A Rogue by Any Other Name (27 page)

“Without her?”

“Without her.”
But he wanted her.

He’d gone without things he wanted before. Survived.

“And how do you expect to explain that to the lady?”

“She doesn’t need me to have the life she wants. She can live where she wants, the way she wants, on my land, with my money. I’m happy to leave her to it.” He’d said it before, more than once, but it was becoming more difficult to believe.

“How do you envision that happening?” Chase fairly drawled. “You are married.”

“There are ways for her to be happy nonetheless.”

“And is that what you are looking for? Her happiness?”

He considered the words, heard the surprise in Chase’s tone. He certainly had not begun this journey with any thought of Penelope’s happiness. And still—even as he knew it made him the worst possible kind of husband—he would sacrifice her happiness for his revenge. But he was not a monster; if he could, he would keep her happy
and
ruin Langford.

As proof, he would honor her request not to touch her.

For he knew well enough that making a habit of taking his perfect, virginal bride to bed would be a mistake, as she was precisely the kind of woman who would want more.

Far more than he had to give.

So he would stay the hell away from her.

Even if he wanted her more than he could say.

“I forced her to marry me for a piece of land. The least I can do is think about what might make the lady content after our marriage has served its purpose. I’m sending her away the moment proof of Langford’s fall is mine.”

“Why?”

Because she deserves more.

He feigned disinterest. “I promised her freedom. And adventure.”

Chase chuckled at that. “Did you? I’m sure she was thrilled to accept it. She’s waited a long time since that first proposal—long enough to realize that most marriages aren’t worth the paper on which the licenses are printed. So you’ll honor the promise?”

Bourne did not look away from the pit floor. “I will.”

“Any adventure?”

Bourne turned his head. “What does that mean?”

“I mean, in my experience, ladies with excitement in their reach are rather . . . creative. Are you prepared for her to travel the globe? To toss your money away on frivolities? To host raucous parties and scandalize the
ton
? To take a lover?”

The last was spoken casually, but Bourne knew Chase was deliberately taunting him. “She may do whatever she likes.”

“So, should the lady choose, you’d allow her to cuckold you?”

He knew it was bait. Knew he should not rise. His fists clenched, nonetheless. “If she is discreet, it is not my concern.”

“You don’t want her for yourself?”

“No.”
Liar.

“An unsatisfying experience, was it? Best to let another handle her, then.”

Bourne resisted the urge to put Chase straight into the wall. He hated the very idea of another man’s touching her. Another man’s discovering her eagerness, her passion—more tempting than cards, than billiards, than roulette. She threatened his control, his tightly leashed desires, his long-hidden conscience.

He could not make her happy.

And it was only a matter of time before he would want to.

It was better this way.

For both of them.

The door to the owners’ suite opened, and Temple saved Bourne from having to continue the irritating conversation. The third man’s hulking silhouette blocked out the light beyond as he crossed the room. It was Saturday evening, and Chase, Cross, and Temple had a standing faro game.

Cross followed behind Temple, shuffling a deck of cards. He spoke, surprise in his tone. “Bourne is playing?”

Bourne ignored the temptation that flared at the question. He wanted to play. He wanted to lose himself in the simple, straightforward rules of the game. He wanted to pretend that there was nothing more to life than luck.

But he knew better.

Luck had not been on his side for a very long time.

“I’m not playing.”

The three hadn’t really expected him to join, but they always asked. Chase met his eyes. “Stay for a drink, then.”

If he stayed, Chase would push him farther. Would ask him more.

But if he left, Penelope would haunt him, making him feel like a dozen kinds of fool.

He stayed.

The others had taken their seats at the owners’ table, used only for this game—Temple, Cross, and Chase the only players. Bourne sat in the fourth chair, always at the table, never at the game.

Temple shuffled the cards, and Michael watched as they fanned through the big man’s fingers once, twice, before they flew across the table, the rhythm of smooth paper against thick baize a temptation in itself.

