The Heiress's Deception

by Christi Caldwell

  Nurse Mattison could have counseled all the commanders in the King’s Army on resolve, and something in that gave Eve a renewed strength. In this, she was not alone.

  “No,” Eve concurred. In a bid to drive back the worry in the other woman’s eyes, she added, “In three months, I’ll turn my funds over as we agreed, and you’ll offer me offices.” So very much depended on those funds that she’d attain when she reached her sixth and twentieth birthday.

  “Three months may as well be a lifetime, Eve,” Nurse Mattison said with an uncharacteristic frown.

  It was. After this evening’s attack, Eve had little doubt Gerald would ultimately succeed in his attempts at getting hold of her inheritance.

  She looked up, startled from her thoughts, when the nurse laid a fleeting hand upon hers. “We are grateful for all you’ve done. Let me help you.”

  “I can’t remain here, either,” Eve said as frustration propelled her to her feet. She began to pace. This would be the first place Gerald sought her out.

  “No,” the nurse confirmed. She reached inside her apron and pulled out a small envelope.

  “What is this?” Eve asked, when Nurse Mattison slid it across the desk.

  “I took the liberties of finding employment opportunities that exist for you.” She nodded once.

  Eve pulled the page free and blinked. “A gaming hell?”

  Surely she’d misheard or misread. For seated in the cramped office, there was no other explaining or understanding why the nurse with a perpetual smile would send her to a . . .

  “Yes. A gaming hell.” Nurse Mattison echoed Eve’s question.

  She blinked. Had she spoken aloud?

  “I was clarifying that you had, in fact, read my note correctly,” the other woman explained with a gentle smile in her eyes. “I have received reports from numerous employment agencies, and this is the ideal option. As such, I took the liberty of securing a meeting for you.”

  Eve sat with her head cocked, studying the nurse. This was her plan? Of all the posts and positions or places she could find for her—a hell? Those dens of sin that her brother frequented more than a vicar did Sunday sermons.

  “I’m sorry, Nurse Mattison,” she began hesitantly. Because she was grateful. Truly. It was not every day a person would risk the wrath of a duke to help secret off that powerful peer’s sister. Nurse Mattison, however, was not most people. A woman who’d followed the drum with her late father during the Peninsular Wars, she’d more strength and courage than any other Eve knew. “Are you suggesting I work inside a”—she dropped her voice to a scandalized whisper—“gaming hell?” What work awaited women in there was on their backs or in scant skirts.

  “The Hell and Sin Club,” she clarified. “And yes.”

  Eve emitted a strangled choking sound, but Nurse Mattison droned on and on about what she knew as a dull humming filled her ears. And in this instance, she felt very much the way she had when Gerald had held her head in Night’s water bucket as punishment for aiding a street rough, after he’d discovered Calum in the mews.

  Nurse Mattison wished to send her to not only a gaming hell but the Hell and Sin Club? The establishment that held the vowels and then some for her brother’s weakness at those tables? “I’m not going there,” she said blankly, shaking her head and dislodging the cobwebs there.

  The nurse stopped midsentence, a frown on her lips. “Eve . . .” she began.

  Eve leaned forward in her seat and touched the edge of the cluttered desk. That faint movement dislodged several papers, and they fluttered to the floor, forgotten. “It is a gaming hell, Nurse Mattison,” she elucidated. She knew she repeated herself . . . but the matter certainly did bear repeating.

  “I know that, Evie,” she said gently, that term of endearment once used by her father. “But they’re in need of help, and you require hiding. Your brother knows your dislike for them.”

  Dislike for them? More like hatred. Palpable, burning, twisting, seething hatred.

  “It would be the last place he’d ever look,” she said with more somberness than Eve ever remembered from her. “With the debt he’s amassed to that club, he’s taken to frequenting the Hell and Sin less.” Less. Not altogether. It spoke of her brother’s weakness for gaming. Even with that, however, the nurse was right. With the sizable debt Gerald had incurred at the Hell and Sin, he’d be mad to make himself a frequent visitor to that particular club.

