Scars and Swindlers

by Val Saintcrowe

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  More by Val Saintcrowe

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  SCARS AND SWINDLERS

  a heist fantasy drawn from Hades and Persephone

  The Rzymn Job: Book Two

  Val Saintcrowe

  VOWS AND VAGABONDS

  © copyright 2021 by Val Saintcrowe

  http://vjchambers.com

  Punk Rawk Books

  More romantic fantasy by Val Saintcrowe

  The Realm of the Living Flame

  The Clash and the Heat trilogy

  The Beast of the Barrens

  The Ryzmn Job duology

  The Nightmare Court trilogy

  The Red Echoes Duet

  Rise of the Death Fae series

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  CHAPTER ONE

  SEFONI RIENCE PUT her feet down on the floor and stood up from the chair where she sat in front of the fireplace in her bedchamber.

  She let out a noisy breath and then she padded across the floor barefoot towards the door, taking the same path her husband Haid Vortinen, the Duex of Darain, had taken only moments before.

  She pushed open the door and looked into the hallway, but Haid wasn’t there anymore. The hallway was empty.

  He’d likely gone upstairs to his own bedchamber, so she turned in that direction. She ascended the steps herself.

  At the top, there was nothing except the door to Haid’s bedchamber. She lifted her hand to knock, but the door opened, and she came face to face with Haid’s valet.

  “Oh!” he said. “Your Grace.”

  “What?” called Haid from within.

  “No, er, it’s Her Grace,” said the valet. “I’m just leaving.” He stepped to the side to go around Sefoni.

  Unfortunately, that was the same inclination Sefoni’d had and she also stepped that direction.

  “My wife? What about my wife?” Haid’s voice was growing closer.

  Sefoni and the valet both stepped the other direction at the exact same time.

  The valet winced. “Your Grace, how about if you stay still?”

  “Yes, of course.” Sefoni bowed her head.

  Haid came into view. He had been with her in her bedchamber only a short time ago, but now he wasn’t dressed. His valet had helped him into his nightclothes. He was wearing a silk paisley robe over a nightshirt. His calves were bare and so were his feet.

  Well, for that matter, her feet were bare. She curled up her toes, and looked down at the both of them—her pale toes and his brown ones—as the valet scooted past her.

  “Is there something I can do for you?” said Haid.

  She lifted her gaze to his. “You want me.”

  His lips parted. “Er, pardon me?”

  “You just said—” She pointed below in the general direction of her bedchamber. “You said that you were blazing happy about having trapped me in a marriage with you, and that you liked the idea of my being yours forever.”

  “You have a startling capacity for repeating things word for word that have just tumbled thoughtlessly out of my mouth.” He sounded annoyed.

  “Oh, do you wish to take it back?” She felt hesitant, waiting.

  He sighed heavily. “We were both there, maidam, and I hardly think we need to rehash the entire conversation.”

  “Does that mean you don’t wish to take it back?”

  He reached behind her and shut the door. “For all we know, the valet has perched inside the stairwell, listening to our every word. If we’re going to talk again, let’s do it behind closed doors.”

  She clasped her hands together. “All right.”

  He turned his back and strode across the room, to his fireplace. He sat down in a large chair there with a huge back and wide arms. It was black velvet with gold accents. He sat down in it and peered at the fire. “I believe I also said that I was a villain and that you should hate me.”

  “Well, I don’t.”

  “Well, you should.”

  This was not going as well as she might have hoped, but she wasn’t about to give up yet. She crossed the room to where he was sitting. There was another chair by the fire, one not nearly as large as the one he sat in. She could have sat down in it, next to him, but she did not.

  Instead, she stood in front of him, between him and the fire, close enough that her legs nearly brushed in his knees. She reached up to the black bodice she was wearing and untied its laces.

  He lifted his chin, but he didn’t say anything.

  She began to unlace her bodice. It was a clever piece, created by Pairce, who was good with both knives and needles and had previously been employed as a strumpet before she started working for Haid as part of his team of thieves. The sleeves were sewed directly into the bodice, so there was no need for two pieces of clothing, and the bodice was boned, so there was no need for stays beneath. It was the only article of clothing she was wearing besides the black trousers she wore.

  “What are you doing?” His expression was blank but his voice was a little hoarse.

  “What does it look like I’m doing?”

  “It looks,” he rasped, “as though you are baring your bosom to me.”

  “Well, you are remarkably observant, Your Grace.” She continued to loosen the laces of the bodice, peeling it aside to show him more and more of her breasts, which were on the largeish side. Most of her life, she had never really liked them, but she liked the way he liked them, and she had very much liked the way it felt when he touched them, and now she wanted him to do that again.

