by Zoë Archer
The proprietor’s mouth opened in surprise. “You are very generous, sir.”
The second time in a handful of minutes Leo had been called such. But his generosity extended only to the coffee house owner. What he had offered Norwood served merely Leo’s own appetite for vengeance.
Donning his hat, Leo stood. “Point of truth,” he said to the proprietor, “I’m the most selfish bastard you’ll ever meet.”
“My wife’s brother might have you beat, sir.”
Leo’s laugh was genuine. They came so seldom, the sound astonished him. He left the coffee house, energy and urgency in his step. He needed to counterinvest in shipments of pepper from Malabar—the price would surely go up after the destruction of the Batavian cargo—and then he needed to get to the pugilism academy. He trained there daily after leaving the ’Change. A necessary outlet, for nothing exhilarated him more than good, ruthless business, and the gentlemanly sports of fencing and riding held no appeal. Peasant blood flowed in his veins, demanding the most primitive, brutal means of release. To hit, and be hit in return, and then emerge the victor, his opponent’s blood on his knuckles.
He wanted to crow about his victory, but the only people he could speak to of it were his fellow Hellraisers. Anne would never know. She could not know. The realization struck him, swift and unexpected. Only yesterday, he had believed that he would not care if she learned about his magic. Her opinion of him had not mattered, nor the need to offer explanations. Now, however ... now he actually cared what she thought of him.
The thought disturbed him. He strode off to seek the uncomplicated interaction of the boxing ring.
Chapter 4
Anne paced the corridor, watching night fall in thick black currents. Her skin felt tight and confining. She was a ghost haunting her own home. Aimless. Uneasy.
Keeping house for a man who seldom made use of it proved a more difficult task than she had anticipated. She had spoken to the cook about planning meals, only to learn that Leo sometimes took coffee in the mornings, but that constituted the whole of his requirements. The cook, in fact, had been painfully eager to talk with Anne, desperate for something to do. Just as Anne was. Yet she had no answers for the poor man. Could they expect guests? Possibly. Would the master be joining them for meals more often? Perhaps.
The clatter of carriage wheels on the street drew Anne to the window. But it was only the man who lived across the street. She watched as he alit from the carriage, and the door to his house opened. A woman stood there, her shadow thrown in jagged increments down the stairs. Her shade swallowed the man as he climbed up to her, then, with their arms looped, they went inside together, and the door closed. The carriage rolled on toward the mews.
Not a word from Leo all day. She’d had supper prepared and waiting for him at four. The hour had passed, and another, until there had been no choice but to eat alone, again, and have the remainder of the dishes shared amongst the servants.
The more hours passed, the more she thought of the previous night. Leo’s warm hands and hotter gaze, the press of his body close to hers, and the even more intimate revelation about his parents’ marriage. A tentative step toward knowing each other. Yet as the day crept forward and Leo’s absence resounded in the empty halls of his home, she began to think of last night as a dream whose details faded after waking. Soon, she would begin to wonder if his touch and disclosure had happened at all.
Anne turned away from the window and resumed her restless pacing. Back and forth, crossing the landing that had a view of the entryway below. Everywhere her gaze fell, she found expensive objects. Axminster carpets, marble-topped tables with elaborately curved, gilded legs, Chinese porcelain. Brilliant things, glittering things. Soulless. Empty. Like elegant corpses.
She hugged herself and kept walking. These were idle fancies brought about by a day of inactivity. Seldom had she had so little to do, and so much time in which to do it.
Leo kept far more servants than her own family. Until yesterday, he was the house’s sole occupant, and even then, he was rarely there. Between the abundance of servants and a master with few demands, Anne found herself superfluous. She’d been far busier at home—her old home. This is where she lived now. This richly furnished ... mausoleum.
Sensation prickled along the back of her neck. The strangest feeling. As if she were being observed.
Anne spun around. “Meg?” She tried to recall the names of other servants she had met today—Leo’s valet, and the steward. “Spinner? Mr. Fowles?”
