My Once and Future Duke (The Wagers of Sin #1)

by Caroline Linden

  Chapter 27

  Sophie did not want to be alone.

  After Philip confirmed what Georgiana had seen, her first thought was to go home, climb into bed and pull the covers over her head, and stay there for the rest of the year. How could she have been so wrong about Jack—­so foolishly, spectacularly wrong? How could he have lied and deceived her so brilliantly? Everything he did had been perfectly designed to work upon her weaknesses, dismantling her rules one by one until he smashed her world to bits. How long would he have continued telling her he loved her? she wondered numbly. How long would he have continued charming his way into her bed? She pressed one hand to her stomach and thought the real question was, how long would she have continued to believe him?

  But crawling into her bed would only remind her more of Jack, and how he had held her there and whispered that he loved her. She would only think of how his big body felt lying beside her, moving above her, and it would only make her misery more profound.

  The cure was to do something to keep her mind off him. When Sophie walked out of that small private room, her heart was in pieces but her resolve was back in place. She took a glass of wine from a waiter and surveyed the room before setting her sights on Anthony Hamilton, sitting by himself with a snifter in one hand.

  Mr. Hamilton was one of the more notorious gentlemen in society. He was heir to an earl, but refused to use his courtesy title. Rumor had connected his name with half the ladies of the ton, and it was a mystery to all why he hadn’t been called out over any of those affairs. He was enigmatic and reserved, the sort of man everyone seemed to talk about but no one spoke to.

  But most important for Sophie’s purposes, he gambled ruthlessly, and no amount was too dauntingly high for him. Her stomach fluttered as she made her way through the room toward him. She’d heard he had once wagered everything he owned, including the clothes on his back, at the hazard table—­and won. Normally she avoided playing with people who could tolerate that kind of risk, but tonight she needed something to distract her. She would either win a great deal, salving the open wound on her soul, or she would lose a great deal, and have something more important to worry about than handsome, lying dukes.

  “Good evening, sir.” She swept a deep curtsy as Mr. Hamilton looked up, his dark brows lifted in surprise. He’d been watching the play at the nearby hazard table, a calculating look in his eyes.

  Now he rose. “Good evening, Mrs. Campbell.” They’d never been introduced, and her stomach fluttered again that he knew who she was.

  “I hope you will forgive my boldness,” she said with a bright smile, “but I was told you are by far the best piquet player in London.”

  He smiled. “Flattery, ma’am? Or condemnation?”

  She laughed. “Admiration! Is it true?”

  “I cannot possibly answer that. I’ve not played with everyone else in London.” He cocked his head slightly. “I’ve not played against you.”

  It was the opening she wanted. Her heart gave a hard thud of warning against her ribs. Sophie widened her smile and ignored it. “Perhaps you would care to remedy that?”

  He seemed amused. His mouth curled into a reluctant smile that never touched his eyes. “What stakes?”

  “Ten guineas a point.” Scoring in piquet could vary immensely. Sophie knew she was risking a thousand pounds, if not more.

  However, piquet had been Papa’s favorite game. When he lost, it was at other tables. Sophie could play piquet since she was a child. It was a complicated game of strategy and skill, not merely luck of the draw, and it would require her full attention—­exactly what she desired. It also had the potential to pay a handsome reward.

  Mr. Hamilton held out one hand. “After you, madam.”

  She located a small table at the back of the room, sheltered from view by some of Vega’s famous palm plants. A servant brought a fresh deck of cards, and Sophie set aside her wine.

  She won the cut and elected to deal first. She shuffled the cards several times, mindful of Papa’s opinion that the cards weren’t completely unordered until they had been shuffled repeatedly. Mr. Hamilton watched with a hint of his amused smile. She dealt the hand, and they settled in to play.

  There were six hands played in a partie of piquet. After a bad beginning, she pulled almost even by the end of the fifth hand. She’d been right about him; playing against Mr. Hamilton required all her concentration. He played with the steeliest demeanor she had ever seen, despite lounging in his chair as if he hardly cared.

