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Authors: Zoe Archer

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BOOK: Demon's Bride
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Just as he turned to make his way back up Lombard and thence to Cheapside, he caught sight of Stephen Norwood emerging from a coffee house.
Destroy him.
The words, spoken silently by a voice not his own, wove through his mind like a trail of smoke. Thoughts of Anne were blotted out. All Leo saw was Norwood, the cheat. A year ago, they had been partners—Leo, Norwood, and two others—in an East Indian shipping venture. Norwood had gone behind Leo’s back, urging the others to underreport the venture’s profits, all the while wearing a wide betrayer’s smile. Leo had caught wind of the scheme and extricated himself with as minimal damage as possible, never letting on that he knew of the deception.
Like a serpent, Leo had bided his time, waiting for the right moment to bring Norwood down with a flash of fang and mouth full of poison.
That time was now. Cold intent spread through Leo, originating between his shoulder blades and winding through his body, his limbs, and his mind.
Destroy him.
“Good to see you, old friend.” He strode up and shook Norwood’s hand.
The charlatan grinned. “Surprised to see you here today. Word is out that yesterday you took a wife.”
Leo decided not to mention that he had
married
Anne, yet as to the
taking
of her ... that would happen later. “A husband I may be, but the ’Change is my mistress, and I can never stray.” He glanced toward the door of the coffee house Norwood had just exited. “You and I haven’t spoken in far too long. Join me inside?”
Though he maintained his grin, Norwood’s eyes were chary. If he knew what Leo had planned, he had good cause for concern. But no one save another Hellraiser or the Devil himself could know what Leo intended.
“I have good intelligence on some new investment prospects.” This was Leo’s bait, for he was renowned, some might say notorious, for his faultless ability to select the best ventures. He’d been strong in business before gaining his gift of precognition. Now, he was unstoppable.
Wariness left Norwood’s gaze, replaced by eager greed. “No greater pleasure than to renew our friendship.”
They ducked into the coffee house and removed their tricorn hats. Inside, men of business hunched at battered wooden tables and crowded into settles. Brokers, jobbers, men seeking capital for their schemes, and those, like Leo, keen to invest in the next profitable ventures. The close air within the shop was thick with the smell of coffee and the sounds of speculation. London was an old city, a city built upon the detritus of centuries rotting into the earth. Yet here, in this coffee house, in the narrow, crowded alleys of the Exchange, men lived in the future. They dwelt in the possibility of what
could be
, what
might be
, and in that gauze-covered world of chance, they staked their fortunes.
Leo had an advantage no one else possessed. And that made him one of the most feared and respected men in the Exchange. Him. A saddler’s son, who’d never drunk tea from fresh, unboiled leaves until he was fifteen years old.
He and Norwood managed to find a table, pushing aside the newspapers stacked there. As they sat, the proprietor flung two steaming mugs of coffee toward them and quickly trundled off.
“Have you change for a bob?” Leo asked Norwood. He held up a shilling.
“Only a tanner and thruppence.”
“That shall suffice.”
“Are you sure?” Norwood raised a brow, believing that the benefit would be all to him.
“Truly, it’s satisfactory.”
With a shrug, Norwood slid his coins across the table and accepted Leo’s shilling. The moment Leo touched the coins, he smiled, for though he had lost three pennies in the exchange, he now gained something far more valuable.
To Norwood, and to all the men in the room, Leo sat at a table within the same coffee house. He did not rise up from his seat. He barely even moved, except to curl his fingers around the coins. Yet with just the brush of his fingers over the money’s metallic surface, Leo’s mind became a spyglass. Time folded in on itself, collapsing inward. Dizzying. The first few times Leo attempted this, he’d found the unexpected sensation unpleasant, like drinking too much whiskey too quickly. Now, he’d learned not only to anticipate the feeling, but to welcome it, for it meant that soon the future would be his.
Leo felt the rough wooden table beneath his fingertips, heard the voices of men around him, yet his eyes beheld not the coffee house but a distant port. Palm trees and golden-skinned people in colorful wraps. Tall-masted ships bobbing at anchor. Buildings both Oriental and European—no, not just European, but the tall, narrow facades of Dutch structures, and battlements. He knew this place, never having been there, but by reputation: Batavia, in the East Indies.