  “You shouldn’t be doing that,” he said.

  “There seem to be quite a few things I should or shouldn’t be doing or feeling,” she said. “You’re quite free with your opinions. I suppose you could stop me, then.” The laces suitably loosened, she pulled the bodice away and showed him everything.

  He let out a hiss. “I could. I should. An honorable man would stop you.”

  “How fortunate that you have just got done explaining that you are not honorable.”

  “Mmm. I don’t know if fortunate is the word.” He reached out and tugged her closer, between his legs, which were parting under that robe of his, and she wasn’t sure he was wearing anything under—

  His mouth on one of her nipples.

  She gasped.

  He kissed it, just a gentle press of his lips, but it hardened obligingly and she felt the sensation shoot through her like a falling star. “Have I told you that your bosom is the most lovely of it
s kind in the entire history of bosoms? That your breasts are exquisite?”

  She couldn’t breathe. “I don’t think you have, no.”

  He kissed her other nipple. “Well, now I have.” He tugged her bodice closed over her and began to tighten her laces.

  “What are you—?”

  “I’m lacing your bodice. You don’t seem as remarkably observant as I am.”

  “But why are you doing that? You want me.”

  “I do, but I have wanted you since the first moment I saw you behind that shanj board, and I have kept myself in check and not had you. I would never have had you if I hadn’t been accidentally given a dose of a very potent aphrodisiac that robbed us both of our will. We are not on cainlach now, maidam, and so I have control of myself.”

  “But—”

  “You said you were sore.” He tugged on the laces, but he wasn’t doing a very good job at it, and they were tightening crookedly.

  “Stop that, you’re pulling too hard on this side.” She tried to take the laces from him.

  He wouldn’t let her. “I’m sore, if it comes to that, and I didn’t have my maidenhead brutally ripped past with no care taken at all.”

  “Well, it’s not as if—” She hunched her shoulders and now she was whispering. “I didn’t bleed or anything.”

  “Yes, I’m told that’s actually not as common as people think it is,” he tugged hard on the opposite side of the laces, evening them up, and then started to tie her bodice closed. “But the fact remains, I can’t see why you’d want me to—”

  “Because it was like that,” she said. “Because it was brutal.”

  He let his hands fall away from her bodice.

  She was still between his legs, and she did not think he was wearing anything under that robe, because she could see that he was aroused from the way the silk robe draped over him.

  “That doesn’t make any sense,” he murmured.

  “Well, it doesn’t have to be like that, does it?” she said. “And there were parts of it I liked. Some of what we did was very nice, so I thought if we weren’t… if there was no cainlach, maybe it could all be nice. But then I thought you didn’t want me, because you weren’t looking at me, and I felt as if you regretted the entire—”

  “I do regret it.”

  “Yes, but you also said that you were pleased that there was a chance that I might be with child, because then we couldn’t get our marriage annulled in five months, and because you wanted me to be yours.”

  “Sefoni…” He caught her about the waist and pulled her down.

  Now she was perched in his lap, and they were close. She put a hand on his chest. It was strange, because they’d been very intimate under the influence of cainlach, touching each other everywhere, unable to keep their hands off each other. But even so, she didn’t feel at ease with him. It somehow felt as if she was touching him like this for the first time.

  “Listen, it’s one thing not to mind the fact that circumstance might have thrown us together,” he said. “It’s another thing entirely to actively do a thing, to attempt to trap you.”

  “But I’m already—”

  “You might not be pregnant.” He brushed his knuckles over her cheek. “I’m not going to bed you now and throw caution to the wind.”

  “You said the thing about, um, about pulling out of me.”

  “That’s no guarantee of anything,” he said. “Besides, it’s not always easy to execute. There are… barrier methods—”

  “Like what?”

  “Well, this is not the point,” he said. “We’re not doing this.”

  “What if I am pregnant?” she said. “What if I am trapped? Then there wouldn’t be any point in holding back, right?”

  He sighed.

  “Right?” she repeated.

  He looked deeply into her eyes, feathering his fingers over her jaw and then down her neck. His face loomed close as he lined up his nose with hers, and then he kissed her.

  The kiss was warm and sweet and full of promise and she clutched his shoulders as he claimed her mouth.

  He pulled away and then planted a kiss on her forehead. “You need time.”

  “What do you mean by that? Is this more about how I should hate you?”

  “I forced you to marry me against your will,” he said. “I maneuvered you into these schemes of mine, and all for the job in Rzymn, which I know you resent. I hear it in your voice all the time. You want to be more important to me than the job, and… blazes, I think I want that, too, to be that kind of man, but I’m… nothing’s more important than the job.”

  Her shoulders sagged.

