by Cecilia Gray
“You can’t mean to participate in this madness,” she said. “Dinah means well enough, but you should by no means take it seriously.”
“Why not?” He met her eyes, liking the bewilderment in them. He rather liked Charlotte bewildered. He liked her surprised. And knowing. In fact, the only way he didn’t like her was in denial of their eminent suitability. “You’ve declined my suit, so it appears I am in need of all the goodwill I can procure.”
“Dinah’s opinion on the matter of my husband is rather moot, since I have already declined your proposals. What could you possibly hope to achieve by participating?”
He had wondered the same when he’d heard Dinah’s announcement. But in the past few years he had come to know Dinah and Charlotte and the Belles, and strangely, in doing so, he had come to know himself.
“You’ve always said things come easily to me,” Damon said. “That I’ve never had to fight for anything. Well, Lottie, you’re about to see me fight for you.” His blood heated at the parting of her lips, the whispered way her breath caught in her throat.
“But… but why now?” she said. “Why this time?”
He knew the matter to which she alluded. He was not particularly proud of the event. “Because I’m a man who doesn’t make the same mistake twice.”
Chapter Six
May, four years ago
London, England
“You seem in more than your usual hurry to arrive at the den,” Benjamin noted with a mildly drunken expression as the carriage rocked on its wheels with their speed. “And letting me take my carriage instead of driving your own? Unheard of!”
“So many people to fleece, so little time,” Damon said, hoping his friend would accept the excuse. It wasn’t like him to rush. In reality, he had planned for the evening to proceed much more slowly. He and Benjamin were to have finished dinner, sobered up, perhaps enjoyed a cigar, and then taken a night ride. But during dinner he’d received a very disturbing missive from Charlotte.
She had been grumbling lately that they were taking far too long to find suitable husbands for her sisters and that he seemed unwilling to provide the right connections, so she had taken it upon herself to search for men where she knew them to be: his gambling saloon.
Thus forcing Damon to drag Benjamin by his collar out to his very own Rivington-crested carriage—Damon’s own horses had not been ready—and to the Stakes.
It was his fault. Last week, he and Charlotte had enjoyed a candid conversation about potential suitors for her sisters. During the discussion, when she had asked how he knew of these men, he’d admitted it was mostly from watching them in the club. He’d seen it at the time—the wheels turning in her mind—but hadn’t realized it would come to this. Judging by the note, she’d already managed to make it inside the club, perhaps in disguise, and he had to find her before anyone else did.
His stomach had twisted into knots by the time the carriage rolled to a stop. He forced himself to take a calming breath and then leaped down, Benjamin beside him. A short distance away stood a slight boy with a cap and dark gray coat, who was staring at Benjamin.
“Is that your page?” he asked.
Damon felt the change in his friend, who went from a lump of insouciance to rod-straight in an instant.
“No,” he said sharply. “Savage, I’ll find you later.”
As curious as Damon was about the identity of the boy, given his friend’s reaction, he had larger problems on his hands. He ran into the building, up the stairs, and into the saloon. The establishment was two stories, the first being a casino floor with all manner of games of chance with cards and dice. There was opulent red carpet and scantily clad women bearing trays of beverages to lighten men’s pockets, one way or another. The second floor consisted of a gallery holding bedrooms for other purposes, with one-way windows that looked out onto the gambling floor—assuming the occupants were the type to prefer watching the depravity of others rather than engaging in their own.
He spotted Charlotte in an instant on the other side of the casino floor next to a roulette table. He’d recognize her buxom backside anywhere, even in a completely uncharacteristic tight red gown that exposed her bosom and set off the fiery sunset color of her hair, which spilled unbound and tangled down her back. He prowled toward her, and rested his hands at her waist.
She gasped and tensed beneath his touch, shoulders drawing up to her ears.
“Don’t say a word,” he whispered against her neck, breathing in her scent. In an instant, she relaxed against him. He felt her languid weight against his chest.
He turned her in his arms, eyeing the domino that did nothing to disguise her gray eyes. He pushed her against the table and pressed into her so as to shield her from any onlookers.
She was warm and inviting, her smile thoughtful. “So glad you could make it.”
Of course she wouldn’t listen to him. “We are going upstairs this instant.”
No one questioned the sight of Damon Cade, Viscount Savage, dragging a woman up to the bedrooms on the second floor. However, there may have been some question as to why the woman looked more reluctant than most. She accompanied him, but calmly disengaged his grip on her arm, which he released immediately upon realizing the force he must have been exerting. But by God, what if she’d been recognized? The Belles were practically celebrities in London. While the feather-white hair of the youngest would win the prize for the most recognizable Belle feature, Lottie’s red locks were a close second.
He didn’t need to ask which bedroom was empty. One was always reserved for him, and he usually employed it for the purpose of spying on the ground floor. Though its bed had seen some action, it was far less than he was given credit for. He skirted the other hallway occupants toward its door, Charlotte close behind. As they wove through the crowded corridor, he occasionally felt her brush up against his back. She was all softness, Lottie, and between that and the sounds of feminine laughter, sighs, and moans that carried through the hall and out the occasional door that chanced to open, his gut drew tight.
