“It’s been a long time since I’ve seen the inside of a ballroom, but you can’t simply walk across the street and engage the enemy, Beast.”
The name brought Whit back. He turned on Devil. “That’s not Hattie.”
One of his brother’s dark brows rose. “Ah. We wait for Hattie after all.”
The emphasis on the diminutive set Whit on edge. Irritation flared. “I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to,” Devil said, tapping a rhythm on the side of his boot. “Brixton told me you brought the lady toff to the Sparrow—”
“If our eyes on the rooftops don’t have enough to do, I’m happy to find them more work.”
“They have plenty to do.”
“Watching me isn’t part of it.”
Devil didn’t reply. “I might note that the last time they weren’t watching you, you were knocked unconscious and disappeared.”
A grunt. “Not disappeared.”
“No, I suppose not. Thank heavens for the lady toff.” Whit clenched his teeth. Had Devil always been such an ass? “Calhoun told me the two of you got lost in the storeroom—which, who among us hasn’t lost their head over a woman at the Sparrow—though the stockroom isn’t exactly dressed for seduction—”
Fucking hell, his brother could talk. “I haven’t lost my head.”
Devil stopped. “No?”
“No. Of course not.” She was a threat to their business—their best link to Ewan. He hadn’t even come after her until tonight. She’d found him unconscious in her carriage. She’d come to his turf. To Shelton Street. To the market square. She’d followed criminals into his darkness.
All he’d done was follow her. To learn more about the enemy.
To keep her safe.
He pushed the thought aside. It was nonsense, after all. The fact that he’d been unable to keep his hands from her once he’d reached her was irrelevant. As was the fact that he couldn’t stop thinking of the feel of her skin beneath his touch, her lips against his, the sting of her fingers tightening in his hair, the sound of her cries when she came on his tongue. The taste of her. Christ. The taste of her.
“So, you stand in the darkness for . . .”
Her.
“Her father’s business offered to repay our debt.”
One of Devil’s black brows rose. “Why?”
“I assume because the son stole from us, and they fear our punishment will be crippling.”
“And will it be?”
“That’s up to the earl.”
“What’s the plan?”
“He gives me Ewan’s location or I take his business. The son, too.”
“And the daughter?” For a moment, Whit let misunderstanding come, imagining what would happen if he took Hattie as well. If he made her his—a warrior queen. If together they ruled over the Garden and the docks. Pleasure thrummed through him for a moment before he pushed it away and shook his head. “She has nothing to do with it.”
“Not smart enough to be in on it?”
She was fucking brilliant. “Not malicious enough.”
Devil’s walking stick tapped twice against his boot, his tell, terrifying to those who did not understand it and infuriating to those who did; it meant there was something he was not saying. “Well then. I assume you’ll sort it out?”
Whit grunted.
“And well?”
What did that mean? Had they not come up together from the muck, built a business from the filth, and become kings together? Had Whit not always chosen their history over all else? “Yes.”
“And quick? We’ve another shipment arriving—”
“I know when the shipment is arriving,” Whit growled, unreasonably irritated by the reminder. “It’s my business as well as yours. You needn’t be such a fucking nag.”
A long silence. Then, entirely casual, “And so you meet him here, dressed for dancing, instead of at his offices, dressed for damage, why? Because you love Mayfair so very much?”
Whit didn’t reply. He loathed Mayfair. Loathed the excess of it and the performance of it. Loathed the people of it—this place that might have been his if his father hadn’t been such a monster.
Devil leaned in close and said, “Your lady has arrived.”
Whit spun back toward the house, where the carriage that had deposited Cheadle drove away. The woman in orange was still there—Hattie now by her side. Hattie, tall and blond and bright-eyed, her hair up to reveal her long neck and her curved shoulders, bare above the line of her lush, wine-colored dress, the golden glow of the house turning the silk to embers. She carried a dark shawl in one hand, but didn’t seem to mind standing before all London without it artfully draped around her. She never tried for artfulness.
Which, he supposed, was why she seemed so much like art. Like a mosaic tile that took up a courtyard, every bit of it worthy of inspection. Like music, filling every crevice of a room. Impossible to ignore.
Magnificent.
She shook out her skirts, the bending movement tightening her bodice, making her breasts more prominent. Whit’s gaze tracked to the perfect swell, his mouth suddenly dry. He wondered if her skin had pinkened in the cool air—she was so easy to flush, he couldn’t imagine it hadn’t. He had a wild vision of stripping off his coat and crossing to her, wrapping her in its warmth. Stealing her away. Warming her.
Instead, he watched her—taller than her father, her companion, and the others assembled outside the house. Bigger, yes, and more open. More honest. Too authentic for Mayfair. He remembered her in the Garden, teasing the broad-tosser, brandishing a throwing knife, cuddling a damn puppy, seeming to blend in with the world.
Here, though—she didn’t blend in. She stood out.
She was focused on her friend—he’d have laid money on them being the best of friends for the ease between them and the way the dark-haired woman smiled without artifice, listening as Hattie talked.
And, of course, Hattie was talking. Whit focused on her mouth, watching those beautiful lips move with fascinating speed. Wondering what she was saying, hating the distance between them and the way it kept him from hearing her.
Her friend laughed raucously, loud enough to carry, and Hattie relaxed into a broad grin of her own, the dimple in her right cheek flashing. Whit’s cock woke as he watched and he growled his irritation, a thread of jealousy coursing through him. He wanted those words. The full force of that smile. Those violet eyes on his.
He wanted her.
He stilled at the thought. Of course he wanted her. What man wouldn’t after time with her? What man wouldn’t want another sweet taste? Another lush touch? Another cry of her delicious pleasure?
But that was it. He wanted the woman’s body, and her father’s business.
Not her.
“She’s not my lady,” he said.
“Do you know what you are doing?”
No. “I have a plan.” He stiffened, straightening his coat. “And an invitation to the Duchess of Warnick’s ball.”
Devil cursed his surprise. “How in hell did you get that?”
“Warnick was happy to give us a favor.” The Duke of Warnick owned a distillery in Scotland that made a fortune aging whiskey in American bourbon barrels, provided to him at a premium by the Bareknuckle Bastards’ overland transport business. Of course, getting bourbon from the States into England beneath the usurious taxation of the Crown was not as easy as one might think, and moving empty barrels was an added risk for the smuggling operation—something Warnick knew.