The lurid light spilling over the city’s walls came not from the setting sun, but a ship burning in the harbor. Sailors tried to douse the flames. Their water buckets failed to stem the fire—it spread like a pestilence over the hull, up the masts, engulfing the sails. The sailors abandoned their task. They shoved themselves into jolly boats and dove overboard, and people on the shore could only watch as the ship became a black, shuddering skeleton, its expensive cargo turning to ash upon the water. The crew had escaped, but the pepper they shipped did not.
A disaster.
“Bailey?”
Norwood’s voice broke the scene. Leo quickly pocketed the coins and the vision of distant calamity faded. He was back in a London coffee house, amidst news sheets and talk of business, with Norwood gazing curiously at him across the table. A phantom scent of burning wood and pepper pods remained in Leo’s memory.
“Are you well, Bailey?”
“Forgive me. My mind ... went somewhere else for a moment.”
A knowing grin spread across Norwood’s face. “Back to your new bride, I imagine.”
Leo manufactured a smile. His ability to foresee financial disaster had been his particular gift from the Devil, a gift that remained a secret between Leo and the other Hellraisers. Anne would never learn of it—for many reasons.
“Are you at the ’Change today in search of new ventures?” he asked.
“There are several, all clamoring for my coin,” answered Norwood, “and the matter remains only to discern which would be the wisest investment.”
“I’ve more than a little intelligence in such matters. Tell me which have commandeered your attention.”
Norwood raised a brow. “To what end? That you might seize an opportunity and leave me out in the cold?”
Leo placed a hand on his chest. “Injurious words. My offer was extended in friendship, that I might advise you.” He glanced down at the heavy ruby he wore on his right ring finger. “And
I’ve
no need to cut you out of the profits, not when my own are so abundant. There is plenty to share.”
If Norwood understood that Leo threw his own crime back at him, he made no sign. Slowly, he nodded. “Everyone has said that lately your investments never fail.”
Leo always possessed good sense, but with the Devil’s gift, he had become infallible. The gold in his coffers and the country estate he had purchased for his mother’s use testified to this.
“Unburden yourself,” he urged Norwood. “Make use of my council.”
After taking a sip of his coffee, the other man proceeded. “Three ventures have applied to me for investment funds. A housing development here in London, sugar from Barbados, or a pepper shipment from Batavia.” He spread his hands. “They have all presented themselves in the best possible light, and I have done as much research into each business as feasible, yet I cannot decide which shall be the recipient of my capital. For I can invest in only one.”
Leo kept his outward appearance calm. He crafted his expression into one of contemplation. Within, however, he felt the quick, exhilarating anticipation of a predator lying in wait. He had merely to let his prey wander farther into the kill zone, and the deed would be accomplished, his claws bright with blood.
“All three have their merits, their potential.”
“But one must be better than the others, surely?”
How long could Leo toy with him? A pleasure to draw it out, knowing that the blow would come, or strike quickly, and then watch the carnage? Both appealed.
“Housing developments are certainly intriguing,” he said. “Every day, more and more people come to London, looking for work beyond tenant farming. They all need places to live.”
“So, that should be my investment?”
Leo feigned deliberation. Finally, he said, “Choose the pepper from Batavia. The appetite for spice goes unabated, and it always finds a buyer. With the desire for French cooking growing, especially amongst the swelling ranks of the bourgeoisie, such goods can only increase in value.”
“Are you certain?” Norwood’s brow pleated.
“A better investment cannot be found.”
For a moment, Norwood simply stared at Leo, as if trying to make sense of a labyrinth. He released a breath. “You are ... generous.”
“This surprises you.”
“No. Well ... aye. You’ve something of a reputation.”
“The Demon of the Exchange.” Leo laughed at Norwood’s pained expression. “I know every name I’m called.” Including
upstart, peasant, lowborn bastard.
Leo had once overheard Norwood call him that.
The lowborn bastard won’t know the difference in the balance sheets. A simple matter, and the profits are ours.
Abruptly, Norwood pushed back from the table and stood. He held out his hand. “My thanks to you, Bailey. You’ve done me a kindness.”
“Nothing kind about it.” Leo resisted the impulse to crush Norwood’s hand in his own, and merely shook it instead. “I have a very good feeling about your investment.”
“I wish you great happiness in your marriage.” With that, Norwood bowed before hurrying out of the coffee house.
Leo sat alone, with two cups of coffee growing cold, yet within, he was a volcano of hot, vicious joy. He took from his pocket Norwood’s coins, the thruppence and tanner, and set them on the table.
Seeing the coins, the proprietor quickly walked over and hefted a steaming pot. “More coffee, sir?”
