Roughly hewn and dimly lit, it was empty, save for the middle stool where someone sat hunched over a tall pint, their face shielded by a hat.
“That must be him,” Helena whispered. “Mr. Bishop. He’s shorter than I pictured he’d be.”
“What do we do?” Calliope whispered back.
“Introduce ourselves, I suppose.” Squaring her shoulders, the countess marched up to the bar and thrust out her hand. “Mr. Bishop,” she said pleasantly, “I’d like to introduce myself. I am Lady Helena Ware, and this is Lady Winchester. We’ve come on a discreet errand in the hopes of employing your services.”
“There isn’t anything discreet about you,” the thief-taker said dryly. He lifted his head, and Calliope gasped again. So did Helena.
The two friends exchanged a shocked glance.
“But you’re…you’re a woman,” Helena blurted.
“So I’m told.” Jumping nimbly off the stool, Art Bishop removed her hat. A long rope of tawny gold hair tumbled down her back. With a smirk, she stretched her arms high over her head. “Were you expecting someone else?”
“N-no,” Calliope stammered. “It’s just that…”
“You assumed I was a man.”
“Yes,” said Helena. “We did.”
The thief-taker flashed a grin. Now that Calliope knew she was woman, it was hard to fathom how she’d ever mistaken Art for the opposite sex. Despite her manly attire–an oversized tailcoat, white shirt, and breeches that bunched at the knees–Art Bishop’s delicate bone structure was obviously female. She had winged eyebrows a shade darker than her hair, large, luminous eyes as blue as the ocean, a narrow nose, and full lips. If she were dressed in a gown with her hair in an elegant twist, she wouldn’t have been out of place in a ballroom.
“Not to worry. It’s a common mistake. My full name is Artemis, but around here, everyone either calls me Art or Bishop.” She shook Helena’s hand. “Do you want a drink?”
“Oh,” Calliope said, looking dubiously at the row of dirty tin tankards sitting on a dusty shelf behind the bar. “We couldn’t possibly–”
“We’d love to,” Helena interceded.
“Smithy is having a quick tup at Molly’s. I’m in charge until he gets back.” With impressive athleticism, Art launched herself over the bar and promptly filled three cups to overflowing with dark, frothy ale. “Cheers.”
“Cheers,” Helena and Calliope echoed as they picked up their tankards.
“So,” said Art after she’d taken a liberal sip. “What brings two fine ladies to this part of town? Something dire, I’d wager. Unless you’ve decided to apply for work at Molly’s? I heard she’s looking a few new girls.”
Calliope and Helena stared at each other.
Art gave a peal of laughter. “I’m jesting! I’m only jesting. You should see your faces.”
“Ha, ha,” Calliope said weakly. “Very amusing.”
“We’re here because our friend, Percy, has been kidnapped.” Helena slid onto a stool. “We believe the Duke of Glastonbury hired someone to take her.”
Art leaned against the shelf and tilted her head. “Why would a duke do a thing like that?”
“Because Percy is his wife,” Calliope explained.
“And she ran away from him after he nearly beat her to death,” Helena added grimly. “We’ve been protecting her ever since.”
“Well, you haven’t done a very good job, have you?” Reaching for her tankard, Art took another drink. “I want to help you, ladies. Truly, I do. But I’m not about to get tangled up in a duke’s affairs.”
“We have money to pay you.” Untying her reticule from her wrist, Calliope spilled its contents onto the bar. “Almost five pounds to start.”
Art smiled thinly. Then, she pulled out a silver dagger. It was small but sharp, and she handled it with ease, flipping the blade from her left hand to her right. “And what’s to prevent me from taking those coins and slitting both your throats?”
Instinctively Calliope’s fingers wrapped around her neck. “I…”
“Because there’s more where that came from,” Helena said smoothly. “Much more. Our friend is very valuable to us.”
“She must be, to go through all this trouble.” The thief-taker held up her dagger and studied her reflection in the flat of the blade. Peeling back her lips, she picked something from between her teeth. “All right. I’ll help you. Five pounds to start, fifty when I find this friend of yours.”
“Fifty pounds?” Helena yelped. “I know I said there’s more, but that’s blind robbery! Do you realize how many hats I could buy with fifty pounds? Infinite. An infinite amount of hats. Red hats. Felt hats. Feathered hats. Hats with–”
“Helena,” said Calliope with a strained smile, “why don’t we agree to give the nice lady with the knife what she wants?”
“Fine,” the countess grumbled. “But Percy better be found.”
Art tucked her dagger away. “Consider it done.”
Chapter Eight
That evening, Lucas had invited Percy to dine with him.
She was reluctant to accept the invitation. After her impulsive kiss, she didn’t trust herself around him.
The irony wasn’t lost on her.
Still, between taking a tray of food in her bedchamber and being allowed to move about the house, what choice did she have but the latter? True to her word, Bessie had drawn her a bath, and after soaking in the luxurious bubbles for what felt like hours, she’d dressed, brushed out her hair, and joined her kidnapper in the dining room.
