Luck Be a Lady (11 page)

“I understand,” she said evenly. “We do not intend to live as a married couple.”

“Ever?”

“Ever.” She would not mention the contractual plan for divorce, which would require a public hearing.
Five years.
What a long time that seemed.

Peter shook his head. “How low you will go to spite me.”

“How little choice you left me,” she countered.

He took a deep breath, then rose. “Well, then. I suppose I have no choice but to agree to this atrocity.”

“I concur,” she said. But her brother's composure struck a chord of unease through her, as did the slight smile that flitted over his mouth, gone almost before she could remark it.

“Glad that's settled,” O'Shea said. “I'll be needing to speak with you about that meeting next week of the Municipal Board.”

“Of course,” said Peter.

Of course
?
“Mr. O'Shea will communicate with you through me,” she said slowly. “Nobody will have any
cause to suspect your alliance.” How odd that Peter had not thought to ask about that himself.

“Very good,” her brother said. “I am relieved to hear it. And now, I will thank you to get him out of this house before anybody remarks that he visited.”

She watched Peter let himself out of the drawing room. When O'Shea started to speak, she held up a hand and jerked her head toward the door.

Eyes narrowed, he nodded. They stood for a long moment in silence before she whispered, “It's all right, go ahead.”

“Bit easier than I'd imagined,” O'Shea said quietly.

“Agreed.” She hesitated, but her suspicions were nameless. “I suppose he felt he had no choice.”

“No doubt. You'd have made a fine lawyer.”

The compliment startled her. She allowed herself a small, gratified smile. He smiled as well. His lower lip was very full. If he bent to kiss her right now—

Horrified by herself, she wheeled away. “I'll see you out.”

“Perhaps you should stay somewhere else, tonight, just in case.”

One hand on the doorknob, she turned back. He had come up hard on her heels; he loomed over her, raw power and protective promise. Another woman would have counted herself fortunate to have such a protector, well capable of defeating danger with his broad, bare palms—

But his handsome hands were quite disfigured by the garish glitter of those rings. He was a criminal, not a gentleman, and she did not require the protection of such a man. She stared at the rings as she spoke. “I've got three locks on the door to my apartment,” she said. “But if anything goes awry—”

“Three locks? Why?”

Until she'd had them installed, her brother had liked to burst in to harangue her at all hours. “It doesn't matter.” Five rings, he wore. Five too many. “But if something were to . . . well . . . I'll send to the House of Diamonds if I'm in need.”

“Look at me.”

She lifted her chin, bristling at his scowl. “You'll spend the night at Diamonds,” he told her. “There's a guest suite on the second floor—”

“I certainly will not!” She pulled open the door. “Discretion, Mr. O'Shea, is the key to our success. Being seen entering that club again—”

His hand on her arm halted her exit. “You won't be seen.” His face, his tone, were implacable. “But you're not staying here. Three locks or no.”

His grip caused a wave of small shivers to chase over her skin, percolating into the pit of her belly . . . and lower. But
he
looked wholly unaware that he was touching her.

She yanked free and drew herself to her full height. “We have an agreement, you and I. By the terms of our contract, I am an independent creature.”

O'Shea gave her a cutting smile. “Don't mistake me, darling. I'd be glad to let you stumble into trouble. But I need you alive if this blackmail's to work.”

She laughed in sheer astonishment, and then to cover her uneasiness. Last spring she had been poisoned by chocolates meant for Lord Palmer. In her delirium, her addled brain had wrongly seized on the suspicions that O'Shea now hinted at.

But Peter was
her brother
. In a sober frame of mind, she could not believe him murderous. “I'm not in
that
kind of danger,” she said.

Her temporary husband watched her for a long, level moment. “You sure about that? Your brother's got reasons now.”

“I should think I know my brother better than you do.” Oh, this was pointless—and it threatened to entangle them further, besides. “You will
not
interfere with me. Regardless of the cause, you have agreed not to do so. If you cannot keep that part of the bargain, then the whole matter is void!”

Narrow-eyed, he blew out a sharp breath. Then he clapped his hat on his head and sketched a mocking bow. “Very well,” he said. “I'll bid you good evening.
Wife.
”

*    *   *

“Fifteen-two going once, fifteen-two going twice . . .” Peter paused. “Lot sixty, sold to Mr. Snowden of Sussex for fifteen-two!”

“Rubbish,” the man beside Catherine muttered.

She retreated to the back wall, where nobody could see her frown. That lot should have gone for twenty pounds at least. So far, the auction of the Cranston library was proving a wet squib.

