The Gentleman Jewel Thief

by Jessica Peterson

  She looked into the night one last time. Disappointment pulsed through her.

  He was gone.

  William, that rogue, that delicious, conniving wonder of a man, was gone.

  Violet turned and began to trudge toward the house. Just a heartbeat or two before, her legs were as wings; now they felt heavy as lead. She didn’t want to go back; didn’t want to face whatever came next. Not without him.

  A strange creaking noise sounded behind her, followed by the unmistakable clatter of a team of horses trotting down the drive.

  Taken entirely off guard, Violet spun around, nearly losing her footing in the process.

  Out of the darkness emerged an enormous carriage, lacquered in a familiar shade of blue. Though the horses hadn’t slowed their pace, the carriage door swung open.

  Two arms appeared from inside the carriage, followed by a familiar face hidden behind a black leather mask.

  Before she knew what the masked man was about, he reached for her and in one strong, steady movement whirled her up and into the vehicle.

  Violet tumbled to the floor of the coach in an ungainly mess of skirts, stockings, and slippers. As if she hadn’t cursed enough that day, she cursed one last time for good measure. Though her dress was up over her ears, and she could hardly see, she heard pleasant, rumbling laughter beside her.

  “You!” Violet gasped, trying in vain to calm the sea of gauze. “You, how dare you! I demand you unhand me—”

  And then his mouth was on hers, pulling, biting, caressing, a savage assault that left her breathless. She knew those lips and the smell of that skin.

  It was William.

  He hooked his hands under her arms and hauled her onto the seat beside him. The kiss knocked her backward and he fell onto her, the feel of his weight against her delicious. She held his face in her hands and inhaled him with her every sense.

  At last he pulled back. She opened her eyes and met his, gleaming dark in the light of the carriage lanterns. Taking the mask in her fingers, she pulled it from his face and blinked, and blinked again, just to be sure he wasn’t a dream, a trick of her imagination.

  William bent his neck, kissing the tender skin of her throat. She let out a little breath and he kissed her again and again and again.

  “You,” he said between kisses, “had me”—another kiss—“worried, darling.”

  “I had you worried? Good heavens, William”—her eyes fluttered shut as his lips grazed a particularly sensitive stretch of skin—“I believed you dead, drowned in the Thames!”

  “Oh, come, Violet, surely you think me worthy of a better, more thrilling end than that?”

  She would’ve smacked the smug smile from his face if she weren’t so happy to have him in her arms. “How did you manage it?”

  William shrugged, as if it were the most natural thing in the world to have escaped from a burning ship, two giants, a pair of imbecile Frenchmen, and a bloodthirsty jewel merchant—and with Hope’s diamond in hand, no less.

  “I admit I cannot take credit for my dashing escape,” he said. “Avery not only managed to get me off the Diamond in the Rough; by some miracle he saved King Louis and the comte, too.”

  “A strong back indeed,” Violet said, shaking her head in disbelief.

  William hoisted himself onto his elbows and fingered Hope’s diamond. “And all for this little thing,” he said. “You should keep it, Violet. I’ve always believed it belonged to you; it’s a perfect match for those lovely eyes of yours.”

  Violet looked down at the diamond and sighed. “I don’t think so. It’s caused enough trouble already, and besides, it’s a bit much, even for me.”

  William’s smile deepened. “Ready for our next adventure, then?”

  Violet looked away, her throat suddenly tight. “Our next adventure?”

  His hand slipped to her swollen breast. A current of understanding passed between them. Violet’s heart began to pound as the smile slowly faded from his lips.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” he said, voice low, soft.

  She smiled weakly. “You were dead, remember?”

  “Fair point,” he conceded. His hand traveled from her breast to her belly. “Even after all the excitement of these past weeks, I do believe this next adventure shall be quite a thrill.”

  Her pounding heart grew wings and took flight. Mute with tears, she nodded her agreement.

