by Zoë Archer
Lord Whitney was a stranger. His mad words could not touch her. They would not.
Yet the red walls of the bedchamber felt too close, the vines snaking up the wall coverings forming a cage. She strode from the room. Some of her books had arrived from her parents’ house, and waited in the library to be unpacked. That would serve to occupy her.
Walking down the corridor toward the stairs, she passed lit sconces and candelabras. They all flickered as she passed, just as they had at Lady Kirton’s.
Magic?
Anne scowled. Magic was not real. She was real. Leo was real. This house and everything within it—all real. Everything that Lord Whitney alleged was false. Perhaps there had been a bad falling-out between him and the other Hellraisers, and he simply sought a means of hurting them. What better way than driving a wedge between Leo and his wife?
She descended the stairs and headed toward the library, resolve in her step. If Lord Whitney thought her some empty-headed girl easily swayed by suggestion, he must reconsider. Leo had shown Anne that her own strength had value. She refused to surrender it to Lord Whitney’s manipulations.
Inside the library, she found a small crate of her books. She called a footman to open the crate, and after he did, she sorted through the few tomes. All of the books had been secondhand, their pages already thumbed, the bindings coming undone.
A man’s purposeful stride sounded in the corridor. Her pulse sped, for she knew the tread, yet she made herself sit in the wing-backed chair and wait, rather than rush out to meet him.
Leo’s long, muscular form filled the doorway. The light from the candles within the library did not fully reach him, and with the glow of the sconces in the hallway behind him, he made a dark, imposing shape.
Anne half rose, unable to keep seated. What was it that made her heart pound: Excitement? Pleasure? Fear?
No, not fear. She pushed that aside as Leo came into the room. He wore a hard, cold expression, as if he had leveled dozens of enemies and burned to bring down more. Then he saw her, and smiled.
Doubt melted away at that smile and the warmth in his gaze.
She started to speak, but before a word left her, he came forward and wrapped her in his arms. His clothing held the chill of outside, yet beneath was the heat of his body. He brought his mouth down onto hers.
Anne leaned up, pressing herself into him.
This was real. This was true—his arms around her, his hand coming up to cradle her head.
“Missed you,” he murmured into her mouth.
“And I, you.”
He touched his forehead to hers. “I brought you something.” He stepped away, then moved to the doorway and spoke into the corridor. “Now.”
Several footmen entered. Two of them carried crates, and the other one held a large, flat wooden box. At Leo’s direction, all of the items were placed upon the desk by the windows. The footmen filed out.
Leo took a large ebony-handled knife from the top drawer of the desk. He pried the tops of the crates open and pulled out handfuls of straw.
Curious, Anne drifted closer. Her mouth opened soundlessly when Leo reached into the crate and drew out the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.
A globe.
He set it on the desk, yet before she could form words or truly comprehend what lay before her, he performed the same task on the other crate. Another globe emerged from the packing—but this one depicted constellations rather than the Earth.
“Yours.” He nodded toward the two globes. When she did not move, his brow furrowed in a rare display of uncertainty. “You don’t like them.”
“No, I—” She shook her head. “I don’t know where to begin, which one to look at first.”
“Start with the Earth, then work your way to the heavens.”
She did. Her finger traced over the coastline of Eastern Africa, from Cape Horn, past Madagascar, to the Gulf of the Arabian Sea. There were names she did not recognize, rivers she did not know. How the world had changed, and she did not even realize it!
In a daze, she moved to the celestial map. Here, myths arrayed themselves in an eternal dance—vain Cassiopeia, brutal Hercules, the fallen hunter Orion—tales of hubris and loss told in the language of stars.
Still unable to truly speak, Anne could only gaze at Leo. The cost of the globes had to be phenomenal, for they were large and modern. And beautiful.
“There’s more.” He flipped open the brass catches on the flat wooden box, and opened the lid.
This time, Anne did gasp.
