Demon's Bride (10 page)
The carriage waited for him outside, and he leapt into it. At his nod, the footman closed the door and called up to the coachman, “Drive on.”
They clattered their way east toward Exchange Alley, but Leo did not see the familiar streets of High Holborn, Chancery Lane, nor any of the others. His mind was with Anne in Bloomsbury, and his body wanted to be there, as well.
Hell, what had come over him? His intentions to take things slowly with her had burned away. He hadn’t even planned on kissing her mouth at all, for it had been enough to kiss her hand. Yet impulse and need had taken over. Once unleashed, it became a battle to rein it in again.
She had thrown him. He prepared himself always for eventualities, outcomes, options. The Devil’s gift showed him the future, and there he often dwelt. Even without this gift, Leo could chart what was, what would be. Yet Anne continued to defy his expectations.
At first, he’d regretted telling his wife about his past, his father, fearing it made him vulnerable. But it had drawn them closer together, revealing unexpected similarities, as if the tide ebbed to uncover a hidden house beneath the waves.
Yet he knew that if he revealed his magic to her, everything they had been building together would crumble. There would be no warm acceptance, no understanding. Only fear. Perhaps even disgust.
No—he must keep his secrets.
He planned to use their strengthening connection by slowly building toward physical intimacy. It seemed the best, soundest plan.
Had she been anyone other than herself, that plan would have unfolded just as he desired. Yet what she had said this morning, what she offered ... no one had ever given him as much. He knew she did not want to pay calls and try to ingratiate herself with the wives of the highest elite. It was more than her overcoming natural shyness. It meant forcibly pulling herself from the shadows into the glare of artificial suns, suns that burned more often than warmed.
Logically, he saw how she might benefit herself by Leo gaining alliances with rich, powerful men. As his status increased, so would hers. But he knew her motivations were different. Her help was for
him
, and no one else.
him
, and no one else.
And she would get coins for him. Coins that would show him future disasters. She had no idea what the coins revealed to him, how he used them to advance his own fortunes whilst ruining another’s. Yet she would get the coins for him because she thought it would make him ... happy. He tried to remember the last time anyone had done anything for him without an ulterior purpose, or simply because it would bring him joy. Even his father’s gifts—a pearl-handled folding knife, a book of quotations—had been to advance Leo within the eyes of the world. And the Hellraisers were a bunch of selfish bastards, just like him, offering companionship but gobbling down experiences as fast as they could be devoured.
He’d thought himself too cynical, too jaded to feel much beyond his own mercenary desires. He was unaccustomed to feeling gratitude. Yet Anne’s offer had pierced him like a golden blade.
And she had looked so damned enticing, still rumpled from sleep, her pretty face touched by morning light. That same morning light had revealed the silken shape of her body beneath her nightgown, and he had been struck with the visceral memory of her breast in his hand, its soft, perfect weight. Desire and something else, something that might have been tenderness, flooded him, and he had acted. Kissed her.
The carriage jounced as it turned onto Fleet Street. Traffic thickened as he moved farther into the heart of the city, the core of London. Yet as the carriage was forced to slow, Leo’s pulse sped.
That kiss ... Before her fear had emerged, Anne had been so responsive, so eager. Her kiss was untried, yet what art it lacked was more than compensated by enthusiasm. He’d suspected that she contained far more passion than she even realized, and he was right. It had taken every ounce of control he possessed not to climb onto the bed, gathering her soft, willing body against him. Show her how to wind her legs around his waist as he undid the buttons on his breeches. Make her fully his. He had never hungered for innocence until that moment.
Only her sound of fright had stopped him. Barely.
He had made a vow to himself. One he would not break. He might not have married for love, like his parents, but by hell, he would not conduct his marriage as the aristos did. When he took Anne’s maidenhead, no fear would exist between them.
She deserved better than an impersonal, calculated fuck. He discovered he liked her too much to treat her like chattel. So he now rode toward Exchange Alley with a faintly aching cock and the taste of her in his mouth.