No answer. Nothing at all, until the middle candle in a three-branched candelabra abruptly went out. A curl of smoke drifted up to the ceiling.
She took one of the lit candles and used it to reignite the one in the middle. Yet the moment she replaced the taper, the middle candle went out again. It didn’t gutter or flicker, as it might if there were a draft. It simply extinguished itself.
As if someone had blown it out.
A rolling clatter sounded on the street outside. Startled, her heart contracted, a painful grip in the center of her chest. Then came the footman’s steps echoing across the checkerboard floor as he strode to the door and held it open. Anne drifted to the railing and looked down.
Cold air swirled in, and a man stood in the doorway. Light from the linkboy’s torch outside made the man a figure of darkness, limned in fire. Tall, and broad-shouldered. He came into the entryway, sleek and sinister as night. She felt a clutch of instinctive fear, the urge to turn and run. Then light from the footman’s candle touched the stranger’s face and she saw it wasn’t a stranger, no one to fear. Only her husband.
Though calling him only anything seemed paltry. For, as Leo strode into the house, removing his hat and caped coat and handing them to the footman, he looked up. Right at her. His storm gray eyes fixed on her with startling accuracy. The chandelier hanging in the domed entry bathed him in light, all the hard and handsome angles of his face, the long lines of his body. He wore the clothes of a gentleman, but the guise did not fool Anne. This was a dangerous man.
They stared at each other. It seemed to take a moment for Leo to place her, like running into an acquaintance after several years’ absence. Then came recognition. He smiled, yet it did not much soften his face.
“Is that a bruise on your cheek?” Her voice sounded overloud, echoing in the foyer.
He reached up and absently touched his face. “I was in a fight.”
Anne hurried down the stairs. “Footpads? Are you injured? We should summon the constabulary.”
“And tell them I paid for the privilege.”
She reached his side, tilting her head back to look at him in confusion. “Paid?”
“A pugilism academy.” He held up his fist. Small cuts and bruises adorned his knuckles. “Every afternoon, after business at the ’Change is done. The man who did this to me looks much worse, but he was given a half crown for his troubles.”
“Boxing.” It made sense. The way he moved, how he held himself, as if expecting a fight at any moment, and not only ready to defend himself, but eager for the challenge. Of course, her supposition was all theory, but she had a rather good grasp of theoreticals. “I’ve never seen a boxing match.”
He raised a brow. “Never?”
“Young ladies aren’t encouraged to attend events where men in undress pummel one another. Though I’ve always been curious. It’s a very ancient sport, isn’t it?”
“I should take you.”
Her mouth dropped open. “You can’t.”
He frowned. “It isn’t illegal for a woman to attend a boxing match. In fact, I’ve heard that, once or twice, a woman was one of the pugilists. Next time a match is arranged, I’ll take you.”
“It will be quite scandalous.” Her pulse came a little quicker to think about it. But not entirely from fear.
“Scandal doesn’t bother me.”
She looked at him, with the bruise on his face and the scabs on his knuckles, his sandy hair coming out from its queue, an
d suddenly understood that what made Leo so very dangerous wasn’t his humble birth, nor his wealth, and not even his physicality. What truly made him dangerous was this: he honestly did not care what anyone else thought. And that gave him perfect freedom to do exactly what he pleased.
It was a thought both frightening and exciting.
Rather than address any of this, Anne said, “That bruise wants tending.”
He merely shrugged. “I heal quickly.”
“A meal for the victor, then?”
“Meal?” He looked blank.
“Food. One consumes it. Often at home. Though,” she added, “I’m given to understand you seldom do.”
“Little reason to.”
“Until now.” She wondered what he must think of her impertinence, yet she was unable to curb herself in his presence. His sense of liberation must be communicable.
He did not seem to mind, however. His smile actually warmed, becoming more genuine. “This must be the side of marriage that is so celebrated. A doting, fussing wife.”
