by Kelly Bowen
She straightened, retrieving her champagne glass, and took steady breaths, slowing her pulse. It was done. Time to slip away. From beside the study door, the portrait of a man gazed back at her, a knowing, self-satisfied smirk curling between an elaborate moustache and a pointed beard. Adeline gave in to the urge and raised her glass in a mock toast to the image.
“Not his best work, I think.”
Adeline froze, her fingers tightening on the stem of her glass.
“But then, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, is it not?”
The air stirred behind her, accompanied by the sound of a second, hidden door clicking shut. King moved beside her, the superfine of his coat sleeve brushing against her bare arm.
Alarm at his presence was oddly absent, as it had been when she had realized who stood at the top of that alley. Almost as if she had been waiting for this. For him.
“Perhaps,” she answered slowly.
King gestured at the bearded man in the portrait. “That is George Villiers, the first Duke of Buckingham, painted by Peter Paul Rubens. Found it hanging in a tavern in Calais, can you imagine? A Rubens relegated to overseeing drunkards.”
Adeline took a slow sip of champagne and swallowed, her gaze not leaving the portrait. “A pity.”
“On the contrary. I bought it for a case of middling Madeira.”
King was still standing close enough that she could smell the starch in his shirt and the richer notes of his shaving soap. The contradiction that was this man struck her anew. The apparent lord of London’s underworld, who dressed and spoke like a prince. A man as comfortable in his place among criminals as he was among the aristocratic crowd in his ballroom.
She tipped her head. “The duke looks…”
“Uninspiring?”
“I was going to say vain.”
Out of the corner of her eye, she could see King’s fingers drumming steadily on the silver head of his walking stick. “You draw that from a single portrait?”
“But it’s not a single portrait, is it?” Adeline replied. “It’s multitudes of portraits. The duke in fine clothes. The duke as an unstoppable equestrian. The duke as Adonis. If Buckingham thought it would further him, I suspect he would have paid to have himself depicted as Jesus. A man obsessed with portraying himself as something he wasn’t.”
King’s fingers abruptly stopped. He shifted, coming to stand directly in front of her. Like Adeline, he wasn’t wearing a mask, and she met his gaze, willing herself to keep her expression neutral even as a crackle of anticipation and awareness raced through her veins, the same way it had when she had faced him in that damn alley.
This was a man who should have been painted by Rubens. Or Titian or Da Vinci or Michelangelo. Or anyone with enough skill to capture the essence of a man who was both compelling and cold at the same time. His red-gold hair was clipped neatly, framing an aquiline face with high cheekbones and a square jaw. He was lithe in stature, not excessively tall or broad, yet exuding a contained power that his tailored evening clothes could not conceal. But it was his eyes that had nearly made her stumble as she had walked up that alley toward him. Eyes that even now made her breath catch in her throat. They were pale blue, icy irises ringed with a deeper indigo. Predatory and remote. Piercing and impenetrable. It would take all her skill to manage this man and escape unscathed.
That thought was far more thrilling than it should ever have been.
King tipped his head to the portrait. “Is it dead dukes or dead artists with whom you’re so familiar?”
Adeline almost smiled. “It depends on the duke. Or the artist, I suppose. Though unlike you, I’m far from an expert.”
“Unlike me?” A red-gold brow rose ever so slightly.
“Your reputation precedes you as a purveyor of fine…things.”
King considered her. “I confess your presence here this evening is unexpected,” he said after a moment.
“In your study?”
He held her gaze. “In my home.”
“You have a lot of guests in your home this evening,” she pointed out.
“Very true.” He seemed to be considering his next words. “Each of these auctions is a spectacle of greed. A spectacle that lays bare the true character of the titled and wealthy who circle each other in my ballroom, squabbling over possessions. Yet to a man, they cling to the illusion that they are, somehow, inherently better than those who circle each other in the desperate shadows of London’s streets. I know those streets. Fought my way out of those gutters and fought for everything that you see here. And I can tell you that the only true difference between the groups, aside from their tailoring, is that those living on the streets do not cling to illusion of any sort.” He paused. “You said it best.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“The lengths to which people will go to portray themselves as something they aren’t. It used to amuse me, the lies that people tell themselves to help them sleep at night.” He still hadn’t looked away. “Lately, I’ve found it tedious and predictable.”
Adeline had no idea what she was supposed to say to that, so she said nothing.
King brushed imaginary lint from the top of his sleeve, a ruby set into a gold ring flashing fire. “You are neither tedious nor predictable.”
“I’m flattered. I think.”
“You didn’t crawl through the hedges or over the fence in that gown. And you came without your weapons tonight.”
Adeline glanced down at her dress, her breasts straining at the embroidered and beaded edge of her bodice, her voluminous skirts falling away. “Mmm.” She made a noncommittal sound.
“Greed, self-indulgence, and umbrage aside, the attendees of this auction all possess an additional three attributes. And those are the familiarity, the means, and, above all, the discretion to purchase what it is I’m selling. Invitations were exceedingly limited.”