At the top of the room, where he presided over the rostrum, Peter looked unconcerned. All this week, ever since he'd learned of her secret marriage, he had seemed unflappable. He visited her office daily to confer on decisions and review accounts. He had even summoned the solicitor to announce, in her presence, that he had abandoned the notion of selling Everleigh's.

But his calm mood had fractured for a moment this morning. “I have done everything you asked,” he'd told her at breakfast when she had wondered aloud if she
should attend the Cranston auction. “Must you dog my every footstep, too?”

Had he shown a sweeter face, she might have skipped the auction after all. She felt run ragged, exhausted by uneasy dreams. But an instinct had driven her to table her afternoon agenda so she might attend the sale.

She was glad of it. Something was amiss here. This auction had been scheduled for weeks, advertised in all the regular journals and newspapers. The soiree organized to accompany the formal preview had attracted over two hundred bibliophiles. What, then, explained the poor attendance today? Half the seats were empty, and the bidding felt sluggish.

Peter didn't seem to have noticed. It was an auctioneer's duty to broadcast an almost infectious excitement about the lot at hand, the better to spur the bidding. But as he watched the attendants carry out the next lot, Peter slouched against the rostrum like a schoolboy, elbows akimbo, gavel drooping. This lot, a very rare volume on the early history of New York, had survived a century in handsome condition. The olive morocco was richly ornamented by gilt dentelle edging that still shone brightly, despite its age. Its color plates had merited a great deal of interest at the preview, for they had been painted by a famous cartographer
.

The clerk intoned the conditions of sale. Almost languidly, Peter waved his gavel to open the bidding.

The reserve was immediately met and raised by Sir Wimple, a crotchety collector who never let a map go by without bidding. “Ten,” he called.

“Ten pounds,” Peter drawled. “Do I hear fifteen?”

“Fifteen,” came the reply, from near the window.

“Fifteen, gentlemen.” Peter sounded as though he were battling a yawn. “Twenty?”

“Twenty,” said Wimple sharply.

Peter paused briefly, staring at Wimple, then seemed to collect himself with a slight shake of his head. “Twenty-five, then?”

The ensuing pause seemed odd. Unlikely. Patrons exchanged uneasy looks, and no wonder. The volume was exceedingly rare, both in type and condition. It had been expected to fetch fifty pounds at minimum.

“Twenty-five, then,” Peter said more pointedly. “Do I hear twenty-five?”

The pause seemed to stretch interminably. The audience looked to Wimple's opponent, a portly blond who stood beneath the great window. As though sensing the general interest, he withdrew a copy of the catalog from his jacket pocket, making a small notation before glancing up at the volume on offer. His slight frown, the faintest shake of his head as he flipped to the next page of his catalog, drew a new round of murmurs. He had the look of a man who was waiting on some upcoming treasure, which quite overshadowed his interest in the current lot.

Others pulled out their catalogs. What did he know that they didn't?

He knew nothing! Catherine did not recognize him; he was no bibliophile of note. Why was Peter not speaking, praising the volume, reminding the audience of its worth? She saw several collectors in the audience who had the knowledge to prize it, if only they were nudged out of their uncertainty—an uncertainty, she privately fumed, that had been fueled by some stranger with a penchant for melodramatic flourishes.

Peter opened his mouth. “Twenty-five, going once . . .” His quick glance toward the man by the window caused a prickle to move down her spine. “Going twice . . .”

The blond man looked up. “Thirty,” he said hesitantly, then grimaced, as though already regretting it.

“Thirty,” Peter said, with a note of clear surprise. “Do I hear thirty-five?” He looked over the crowd, but did not take special note of Sir Wimple.

He was in on it. He was conspiring with that man by the window to slow the bidding.

No. It couldn't be. A ring, in the saleroom? She looked sharply through the crowd, ignoring the familiar faces for those she did not recognize. Even Peter would not do this, surely. Rings were a plague on country sales, but respectable auction rooms did not tolerate them.
Could
not, if they wished to remain respectable.

“Thirty-five,” Sir Wimple said.

But last spring . . . hadn't she wondered about a ring then as well? At an auction of English paintings, she'd sensed collusion at work, strangely sluggish bidding on a portrait by Gainsborough. Rings generally appointed a single man to bid, and agreed not to challenge him. Then they conspired to discourage strangers from mounting a challenge. They spread rumors about the legitimacy of a particular piece; during the sale, they under­took any number of tricks, like that cheap showmanship with the catalog, to convey their indifference to a desirable lot. Once their man had obtained it at a cut-rate price, they reconvened for a new, private auction among themselves, bidding on the item's true worth. The money saved in the first, corrupt sale then went to the ring as a whole.

In corrupt salesrooms, half the profit went straight to the auctioneer.

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

F
ive 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.”

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.