His smile mocked only himself. At last, Leo Bailey had developed ethics. And his cock hated him for it.
Traffic stalled, and Leo poked his head out the carriage window to see what caused the delay. An overturned cart blocked the street. Two men argued fiercely, their faces red, as bystanders watched. One of the men swung at the other. Within a moment, the street filled with brawling.
The carriage rocked as the horse grew agitated. From his seat, the driver called down to Leo, “Sorry, sir, but we’re jammed. Oi! Get off!” The coachman knocked down a man trying to climb up onto his perch.
Leo bit back an oath of impatience. He hadn’t time for this. Occasional scuffles in the streets were as common as rats, but this altercation went beyond the usual fracas. It seemed as though it hadn’t taken much to make the little fight explode into a much bigger brawl. Yet he needed to get to the Exchange. Business hours had already begun. Missing important deals infuriated him.
“I’ll walk the rest of the way, Dawkins.”
“Are you sure, sir? It’s—down from there, you son of a whore—a bit rough.”
Leo smiled grimly, and opened the carriage door.
Amazing what a bit of brawling could do for one’s humor. As Leo wended his way up Queen Street and then turned on to Poultry, he shook out his fist. Fortunately, he knew how to throw a punch, and the ache in his hand had already begun to subside. No one in that melee had expected a gent in a fine private coach to come out swinging. But he had, and laid out three big men for their trouble. He had cleared a path for himself.
Now he had to stop himself from whistling. He hadn’t been able to obtain physical release with his wife, but fighting in the street offered more brutal means.
He reached the entrance to Exchange Alley off Cornhill. Three men waited for him. Hellraisers. Bram made a tall, dark shape against the sunlit street, and both Edmund and John glanced around with tense, strained expressions.
“What in the name of God has you out of bed so early?” The hour had barely reached eight o’clock. “Unless you haven’t been to bed yet.”
“Bram and John roused me from mine,” Edmund muttered.
The shadows under John and Bram’s eyes confirmed that neither had gone home last night. Leo realized that, for the first time in ... as long as he could remember, he hadn’t joined in for the evening’s debauchery. He had been at home. With Anne.
And he hadn’t missed going out, not a bit.
“It’s business hours, lads,” he said. “If there’s carousing to be done, it must wait ’til later.”
Bram shook his head, and Leo saw that the drawn cast that honed his friend’s already sharp features came not from a night’s dissipated revels, but something else. Something troubling.
Nerves tightened along the back of Leo’s neck and his pleasant mood burst like a blister.
He glanced around. Men of business who knew him well were casting him and the other Hellraisers speculative glances. Leo’s presence at the ’Change was common, but his dissolute friends’ attendance was noteworthy.
“There’s a tavern in an alley off Threadneedle. The Cormorant. I’ll meet you there in a quarter of an hour.”
His friends dispersed, trailing shadows. Leo spent a few minutes chatting with acquaintances, maintaining the illusion that all was well, even as he knew otherwise. Eventually, he drifted away and toward Threadneedle Street. He hated missing any potential deals, but he had no choice. The Hellraisers would not seek him out at this hour unless the situation were dire.
Less crowded than a coffee house, the Cormorant tavern still held a few patrons. One man slept with his head on the table, beside his tankard. Another puffed on a pipe by the fire, watching smoke rings drift up to the stained ceiling. The Hellraisers occupied the settles in the corner, and they stared at their mugs with hard, wary expressions, as if anticipating an attack.
Leo sat next to John. He grunted his thanks when the tapster brought a grimy mug of ale, though he had no thirst for it.
“Whit’s been spotted,” Bram said without preamble. “Here, in London.”
Leo clenched his hands into fists. “When?”
“Don’t know. John and I only heard about it last night.”
“We ran into Chilton at the Theatre Royal,” said John. “He asked why Whit wasn’t with us, as he had seen him just that morning on Westminster Bridge, with a pretty Gypsy girl on his arm. Whit asked Chilton about us, wanted to know what we had been doing.”