“They were indeed.” She ran a finger along the rim of her glass.
“Perhaps you would share with me who was so careless with theirs?” He paused. “As a courtesy from one…professional to another, if you will.”
He might not know exactly who she was, but he knew what she was, to some degree at least. He would, after all, have far-reaching resources, so his words didn’t surprise her. What did surprise her was the peculiar ache of longing that caught her unaware as he uttered them. The suggestion, as absurd as it might be, that they were professional allies of some sort sliced through her carefully constructed walls of solitary distance. For a heartbeat she was no longer alone.
And maybe he was manipulating her, and maybe he wasn’t, but for just this moment, she wanted to hold on to that feeling of connection.
“Lord Reddingforth,” she said, pulling the invitation from her pocket. “His love of art is eclipsed by his love of opium. He’s currently insensible on a brothel bed under the care of a madam who has been paid handsomely to keep him thus until dawn.”
King reached for it, though Adeline did not release it. Their fingers tangled, and heat shot through her veins. She tried to steel herself against the sensation, but all she could concentrate on was the way his thumb was sliding over the back of her hand.
Adeline dropped her arm, leaving the invitation in King’s fingers. “You should have a care in the future,” she said. “The next person to exploit Reddingforth’s weakness to gain access to Helmsdale may have far less…professional motivations than I.”
She could still feel the ghost of his fingers on her skin. Nor did the heat that still pulsed through her body diminish with space.
“Noted,” he said, tucking the missive into the inside of his coat.
Adeline hesitated, this dance of questions and answers a complex series of steps. “I have no quarrel with you, King.”
“I heard you say that to a man already once this evening before you ran him through.” A smile drifted across his lips, and Adeline’s mouth went dry. Never had she met a man who was as casually intimidating and as effortlessly provocat
ive at the same time. The combination was far more alluring than was safe.
“I did not run him through. I do not enjoy killing stupid men.”
“No, I don’t suppose you do.”
She swirled the last of her champagne in the bottom of the glass she still held before draining it. “Think of me what you will, I am not an assassin.”
“The inescapable,” King said.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Your name. Adrestia. Meaning ‘the inescapable.’ Goddess of retribution and vengeance.”
“Most of my clients prefer the term justice.”
“A much more civilized word indeed.” King took the empty glass from her and set it on the desk without looking away. “Be that as it may, your reputation precedes you as well.”
“I wasn’t aware.” She frowned.
“I have excellent sources. Sources who have a great deal of respect for your work administering…justice when all else has failed.”
Adeline wasn’t sure if King was trying to flatter her into revealing information, but she wasn’t about to discuss past contracts with this man or anyone. Now or ever.
“Tell me why you’re here, Miss Archambault.”
Adeline’s heart stuttered, her lungs squeezing the air from her chest. It took all of her willpower to remain still. “I’m impressed,” she said, pleased that her voice was steady.
“You underestimated me.”
“No. Just your sources. I’ve never been anything other than Adrestia in my work. I’d prefer it to remain so.”
“As you wish,” King murmured. “Some say Adrestia was handmaiden to the merciless Nemesis.” He set his walking stick against the edge of the desk and stepped closer.
Adeline didn’t move. “And some say they were one and the same.”
King slipped his fingers under the weight of her locket, a featherlight touch against her skin. “I suppose, in our business, ambiguity and duplicity are advantageous.”
Whatever breath Adeline had caught fled again.
“Tell me why you’re here,” he repeated, his eyes never leaving hers. “For I cannot let you leave with something that is not yours.” He tapped the locket with his thumb, and Adeline understood he had been watching her all along. Probably since the moment she had stepped from her hired carriage.
This close, Adeline could see the tiny lines around his eyes, lines not of laughter but of burden. Of living a life in a world that offered survival only to those strong enough to take it. Adeline knew, because she lived in that world too. And had survived.
She reached up and wrapped her fingers around his hand, pressing it against the slope of her breasts, the locket trapped between them. Then she whispered, “This was never yours to sell in the first place.”
Chapter 4
Adeline Archambault was bewitching.
And breathtaking and daring and possibly mad, and the desire coursing through King right now was unlike anything he had ever experienced. She had trapped his hand beneath hers, and beneath her smooth skin, her heart thumped steadily. The edges of the heavy locket pressed against the pads of his fingers, the gold warm under his touch. All he needed to do, all he had intended to do, all he should do, was yank the locket from her beautiful neck. Take back what was his. Except he couldn’t move.
“I do not suffer thieves,” he said roughly. “No matter what they call themselves.”
“Then we have that in common,” she replied. She didn’t flinch, didn’t cower, didn’t plead or beg or dissemble. She simply held his gaze until her eyes dropped to his mouth. A new arc of need flashed through him like liquid lightning, and he shivered.
King released the locket and jerked his hand from hers, stepping away from this woman and the unacceptable longings she stirred within him. He could not put together a coherent thought when she was looking at him like that. He didn’t understand her, or her motivations, or her layers.
Worst of all, he didn’t understand what she did to him.
