Sutton's Spinster (The Sinful Suttons 1)

A discreet knock on the door followed her outburst. Jasper was staring at her, as impenetrable as ever.

“What is it?” he called.

“We’ve got trouble again,” Hugh reported from the other side of the door.

Jasper cursed low beneath his breath.

“We’ll ‘ave this patter later,” he told Octavia, before offering her a curt bow and stalking from the room.

By patter, she supposed he meant discussion. His slips into cant were telling, but she had no way of knowing if he was irritated with her for her reaction or nettled by the situation in general. There was so much about the man she had married, in fact, that she remained ignorant of. In many ways, he remained a stranger.

A stranger who had shared her bed.

A stranger who was walking away from her now.

Octavia could do nothing but watch him go, once more the powerful businessman. She had been dismissed.

First Mary had kissed him and now the goddamned Bradleys had started a war.

“Fire brigade couldn’t do nothing for it,” Hugh said grimly at his side.

Rain slashed at Jasper, cutting through his coat and pounding his face beneath the brim of his hat. He stared at the smoking rubble of the building he and his siblings had recently purchased, disbelief and fury raging for supremacy within him.

What was it about this bloody day?

His wife was livid with him.

His daughters could not read or write.

The rains continued to batter him. A whole damned deluge from the sky. Too late to aid in the quelling of the fire which had ripped through the edifice with a vengeance. The heat rising from the ruine

d coals of what was to have been a second Sutton gaming hell taunted him.

“You’re certain this was the work of the Bradleys?” he asked Hugh, raising his voice above the din of the torrent currently soaking them all to the bone.

It was true that Jasper had many enemies. Including, likely, the mother of his children. The Bradleys, however, were the most aggressive of the lot. When the Bradley family had begun a rival establishment in Sutton territory in recent months, Jasper had told himself they were testing him.

But their hell was far smaller. Less respectable. Seedier. There were rumors that coves were being fleeced there. Weighted dice, marked cards, ladybirds who robbed their duped lovers of coin, watered-down liquor…it had become apparent the Bradleys were no competition to The Sinner’s Palace. All the same, Jasper and his siblings had decided to strengthen their holdings by growing.

But growth would not be happening now, thanks to the bastards who had lit up the building like it was Covent Garden fireworks.

“Randall ‘eard one of the lads gathered to watch the flames say it was Bradleys what done it,” Hugh confirmed.

“We can’t allow this to go unanswered,” Rafe growled at Jasper’s side.

His brother was not wrong. If the Bradleys were indeed responsible for setting fire to their building, then there would be hell to pay. A war in the rookeries. But that was just fine. Jasper had fought before. He would fight again. And he and his family would be the last ones standing.

“One lad?” he asked Hugh.

“And another what said ‘e saw Tim Bradley pokin’ about,” Hugh confirmed.

Rafe made a low noise of rage. “Those bloody bastards are going to pay for this.”

Yes, they would. And dearly too.

But as he stared at the smoldering remnants of what was to have been The Sinner’s Palace II, all he could think about was not the devastation of the fire or the need to retaliate against the Bradleys. No indeed. All he could think about was Octavia.

She had burst into his office when he had been in the process of disentangling himself from Mary, who had once shared his bed and was vying to return. There would be no return, as he had told her before she had thrown herself into him and attempted to persuade him by ramming her tongue down his throat.