Maps filled the box. She could not stop herself from moving in front of Leo and pulling out map after map. The Americas, the Baltic Sea, China and the Japans.
“There are dozens of maps in here.” She lay them out upon the desk, but they were so numerous, their edges overlapped, a world folding in on itself. She wanted to spend hours studying each and every one. She could barely comprehend any of it.
“Are there enough? I can get more.”
She stared at him. “This is ... this is ...” Her voice trailed off. “You have given me the world.” Beyond that, with the maps, he had brought her the rational word, banishing fear.
“They please you.” Pure male pride illuminated him, and he seemed to grow even taller.
“Please is too mild a word. Leo, you overwhelm me.” It was more than the expense, though she knew the price to be astronomical. He had heard her, listened to her. “There is no gift equal to this.”
“Good.” His gaze was warm as he trailed a finger along the line of her jaw.
“I have something for you, too.”
His brows rose, and he looked almost comically surprised. “For me?”
“It isn’t half so extraordinary as what you have provided, nor as numerous. But ...” She reached into her pockets. “Guess which hand.”
After a moment’s deliberation, he picked her left hand. She held it out.
“Three shillings seven,” he said, counting the coins.
“From Lord Daleford. Now pick the right hand.”
He did. “Two shillings thruppence.”
“From Lord Kirton.”
Leo stared at her hands, then up at her face, his expression one of wonderment. “You did it.”
She nodded. “I must own, it was rather ... exciting, finding a means of extracting the coins. Rather cunning of me.” Her cheeks heated, and she studied him. “They please you,” she echoed.
“More than please me.” He laid his palms over hers, covering them and the coins. For a moment, his gaze went far-off, as if briefly distracted by a thought or memory, but they quickly cleared, and all he seemed to see was her. “I’m more than overwhelmed, Anne. I’m ... humbled.”
It shocked her, the truth of his words. She thought nothing and no one could ever breach his pride, this fierce man who admitted no weakness, no impediment. Yet a handful of coins had done just that. She had done it.
“I don’t want you humble.” She threaded her fingers with his, so their hands clasped. “I want you precisely as you are.”
His eyes closed; his jaw tightened. Something passed through him, a wave of ferocious energy, and an answering power responded in her. In silence, they called out to each other. In silence, they responded.
He opened his eyes. What she saw there—her breath caught. Leo, the man. Without ramparts, fortifications, constructed identities. The saddler’s son.
This was the finest gift of all. Not expensive maps and globes, but him. She understood that she alone had ever seen him this way. And it appeared to frighten him a little.
“Observe.” She pulled out a map. “The last a map I saw of North America was Mitchell’s, over eight years ago. There are far more places with names between now and then.”
Apprehension dimmed in his gaze. “The spread of civilization.”
“In your case,” she said, smiling, “new opportunities for investment.”
“I ought to invest in cartography.” He studied the boundaries delineated on the
map. “For all this will change with the end of the war with France. Will you take a commission?”
Anne laughed. “I have merely an appreciation for mapmaking, not an aptitude.”
His gaze flicked up to her. “I’ll hire men to teach you, if you desire.”
She laughed again, thinking he jested, but saw his sincerity. “Studying them contents me. If you wish to have a map drawn, it would be far wiser to engage an experienced cartographer.”
“As you wish. But if you change your mind, you’ve but to say the word.” He bent to examine the map once more. She stared at his lowered head, his hair pulled back into a simple queue, yet burnished as gold.
He would give her everything, just as she would hold nothing back from him. She believed herself utterly open to him, yet she knew this was not entirely true.
She had not informed him of Lord Whitney’s letter, and its secret lay in her heart like a waiting poison.
Chapter 9
He was in a fever of impatience. He left Exchange Alley as soon as business had concluded for the day. Normally, he stayed until the last bleary trader or investment seeker staggered from the coffee houses. He had been the first to arrive, last to leave.
