Not here. Everleigh’s was renowned for its honesty. Rumors of a ring at work, supported by the auctioneer himself, would prove disastrous.
“Thirty-five going twice,” Peter was saying.
“Forty,” said the man by the window.
On cue, Peter rushed through his words. “Forty going once, forty going twice—”
You will continue with your duties as auctioneer. Had she been so stupid, so unforgivably naïve, to imagine that Peter would not find a way to enrich himself despite her?
“Sold,” Peter said over Sir Wimple’s outcry. “To Mr. Hastings of Haverford, for forty pounds.”
He could not be allowed to do this. People would talk afterward. He must sell the next lots without any appearance of impropriety. On a deep breath, she started down the aisle.
The clerk stepped forward to announce the next item. “A collection of the Encyclopedia Britannica, fourth edition, very rare. Bound in . . .”
Peter caught sight of her as she neared the rostrum. “What is it?”
She climbed the stairs to speak into her brother’s ear. “You will stop this ring, now.”
“I beg your pardon?” He stared fixedly at the assistants positioning the new set of volumes. “Get off my dais.”
“You will have Hastings shown out,” she said in a fierce undertone, “and you will smile as you encourage honest bids. I will not disservice Lord Cranston by selling his father’s collection at half the price it should fetch.”
He turned on her so suddenly that she heard a gasp from below. Perhaps he did, too, for he mustered a sickening facsimile of a smile. “Get out,” he said through his teeth. “You are creating a scene.”
“Have him removed. Now. Or I will stop this auction.”
His laughter was low and scornful. “Oh, yes? That will look very good for Everleigh’s. Get off this dais, before you turn into a spectacle.”
But that, she realized, was her solution. She cast a prayer heavenward, then put her heel backward and screamed as she toppled off the platform.
CHAPTER SIX
Five months ago, the lunatic hunting Lord Palmer had lit a bundle of dynamite in the neighboring building. The explosion had shattered the great window in the saleroom, and driven the patrons to scramble toward the exits, dropping catalogs and canes in their haste.
As Catherine picked herself up off the floor, she remembered that day vividly, for catalogs littered the carpets once more. The saleroom stood silent and empty, the crowd having departed so a doctor might be summoned.
But none was coming. Peter knew she had faked her swoon. He had said as much into her ear as he’d roughly gripped her shoulders. “You will pay for this,” he’d muttered before announcing to the crowd that the sale must be halted.
He should have thanked her. Their customers were not blind. Had she not disrupted the sale so spectacularly, they would have left gossiping about corruption in the saleroom. Instead, they would talk of her.
Either way, it did not make for a good day of business.
Her ankle was throbbing. She hobbled toward the exit, using the backs of chairs to brace herself. The double doors were heavy; she caught her balance on one foot as she wrestled with the handle.
It opened abruptly, nearly knocking her off her feet. A familiar figure stepped across the threshold, catching her by the waist. “Here you are,” O’Shea said.
Stupefied, she sagged in his grip. For a week she had done her best not to think of him, but with his hands on her, his warmth surrounding her, no time might have elapsed at all. The scent of him kindled a deep, churning need—
Here! She twisted out of his grip, panicked. “What are you doing here?”
“Just happened to be in the neighborhood.”
That was a likely story! “If Peter sees you—”
“Is the place on fire?” His luminous gray gaze swept past her, taking a quick survey of the deserted room. “Half London is spilling down the front steps.”
Half London, indeed! “You can’t be seen here,” she said through her teeth. “There are staff—”
He snorted. “Truants, more like. Halls are empty. And your brother went chasing after some bloke. Halfway to the market by now.”
Hastings, no doubt. Peter had dropped her back onto the carpet to go hurrying after the man. She blew out a breath. They were working together, no doubt of it.
“What happened?” O’Shea propped one shoulder against the doorjamb, tapping his tall hat against his thigh. “Stampede?”
“I swooned.”
His light eyes fixed on her. “Thought you never swooned.”