They’d played two hands in silence before Chase’s question came, clear and unyielding across the table. “And when she desires children?”

Temple and Cross hesitated in considering their cards, the question so unexpected that they could not help but show their interest. Cross spoke first, “When who desires children?”

Chase leaned back. “Bourne’s Penelope.”

Bourne did not like the possessive description.

Or perhaps he liked it too much.

Children.
They would require more than a father in London and a mother in the country. They would require more than a childhood spent living in the shadow of a gaming hell. And if they were girls, they would require more than a father with a sordid reputation. A father who ruined everything he touched.

Including their mother.

Shit.

“She will want them,” Chase pressed on. “She’s the type to want them.”

“How would you know?” Bourne asked, irritated that this was even a topic of discussion.

“I know a great deal about the lady.”

Temple and Cross now swung their attention to Chase. “Honestly?” Temple asked, disbelief in his tone.

“Is she horsefaced?” Cross asked. “Bourne says she’s not, but I think that must be the reason why he’s here with us instead of home, showing her how entertaining the late-night experiences of the Marchioness of Bourne can be.”

Irritation flared in Bourne. “Not all of us spend our evenings rutting like pigs.”

Cross considered his cards once more. “I prefer rabbits,” he said casually, drawing a bark of laughter from Temple before he looked to Chase once more. “Honestly, though. Tell us about the new Lady Bourne?”

Chase discarded. “She is not horsefaced.”

Bourne gritted his teeth.
No. She isn’t.

Cross leaned forward. “Is she dull?”

“To my knowledge, no,” Chase said, before turning to Bourne. “Is she dull?”

A vision flashed of Penelope traipsing through the snow in the dead of night with a lantern before announcing that she was in search of inland pirates, followed by a memory of her naked, spread across his fur coverlet. He shifted in his seat. “She is in no way dull.”

Temple lifted a card. “Then what is wrong with you?”

There was a pause, and Bourne looked from one partner to the next, each wider-eyed than the last. “Honestly, you’re all like gossiping, scandal-loving women.”

Chase raised a brow. “For that, I’m telling them.” There was a pause, as the others leaned forward, waiting. “What’s wrong with him is that he’s committed to sending the lady away.”

Temple looked up. “For how long?”

“Forever.”

Cross pursed his lips together and turned to Bourne. “Is it because she was a virgin? Really, Bourne. You can’t fault her for that. I mean, Lord knows why, but most of the aristocratic nobs out there value the trait. Give her time. She’ll learn.”

Bourne clenched his teeth. “She did just fine.”

Temple leaned in, all seriousness. “Did she not like it?”

Chase snickered, and Bourne narrowed his eyes to slits. “You are enjoying yourself, are you not?”

“Quite.”

“Perhaps you could ask Worth for some advice,” Cross offered, discarding.

Chase picked up the card. “I’m happy to share from my personal experience, if you like.”

Temple grinned at his hand. “And I.”

It was all too much. “I do not need advice. She enjoyed it immensely.”

“I hear they don’t all enjoy it right off the bat,” Cross said.

“That is true,” Chase said, all expertise.

“It’s fine if she didn’t, old man,” Temple offered. “You can try again.”

“She enjoyed it.” Bourne’s voice was low and tight, and he thought he might kill the next person who spoke.

“Well, one thing is for certain,” Temple said, casually, and Bourne ignored the pang of disappointment that the enormous man was very likely the only one at the table he could not kill.

“What’s that?” Chase asked, discarding.

“If she wants children, someone’s going to have to do the deed.”

If she wanted children, he would do the deed.

Cross discarded. “If you’re sure she’s not ugly, I’m happy to—”

He did not finish the sentence. Bourne lunged at him, and the two went tumbling to the floor, in a cacophony of broken chairs, laughter, and the sound of flesh hitting bone.

Temple sighed, throwing his cards down to the table. “These games never end the way cards are supposed to end.”