Now, he strode down Lombard, the sun still high. It had been a good day’s work. Between his own instincts and his visions of the future, he would net himself a very fine profit. But he had not been working entirely on his own. Anne provided him with a steady stream of coins from England’s most ancient and esteemed families. Lord Kirton, who had publicly called Leo a “baseborn scoundrel,” would find his investment in South American coffee to be a poor one after hurricanes destroyed his crops. Leo had counterinvested in another coffee harvest. His fortunes would rise, and Kirton would suffer.
Leo walked quickly toward home, barely hearing the tolling of Saint Mary-le-Bow’s bells. Over the past week, since he and Anne had consummated their marriage, he had become a man on a rack, torn between two needs.
Building his fortune, destroying his enemies—these were the demands of the day. He awoke every morning in a fever of impatience, needing to devastate those in his path, to have more. It fueled his daylight hours, like tinder thrown upon flame, yet the fire’s demands never ceased. He wanted his coffers overflowing, and the power to crush those who opposed him, consigning them to a life of humiliation and poverty. The greater his fortune, the more power he wielded. And he would use it like a vengeful god.
The demands of the night, those were the sweet to his days’ metallic taste. Even now, hastening through the streets of London, past Gray’s Inn, need to see Anne pulsed through him.
This week with Anne ... He’d never experienced its like. Their bedsport was delicious, especially as they both grew more confident with each other. Every night, after exhausting himself and her, he sank into a profound slumber, his arms wrapped around her, soft and slumberous and murmuring contentment.
Oh, but it was more, so much more, than the pleasure their bodies gave each other. With her, he found himself ... comfortable. For the first time in perhaps the whole of his life. All of his other identities—upstart, knave—fell away. She did not judge him for his choices, had no expectations for him to be anything other than himself. Even with the Hellraisers, he kept part of himself guarded as he acted the part of rake and libertine.
He played no roles with Anne. For the first time in his life, he simply was. The way she wanted him.
A man could grow used to that. A man might want that plainness of self every day, every moment.
As he turned onto Southampton Row, his step quick, he felt the force of his two hungers drumming through him. His hunger for power never ceased, could not be sated. It was the cold bite of steel always present.
Anne was his other hunger, yet this was a pleasurable desire. Pursuing and feeding it became its own reward.
Someone called his name. Leo intended to ignore the man, but hurried footsteps sounded behind him. “I say, Bailey!”
It was Robbins, a coal magnate with whom Leo had done business with many times before. And to great profit. With an inward sigh, Leo stopped, allowing Robbins to catch up with him.
“Afternoon,” Leo said, trying to remain civil, though he merely felt impatience to be home.
Robbins puffed, his face reddened, then grinned. “No wonder you put all the other men of commerce to shame. It seems you are always going to or from the Exchange.”
“There is no spontaneous generation for money,” answered Leo. “Someone must be there to make it.”
“Yes, however, one needs to enjoy the fruits of one’s labors.”
“So I do.” Leo thought of Anne’s joy when he gave her the maps and globes, and had never enjoyed his wealth more.
“But when? You’re coming from the Exchange now, and just last night, I saw you at Crowe’s Coffee House, in discussion with Vere and Delfort, the cotton importers.”
Leo frowned. “I was at home with my wife last night. You must be mistaken.”
Yet Robbins seemed adamant. “Think I can’t recognize the Demon of the Exchange?”
Leo grew truly irritated. He just wanted to get home to see Anne, not argue with Robbins as to where he was or was not last night. Leo knew exactly where he had been—studying maps, having supper, and then making love with his wife.
“Get yourself to Bond Street and be fitted for a pair of spectacles.” He strode away, ignoring Robbins’s stuttered shock at being dismissed so rudely.
Anticipation coursed through him as he reached home. The moment a footman opened the door, Leo asked, “Where is my wife?” Already striding up the stairs, he threw the servant his hat and overcoat.
“She’s in the downstairs parlor, sir. With a visitor.”