  She was preparing to deal the final hand when a footman glided up to Mr. Hamilton, leaned down and murmured something to him. He looked startled, then rose from his seat. “Mrs. Campbell, my apologies. I must step away for a moment.”

  “Of course.” She put down the deck. “Shall you return to finish the partie?”

  He hesitated. “I believe so.” He smiled briefly. “I hope so.” He gave a little bow and walked away.

  Sophie reached for her wine. She must either play much better in this final deal of the cards, or much worse. Her score hadn’t yet reached one hundred points, which meant her loss—­if she must lose—­would be less than if she played well enough to score one hundred but still lost. Sophie rarely played to lose, but sometimes it was the right tactic. She was contemplating her odds when Mr. Hamilton pulled out his chair.

  “Good evening,” said the wrong voice.

  She jerked upright in her chair. It was not Mr. Hamilton who had returned, but the man she’d spent all evening trying to forget. Perfectly attired in evening clothes, he was as blindingly handsome as ever. Her throat closed up as he smiled at her, so damnably, appealingly rueful, when she knew he was the worst sort of liar.

  “I’ve been looking for you,” Jack added.

  She swept one hand in a mock salute. “Here I am. What do you want?”

  “To speak to you. Sophie—­”

  “Don’t,” she snapped. “I don’t want to see you tonight, let alone speak to you.”

  Jack paused. “You deserve to be angry.”

  Any flicker of hope she had that there was some incredible misunderstanding died in a burst of flame. “You must pardon me, sir. I am already engaged at the moment,” she said acidly, hoping the double meaning of that word hit him in the head. “My companion will be returning soon, and I wish to continue my game of piquet with him.”

  “You mean Hamilton?” Jack leaned forward, resting one elbow on the table. His eyes were such a soft blue, she had to look away. “He won’t be back.”

  “What?” She looked past him in angry alarm. “Why not? What did you do to him?”

  “Nothing. Philip’s having a word with him.” He reached for the deck of cards in the center of the table. “Play a hand with me instead.” He glanced at her. “I was told it’s what people do here.”

  Her face felt hot. “Not with me.”

  “Why not?” He cut the cards and shuffled. “I’ve been practicing. I shan’t lose every hand this time.”

  She bared her teeth in a smile. “You know very well why not.”

  “Oh?” He shuffled the cards again, his enigmatic gaze fixed on her. “Do explain.”

  Sophie was having a hard time keeping her temper. It was bad enough that she had to see him here, where she needed to be but he came for no apparent purpose. It was awful enough that she had to imagine him with his bride, some lovely, elegant creature of a rank and family fitting to be a duchess. She could not sit across from him and pretend none of that mattered, that he hadn’t driven a spike through her heart.

  She couldn’t take it, not now. “Mr. Dashwood explicitly warned me against associating with you, Your Grace.” She bit out the honorific, trying to remind him of his place. Of her place.

  “Did he?” He nodded sagely. “Dashwood warned me about you, as well. But he shan’t interfere this time. Don’t worry, you won’t lose your membership
for playing a hand with me.”

  She was going to do something unpardonable in a moment—­fly into a shrieking fit, snatch the cards and throw them into his face, even burst into tears. “Go away,” she said, enunciating every word. “Please.”

  “Why?”

  “Because this isn’t a decent place for a man of your stature,” she said in the same low, hard voice.

  He glanced over his shoulder. “There is an earl playing hazard at this moment, if it matters that much to you.”

  She pressed her fingertips to the bridge of her nose. “Please.”

  “Sophie.” He spoke softly. “Let me explain. I know what you heard—­”

  “Jack,” she said wearily, “it’s over. It’s for the best.”

  He exhaled. “Then play.” With surprising dexterity, he dealt a hand of piquet.

