Surrender to a Wicked Spy by Celeste Bradley

could arrange an introduction to Lord Wallingford."
    "I'm sure Mother could easily manage that."
    "Hmm. Yes." Miss Hackerman paused, waiting for Olivia to twig. Olivia had already twigged, thank you. Apparently, Miss Hackerman wasn't satisfied to be introduced by Lady Cheltenham, eminently respectable but hardly the highest of the high in Society. Miss Hackerman wished for the implied approval of Greenleigh.
    It was an interesting sensation, this possession of social currency. Olivia doubted she was much in the way of using it—except perhaps this once. She stood gracefully, suddenly completely comfortable with how she towered over the petite heiress.
    "Well, I suppose you'll be on your way to Mother, then."
    Storm clouds darkened that pretty brow. Miss Hackerman positively twitched with fury, but there was nothing she could do.
    It was a delicious moment indeed.
    "Well, then I suppose I shall." In a whirl of expensive skirts, Miss Hackerman was gone.
    Pity it wasn't forever.
    Olivia sighed. Dinner was going to be grim, she simply knew it.
     
    Dane eyed his table companions with a furrowed brow. An unlikelier bunch he'd never seen.
    Lord Cheltenham sat at the head of the table, of course, with Dane at his right. Olivia sat next to Dane, while on her other side lounged Lord Wallingford, who was bloody drank already. After him sat Lady Reardon, then Marcus, then Lady Cheltenham at the foot of the table, with a pained-looking Nate at her right. After him sat Miss Hackerman, the very one who'd needed rescuing from her fractious horse—now that he'd spent the evening with the girl, he understood the mount's objections—and then there was Stanton Home, the Marquis of Wyndham, at Lord Cheltenham's left.
    Four spies, a monosyllabic earl, an annoying heiress, an obnoxious young sot, two very pleasing ladies—although Olivia had scarcely spoken this evening—and the mother from hell.
    Dane found himself listening eagerly for the chiming of the clock in the hall. Soon the ladies would excuse themselves and the gentlemen would take out their cigars. Dane had arranged this evening in order to hold an impromptu session of the Royal Four. If they could rid themselves of Cheltenham and Wallingford, then the Cobra, the Lion, and the Falcon could discuss Dane's plan for Prince George.
    If Dane could persuade the others, he could declare a quorum—they had little choice, with the Fox on his deathbed. Lord Barrowby had named no successor yet, and their reconnaissance had reported no apparent candidate lingering about. If Barrowby had neglected his duty, there was going to be hell to pay in the Four.
    The Prime Minister of England, who had formerly served as Cobra, would likely fight to have his own candidate take the spot. Frankly, Dane was weary of Liverpool's constant maneuverings within the Four. Nate had been Liverpool's successor, after Lord Etheridge had stepped down to take over the Liar's Club, but thankfully Nate wasn't inclined to kowtow to his former master.
    The last thing Dane or the others wanted was to allow Liverpool to install someone who still retained loyalty to him.
    Dane looked down the table to where Marcus was valiantly trying to maintain an attentive facade to Miss Hackerman's complaints and objections. Marcus would make a good Fox, although the duties were slightly different from the Lion's. Marcus was brilliant and deathly loyal to England. He deserved more than to live out his days as only Dane's protégé.
    Unfortunately, that meant Dane would have to begin all over again selecting his second—and a poor crop of candidates there was, too. Most of the young lords about these days resembled Wallingford, drunken, stupid, and useless.
    If Dane could be allowed to choose from the gentry, it would at least widen the pool, but for seven hundred years the Four had been carefully selected from the peerage. Dane would not like to be the first to break tradition thus.
    Dane's attention was caught by his wife's rather