  “We couldn’t have timed the birth of our baby any better if we tried,” he said, his smile returning. “February, if I’m not mistaken? She—or he—will be born in the very same room I was, at my country seat in Oxfordshire. If, of course, you’ll make me the happiest man in all England and become my wife.” He thumbed her chin and tilted her eyes toward his. “Violet, I’ve wanted you from the day we met. And I shall want you all my days, ’til the very last one. Please, please say yes, darling.”

  He took her left hand and slid something on her fourth finger that flashed and glinted in the half-light of the carriage. “Your mother’s ring,” he explained. “The one you lost along with Hope’s diamond, remember?”

  “Of course I remember,” Violet whispered. “I thought I’d lost it forever.”

  William shook his head. “I had a few diamonds—smaller than Hope’s, I’m afraid—added to it. Thought it would make a lovely wedding ring for you.”

  Happiness, joy, love like she’d never known warmed her through and through and through again as she held the ring before her.

  And I shall want you all my days.

  So much happiness that she could not speak, and instead buried her face in William’s chest and wept noisily.

  “Yes,” she managed at last, pressing her mouth to his. “Yes!”

  He squeezed her tight against him, kissing her lips, her head, her shoulders and neck and belly. She laughed and cried and he laughed, too, laughed until they collapsed against each other in a breathless tumble.

  When they had at last caught their breath, William sat up and pulled Violet up next to him. Only then did she realize the carriage was moving, and had been moving all along.

  “Kidnapping me, are you?” she asked, tucking back a stray lock of hair from his forehead.

  His eyes gleamed with mischief. “Our scandalous affair is deserving of an equally scandalous ending, don’t you agree?”

  Violet bit her lip, grinning. “I was never one to be married, much less in a proper ceremony at St. George’s.”

  “Ah, Violet, we may not be proper, but we are properly matched,” William said, pressing a kiss onto her cheek. “To Gretna Green, then!”

  “First, to Hope’s; I think you’ve kept him waiting long enough, don’t you? We’ll deposit the diamond so he might come home from your ball to a very pleasant surprise. It’s early enough that the happy news might even make tomorrow’s headlines. Then to Gretna Green; and, afterward, a lifetime of bliss, and perhaps”—she wagged her brows suggestively—“a bit of pleasure, too.”

  William’s lips roamed down her cheek onto her throat. “A bit?” he murmured against her skin. “No, we’ll have a lifetime of bliss and pleasure. Surely you haven’t forgotten I enjoy pleasuring above all things.”

  Violet gasped as his teeth nicked her earlobe. “No,” she panted, smiling. “How could I ever forget?”

  Historical Note

  The French Blue vanished from historical record following its theft in Paris from the Royal Warehouse in autumn 1792. It reappeared some two decades later in 1812 London, in association with French émigré and jeweler John Françillon; in his papers, Françillon described an enormous, and enormously unique, blue diamond that was at the time in possession of another jeweler (you may recognize his name from the last pages of this book!)—Daniel Eliason.

  The diamond disappeared again, mysteriously, for another two decades. It is posited Eliason sold it to the Prince Regent,
famous for his extravagance; that Prinny’s long-suffering, eccentric wife, Princess Caroline, owned the stone for a time; that Napoleon lusted, rather ardently, after the French Blue as part of his scheme to restore the Crown Jewels of France.

  The jewel resurfaced in 1839, when it was recorded as being part of Henry Philip Hope’s impressive collection of gems. The Hope who appears in this book, however (and who, it just so happens, is the intrepid hero of the next!), is Thomas Hope, Henry’s elder brother.

  So why not Henry? For starters, I found Thomas a more compelling historical figure; as you’ll learn in book two, he was an intriguing, well-traveled member of London society, and an author in his own right.

  I’d like to imagine that, as heirs to the immense Hope & Company banking empire and expatriates marooned together in London, Thomas and his brother Henry worked together to build their collections—art, books, jewels. Perhaps they even comingled their possessions; in Hope: Adventures of a Diamond, Marian Fowler suggests that Thomas’s wife wore the French Blue to a ball in 1824.