King shifted farther away, until the bulk of the desk nudged against the backs of his thighs. The men he had set to following this woman who called herself Adrestia had lost her almost immediately in the twisted maze of London. At the time King had acknowledged that he might never lay eyes on her again, and an acute and disturbing regret had come with that admission. Until that woman had unexpectedly swept into his hall in a gown fit for a queen, and his disturbing regret had been replaced by an equally disturbing anticipation.
She had dared to steal from him in his own home and offered no apology or excuse, only challenge and accusation. Had she been anyone else, he would have already ordered her escorted out at the very least, or thrown in a dark hole somewhere, or tossed onto the first ship back to whatever corner of the continent from which she had come. Instead he remained rooted where he was, fantasizing about casting her in far more sensual places. Like his bed. Or the desk behind him. Or—
“Make your case before I change my mind and do something I may or may not regret later,” he heard himself say.
Adrestia merely gazed back at him, the silver in her eyes reflected in the metallic threads that ran through the pale silk of her gown. The dress was daring, skimming low over her breasts, cinched tightly at her ribs, and then flowing enticingly over her hips in a froth of fine fabric. King grasped the edge of the desk at his sides in an effort to smother the sudden, excruciating impulse to reach out and touch her again.
Jesus, this was insane. He had to stop this.
From the surface of his desk he picked up a small knife, the one he used to trim quills. He turned it over in his hand, allowing the blade to press uncomfortably into his palm. “My patience is not infinite.” His words came out harshly. Good.
“The man who sold you this.” She seemed impervious to his tone and instead simply touched again the locket where the sapphire was concealed. “Charles Howells. Did he tell where it came from?”
“I don’t ask questions I don’t need or want answers to.”
“Ah.” She glanced around at the art that hung from his walls. “No, I don’t suppose you do.”
King could feel his jaw clench, but he didn’t give her the satisfaction of a reply. At the time he had bought that sapphire, it hadn’t mattered to him where it had come from. Just as it hadn’t mattered that he didn’t like Howells. The man reeked of desperation, but so did most of the men who came to him for money. And desperation was always profitable.
Yet the sapphire, impressive as it was, was not as valuable as the two magnificent diamonds that had flanked it. Adrestia could have taken either of those stones. Or taken both and been far richer for it. But he had watched her leave the diamonds where they lay and take only the sapphire.
And King wanted to know why. Needed to know why.
In the wrong hands, need, more often than not, ultimately leads to downfall. Unbidden, Adrestia’s earlier words echoed in his mind. And as he had earlier, he dismissed them.
“I’m asking now,” he growled, tapping the tip of his knife against his thigh. “Where did the sapphire come from?”
Her full lips thinned. “Spain,” she said. “A tiny villa called Canillas de Río. It doesn’t exist any longer, of course. It was razed, its livestock slaughtered, its men killed, its women raped, and its contents looted, the most valuable objects shipped back to England by one Lieutenant Charles Howells during Wellington’s 1809 campaign. The sapphire was part of that shipment.”
“And now you’ve come to fetch it back.”
“That’s a rather overly simplistic assumption.”
King’s jaw hardened. That was the second time today she had accused him of making assumptions. The worst part of her accusation was that she was right.
“My client,” she said, “grew up in Canillas de Río and was thirteen at the time Charles Howells raped her. She might have forgiven him that transgression had he not made her watch his men brutalize each one of her younger sisters first.”
King swallowed, dark tentacles of
memory rattling their prison walls in the deepest recesses of his mind. Recesses he had ruthlessly buried with time and self-control. With some horror he felt cold perspiration gather at the back of his neck. “Stealing back a family heirloom will not fix any of that. It will not make her forget.”
“No,” she agreed flatly. “It won’t.”
And King understood that Adrestia hadn’t come just for the sapphire. She’d come for far more.
“You’ve come to destroy Howells,” he breathed.
The goddess of retribution held his gaze, unflinching. “I’ve come for justice.”
“How?”
She considered him, a faint smile playing about her lips. “I think that might fall into the category of questions you do not need or want an answer to.”
“On the contrary,” King snapped. “Howells destroyed your client’s confidence, her security, her future. He stole what was most valuable to her, and I’m not talking about pretty stones. I would know how you plan to return the favor.”
Her smile faded, and her eyes held his, measuring, assessing, weighing.
King tensed, wanting each and every one of those words back. This was what happened when one lost control and gave in to emotion. Weakness was exposed, secrets betrayed.
Adrestia opened her mouth to speak and then seemed to reconsider. She fingered the black ribbon around her neck from which the locket dangled before dropping her hand. “Howells’s crippling gambling debts have emptied his family coffers, and he’s been reduced to selling what he can.” Her voice was toneless, as if she was trying to counter the intensity of his last words, and for that King was grateful. “Aside from selling baubles, Howells has also been selling military secrets. That bit was harder to unearth than the location of a stolen jewel, but desperate people make predictable mistakes.” She paused. “Did your men not tell you where they lost me?”
King stiffened. “The Dockyard Inn. And those men have since been dismissed for their ineptitude.”