  Eve closed her eyes and ran her palms over her face. Damn Gerald for being a damned Judas who’d sell her for a bag of silver. Damn her other brother Kit for having gone off on matters of business, never to return. Tears pricked her lashes, and she blinked back the crystalline drops. She’d not shed another tear. What good came from weeping? None. It didn’t fix a person’s problems or erase hurts or create stability. Angling her head, she discreetly dabbed at her eyes. And damn society for leaving a lady with so few choices outside the bonds of marriage.

  “It is just three months,” the older nurse pointed out gently. Three months may as well have been three years for the peril she faced with Gerald. “And then you’ll be in control of your funds.”

  Eve held the other woman’s gaze. “Our agreement still stands?” Most any other person would wash their proverbial hands of Eve and her money to be spared the wrath of a duke.

  “Our agreement still stands,” Nurse Mattison confirmed.

  That Salvation Foundling Hospital, where parentless children went to live, would be the recipient of her funds—all of them. As long as Eve was connected to that money, her brother would not quit in his pursuits. In exchange for her inheritance, Nurse Mattison had agreed to grant Eve permanent offices, rooms, and a post as second-in-command at the hospital. Eve twisted her hands. How was she to call home to a place that had seen her life shattered? Oh, it was certainly Gerald who was to blame . . . and yet taking shelter in the halls of that place . . . She grimaced and leaned forward. “My brother . . . Kit,” she amended. She rarely allowed herself to speak his name, for when she did, the knifelike pain carved away at her heart all over again. Did she truly believe that if he’d been located and had found out the fate of their father, and now Gerald’s intentions for her, he’d not return? No, only one thing could keep him away . . . Violently pushing aside that niggling truth, she fixed on Nurse Mattison.

  The other woman gave her a pitying look, and Eve glanced away.

  “Is missing and unaccounted for, Eve. I never knew your brother,” she murmured, “but given the warmth with which you’ve spoken of him, I believe he’d want you to be safe at any cost.” She stared back expectantly. Waiting. Her meaning clear.

  The next move belonged to Eve. Opportunities for women were far and few between, and Nurse Mattison had proffered the temporary security she needed.

  Eve stared out the lone window, overlooking the empty London streets. And yet . . . what choice did she have? Knowing how very close she was to attaining her majority, Gerald would not rest until she was ruined—or worse, committed—freeing those funds to his greedy, grasping hands. Releasing a sigh, she sat back in her seat. “What would my responsibilities entail there?”

  The nurse smiled. “You would be their new bookkeeper.”

  “A bookkeeper,” she echoed back.

  The freckle-faced woman nodded, an ever-widening smile splitting her cheeks. “Given that you’ve handled the books for your family’s estates and those at this foundling hospital, there is no better role for you.”

  Which she despised. Skilled at it though she may be, Eve still had at best a palpable dislike for math, and at worst, a decided loathing. It had been just one more responsibility she’d taken on when her father had fallen ill, and then kept up for the agonizing two-year period in which he’d wasted away and then drawn his last breath. That responsibility had continued in her hands when Gerald had ascended to the dukedom and driven to dust the legacy of wealth their father had left behind. Helping the children at the hospital, however, had fueled her, and because of the
m, she’d discovered an appreciation for those numbers that might help others.

  The nurse’s smile dipped. “It is the best I am able to do with such short time,” she explained. “You cannot enter a nobleman’s household as governess or companion.”

  No. Society well knew the Pruitt family. Obscurity could never be achieved in a townhouse in Mayfair or any other fashionable end of London.

  “And more importantly, Eve, with the money your brother owes that hell, he’s taken up at other clubs.”

  Bitterness stung Eve’s throat. Those details about her brother’s gaming pursuits had been splashed upon every gossip column so that even Nurse Mattison had discovered the truth.

  “It is the last place His Grace will ever dare think to look for you,” the nurse said.

  It was. Because she’d spent the better part of four years berating and lecturing him for those pursuits that had left them bankrupted and jeered in society for his wastrel ways. Eve scrubbed another hand over her face. “Three months.” It was a reminder more for herself, but Nurse Mattison answered her anyway.

  “Just three months. And it is my understanding the proprietor, Mr. Black, is fair and kind with his staff.”

  An inelegant snort escaped her. That generous assessment went against everything those sinful establishments represented.