  “Not tonight.” She pushed back her chair and rose. Where had Mr. Hamilton gone? There must be someone she knew close by who would rescue her. Perhaps tonight was the night she should bring Giles Carter up to scratch; she didn’t love him, but he was a good man. Perhaps that was what she needed—­a sharp clean break from this ill-­fated, doomed love she’d developed for the Duke of Ware. Filling her thoughts and time planning a life as Mrs. Carter would distract her. It had to. Nothing else had, but if she married Giles, she would force herself to think only of him, to throw herself into making herself care for him. She would firmly block every thought about the Duke of Ware and the way he’d once kissed her and laughed with her and made her knees go utterly weak with desire.

  Jack laid a stack of markers on the table. “I stake five thousand pounds on this hand.”

  Her stomach dropped at the amount. He’d wagered that huge sum once before, and she’d lost—­not just the wager but her heart, in the end.

  “If you win, it will be a wedding gift,” he went on, “enough to set you up quite nicely with Carter or some other chap, as you’d be a wealthy woman and sure to have several suitors.”

  Sophie knew she should walk away, but somehow when she opened her mouth to say so, instead she asked, “Against what?”

  He leaned forward. His hair was burnished gold in the chandelier light. “If I win . . . you’ll marry me instead, as you promised.”

  Her mouth fell open in shock. How dare he? He was going to marry Lady Lucinda Afton. Georgiana and Philip had told her so.

  “Do you agree to the wager?” he prompted.

  She stared at the cards, then at him. He had hurt her and lied to her, and now he treated the entire thing as a game. Very well—­she could do the same. Piquet was a challenging game, and she knew he didn’t play often. After the night of intense joy followed by a day of crushing heartbreak, she deserved to win five thousand pounds from him. She sat down and reached for the cards. “Only a fool would wager on marriage, but if you’re foolish enough to risk five thousand, I’ll be pleased to win it from you.” She inspected her deal. “I have carte blanche, and I will exchange five.”

  Jack nodded once. “I am indeed a fool. I should have mentioned Lucinda sooner—­”

  Sophie didn’t even want to hear the other woman’s name. “How many cards are you exchanging?”

  He exhaled. “Three.”

  “I suppose you didn’t mention her sooner for fear I would refuse to have an affair with an engaged man. You were correct.” Sophie flipped her cards quickly onto the table, just long enough for him to see she did have carte blanche, then scooped her hand back up. She was already ten points in the lead, simply by having no court cards.

  “I didn’t mention her because I was not engaged to her,” he said.

  “Oh?” She selected five cards from her hand, set them aside, and drew five replacements from the cards still in the talon. It was a good draw, as she had expected, full of high cards. “A bit odd that your own family thinks you are.”

  Jack tossed aside three cards from his hand and took the remaining talon cards. “My mother hoped I would marry Lucinda, but that is all it ever was—­her hope.”

  “No? Is that why you took her for ices at Gunter’s?” Sophie widened her eyes while keeping her attention on her cards. She would not fall for him so easily again. “I have a point of six.”

  Jack’s lips tightened. “Good,” he said tersely, admitting he did not have six or more cards of the same suit.

  Sophie added a six to her score.

  “I had to speak to her and be certain Lucinda also knew there was no betrothal between us,” he added. “Her mother had been telling her for years it was her duty to marry me . . .”

  Sophie’s vision burned red around the edges. “Sixième,” she said coldly. She had clubs from seven to queen.

  “Good,” said Jack again, after a slight pause. He did not have a longer sequence than six in his hand.

  She smiled without meeting his eyes. “That’s a repique for me.” And another thirty points, on top of the sixteen for the sixième. She was at sixty-­two before play even began.

  “Lucinda couldn’t wait to say that she did not want to marry me,” Jack said in a low, urgent voice. “She even hoped, when I left town a few weeks ago, that I would never come back and she wouldn’t have to see me.” Unthinkingly Sophie glanced at him. He looked pale, but his blue eyes were steady. “I wish we’d never come back from Alwyn House, either.”

  Her breath faltered. She had also wished they could have stayed at Alwyn House, just the two of them, forever. She forced her eyes back down to her cards. “But we did,” she pointed out. “Because of duty.”