  Thomas was well connected in royal circles and would likely be among the first to know when such a unique stone came up for sale. While no written records exist, it’s possible Thomas was involved in the purchase, and perhaps at some point even the ownership, of the stone—after all, Thomas’s sons would go on to inherit it.

  The theft of the French Blue by a daring—and daringly handsome—earl, however, is entirely the product of my imagination (well, my agent’s, too, but that’s neither here nor there.)

  It is true King Louis XVIII and his brother, the Comte d’Artois, lived in exile in London following the Revolution. They would return to France in 1814 during the Bourbon Restoration. That they frequented White’s—and had a penchant for nubile women—is, as far as my research tells me, purely fiction.

  For more on the Hope Diamond, check out Richard Kurin’s excellent Hope Diamond: The Legendary History of a Cursed Gem and Ms. Fowler’s Hope: Adventures of a Diamond, both of which proved indispensable to my research for this book.

  Turn the page for a preview of the next book in Jessica Peterson’s Hope Diamond Trilogy

  The Millionaire Rogue

  Coming from Berkley Sensation in January 2015

  Prologue

  THE FRENCH BLUE:

  A HISTORY OF THE WORLD’S GREATEST DIAMOND

  Volume 1

  By Thomas Hope

  Across lands dry and rivers wide, through centuries of bloodshed and the downfall of great kingdoms, the French Blue’s siren call has, like forbidden fruit, proven irresistible to royal and common man alike.

  It all began in that mythic land across the great sea: India. Nearly three hundred years ago, a blue-gray diamond the size of a snuffbox was mined from the bowels of the earth. The great Shah Jahan, an emperor the likes of which the world had never seen, made an offering of the jewel to the goddess Sita; he commissioned a great statue of his goddess, the diamond glittering from the center of her forehead as her all-seeing third eye.

  It was during this time that a Frenchman by the name of Jean-Baptiste Tavernier traveled to the court of Shah Jahan. Being French, Tavernier was by nature dirty, wily, a born thief, and, of course, a libertine. Goading the Shah with false gifts and flattery, Tavernier gained his trust, and the love of his court.

  It is impossible to know what, exactly, happened next; but it is widely assumed that, just as the Shah pressed Tavernier to his breast as brother and friend, Tavernier betrayed him. Some accounts even posit that the Frenchman slit his host’s throat; others, that Tavernier poisoned him and half his glorious court.

  The goddess Sita was witness to the violence, and when Tavernier pried the jewel from her forehead with a dagger thieved from Shah Jahan’s still-warm body, Sita cursed the Frenchman, and all those who would come to own the diamond after him.

  Sewn into the forearm of a slave girl, the diamond was brought to Europe, where Tavernier sold it to Louis XIV for the princely sum of two hundred thousand livres. The Sun King recut the jewel to improve its luster, and wore it slung about his royal breast on a blue ribbon. As part of the crown jewels of France, the diamond would be henceforth known as the French Blue.

  Alas, the jewel that bewitched the Frenchman and the king with its beauty would also bring doom upon their heads; Sita would see her curse satisfied. Tavernier, living out his last days exiled in the wilds of Russia, was torn limb from limb by a pack of wild dogs, and buried in an unmarked grave.

  Neither were the kings of France immune to Sita’s curse. It was on a bitterly cold day in January when the last king, Louis XVI, lost his crown, his fortune, and his head before a crowd of angry Parisians.

  And yet Sita’s thirst for vengeance is not yet satisfied. The French Blue, along with most of the crown jewels, was thieved in late 1791 from the Garde Mueble, a royal warehouse on the outskirts of Paris. No one knows who stole it or where it might be hidden away; in a Bavarian duke’s treasure chest, perhaps, or the dirty pocket of a serving wench in Calais. The diamond could be anywhere.

  While the trail grows cold, Sita’s thirst burns hot. The French Blue is far too glorious a gem to remain hidden forever. Only when it is again brought into the light; only when it is claimed by whoever is brave, or perhaps daft, enough to claim it; only then will Sita’s lust for blood be satisfied, and her curse at last fulfilled.