Lucas stood when she entered, those golden eyes sliding over her with an intensity that had her plucking self-consciously at her skirt.
“I…I didn’t know what to wear,” she said, gathering a handful of muslin fabric. The blue gown with its ivory brocade overlay was far more suited for a night at the theater than a simple dinner for two, but in her haste to pack, she hadn’t brought anything more suitable.
“It’s perfect.” Lucas swallowed audibly, then walked down the length of the long table draped in white cloth and pulled out a chair. “I hope you’re hungry. Bessie has outdone herself.”
Feeling rather like a hen sitting down to dine with a fox, Percy sank gracefully into the chair and braced her hands on the armrests as Lucas slid her towards the table. He lingered behind her a full minute more than he should have, and she could have sworn she heard the gallop of his heartbeat through his impeccably tailored waistcoat before he moved away.
“This is lovely,” she said when the food arrived.
Lucas grunted in agreement, and they began their meal in the prickly, awkward silence of strangers left alone together. Which was what they were, of course. Strangers. Except when she’d kissed him, he hadn’t felt like a stranger. In those moments of heat and passion, her soul had recognized his.
And in that recognition she’d found the acceptance she had been starving for all her life.
Now they sat at opposite ends of a table that might as well have been an ocean, and Percy honestly didn’t know if she wanted to sail as far away from him as she could possibly get, or dive overboard and swim straight into his arms.
Within the first choice lay the opportunity to escape. With the second came almost certain death. Certainly there’d at least be sharks. Yesterday, the decision would have been obvious. But suddenly the answer wasn’t so clear.
“The chicken is excellent,” she said tentatively, her fork poised in mid-air. “Very moist.”
“Bessie is a good cook,” Lucas replied. In the flickering candlelight, he appeared every inch the formidable rogue that he was. But for some reason, Percy wasn’t intimidated.
Quite the opposite.
Against her will, she found herself drawn to Lucas’s inherent wickedness. His dark charm had mesmerized her. His mysterious allure had captivated her. She should have been terrified of him. Especially after everything she’d endured at the hands of her husband. But despite what Lucas was, and despite what he’d done, there
was one thing that set him apart from Andrew.
He made her feel safe.
There was no rhyme to it. No reason. Lucas had kidnapped her. Taken her to the other side of London. Locked her in a room. But he’d also brought her sweet muffins. Held her while she cried. Kissed her until she saw stars. Given her a lady’s maid. Promised to protect her from the duke.
Her fingers tightened around the fork.
“How much did he pay you?” she asked quietly.
Lucas sipped his wine, a red Madeira that Percy had yet to taste. “Who?”
“My husband. How much did he pay you to kidnap me?”
“Enough.”
“And yet you said you’re not going to do it. You’re not going to give me to him.”
His gaze shuttered. “No. I’m not.”
“Why?” she asked, genuinely confused. Lucas was a criminal. He’d made no effort to hide it. So what was preventing him from following through on the bargain he’d struck with her husband? A bargain that (if she knew Andrew, which she did) was almost guaranteed to be incredibly lucrative. “If you were paid for a job–”
“The job I was paid for wasn’t the job I was given,” Lucas said curtly. “Your husband”–he spat out the word in disgust–“neglected to mention all of the details when he employed my services.”
“What details are those?”
Lucas’s eyes were shimmering pools of barely restrained fury. “The fact that he beat you. Not once, or twice, but dozens of times, if I had to guess. The fact that he’ll do it again, and keep doing it until you’re either dead or withdrawn so far into yourself that you might as well be.”
Percy flinched at Lucas’s brutal honesty.
She couldn’t help it.
But when she spoke, she was proud that her voice was steady and even. “Yes, he did. And he will. Andrew is horrible. I regret I ever met him. I never should have married him. But why would that matter to you?”
Lucas stood up so fast his chair fell over. “Why would it matter to me?” he said incredulously, slapping his hands on the table with enough force to rattle the dishes. “Why would it matter to me?”
Panic fluttered in Percy’s throat. She managed–barely–to hold it at bay. “If Andrew hired you, I can only assume it was for your expertise. Which means you’ve done this before. Do you swoop in and rescue all the damsels in distress you come across?”
Or am I special to you?
The question rested on the tip of her tongue, but she didn’t dare say it aloud. How could she, when she didn’t know what she wanted his answer to be?
“You’re not a damsel, Persephone. Any more than I’m a knight in shining armor. Damsels are weak. And you…” A muscle ticked high in his jaw. “You may just be the strongest woman I’ve ever met. I am not a good man, love. I am not a hero. But I’ve enough decency left in me to understand the difference between right and wrong, and turning you over to that filth wouldn’t just be wrong. It’d be a bloody sin.”
“Oh. I…I see.” It was all she could think to say as Lucas righted his chair and sat back down. This time when he drank his wine she picked up her own glass and joined him, indulging in a deep swallow to calm her frayed nerves.