  “Damn duty,” he said with sudden fierceness. “Do you really think I would have proposed that you marry me if I were engaged to Lucinda?”

  Her chin quivered before she could stop it. “Philip said you’ve been promised to her for years . . .”

  “Philip,” Jack bit out, “is an idiot.”

  Her vision blurred, and she had to blink several times. “He said you’d got your heart broken years ago and never recovered. He said you would marry for practical reasons.”

  “He was right about that.” Jack dropped his cards. “I think it eminently practical to marry the woman I want to see every morning when I open my eyes. The woman with enough nerve and cleverness to come to London and expect to support herself playing cards, of all the cursed things to depend on. The woman who would get out of a carriage and walk a mile in the rain and mud, and then ask where the dungeons are. The woman I want to have on my arm at balls and soirees, because she’ll make me laugh through the endless tedium. I think it’s the best idea I’ve ever had, marrying you, because it suits my every desire. I love you, Sophie—­only you.”

  Sophie was stunned into silence, which was a good thing; it let her mind start working again. The first time he kissed her, she was the one who invited him to make love to her. Back in London, she had broken their promise not to see each other again by seeking him out. When she asked for his help regarding Philip, he went to great lengths to do so—­personally. He hadn’t asked to resume their affair in London, she had invited him to share her carriage and then to stay the night with her. In everything, he had followed her lead, and now she had repaid him by believing the worst of him.

  She looked at him, at his perfect face and his elegant clothing and the intense, anguished gaze he leveled at her. Slowly she put down her cards.

  She thought about her uncle, admitting he’d never got around to finding a wife because he had no expectations. Of Giles Carter, who seemed so eligible and kind but was also still unmarried, whiling away his nights at the card tables. And of her father, walking away from his family, rank, and wealth because he’d met her mother, standing by her through poverty and sickness and never uttering a word of regret.

  Finding someone she loved as much as she loved Jack was a rare stroke of luck. If Sophie knew anything about luck, it was not to waste it.

  “You win,” sh
e said, lashing out with one arm to sweep the cards and markers off the table.

  Jack was out of his chair and around the table before they hit the floor. He pulled her up and into his arms, capturing her mouth in a scorching kiss.

  Sophie thought she might combust right on the spot. She arched against him, winding her arms around his neck so she could kiss him back with equal passion. He growled low in his throat and licked her lower lip until she opened for him. His fingers plowed into her hair as his kiss deepened until she lost all sense of where they were. In her world there was only Jack, and he loved her—­only her.

  Finally he lifted his head and clasped her to his chest. Sophie felt the rapid thud of his heart against her temple, and it made her own chest unbearably tight. “Right,” Jack muttered, breathing hard. “Enough of this place.”

  His arm still around her waist, he headed toward the hall, carrying her along with him, just as he’d done once before. This time Sophie went willingly, almost running to keep up with his stride as she clutched at his jacket for balance. Dimly she realized people were watching them—­staring in astonishment at them, actually—­but this time she didn’t care at all. Let them stare. She caught sight of Philip and Mr. Hamilton sitting at a table with a bottle of port between them; Mr. Hamilton lifted his glass in salute, but Philip didn’t even look at her.

  “Damnation,” said Jack under his breath. Face dark with disapproval, Mr. Dashwood was striding toward them, Forbes at his heels.

  Sophie flushed as she recalled the stern warning Mr. Dashwood had given her. “We’re about to be scolded.”

  “Not much,” returned Jack, his pace unchanged. They reached the hall, and he turned a look of ducal command on a wide-­eyed Frank. “Fetch Mrs. Campbell’s cloak and my things.” The servant gulped and ran to do as ordered.

  “Jack, Mr. Dashwood made me promise not to wager with you,” Sophie whispered. Jack still held her tight against him, almost as if he feared to let her go. Her heart swelled; he needn’t worry. She wasn’t leaving his side again, even if Mr. Dashwood threw her out and banished her for life.