“And I thought you didn’t frequent the West End.”
He shrugged. Clearly he had no intention of accounting for himself. “Hit your head when you fell?” He reached out to touch her cheek, his fingertips surprisingly warm.
She jerked her face aside. His fingers looked brutish. Long and scarred, beringed in Birmingham paste, dramatically thickened around the knuckles—as though brawling had swollen them permanently. A criminal’s hands.
Criminals were probably cleverer with their hands than any gentleman.
A flush crawled over her. The bedding had been necessary, contractually. That should not make him entitled to touch her here, in public. “Has everyone truly gone?” she asked. “Nobody saw you as you came inside?”
“Not a soul.”
She hesitated. Her boot felt as though it were strangling her ankle. Swelling, she supposed. “Can you help me to my coach, then?”
“Sure,” he said, and slipped an arm around her waist. “Lean into me.”
God save me. There was no choice for it, was there? She tried to hold her breath, tried to ignore the feel of his strong body as he guided her in a slow, hitching pace down the corridor. He smelled like coffee. Coffee and . . . the faint hint of cigar smoke and . . .
His skin. His naked, bare skin.
She tried to walk faster. Her ankle immediately protested. Wincing, she drew to a stop. “Perhaps I should just stay here tonight.”
“Here?” He drew away slightly to look into her face. “You got a bed here?”
There was nothing suggestive in his voice, but her stomach fluttered regardless. “A cot, in my office.”
He lifted his brows. “You sleep here often?”
She shrugged. “When work demands it.”
“No need for that tonight.” He bent and scooped her up; on a soundless gasp, she threw her arms around his neck for balance.
“Put me down,” she snapped. “If someone sees us now—”
“I’ll say I’m a footman.” He grinned at her. Another imperfection! His canine was chipped.
His lips were very close to hers.
She looked quickly away, staring over his shoulder at the rapidly retreating saleroom. “I’ll say you’re the doctor. Peter was meant to summon one.”
“For your swoon?” He started down the stairs at a terrifyingly brisk clip. She gripped him more tightly, convinced he would drop her.
“I won’t drop you,” he said on a laugh. Before she could register his uncanny knack for reading her mind, he added, “Started hauling cargo at the docks when I was all of nine. Grain bags, that’ll teach you to balance properly.”
He’d worked as a dockhand? And so young?
Perhaps his early exertions explained his build, then. His dark suit looked like any other gentleman’s walking suit. But surely it was cut from a thinner, cheaper cloth. It felt as soft as fine wool, but a suit should not translate so clearly the shifting muscles beneath it. His back, his waist, were whittled lean, and his arms, where they wrapped around her, bulged with power. The feel of them fascinated her palms. Her palms had no discipline.
She was very grateful when they reached the main floor, and she could risk easing her grip on him. “Please hurry,” she whispered, looking frantically around. “On the off chance he called an actual doctor—”
“And why didn’t he?”
“He knew I wasn’t truly sick.”
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His gray eyes held hers a thoughtful moment. “So you faked it?”
“Yes,” she said in a clipped voice. “But—let’s not discuss it here.”
He grunted acknowledgment, then shouldered open the front door, carrying her into the autumn chill. She took a quick, deep breath. Autumn had always been her favorite time of year—the bite in the air; the scarlet and gold tapestries made by the leaves, and their pleasant crunch underfoot. But tonight, it could not soothe her.
Perhaps henceforth she would remember autumn as the time when everything ended—hopes, dreams, mad conspiracies to save companies. That was only as it ought to be, she supposed; the leaves, after all, only turned because they were dying.
At the curb, he carefully set her on her feet. She looked around and groaned as she saw only the one vehicle—not hers. “He sent away my coach!” Peter was fond of these spiteful little punishments.
“Fine fellow, he. I’ll drop you home.”
She wrestled with temptation. “That would look very nice. I’m sure nobody at Henton Court would wonder why I accepted a ride from you.”
He tipped his head. “You think they’d recognize me?”