“I’ve little experience with the matter,” she said, “having never had a wife before.”
“Then we are equally innocent on the subject.”
One word she would never choose to describe Leo: innocent. Even a rather sheltered young woman such as herself recognized that a whole life was lived behind the cool gray of Leo’s eyes, a life utterly unknown to her.
She turned to the footman. “Ask Cook to prepare a collation for Mr. Bailey. Meat, cheese, bread. Wine. Some of the pie from this afternoon’s supper.”
The footman bowed and departed, leaving Anne and Leo standing alone in the chill of the vaulted foyer.
“Do you wish to bathe before eating, sir ... Leo?” She caught the scent of fresh sweat from his skin, musky and clean, and fought to keep from drawing closer to his wool coat and inhaling deeply.
His smile turned rueful. “I did not know you had a supper prepared.”
“It is a wife’s duty to have meals ready.”
“And a husband’s folly if he forgets. Consider me chastised.”
“I’ll do nothing of the sort,” she answered. “You aren’t chastised in the slightest.”
He chuckled. “Perhaps a little.”
Anne gestured toward the stairs. “A bath? And then something to eat. I’m given to understand that is the common order of things.”
“Behold your obedient husband.” He turned to the stairs and brushed past her, his body large and warm. A shiver of awareness passed through her, like a fingertip drawn down her throat and between her breasts. She remembered the sensation of his hands on her, and the insistent press of his arousal. No, this was not to be a chaste marriage, but as to the when of its consummation ... The promise filled her with dread. And eagerness.
At the foot of the stairs, he paused, his hand on the newel post. He gave a low laugh.
“A wife. A bath. A meal at home.” He shook his head. “I’m becoming damned civilized.”
As he continued up the stairs, Anne understood that no matter what Leo Bailey did, he would never be domesticated. He was, and always would be, wild.
“This is where we’re supposed to eat?”
Anne noted the appalled expression on Leo’s face as he surveyed the capacious dining chamber. He had bathed and changed into fresh clothes. In his pristine stock, snowy against his jaw, expertly cut green woolen coat, his hair dark, gleaming gold in the candlelight, he had transformed from a bruised brawler. But he didn’t look a gentleman. No, in his restrained evening finery, he seemed a pirate prince contemplating future pillaging.
“You found no fault with the room yesterday.”
“Because there were people everywhere. This.” He waved his hand at the chamber, where a collation awaited him at the vast dining table, and two footmen stood in disinterested readiness. “All we need is a bear to bait.”
“One of your footmen is a very big fellow. Perhaps he’d be willing to play the part of the bear.”
With Anne on his arm, Leo brought them farther into the room. All the chandeliers had been lit—an expense she could scarcely fathom—yet this only illuminated how large and empty the dining chamber truly was. He frowned at the walls as if displeased by their distance, and the look was so commanding, she half expected the walls to simply get up and move closer just to please him.
“No wonder I never ate at home. Who could dine in here?”
“I did.”
Her quiet words snared his attention. “Today.”
“Yes, today. I broke my fast in this chamber, and dined, as well.”
“Alone.”
“There was a footman.”
He shook his head, his frown deepening. “God, I’m an ass.” He quirked an eyebrow at her. “This is the point in the exchange where you contradict me.”
“I was given to understand that a good wife does not contradict her husband.”
His scowl transformed into a smile that glittered in his eyes. “I think I’ve married an impertinent hoyden.”
Her own lips curved. “No one has ever called me a hoyden before.” And she rather liked it, for as a daughter of parents with little means, subdued obedience had been her byword. Being poor and an unmarried woman did not improve one’s chances of being abided. “I suspect it’s the low company I now keep.”
The moment the words left her, she wanted to call them back. Leo’s face shuttered at the perceived insult.
“I didn’t—that’s not what I mean.” She gripped his sleeve. “It was a jest. Nothing more. I don’t think of you as low.”
