Wicked and the Wallflower (The Bareknuckle Bastards 1)

“Where are we, Nik?” Devil asked.

The fair-haired Norwegian looked about and then waved them toward the far corner of the warehouse, where a guard reached down to open a door leading into the ground, revealing a great, black abyss below.

A thread of unease coursed through Devil, and he turned to his brother. “After you.”

Whit’s hand signal spoke more than words could, but he crouched low and dropped into the darkness without hesitation.

Devil went in next, reaching back up to accept an unlit lantern from Nik as she followed them in, looking up to the guard only to say, “Close it up.”

The guard did as he was instructed without hesitation, and Devil was certain that the blackness of the cavernous hole was rivaled only by that of death. He worked to keep his breath even. To not remember.

“Fuck.” Whit growled in the darkness. “Light.”

“You have it, Devil.” This, in Nik’s thick Scandinavian accent.

Christ. He’d forgotten he was holding it. He fumbled for the door of the lantern, the dark and his own unsettling emotions making it take longer than usual. But finally, he worked the flint and light came, blessed.

“Quickly, then.” Nik took the lantern from him and led the way. “We don’t want to make any more heat than necessary.”

The pitch-black holding area led to a long, narrow passageway. Devil followed Nik, and halfway down the corridor, the air began to grow crisp and cold. She turned and said, “Hats and coats, if you please.”

Devil closed his coat, buttoning it thoroughly as Whit did the same, pulling his hat low over his brow.

At the end of the corridor, Nik extracted a ring of iron keys and began to work on a long line of locks set against a heavy metal door. When they were all unlocked, she swung open the door and set to work on a second batch of locks—twelve in total. She turned back before opening the door. “We go in quickly. The longer we leave the door—”

Whit cut her off with a grunt.

“What my brother means to say,” Devil said, “is that we’ve been filling this hold for longer than you’ve been alive, Annika.” Her gaze narrowed in the lamplight at the use of her full name, but she opened the door. “Go on, then.”

Once inside, Nik slammed the door shut, and they were in darkness again, until she turned, lifting the light high to reveal the great, cavernous room, filled with blocks of ice.

“How much survived?”

“One hundred tons.”

Devil let out a low whistle. “We lost thirty-five percent?”

“It’s May,” Nik explained, pulling the wool scarf off the lower half of her face so she could be heard. “The ocean warms.”

“And the rest of the cargo?”

“All accounted for.” She extracted a bill of lading from her pocket. “Sixty-eight barrels brandy, forty-three casks American bourbon, twenty-four crates silk, twenty-four crates playing cards, sixteen cases dice. Also, a box of face powder and three crates of French wigs, which are not on the list and I’m going to ignore, other than to assume you want them delivered to the usual location.”

“Precisely,” Devil said. “No damage from the melt?”

“None. It was packed well on the other end.”

Whit grunted his approval.

“Thanks to you, Nik,” Devil said.

She did not hide her smile. “Norwegians like Norwegians.” She paused. “There is one thing.” Two sets of dark eyes found her face. “There was a watch on the docks.”

The brothers looked to each other. While no one would dare steal from the Bastards’ in the rookery, the brothers’ overland caravans had been compromised twice in the last two months, robbed at gunpoint once they’d left the safety of Covent Garden. It was part of the business, but Devil didn’t like the uptick in thievery. “What kind of watch?”

Nik tilted her head. “Can’t say for sure.”

“Try,” Whit said.

“Clothes looked like dockside competition.”

It made sense. There were any number of smugglers working the French and American angles, though none had such an airtight method of import. “But?”

She pressed her lips into a thin line. “Boots awfully clean for a Cheapside boy.”

“Crown?” Always a risk for a smuggling operation.

“Possible,” Nik said, but she didn’t sound sure.

“The crates?” Whit asked.

“Out of view the whole time. Ice moved by flatbed wagon and horse, crates secure within. And none of our men have seen anything out of the ordinary.”