“Consider that a gratuity.”
“All of it?”
“I’ve no use for the coin.” Not anymore. It had given him precisely what he needed, for his gift of prescience required him to touch an article of money belonging to an individual, and from that, he would have a vision of their future financial disasters. Seldom did he not encounter a disaster, for they marked everyone’s lives, and he’d gained most of his fortune since by counterinvesting. On the rare occasion when he saw no calamity, he knew the venture to be solid. Yet in the time that he’d gained this gift, he’d been witness to scores, perhaps hundreds, of catastrophes. Difficult now not to see disaster everywhere, lurking around corners and in the shadows of crumbling bridges.
The proprietor’s mouth opened in surprise. “You are very generous, sir.”
The second time in a handful of minutes Leo had been called such. But his generosity extended only to the coffee house owner. What he had offered Norwood served merely Leo’s own appetite for vengeance.
Donning his hat, Leo stood. “Point of truth,” he said to the proprietor, “I’m the most selfish bastard you’ll ever meet.”
“My wife’s brother might have you beat, sir.”
Leo’s laugh was genuine. They came so seldom, the sound astonished him. He left the coffee house, energy and urgency in his step. He needed to counterinvest in shipments of pepper from Malabar—the price would surely go up after the destruction of the Batavian cargo—and then he needed to get to the pugilism academy. He trained there daily after leaving the ’Change. A necessary outlet, for nothing exhilarated him more than good, ruthless business, and the gentlemanly sports of fencing and riding held no appeal. Peasant blood flowed in his veins, demanding the most primitive, brutal means of release. To hit, and be hit in return, and then emerge the victor, his opponent’s blood on his knuckles.
He wanted to crow about his victory, but the only people he could speak to of it were his fellow Hellraisers. Anne would never know. She
could not
know. The realization struck him, swift and unexpected. Only yesterday, he had believed that he would not care if she learned about his magic. Her opinion of him had not mattered, nor the need to offer explanations. Now, however ... now he actually cared what she thought of him.
The thought disturbed him. He strode off to seek the uncomplicated interaction of the boxing ring.
Chapter 4
 
Anne paced the corridor, watching night fall in thick black currents. Her skin felt tight and confining. She was a ghost haunting her own home. Aimless. Uneasy.
Keeping house for a man who seldom made use of it proved a more difficult task than she had anticipated. She had spoken to the cook about planning meals, only to learn that Leo sometimes took coffee in the mornings, but that constituted the whole of his requirements. The cook, in fact, had been painfully eager to talk with Anne, desperate for something to do. Just as Anne was. Yet she had no answers for the poor man. Could they expect guests? Possibly. Would the master be joining them for meals more often? Perhaps.
The clatter of carriage wheels on the street drew Anne to the window. But it was only the man who lived across the street. She watched as he alit from the carriage, and the door to his house opened. A woman stood there, her shadow thrown in jagged increments down the stairs. Her shade swallowed the man as he climbed up to her, then, with their arms looped, they went inside together, and the door closed. The carriage rolled on toward the mews.
Not a word from Leo all day. She’d had supper prepared and waiting for him at four. The hour had passed, and another, until there had been no choice but to eat alone, again, and have the remainder of the dishes shared amongst the servants.
The more hours passed, the more she thought of the previous night. Leo’s warm hands and hotter gaze, the press of his body close to hers, and the even more intimate revelation about his parents’ marriage. A tentative step toward knowing each other. Yet as the day crept forward and Leo’s absence resounded in the empty halls of his home, she began to think of last night as a dream whose details faded after waking. Soon, she would begin to wonder if his touch and disclosure had happened at all.
Anne turned away from the window and resumed her restless pacing. Back and forth, crossing the landing that had a view of the entryway below. Everywhere her gaze fell, she found expensive objects. Axminster carpets, marble-topped tables with elaborately curved, gilded legs, Chinese porcelain. Brilliant things, glittering things. Soulless. Empty. Like elegant corpses.
She hugged herself and kept walking. These were idle fancies brought about by a day of inactivity. Seldom had she had so little to do, and so much time in which to do it.
Leo kept far more servants than her own family. Until yesterday, he was the house’s sole occupant, and even then, he was rarely there. Between the abundance of servants and a master with few demands, Anne found herself superfluous. She’d been far busier at home—her old home. This is where she lived now. This richly furnished ... mausoleum.
Sensation prickled along the back of her neck. The strangest feeling. As if she were being observed.