Leo stopped, his hand on the railing. “Who’s the visitor?”
“Lord Wansford, sir.”
His father-in-law. The first call the man had paid since Leo had wed his daughter. Frowning, Leo turned and headed back down the stairs. This was not how Leo had planned on spending the afternoon.
Yet he felt a buoyancy within him when he saw Anne in the parlor, perched there on the sofa, a dish of tea in her hand, with cool city light in her hair and along her shoulders. She set down her tea and rose to meet him, smiling.
“Here you are,” she murmured.
What was this strange sensation? This sharp tug in the center of his chest? God, was it ... did he feel ... happiness?
He reached for her, but remembered just in time that they weren’t alone. A brief kiss had to content him, and then he turned to face Lord Wansford.
The man was everything Leo’s father had not been. Round, where his father had been lean. Complacent, where his father had been determined. And at the end of his life, his father’s clothing had all been impeccable. Plain, but expertly made, and new. The embroidery on Wansford’s waistcoat blurred as its stitches came up, and the lace at his wrists bore stains of wine and tobacco. A shabby man, his father-in-law.
“An unexpected honor,” Leo said, bowing.
Wansford returned the bow. “No, you are kindness itself to receive me.”
“You can see your daughter is well cared for.”
Anne blushed, tugging on the kerchief she had tucked into the neck of her gown. Leo’s teeth had left faint red marks upon the juncture of her neck and shoulder, and her moans still resounded in his ears.
“Oh, Anne.” The baron seemed surprised to recall that his daughter was in the room. “Yes, yes, I’m glad to see you hale. Your mother sends her regards. And I see you’re looking very ... prosperous, my child.” He eyed the gold-and-emerald pendant hanging from her choker.
“I have what I need, Father.” Her eyes never left Leo’s.
The baron shifted from foot to foot. Leo waited. When someone wanted something, all one had to do was wait.
“Bailey, I wondered, that is, I was thinking, if you had a spare moment. We might have a chat.” Wansford’s gaze slid to his daughter. “Privately.”
“A
nything you say to me can be said in front of Anne.”
Her father reddened. “I rather think the subject indelicate for ladies.”
Before Leo could insist on Wansford’s candor, Anne spoke. “I’m certain I can find something that needs mending or perhaps a fatuous romantic novel to read.” She glided to the door, then curtsied as she took her leave.
Leo’s humor darkened. He had nearly run through the streets of London to get home to her, but the pleasure of her company had to be delayed because of her damned father.
The baron turned to him and opened his mouth to speak.
“In my study,” Leo clipped. At least he kept good brandy there.
Wansford followed him down the corridor to the study. There, Leo poured them both drinks and settled behind his desk. He sipped at his brandy. The baron bolted down his own liquor and took a seat.
Leo felt a shifting within, his other self coming to the fore. It roused, its appetite fathomless, even here in his own home. Without Anne to tame that creature, he became ravenous, merciless.
After fidgeting with his knuckles, Wansford finally spoke. “You do very well for yourself, don’t you, Bailey?”
“We had this discussion already. When I was negotiating for the hand of your daughter.” Though negotiate was not quite the word for it, since she brought no wealth to the marriage. No material wealth. Little had he known that the true value of Anne came not from her breeding and connections, but from the woman herself.
The more Leo came to know her, the less he respected her father. What kind of man simply sold his daughter to whatever deep pocket would have her? No woman deserved that fate, especially not Anne.
Wansford looked abashed. “We never spoke of specifics.”
“I’ve no intention of giving you specifics. My coffers are my concern. No one else’s.”
“They say that you have a rare gift.”
Leo frowned. Surely Wansford wasn’t talking of Leo’s gift of prophecy. No one but the other Hellraisers knew of it.
“A gift with ... investing.” The baron spoke the word as if it held a faintly rancid taste, and for men like him, it did. Wealth came from the land. Only commoners earned their fortunes through trade.