Devil nodded. “The product stays here for a week. No one comes in or out. Get it to the boys on the street to keep an eye out for anyone out of the ordinary.”

Nik nodded. “Done.”

Whit kicked at an ice block. “And the packaging?”

“Pure. Good enough to sell.”

“Make sure the offal shops in the rookery get some tonight. No one eats rancid meat when we’ve a hundred tons of ice to go around.” Devil paused. “And Beast promised the children lemon ice.”

Nik’s brows rose. “Kind of him.”

“That’s what everyone says,” Devil said, dry as sand. “Oh, that Beast, he’s so very kind.”

“Are you going to mix the lemon syrup, too, Beast?” she asked with a grin.

Whit growled.

Devil laughed and slapped a hand on a block of ice. “Send one of these round to the office, will you?”

Nik nodded. “Already done. And a case of the bourbon from the Colonies.”

“You know me well. I’ve got to get back.” After a wander through the rookery, he was going to need a wash. He had business on Bond Street.

And then he had business with Felicity Faircloth.

Felicity Faircloth, with skin that turned gold in the light of a candle, brown eyes wide and clever, full of fear and fire and fury. And able to spar like none he’d met in recent memory.

He wanted another spar.

He cleared his throat at the thought, turning to look at Whit, who was watching him, a knowing look in his eye.

Devil ignored it, pulling his coat tight around him. “What? It’s fucking freezing in here.”

“You’re the ones who chose to deal in ice,” Nik said.

“It’s a bad plan,” Whit said, looking directly at him.

“Well, it’s a bit late to change it. The ship, one might say,” Nik added with a smirk, “has sailed.”

Devil and Whit did not smile at the silly jest. She didn’t realize that Whit wasn’t talking about the ice; he was talking about the girl.

Devil turned on his heel and headed for the door to the hold. “Come on then, Nik,” he said. “Bring the light.”

She did, and the three exited, Devil refusing to meet Whit’s knowing gaze as they waited for Nik to lock the double steel doors and return them through darkness to the warehouse.

He continued to evade his brother’s watch as they collected Whit’s wash and picked their way back to the heart of Covent Garden, weaving their way through the cobblestone streets to their offices and apartments in the large building on Arne Street.

After a quarter of an hour of silent walking, Whit said, “You lay your trap for the girl.”

Devil didn’t like the insinuation in the words. “I lay my trap for them both.”

“You still intend to seduce the girl out from under him.”

“Her, and every one that comes after, if need be,” Devil replied. “He’s as arrogant as ever, Beast. He thinks to have his heir.”

Whit shook his head. “No, he thinks to have Grace. He thinks we’ll give her up to keep him from whelping a new duke on this girl.”

“He’s wrong. He gets neither Grace, nor the girl.”

“Two carriages, careening toward each other,” Whit growled.

“He shall turn.”

His brother’s eyes found his. “He never has before.”

Memory flashed. Ewan, tall and lean, fists raised, eyes

swollen, lip split, and refusing to yield. Unwilling to back down. Desperate to win. “It’s not the same. We have hungered longer. Worked harder. Dukedom has made the man soft.”

Whit grunted. “And Grace?”

“He doesn’t find her. He never finds her.”

“We should have killed him.”

Killing him would have brought London crashing down around them. “Too much risk. You know that.”

“That, and we made Grace a promise.”

Devil nodded. “And that.”

“His return threatens us all, and Grace more than anyone.”

“No,” Devil said. “His return threatens him the most. Remember—if anyone discovers what he did . . . how he got his title . . . he swings from a noose. A traitor to the Crown.”

Whit shook his head. “And what if he’s willing to risk it for a chance at her?” At Grace, the girl he’d once loved. The girl whose future he’d thieved. The girl whom he would have destroyed if not for Devil and Whit.

“Then he sacrifices it all,” Devil said. “He gets nothing.”