Anne spun around. “Meg?” She tried to recall the names of other servants she had met today—Leo’s valet, and the steward. “Spinner? Mr. Fowles?”
No answer. Nothing at all, until the middle candle in a three-branched candelabra abruptly went out. A curl of smoke drifted up to the ceiling.
She took one of the lit candles and used it to reignite the one in the middle. Yet the moment she replaced the taper, the middle candle went out again. It didn’t gutter or flicker, as it might if there were a draft. It simply extinguished itself.
As if someone had blown it out.
A rolling clatter sounded on the street outside. Startled, her heart contracted, a painful grip in the center of her chest. Then came the footman’s steps echoing across the checkerboard floor as he strode to the door and held it open. Anne drifted to the railing and looked down.
Cold air swirled in, and a man stood in the doorway. Light from the linkboy’s torch outside made the man a figure of darkness, limned in fire. Tall, and broad-shouldered. He came into the entryway, sleek and sinister as night. She felt a clutch of instinctive fear, the urge to turn and run. Then light from the footman’s candle touched the stranger’s face and she saw it wasn’t a stranger, no one to fear. Only her husband.
Though calling him
only
anything seemed paltry. For, as Leo strode into the house, removing his hat and caped coat and handing them to the footman, he looked up. Right at her. His storm gray eyes fixed on her with startling accuracy. The chandelier hanging in the domed entry bathed him in light, all the hard and handsome angles of his face, the long lines of his body. He wore the clothes of a gentleman, but the guise did not fool Anne. This was a dangerous man.
They stared at each other. It seemed to take a moment for Leo to place her, like running into an acquaintance after several years’ absence. Then came recognition. He smiled, yet it did not much soften his face.
“Is that a bruise on your cheek?” Her voice sounded overloud, echoing in the foyer.
He reached up and absently touched his face. “I was in a fight.”
Anne hurried down the stairs. “Footpads? Are you injured? We should summon the constabulary.”
“And tell them I paid for the privilege.”
She reached his side, tilting her head back to look at him in confusion. “Paid?”
“A pugilism academy.” He held up his fist. Small cuts and bruises adorned his knuckles. “Every afternoon, after business at the ’Change is done. The man who did this to me looks much worse, but he was given a half crown for his troubles.”
“Boxing.” It made sense. The way he moved, how he held himself, as if expecting a fight at any moment, and not only ready to defend himself, but eager for the challenge. Of course, her supposition was all theory, but she had a rather good grasp of theoreticals. “I’ve never seen a boxing match.”
He raised a brow. “Never?”
“Young ladies aren’t encouraged to attend events where men in undress pummel one another. Though I’ve always been curious. It’s a very ancient sport, isn’t it?”
“I should take you.”
Her mouth dropped open. “You can’t.”
He frowned. “It isn’t illegal for a woman to attend a boxing match. In fact, I’ve heard that, once or twice, a woman was one of the pugilists. Next time a match is arranged, I’ll take you.”
“It will be quite scandalous.” Her pulse came a little quicker to think about it. But not entirely from fear.
“Scandal doesn’t bother me.”
She looked at him, with the bruise on his face and the scabs on his knuckles, his sandy hair coming out from its queue, and suddenly understood that what made Leo so very dangerous wasn’t his humble birth, nor his wealth, and not even his physicality. What truly made him dangerous was this: he honestly did not care what anyone else thought. And that gave him perfect freedom to do exactly what he pleased.
It was a thought both frightening and exciting.
Rather than address any of this, Anne said, “That bruise wants tending.”
He merely shrugged. “I heal quickly.”
“A meal for the victor, then?”
“Meal?” He looked blank.
“Food. One consumes it. Often at home. Though,” she added, “I’m given to understand you seldom do.”
“Little reason to.”
“Until now.” She wondered what he must think of her impertinence, yet she was unable to curb herself in his presence. His sense of liberation must be communicable.
He did not seem to mind, however. His smile actually warmed, becoming more genuine. “This must be the side of marriage that is so celebrated. A doting, fussing wife.”
“I’ve little experience with the matter,” she said, “having never had a wife before.”
“Then we are equally innocent on the subject.”
One word she would never choose to describe Leo: innocent. Even a rather sheltered young woman such as herself recognized that a whole life was lived behind the cool gray of Leo’s eyes, a life utterly unknown to her.