She hesitated. He had a point. Who would imagine that here stood the king of the East End? The lamplight silhouetted the elegant cut of his suit. It translated his brutal muscle into long and deceptively lean lines, and flattered the breadth of his shoulders, making them appear less . . . conspicuous.
She could hardly hobble to the cabstand. It was several blocks away.
“Very well,” she said grudgingly. “You may—” She fell abruptly silent as a group of women approached, market baskets on their arms. She knew none of them, of course, and to her relief, they seemed not much interested in her. Their interest focused firmly on O’Shea, who answered their smiles with a wink.
When they had passed, she said stiffly, “In my company, you might at least pretend to be a gentleman.”
He lifted his brows. “Who’s pretending?”
“Gentlemen do not acknowledge a woman’s leering.”
“Leering, you say?” He glanced after the women. “And here I thought those ladies were simpering.”
“Ladies, sir, do not simper.”
He gave her a cat-in-the-cream smile. “But they do leer?”
She cast a dismissive glance after the women, noting the aggression of their strides. No corseting, nor many petticoats, either. “Not if they’re well bred.”
“It’s a cold heart you’ve got, madam.”
From another man, these words might have formed a reproach. But his smile said he was teasing her.
She had no notion of how to reply to such banter, but she knew it should not make her feel so lighthearted and giddy and . . . girlish. Frowning, she opened the door to his carriage herself.
* * *
Nick had come by the auction rooms thinking to give Catherine some good news. But his new wife was clearly in no mood to celebrate. She retreated to her side of the coach and curled up there as though he might throw himself atop her.
Not that the thought hadn’t crossed his mind. She had a sweet heft to her, she did, all in her bottom half. He’d done his best to keep his mind off that half while carrying her out of the building. But her bottom had a way of announcing itself regardless.
As though she glimpsed his thoughts, her eyes narrowed. “Why did you come to Everleigh’s, anyway? You mustn’t do so again. Had my brother seen you—”
“Just wanted to tell you,” he said. “Your brother kept his end of the bargain. Pilcher’s petition got scuttled today.”
“What?”
He grinned. “You look surprised. Don’t say you thought he’d grow a spine.”
“I didn’t,” she muttered. “No, I’m . . . pleased that he abided by the agreement. Would that he were so amenable in all regards.”
“Ah.” He settled more comfortably against the cushions. “He gave you trouble today, I take it.”
“He was running a ring on the saleroom floor.” She made a noise of disgust. “At a book sale, no less! One would think he would save his shenanigans for a richer auction. At any rate, I stopped him.”
A note of pride in that statement. “By swooning?”
“Well, yes.” She met his eyes. “One can hardly conduct an auction with a woman sprawled on the floor.”
He laughed softly. “Clever of you.”
She wrestled with her own laugh, and lost. “I thought so.”
For a companionable moment, they smiled at each other. Then she appeared to remember her role, and gave a sour tug of her mouth as she flicked back the window shade. “This coach,” she said primly, “looks like a bordello.”
He lifted a brow. Scarlet upholstery, gold fringe, black enamel—he’d thought it a grand vehicle. But she had something against the palette, he supposed. Devil’s colors, she’d called them when visiting Diamonds. “I’ll redo it in blue and white,” he said, “just for you. He didn’t look happy when I saw him leaving. You expect more trouble from him?”
She shrugged. “I can manage him.”
“With those three locks on your door.”
“It isn’t your concern.”
True enough. Yet he felt a lick of temper as he eyed her. She sat a foot away, looking as cool and remote as a stranger. He might still be watching her from a distance, the beautiful, untouchable lady who’d hired his niece.
The difference, of course, was that he’d touched her now. He’d bloody married her. Secret or no, she was his burden to bear.
“You could lodge at Diamonds,” he said. “Plenty of locks, and guards as well.”
She made a low noise, a sound balanced precisely between amusement and scorn. “Yes, that would be very discreet, indeed. Nobody would guess at our connection when it circulated that I was living at your gambling club.”