  Drawing in a slow, purposeful inhalation, Eve stood. “I cannot,” she said quietly, regretfully. There had to be another way.

  Surprise stamped the nurse’s features, and she quickly jumped up. “But—”

  “My brother poses a danger, and yet, the peril would surely be far greater in an establishment filled with licentious men and their wicked pursuits.” Memory of Lord Flynn’s attack slipped forward. Her stomach muscles contracted, and she fought to stave off the remembered horror. “I can certainly outmaneuver my brother for three additional months.” She spoke that assurance as a reminder for herself, only partially believing it.

  “Eve,” the other woman entreated. “We all do what we must in order to survive.”

  Something flashed in Nurse Mattison’s eyes. So she was a woman who also had known strife. How much she knew of the nurse’s spirit and life . . . and yet at the same time, how little.

  Nurse Mattison persisted. “The post at the club will surely be filled soon, and then who knows how long it will be before I can find you an alternative place to go until you reach your majority.”

  Seeing the uncharacteristic worry in the nurse’s blue eyes, Eve leaned across the desk and gathered her hand, giving a slight squeeze. “I thank you for your efforts and concerns, but I cannot go there,” she repeated. Her gaze went to the wall clock just beyond her shoulder. Fifteen minutes past three. After his revelries, Gerald would no doubt be sleeping, as he always did. Eve stood. “I will be in touch with you should anything change.”

  Nurse Mattison looked about one wrong word on Eve’s part from dissolving into a fit of tears. “Then you must at least remain the night here.”

  The following morn, when the sun crept over the London sky and the world stirred, Eve, escorted out by Mr. Dunkirk, climbed inside a hired hack.

  A gaming hell . . .

  That was the place where Nurse Mattison would send her for security and safety, when those establishments represented the furthest thing from either of those craved-for gifts. She’d seen her brother stumble in, stinking of too many spirits and cheap perfume, on too many nights. Now Nurse Mattison would talk of sending her to a place where there was a sea of those lecherous figures?

  A moment later, the carriage dipped under the driver’s weight as he climbed into his seat, and then they were rolling through the streets of London. Drawing back the tattered, long-faded, red velvet curtains, Eve stared absently out at the foundling hospital. For her earlier bravado and assurances to the nurse that Eve could oversee her own safety for the next three months, she at least acknowledged the truth to herself—she was less convinced than she’d let on.

  Having been born the son of a duke, and knowing he’d inherit the distinguished title, Gerald had lived an unrepentant life focused only on his own pleasures. His recklessness, however, had spiraled out of control, descending into new, dangerous territory once he’d gone through their fortune at his tables and in the arms of his mistresses. And given that Gerald had surely provided Lord Flynn the key to her chambers, she feared the other devious measures her brother would concoct as the days drew closer to her sixth and twentieth birthday.

  The carriage drew to a slow halt outside her family’s townhouse, and Eve sat on the bench, staring up at the white stucco residence. When her parents were alive, it had been a model of grandeur and elegance . . . a place visited by distinguished guests. Her mouth twisted in a macabre rendition of a smile. Now that home was nothing more than a symbol of depravity and shame.

  Eve rapped once, and the hack driver instantly opened the door. With a murmur of thanks, she accepted his hand and rushed up the steps of the townhouse.

  The butler, Sams, drew the door open.

  By her estimation, she’d another one to two hours before her brother roused himself from his alcohol-induced slumber. Fueled by that reminder, she marched through the halls, seeking out her rooms.

  Those same rooms where I was nearly raped . . .

  Bile stung her throat.

  Damn him. Damn Lord Flynn and damn Gerald for—

  “Where have you been?”

  A gasp burst from her lips, and she jerked around. Her heart sank.

  Eyes bloodshot, hair disheveled, and a day’s growth of beard on his cheeks, Gerald stood in the middle of the hall. Bloody hell.

  “Gerald,” she said in careful greeting. She folded her hands primly before her and stared expectantly at him.

  He narrowed his gaze on her tattered gown, then strode over. More than a foot taller than her own five feet, one inch, he reveled in intimidating her. A girl with her head oftentimes dunked in a bucket of bathwater, she’d developed a healthy fear of him . . . until she’d come to discover that depriving him of her tears, pleas, and cries weakened him. “I asked you a question.”

