orange glow revealed the walls of the study, stacked high with books.
    In wonder