  “I don’t want to hurt you. What happened to us with the cainlach was not natural and you need time to process it.”

  “I’m not going to start blaming you for it and hating you. I’m not sad it happened. I’m not sad that we were together.”

  “I’m not either.” He pulled back, letting his hand fall away. “But after some time has passed and the shock of it’s worn off, you might change your mind. I’m not going to take advantage of you in the meantime. Go to bed, Sefoni. Your own bed.”

  AFTER SEFONI LEFT, Haid felt antsy.

  He had dressed for bed, planning to go to sleep, but now he couldn’t bear to be alone. She’d roused parts of him that pulsed with a faint echo of the burning of the cainlach, and that was unbearable.

  He knew he’d done the right thing to send her away, but that didn’t mean it was the easy thing. Even so, he was adamant that nothing else between them be forced or wrong, and even if she wanted him, she had asked him to be with her in order to erase the memory of their first coupling, to replace it with something nice, as she’d said.

  So, that meant that her desire for him was still being fueled by the cainlach in some way.

  He cared about her.

  He’d never cared like this before.

  He…

  He didn’t want to think about this anymore. It was torment.

  So, he dressed again, without the help of his valet. He didn’t bother with a jacket or a neckbow, but he didn’t feel entirely dressed without a waistcoat, so that went on. He laced his trousers and laced his shoes. He took a cloak, for the chill, and then he left the house and walked to the other side of town in the brisk, autumn air.

  When he unlocked the back door of the Sticx Gentleman’s Club, someone was moving around in the hallway, and this startled him so much that he panicked. How could he have come here with no weapon at all?

  But it was only Pairce.

  Obviously, she’d been here with Cadon. He’d left her here with him. He should have remembered that. Actually, it wouldn’t have been out of the bounds of reason to think that she would sleep here, with him, in his bed.

  Of course, their coupling had been at his behest, and something rose up in him at the thought of that, something like guilt.

  “Are you going to see him?” said Pairce.

  “Well, I thought I’d busy my mind with the next task,” he said.

  “Which is breaking his curse?”

  “Yes.” Haid fiddled with the buttons on his waistcoat. “Unless he’s asleep or doesn’t wish to see me or—”

  “He was awake just moments ago,” said Pairce. “I wish you’d tell him that you’re not paying me to be his whore.”

  “Is that what he thinks?” Haid supposed it made sense from Cadon’s point of view. “I’ll tell him, but I don’t know if he’ll believe me. If he thinks I’m trying to manipulate him, then I’d have an inducement to lie.”

  Pairce sighed. “Oh, never mind. Don’t say anything to him.”

  “Do you…?” Haid swallowed. “You lay with him under duress, and you still feel…?”

  “There wasn’t a lot of laying,” she said. “And I suppose I’m incredibly stupid.”

  “He hurt you?” said Haid. “And yet you don’t…” He didn’t know how to finish the sentence.

  “Well, that wasn’t his fault,” said Pairce. “Why are
you asking me this?”

  “I suppose I want you to tell me it’s utterly possible to recover from such a thing, and that… that two people could still have something good on the other side of it.” He looked back at his waistcoat buttons. “Of course, you’re not in his bed right now, are you? So, who knows if you do have anything with him.”

  “Thank you for this little talk, Haid,” Pairce said through clenched teeth. “I can’t tell you how comforting it’s been.” She started to move past him.

  He caught her by the arm. “Sefoni’s mother wanted to end our marriage, so she gave her own daughter a drink spiked with cainlach in the hopes that she would make a spectacle of herself at the breakfast party and that I would be horrified and want free of her. But I drank some of it too and…” He let go of her. “Never mind. I don’t know why I’m telling you this.” Now, everyone would know. Tristanne would tell Mairli and Pairce would tell Cadon, and the entire team would be privy to their private history, and what was wrong with him?

  “Cainlach?” said Pairce. “I’ve used it. I knew girls who swore by it in order to make themselves more excited for the job. But the tail end of it is quite bad, what with what it does to your balance, how it fractures your memory. You agree to things and don’t remember them. I can’t think it’s worth it.”

  “I had forgotten about all those side effects. I suppose we were lucky to knock ourselves out with the sleeping draught when we did, even though it wasn’t soon enough to stop us from…”

  “Is she all right?” said Pairce. She stepped closer. “Are you all right?”

  “Of course I am.” He gave her what he hoped was a careless smile. “And she claims she is, but…” He swallowed. “I’m sorry, you know. I’m quite terribly sorry that I sent you to him and tasked you with giving yourself to him in that way. Near flame, he is a monster, and I sent you to that, so I am a monster too, and there is no excuse for it, and I am ashamed of myself. If I could give up this blazing job in Rzymn—”