  “Nay,” she challenged, leaning back against the wall. She folded her arms at her chest. “You made a demand. I tend the books and oversee the household, but I’ll not be subject to bullying.” This was the first their paths had crossed since he’d sent Lord Flynn to her chambers, and she searched him for a hint of . . . something. Certainly not remorse. He was incapable of it.

  “Well?” he snapped.

  So, he’ll pretend Lord Flynn didn’t attempt to rape me last evening. The bastard. Tamping down the fury boiling under the surface, she strove for calm, arching an eyebrow.

  A mottled flesh marred his cheeks. “Well?” he said again in a more conciliatory tone. “How many funds do I have for the month?”

  Her lip curled in disgust. “With your latest expenses, we’ve exceeded more money than we presently have to pay the debt. As long as you insist on keeping your mistress, and membership at four clubs”—including the Hell and Sin, which owned fifteen thousand pounds of her brother’s debt—“and drink and wager, then you are doomed.”

  His mouth tightened. “I am doomed.”

  “Yes,” she pointed out. “You.”

  Silence met her pronouncement.

  Vile curses burst from his lips and singed her ears. “By God, this is all your fault.” He slammed his fist into the wall, and she recoiled. “You are sitting on twenty thousand pounds.”

  Heart racing, she schooled her features. Do not let him see your fear. Do not let him see your fear . . . “My twenty thousand pounds,” she said quietly. “Left to me by Father.”

  “Left to your husband,” he spat and proceeded to pace. “You are the only goddamned woman in the whole of England who won’t do your damned duty and make a match. Flynn doesn’t even care that you’re homely as a horse.”

  Long ago, his insults had cut her to the quick. Over the years, she’d developed a stern protective shell against
any of Gerald’s slights. What would he say if he knew the real truth of what she intended with her funds? A secret only Nurse Mattison knew of.

  “I rather think horses are beautiful. Do you know what else they are, Gerald?” She didn’t give him leave to answer. “Loyal. They are loyal.” She let the meaning linger in the air. Of course, too self-absorbed, he’d neither heard nor cared about that slight upon his character.

  Her brother stopped his frenetic movements. He leaned forward. Malice and hatred glimmered bright in his eyes, and despite her resolve for courage, a shiver scraped along her spine.

  This time, he turned his own question on her. “Do you truly believe you’ll circumvent me?” he seethed. “When the only thing between me and Marshalsea is the funds in your name, I’d sooner see you committed as mad than claim them.”

  Another shiver snaked through her, chilling her from the inside out. For staring at him, the venom in his eyes, she saw he was very much the cruel young man who’d hauled an injured boy off to Newgate and then roundly punished Eve for having helped that boy. Only this man before her now spoke of a fate worse than death . . . and by God if she didn’t believe that he would. “You wouldn’t.”

  Except, how easily he could.

  A ruthless smile turned his lips. “Oh, but I would. And it would be all too easy for a duke. You were never the same after you’d cared for your beloved papa. Went mad.”

  She tried to force out a tart, dry rejoinder—that would not come. She balled her shaking hands into tight fists. “You are a bastard.”

  “No,” he said, matter-of-factly flicking a speck of lint from his wrinkled mauve sleeve. “I am a duke.” He jabbed a finger across at her. “You’ll marry Flynn. Have I made myself clear?”

  “Abundantly,” she said quietly.

  After he’d gone, Eve stared at the empty hallway. Yes, it was indeed clear . . . just not in the way her wastrel of a brother believed. Stealing a glance about, she found her way to her rooms and the small bookshelf next to her bed. Eve plucked the copy of Eighteen Books of the Secrets of Art and Nature. An ache pulled at her heart for the loss of the only true family she had left. It is a book that has all secrets for warding off pain and evil. Smoothing her palm over the aged leather volume, she heard Kit’s voice in her mind as clear as it was that day he’d given her the obscure tome. Her elder brother had been missing now two years, and Gerald had dispassionately determined Kit was, in fact, dead. She hated that it was the one time he’d likely prove correct. For nothing, not even his work for the Home Office, would have kept Kit away.