“I thought good card games always end in a brawl,” Chase said. Cross and Bourne rolled into a chair, toppling it over as Justin entered the suite. The bespectacled man ignored Bourne and Cross, tumbling across the floor, and leaned low to whisper something to Temple and Chase.

Temple entered the fray then, a stray fist grazing the high arch of one of his cheeks, eliciting a wicked curse before he yanked Cross from Bourne. Pulling out a handkerchief, Cross wiped the blood from a cut just above his eye and leveled a long, knowing look at Bourne. “If you’re this high-strung on the first week of your marriage, you need to get that wife of yours into bed, or you need to get her out of your house.”

Bourne wiped a hand along one swollen lip, knowing the words were true.

“I need her. Without her, I haven’t got Langford.”

And if I touch her again, I might not let her go.

And then he’d ruin her just as he’d ruined everything else of value he’d ever had.

Cross’s eyes gleamed, one fast swelling shut, as though he’d heard Bourne’s thought with crystal clarity. “That limits your options, then.”

“Bourne,” Justin said, drawing his attention, “you’ve a note from Worth.”

A thrum of unease coursed through Bourne as he broke the seal of Hell House and read the few lines of text scrawled hastily across the paper. Disbelief and fury shot through him at the words.

Tommy Alles was in his house. With his wife.

He would kill him if he touched her.

He might kill him anyway.

With a wicked curse, Bourne was on his feet and headed for the door, halfway across the massive room before Chase spoke, “I’m told there’s a problem at the roulette table as well.”

“Bugger the roulette table,” he growled, yanking open the door to the owner’s suite.

“Well, considering your wife is down there, Cross might be willing, but—”

Bourne froze at the words, disbelief and dread settling in his gut as he registered his partners’ smirks. Barely retaining his control, he headed for the window to look down on the casino floor, drawn immediately to a cloaked figure standing at one side of the roulette field, one delicate hand reaching out to place a single gold coin on the numbered baize.

“It appears the lady is taking the adventure you promised,” Chase said, wryly.

No.

It could not be her. She would not have done something so foolish.

She would not have risked her sisters.

She would not have risked
herself.

Anything could happen to her down there, in the pit of vipers, surrounded by men who drank too much and wagered too much . . . men who were high on their winnings or driven to prove that they were in control of something, even if it was not their purse.

He cursed, dark and wicked, and set off for the door at a run.

A low whistle sounded, and Cross’s words followed behind him. “If her face is half as fine as her courage, I’ll happily take her off your hands.”

Over his dead body
.

Chapter Thirteen

Dear M—

Well, the Marchioness of Needham and Dolby is very proud indeed today. I had my coming out, presentation at court, vouchers to Almack’s and all, and there’s no question that I am a resounding success.

This should come as no surprise, as I’ve been officially on the marriage mart for nearly two weeks and I haven’t had a single interesting conversation. Not one, would you believe it? My mother’s angling for a duke, but it’s not as though there is a glut of young, eligible ones on hand.

I confess, I had hoped I might see you—at a ball, or a dinner or some affair this week, but you’ve gone missing, and all I am left with is foolscap.

An apt name. Fool indeed.

Unsigned

Dolby House, March 1820

Letter unsent

The Fallen Angel was magnificent.

Penelope had never seen anything so stunning as this place, this marvelous, lush, place, filled with candlelight and color, teeming with people who called out obscene bets and rolled with laughter, who kissed their dice and cursed their bad luck.

She had announced herself quietly, not wanting to reveal her identity but knowing that if she did not tell the men guarding the entrance her name, she would not be allowed inside. Their eyes had gone wide as she’d spoken her identity, naming her husband and lingering in the shadows of the entryway, waiting for them to decide they believed her.

When one of the large men had grinned wide and knocked twice on the inner door to the club with a fist the size of a ham, the door had opened just barely. “Bourne’s lady. Best let ’er in.”