  One

  London, Duchess Street, near Cavendish Square

  Spring 1812

  Resisting the impulse to leap from his chair, fists raised, with a great Huzzah!, Mr. Thomas Hope thrust the quill into its holder beside the inkwell. He gathered the pages scattered across his desk and settled in to read the history.

  The gray afternoon light was fading, and he drew the oil lamp closer so that he might read his masterwork without having to squint. For a masterwork it was, surely; how could it not be, after all the years Hope dreamed of the diamond, researched its origins and the fantastic claims behind its curse?

  But as his eyes traveled the length of each sentence, it became abundantly clear that Hope’s history was no masterwork. Indeed, it was something else altogether.

  Dear God, it was awful. Dramatic to the extreme, like an opera, but without the painted prima donna to compensate for its lack of narrative savvy. The size of a snuffbox. Whence had come that rubbish?

  Tossing the pages onto the desk, Hope tugged a hand through his tangle of errant curls. He was reading too much of that brooding, wicked man Lord Byron, and it was starting to take its toll on his pen.

  He didn’t have time for such frivolity besides. Hope had a goodly bit of work waiting for him back at the bank, and an even larger bit—a barrel, actually—of cognac to drink this evening.

  Literary aspirations all but shot to hell, Hope was about to crumple the pages into his fists when a strange noise, sounding suspiciously like muffled laughter, broke out over his shoulder.

  His blood rushed cold. Not one of his men, the butler or steward or a cashier from the bank. He was not expecting any visitors, and the hour for social calls had long passed.

  Hope glanced across the gleaming expanse of his desk. His eyes landed on a silver letter opener, winking from its place beside the inkwell. Then there was the pistol in the top right drawer, of course, and the Ottoman kinjon in its box on the shelf; and his fists, he couldn’t very well discount those weapons—

  He swallowed, hard. Those days were behind him. The time for violence and subterfuge had passed. Hope was a respectable man of business now, like his father, and his father before him.

  Respectable men of business did not greet visitors with a sock to the eye or a bejeweled dagger thrust at their throats.

  At least not in England.

  Removing his spectacles one ear at a time, he carefully placed them beside the pages on his desk. For a moment he closed his eyes, pulse racing.

  Hope spun about
in his chair. The breath left his body when his gaze fell on the hulking figure that loomed half a step behind him.

  “Oh, God.” Hope gaped. “Not you. Not now.”

  Smirking in that familiar way of his—one side of his mouth kicked up saucily, provokingly—Mr. Henry Beaton Lake reached past Hope and lifted the history from his desk.

  “‘Forbidden fruit’?” Lake wheezed. “Oh, God, indeed! That’s bad, old man, very bad indeed. I advise you to leave alliteration to the feebleminded, poets and the like. And the curse!”

  Here Mr. Lake whooped with laughter, going so far as to bend over and slap his knee with great jollity. “Brilliant, I say, brilliant! Reading your little history I’d almost venture you believed it. Heavens, what a good laugh you’ve given me, and how in the gloom of these past months I’ve needed it!”

  Hope snatched the pages from Mr. Lake’s pawlike hand and stuffed them into a drawer. “It’s a work in progress,” he growled. “I wasn’t expecting to share it, not yet. What in the hell are you doing here, and in daylight? Someone could have seen you.”

  Lake turned and leaned the backs of his enormous thighs against the desk. He crossed his ankles, then his arms, and looked down at Hope. “Anxious as always, old friend. You haven’t changed a bit—well, except for those clothes. You look like a peacock.”

  Hope watched as Lake’s penetrating gaze lingered a moment on Hope’s crisply knotted cravat, his simple but exquisitely cut kerseymere waistcoat, and the onyx-studded watch peeking from his pocket.

  “And you, Lake, look like a pirate out of Robinson Crusoe. What of it?” Hope took in Lake’s broad shoulders, the corded muscles in his neck. He wore the black patch over his eye as some men wore a well-cut dinner jacket: with pride and a sort of impudent, knowing smile, confident any female in the vicinity would find him a little dangerous, wholly debonair, and far too tempting to resist.