“And Chilton told him,” added Bram.
Leo swore. He considered taking a drink of his ale just to steady himself, but something floated on the drink’s surface, and he pushed it away.
Damn it.
Damn.
Damn.
“What do you think he wants?” Edmund gnawed on his thumbnail, as he always did when anxious.
“Same as he’s always wanted—to take our gifts.” John’s fingers beat a staccato rhythm on the tabletop.
“He hasn’t the power to do so.” Yet Bram did not sound as confident as his words attested.
“Not that we know of.” Leo crossed his arms over his chest. “It’s been months since Bram saw him in Manchester. Not even Mr. Holliday has been able to keep track of him. Anything might have happened in the interval.”
“We can’t let him take our gifts. We
cannot.
” A note of panic threaded into Edmund’s voice. Unlike the broader-reaching gifts that John, Bram, and Leo had received, Edmund had received one, and one alone: Rosalind.
cannot.
” A note of panic threaded into Edmund’s voice. Unlike the broader-reaching gifts that John, Bram, and Leo had received, Edmund had received one, and one alone: Rosalind.
Bram scowled. “Just last night I used my gift to persuade my way into Lady Hadlow’s bed. She was always too devoted to her husband, even if he’s in India.”
“As a married man,” said Edmund, “I find your actions deplorable.”
“Because, before Rosalind, you only fucked widows and courtesans?” Bram snorted. “You forget, I once saw you sneaking off with the very married Augustine Colford.” When Edmund continued to sulk, Bram added, “For all her fidelity, Lady Hadlow did not complain when I brought her to climax four times.”
“There’s more at stake than your damned cock.” John growled. “Yesterday afternoon, I read the mind of the Earl of Northington, the damned Lord Chancellor, and learned his plans for the treaty with France. Without Mr. Holliday’s gift, I wouldn’t know a bloody thing. I’d be merely another
normal
man,” he sneered.
normal
man,” he sneered.
Dissention was never difficult to come by with the Hellraisers, but Leo needed to stop it before they degenerated into an outright scrum. “No one is taking anything. There are four of us, and one of him.”
“And the Gypsy,” added John. “The ghost, too. If she has reappeared.”
“Doesn’t matter,” said Bram. “Between us four Hellraisers and his less-than-reliable confederates, the odds favor us.”
“Whit always did like steep odds.” Leo smiled darkly. “But this is one gamble he cannot win.”
“You have a scheme in mind,” said Bram.
“Continuously.” Leaning forward, Leo braced his elbows on the table. “Whit might not be able to mount a full-scale frontal assault. He knows that he cannot beat us all. If I were him, I would seek out allies, wherever I could find them. All that remains to us is to ensure that he makes no allegiances.”
John’s fingers slowed their beat as he began to understand Leo’s intent. “Ostracize him.”
“If Whit is not received anywhere in London, if he becomes a pariah, then he is left to his own frail resources.”
Still, Bram looked skeptical. “
Frail
was not the word I would have used to describe Whit in Manchester. He had no magic, ’tis true, but he seemed stronger than ever. Especially with that damned girl at his side. As if he could level mountains with thought alone.”
Frail
was not the word I would have used to describe Whit in Manchester. He had no magic, ’tis true, but he seemed stronger than ever. Especially with that damned girl at his side. As if he could level mountains with thought alone.”
John snorted. “False confidence engendered by a bit of quim. Doubtless he has begun to realize that, outside of the bedchamber, a Gypsy girl makes for an inferior companion. He could be weakening even now.”
“We cut Whit off from any source of support,” said Leo, “leave him with nary a friend, so he has no reinforcements.”
Clearly heartened by this idea, Edmund brightened. “That should not prove overly difficult. His habits at the gaming tables seldom won him friends—beyond us, of course.”
“A few well-placed tales of cheating and theft,” Leo continued, “and the deed is done. There’ve already been rumors about him ruining lordlings and reckless gentlemen. Some more kindling on that fire, and we will smoke him out.”
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