His was the corner suite at the end of the gallery. By the time they reached it, desire pooled in him so that he hauled Lottie inside, and shut the door, excruciatingly aware of the four-poster with its red-and-gold curtains hanging down to veil the mattress. Then he went over to the window that ran the length of the wall, looking out over the floor. With slow breaths, he got himself under control.
Her soft footsteps padded around the room. By the sound, he marked her progress. The bed, the nightstand, the firm round cushions that dotted the floor, cushions of varying sizes, for varying preferences and positions—positions in which, unfortunately, he began picturing Lottie, one after the next, as she made her way to him.
Her gaze swept the floor below. “You were right to bring me up here. This is much better.”
“This is where I should lecture you,” he noted dryly.
“Ah yes, where you’ll tell me I’m a fool and engaging in risky behavior and possibly damaging my reputation.” She turned to him and removed her domino. She set it upon the window ledge.
“I should turn you over my knee.”
A saucy smile lifted her lips. “According to the gossip sheets, that would be encouragement.”
He barked a laugh. She never failed to surprise him. He found it impossible to stay angry with her. Instead, he crossed his arms over his chest and rested his forehead against the window. “All right, Lottie. What gentlemen have you found for your sisters?”
She became serious, pointing to groups of men below. “Those seem the most reliable. It’s amazing what men will say when they think no one worthy is listening. That other set by the dice are absolute cads.”
“Agreed.”
“But those gentlemen over there, perhaps, would do?”
For the better part of an hour they debated the merits of the men present, and he forgot altogether that he’d arrived with Benjamin.
Charlotte hastily scrawled the names of the men
they had agreed upon on a sheet of paper from the secretary’s desk in the corner of the room. It was not as short a list as one would imagine. Quite a few gentlemen frequented gambling hells for the camaraderie, not to partake of prostitutes or other excesses. It was easy to see who spent well and who was in his cups. Illuminating, really.
They had been so focused on their task, though, that she’d failed to really appreciate the room in which she was concealed until just now. Her gaze moved from the four-poster, to the tufted cushions, to the red-and-gold tapestries across the walls.
“I presume this is not merely a place one rests one’s head after a challenging game of whist.”
He smiled, amused, and prowled around the edge of the bed, his beautiful hands smoothing the coverlet. “Very little rest happens in this room.”
“I don’t suppose gentlemen discuss what happens in rooms such as these.”
“I don’t suppose true gentlemen use rooms such as these.”
“But you do,” she noted.
He shrugged and slid his hands into his coat pockets. His green eyes were hooded but unapologetic. Her pulse fluttered at her neck, as it always did when he looked at her. Lottie didn’t often feel desired, and it was foolish to believe that of all men, someone as rich, titled, and universally desired as Damon would ever want someone like her for anything other than her eminent usefulness. And yet, there were times she felt she amused him, interested him, and she never felt as powerful as during those times.
“Would you mind showing me what happens in rooms such as these?” Her throat went dry as she asked, as she watched the intensity of his features. He moved toward the wall, his eyes on her, and pulled back the red tapestry.
She gasped at the display. A window into another room, another bed, another couple. “Can they see us?” she asked, crossing to him.
He shook his head. “This is the only room that can see into any of the others. That is the room’s true purpose. To spy.”
Of course. Damon was never more excitable as when he served the Crown.
While the thought brought a measure of relief, she was distracted by movement in the other room. One of the men that she’d labeled a cad earlier stood in its center, a woman in his arms. They sank to the bed and kissed, their tongues lapping at each other. Their bodies pressed together and the man reached down to grab the woman’s leg and bring it against his body.
“What are they doing?” She pressed her nose up to the glass. “Is that kissing? Is that what we did?”
She turned and found he’d stepped closer, that he was right beside her. “Not quite.”
“Is there something to kissing that way?”
He was close enough that she could make out the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallowed, the dilation of his pupils. The tapestry fell back over the window. His lips parted to say, “Christ,” under his breath, then he had her against the wall. His leg slid between her thighs, and he pressed into her with his hips, pinning her between the wall and his body.
His mouth closed over hers, and she felt his tongue against her lips. She met him eagerly, gripped his shoulders tightly, her fingers playing with the tendrils of hair at his nape. Her shoulder blades dug into the wall so she could arch against him. Slanting his head in the other direction, he deepened the kiss, varied the stroke of his tongue, fisted her hair in his hands. A soft moan left her throat. His fist tightened, tilting her neck to one side, and he ran his tongue against its column, finishing with a nip on her ear that made her whimper. For a brief moment, he gripped her hips and pressed forward into her. She felt a keen blade of pleasure so sharp, she went limp with it.
He let go of her hair, slammed his palms into the wall, and pushed away. He was breathing heavily as he took two steps back. He wiped at his mouth with the back of his right hand.
The wall at her back was the only thing keeping her upright.
“There,” he said, his voice tight. “Will you shut up about it now?”
She let out a long breath, looking skyward. “Probably not,” she said. “There’s quite a bit to it to liven up conversation.”