She turned to the footman. “Ask Cook to prepare a collation for Mr. Bailey. Meat, cheese, bread. Wine. Some of the pie from this afternoon’s supper.”
The footman bowed and departed, leaving Anne and Leo standing alone in the chill of the vaulted foyer.
“Do you wish to bathe before eating, sir ... Leo?” She caught the scent of fresh sweat from his skin, musky and clean, and fought to keep from drawing closer to his wool coat and inhaling deeply.
His smile turned rueful. “I did not know you had a supper prepared.”
“It is a wife’s duty to have meals ready.”
“And a husband’s folly if he forgets. Consider me chastised.”
“I’ll do nothing of the sort,” she answered. “You aren’t chastised in the slightest.”
He chuckled. “Perhaps a little.”
Anne gestured toward the stairs. “A bath? And then something to eat. I’m given to understand that is the common order of things.”
“Behold your obedient husband.” He turned to the stairs and brushed past her, his body large and warm. A shiver of awareness passed through her, like a fingertip drawn down her throat and between her breasts. She remembered the sensation of his hands on her, and the insistent press of his arousal. No, this was not to be a chaste marriage, but as to the when of its consummation ... The promise filled her with dread. And eagerness.
At the foot of the stairs, he paused, his hand on the newel post. He gave a low laugh.
“A wife. A bath. A meal at home.” He shook his head. “I’m becoming damned civilized.”
As he continued up the stairs, Anne understood that no matter what Leo Bailey did, he would never be domesticated. He was, and always would be, wild.
 
 
“
This
is where we’re supposed to eat?”
Anne noted the appalled expression on Leo’s face as he surveyed the capacious dining chamber. He had bathed and changed into fresh clothes. In his pristine stock, snowy against his jaw, expertly cut green woolen coat, his hair dark, gleaming gold in the candlelight, he had transformed from a bruised brawler. But he didn’t look a gentleman. No, in his restrained evening finery, he seemed a pirate prince contemplating future pillaging.
“You found no fault with the room yesterday.”
“Because there were people everywhere. This.” He waved his hand at the chamber, where a collation awaited him at the vast dining table, and two footmen stood in disinterested readiness. “All we need is a bear to bait.”
“One of your footmen is a very big fellow. Perhaps he’d be willing to play the part of the bear.”
With Anne on his arm, Leo brought them farther into the room. All the chandeliers had been lit—an expense she could scarcely fathom—yet this only illuminated how large and empty the dining chamber truly was. He frowned at the walls as if displeased by their distance, and the look was so commanding, she half expected the walls to simply get up and move closer just to please him.
“No wonder I never ate at home. Who could dine in here?”
“I did.”
Her quiet words snared his attention. “Today.”
“Yes, today. I broke my fast in this chamber, and dined, as well.”
“Alone.”
“There was a footman.”
He shook his head, his frown deepening. “God, I’m an ass.” He quirked an eyebrow at her. “This is the point in the exchange where you contradict me.”
“I was given to understand that a good wife does not contradict her husband.”
His scowl transformed into a smile that glittered in his eyes. “I think I’ve married an impertinent hoyden.”
Her own lips curved. “No one has ever called me a hoyden before.” And she rather liked it, for as a daughter of parents with little means,
subdued obedience
had been her byword. Being poor
and
an unmarried woman did not improve one’s chances of being abided. “I suspect it’s the low company I now keep.”
The moment the words left her, she wanted to call them back. Leo’s face shuttered at the perceived insult.
“I didn’t—that’s not what I mean.” She gripped his sleeve. “It was a jest. Nothing more. I don’t think of you as low.”
“But I am,” he said, words cool and impersonal. He withdrew his arm.
“Not truly. Low is defined by deeds, not blood.”
His smile returned, only now it had a dark and cynical cast to it. “To repeat: I am.”
She did not understand to what he referred, but the shadows in his eyes made her think perhaps she did not want to know.
Blast.
They had been heading toward something, a connection as tenuous as it was vital, and a few thoughtless words had torn it asunder.
Another realization dawned: he claimed not to care what others thought, and in many ways, he didn’t, but there was still some part of him that bristled and brooded when his origins were derided. He lashed out when hurt, like a wounded beast. To keep her hand from being bitten off, she must proceed carefully.
“Grand though this chamber is,” she said, searching for another topic, “it doesn’t lend itself well to intimate suppers.” She turned to one of the footmen. “Remove the collation to the parlor upstairs.” The servant bowed, and he and the other footman began gathering up the plates and platters of food.
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