“Nobody would see you coming and going. There’s a tunnel from the high road, entered through a sweet-shop.”
“Your offer is kind,” she said after a pause. “But there’s no cause for it. I am perfectly comfortable at home.”
They were circling toward an argument they’d already had. Before she could trot out threats about breach of contract, he said, “I could make it a condition. You stay at Diamonds, where I can keep an eye on you, or the game is up.”
She glanced at him sidelong. “Perhaps I don’t want you keeping an eye on me,” she said evenly. “Why should you? There’s no call to pretend that we care for each other. You go your way, Mr. O’Shea, and allow me, please, to go mine.”
Had she spat and hissed fire at him, he might have argued back. But she spoke with a calm dignity that he was suddenly loathe to nettle. Please, she’d said.
She’d had a rough day. Hid it well, but he saw proof of fatigue. Shadows beneath her eyes, and a sag to her shoulders that put him in mind of discouragement.
She deserved to hold her chin high tonight. She’d showed courage and wit, putting an end to that rotten auction. She’d won a round, and deserved to feel the triumph. But who would share it with her? She’d been all alone in that saleroom, hobbling on her sore ankle. Not even a servant to check on her.
Before he knew what he was doing, he reached across the compartment to catch her hand. “Maybe you need a friend,” he said. All those calluses in her damp little palm. Another woman in her shoes would have spent her days eating bonbons and ordering servants to do the lifting. “I’m a good one to have.”
She stared at him for a moment, an odd look on her face. Probably a trick of the side lamp—it turned her eyes large and luminous, and made her expression look oddly stricken. “A friend,” she said softly.
“That’s right.”
She took a deep, audible breath. “But . . . why would you bother?”
Good question. It made him uneasy how much he wanted to look after her. Or maybe he just disliked that nobody else cared to do it. He’d been in that position, alone and friendless, nobody worrying where he laid his head. But
he’d never imagined that kind of loneliness could afflict people of her rank. “Kindness never cost me a penny,” he said. “I see no need to hoard it.”
She bowed her head, then pulled her hand from his. “Thank you,” she said, very low. “But I think friendship would only complicate matters.”
Odd to feel a sting in her rejection. A thousand people would be grateful for his interest, but no surprise that a rich, spoiled girl from Bloomsbury wouldn’t prize it.
Spoiled. No, that didn’t sound right. Nobody was coddling this woman. Nor, did it seem, would she allow someone to do so.
He slid open the window and spoke to the driver. “Bloomsbury,” he said. “Henton Court.”
When he snapped the window shut, she said, “Thank you.” Her sigh sounded relieved. “I had feared you might . . .”
“What?” What did she imagine him capable of doing? To a woman—a woman he’d married, no less, and carried in his arms when her ankle gave way. “What did you think I might do?”
But she only shook her head. “Never mind. The newspapers do you an injustice. You’re a decent man, after all.”
A note of condescension, there, like she expected him to gobble up the words and wag his tail in gratitude. Decent, was he? And that surprised her? Whom did she think she’d married?
God above, but if she was surprised to find him decent, she must have been shaking in her boots at that register office. He remembered suddenly the coldness she’d shown in his bedroom, the great effort it had taken to crack her and make her yield to pleasure. No wonder. All the time, she’d imagined herself bedding scum.
“Sure,” he said, “I’ve no interest in complicating matters. But if you ever change your mind, let me know. Wouldn’t mind shagging you again.”
Her spine snapped straight. “I beg your pardon.”
He snorted. Clearly she meant to forget that he’d ever touched her—that he’d seen her bare as the day she was born, and made her moan from the pleasure of it. Why, she’d probably scrubbed herself raw afterward, lest his filthy touch leave a mark.
“You’re right, the vulgarity don’t fit,” he said. “What we did in that bed, it was more than the normal fuck. I don’t expect you to realize it, being a proper, prissy miss. But I’d be glad to prove it again. Pity this coach is so cramped.”