After a stunned silence, he bent over laughing and rested his hands on his knees. “You’ll be the death of me. Come. We need to get you home before someone becomes suspicious about your absence.”
She did not want to go home. She wanted to stay. She wanted to kiss Damon again, perhaps against the wall, and in the bed, and on the cushions. Everywhere. She cherished the time they shared. She felt important, smart, and funny when she was with him. She felt as though she mattered. And even if it was just temporary, even if it was just an illusion, it was one she craved. Still, she was proud and she would not beg only to be rejected. She gathered her domino, tied it back on, and followed him out the door.
The hallway was even more crowded than before, and bodies pressed against one another as Charlotte and Damon made their way toward the stairs. Only before they got there, the man from the next room caught up with them, the girl nowhere to be seen.
“Savage,” he said smoothly, his eyes drifting down Charlotte’s body. “Are you done with her?”
Charlotte tensed. Unlike Damon, this cad’s attention did not set her body to quickening. Instead, she felt tense and cold. She felt like a possession, instead of a person.
“Do you enjoy sloppy seconds?” Damon asked.
The cad threw back his head and laughed. “I prefer to think of them as broken in. I have one in the room but could use a second.”
Damon glanced back at her. She waited for him to grab her hand, to pull her against him, to say that no, she was his, and she would not be shared.
But instead Damon shrugged and smiled. “Be my guest. I haven’t had her at all, really. Not quite to my taste once the drink wore off.”
Charlotte felt the languid headiness from their kiss drain out of her body. But before she could retort, he walked away, leaving her behind in the corridor with the lecher’s eyes dragging down her body. She stared back at him, horrified, but after a moment, his eyes hooded and he walked past her back to his room.
She was shaking—with relief, with anger—and it took a moment before she could make her way to the stairs. She found Damon at the bottom, his foot on the step, his hand on the rail, as if he might sprint back up.
“How could you—”
“I had to,” he said. “Men are always more interested in my interests. It was the simplest way to make you seem utterly forgettable.”
“Oh.” She couldn’t argue with the results; he’d been correct. But oh, those dreadful few moments…
He took her hand again and escorted her through the tables, past the card room, and out of the building. “Do you object to my methods?” he asked as he hailed a hackney, apologizing for not having his own horses, but he’d been forced to arrive with very little notice.
“I suppose I don’t know. I’ve never had men fight over me before,” she said. “If I’m to be honest, for a brief moment, I suppose I would have liked it.”
“I’ve never met a woman who would admit she’d like men to fight over her, even if she did,” he said.
“Not that I would have wanted you hurt anyone or to come to blows,” she said. “It’s just… men are always fighting for Sera’s attention or for the right to speak to Dinah. They are always trying to show they are worthy of my sisters’ attention. Whereas I have to prove I am worthy of any man’s attention at all.”
Chapter Seven
Belle birthday crush
July 2, 1822
Woodbury, England
The race was easy. So easy that Damon ran the obstacle course twice before a single other contestant managed it once. He could have done it blindfolded, quite frankly. It was an unneeded show of arrogance to which he was spurred by some unseen demon on his shoulder, a little voice that hissed and spat in his ear that he had not only to be the best but the only. Still, two men fell over their obstacles, leaving eleven for the next round.
Dinah had devised a locked-room
puzzle in which she placed the competitors in the gardener’s cottage, locked the door, and left them with a series of clues to discover one of eight possible keys to release them. The clues were beyond his comprehension, some level of mathematics, but he knew the cottage as well as his own home and searched in the best hiding places until he came upon a key. Unfortunately, the eight men remaining, including Crawford, seemed more and more determined to win.
Archery proved to be the third round, and all but six of them managed a bull’s-eye. Damon had told himself he did not need to show off, but once Crawford made a clean central shot, he split the man’s arrow in half, primarily out of spite but much to the delight of the gathering crowd of onlookers.
By now, more than half the guests in their ballroom finery were gathered on the main lawn. They endured the heat by waving paper fans and gulping lemonade. His own growing impatience was reflected in the crowd. Whispers and speculation about the next event rose to compete with the buzzing bees.
Damon stood among the remaining five competitors beneath the shade of a tent while the rest of the crowd endured the sun. Dinah and Charlotte were arguing by the refreshments tent. Their disagreement had begun in earnest shortly after the archery event and had not abated.
“What do you think they’re discussing?” Crawford asked, moving closer.
Damon glanced at the man. While he counted Robert as one of his closest friends, that didn’t mean Reece merited his attention just because of the kinship. Still, he imagined that Lottie wouldn’t want him to be rude to anyone among her acquaintance. “I see no benefit in speculation.”
Crawford cocked his head. “Do all transactions require a benefit in order for you to participate in them? If so, I can’t imagine what benefit you might receive from this.”
“Can’t you?” he said, aware of the razor edge to his voice. “Lady Abernathy was quite clear in her terms.”
“But… you can’t mean… ? You and Charlotte?”
He turned sharply toward Crawford. “You use her Christian name so easily?”