“But I am,” he said, words cool and impersonal. He withdrew his arm.
“Not truly. Low is defined by deeds, not blood.”
His smile returned, only now it had a dark and cynical cast to it. “To repeat: I am.”
She did not understand to what he referred, but the shadows in his eyes made her think perhaps she did not want to know. Blast. They had been heading toward something, a connection as tenuous as it was vital, and a few thoughtless words had torn it asunder.
Another realization dawned: he claimed not to care what others thought, and in many ways, he didn’t, but there was still some part of him that bristled and brooded when his origins were derided. He lashed out when hurt, like a wounded beast. To keep her hand from being bitten off, she must proceed carefully.
“Grand though this chamber is,” she said, searching for another topic, “it doesn’t lend itself well to intimate suppers.” She turned to one of the footmen. “Remove the collation to the parlor upstairs.” The servant bowed, and he and the other footman began gathering up the plates and platters of food.
“There’s a parlor upstairs?”
She exhaled. At the least, Leo’s voice had lost its cold timbre. “This house has a saloon, two parlors, a promenade, study, drawing room, and three bedchambers. I can draw you a map. I’m very good with them.”
“No need. If I get lost, I’ll whistle for you.”
“Like a hound.” She affected a sigh, though glad that his aloof, cutting mood had not lasted long. “Has any woman received a more romantic proposition?”
A mercurial man, her husband, for now he was grave. “I know little of romance. If it’s pretty words and poesies you want, you’ll have to find them in the pages of a novel.”
“I don’t read novels. Besides,” she added, smiling, “I think we’re doing well enough on our own. We do not need a histrionic novelist to tell us how to behave.”
“Never did trust writers. A bunch of Grub Street scribblers paid to lie.” Affable, he offered her his arm. “Shall we go up to dine, my lady wife?”
She placed her hand on his sleeve, and felt anew the jolt that came from touching his solid, sinewy form. “Let’s. And I’ll provide direction, should we get lost en route.” At the least, she knew how to navigate the house. When it came to her husband, she found herself continually redrawing the map.
Leo never anticipated the pleasures of a meal at home. U
ntil last night, his evenings had been spent in the company of his fellow Hellraisers. They had earned their name honestly—if such a thing could be done with honesty. Though he didn’t possess the privilege of birth, he had that other opener of doors: money. With it, in the company of gently born scoundrels, he had experienced all that London had to offer. Wine, carousing, music. Women.
His taxonomy of women separated them into discrete categories. The demimondaine was the sort he knew best, and as a man of business, he appreciated the clear directives by which they led their lives. Some men liked to pretend that courtesans truly held affection for them. Leo was not one of those men. For all his manipulations at Exchange Alley, he liked dealings honest and with clear intent. So he paid courtesans for their time, their company, and never flattered himself that they found him handsome or charming. Only wealthy.
There were the wives and daughters of rich merchants and men of trade, but he seldom interacted with them. His ambitions lay elsewhere, even if he could increase his fortune tenfold by making a strategic marriage. Money he could make entirely on his own. He didn’t need a wife to bring him that.
Also in his catalog were the women of the aristocracy. Staid matrons. Sly-eyed widows and bored, neglected wives—these were the sort who invited him into their beds, curious for a taste of the lower orders. He was happy to oblige. It gratified Leo to know that he vigorously pleasured women whose husbands sneered at him.
The delicate young ladies who played fortepiano and, by design, knew little of the world beyond the circumference of Mayfair—these he knew least of all. Wealth he possessed, but not reputation or bloodline, and genteel girls gave him wide berth. He did not mind overmuch, discovering in his limited conversations with them that they had been carefully instructed to have no opinions or use beyond silk-gowned broodmares. In his nights with the Hellraisers, the shortest portion of the evening was spent at aristocratic assemblies, for the company was dull and circumscribed, especially the young women.
Leo was young. And a man. When it came to female company, he wanted anything but dull and circumscribed.