Bessie came in to remove the second course and deliver the third, a rich chocolate cake drizzled in raspberry sauce and topped with a generous dollop of sweet cream. Percy’s mouth watered when she saw it, and she scooted to the edge of her seat in anticipation.
Lucas took note of the small movement. “Do you’ve a sweet tooth, love?”
“A tiny one,” she admitted, her gaze on the sumptuous dessert.
Andrew had always limited her sugar. “It’s for our own goo” he’d told her on their wedding day when she’d requested a second piece of cake. “I don’t want a fat wife”. Newly married and not wanting to displease her husband, she’d obeyed the decree. It was only one request, she had reasoned. What as the harm? Little did she know it was but the first of many, and by the end of their first year together, Andrew’s rules would comprise her entire world.
Do this, not that.
Listen to me, not yourself.
Wear what I’ve selected, not what you want.
From sunup to sundown, he had been in charge of her every movement. Her every word. Her every idea. She’d lived in constant fear of disappointing him. Of making him have to discipline her. Which was how he’d always made it seem. Not that he was hurting her, but that she’d chosen to be hurt by not listening
As an old, familiar cramp twisted within her belly, Percy looked away from the dessert.
“I’m…I’m no longer hungry,” she said softly.
From the other end of the table, Lucas lowered the knife he’d been using to cut the cake into slices. “What’s wrong?”
“There isn’t anything wrong. I…I just lost my appetite. That’s all.” She could feel his gaze upon her as she stared at her lap, and she bit hard the inside of her cheek when she heard the legs of his chair scrape across the floor. He brought her a plate and then knelt beside her, his left arm going around her back while his right picked up her fork.
“Glastonbury isn’t here, love.” Lucas’s gentle understanding brought a flood of tears rushing to Percy’s eyes. She blinked them away as he scooped up a bite of cake. “The only power he has left over you resides in that beautiful, clever mind of yours.”
“I know that. I do,” she insisted, her emotional proclamation more for her own benefit than Lucas’s. “But I still hear him. I still…I still fear him. And I hate it. I hate that he still has control over me.” A single tear trickled down her cheek. She dashed it away. “I hate that I am crying over a dessert. A dessert that I am afraid to eat because if he was here, he wouldn’t let me.”
“Except he isn’t here.” Lucas put his hand on her shoulder. “I am. And I say you can eat all the damned cake you want. Or none at all. Because it’s your decision. It’s your decision, love, and he only has as much control over you as you allow.”
In her heart, she knew Lucas was right.
But it was her head that she still needed to convince.
“It does look like a very nice cake,” she whispered.
“Why not try it, and find out?”
Percy opened her mouth.
Carefully, Lucas slid the fork between her lips.
“How is it?” he murmured after she’d chewed and swallowed.
She smiled through her tears. “Better than I could have imagined.”
“Good. Then you should have another bite.” He fed her the chocolatey dessert with all the tender care of a parent spooning broth to a sick child. And when he was done, he scooped her up and carried her all the way to her bedchamber.
“This really isn’t necessary,” she protested, even as she nestled into his chest and closed her eyes. Lucas might not have been a knight or a hero, but he was warmth and safety and reassurance. Her source of serenity in the midst of a violent storm. She didn’t know what would come once the skies cleared and the winds stopped howling, but for now…for now, she would cling to what was, and do her best to let go of what had been.
When they reached her temporary quarters, Lucas released her, his rough hands trailing down her arms before he stepped away. “I have to go out for a bit, but Bessie will be here should you need anything.”
“You’re leaving?” As anxiety bubbled through her calm, she twisted her fingers together. “But–”
“No one knows where this house is,” he said, cutting her off. “No one knows you’re here. This is the safest place for you in all of London.”
She drew a breath. “You’ll return soon?”
“As soon as I can.” He turned to the door. Hesitated. Without meeting her gaze, he said, “I’m glad you enjoyed the cake, love.”
Then he was gone, leaving Percy to wait…and to yearn.
Bollocks. Bollocks. Bollocks.
As Lucas strode out of the house and into the night, he cursed steadily and silently.
He
’d gone and done it this time. There would be no coming back from this. At least not without a great deal of trouble and heartache.
Two things he’d always tried to avoid at all costs.
Hailing a hackney as a misting rain began to fall, he directed the driver to the Fox and Bull, a hole in the wall tavern tucked away at the end of an alley in the middle of Seven Dials. Nodding a curt greeting to a few familiar faces, he proceeded to sit at the farthest end of the bar and ordered a pint and a glass of gin besides. Slugging back the second and taking a sip of the first, he glared into the amber ale as he wondered how he had allowed it to happen. And what the hell he was going to do about it.
When all this had started, his plan had been simple enough.
Kidnap the girl, bring her to the duke, collect the money.
How bloody difficult was that?
Three steps to follow.
An imbecile could do it.
But while step one had been as easy as taking a sugar stick from a baby, the other two had proven much more difficult. Especially now that he’d gone and fallen in love.
Swearing again, out loud this time, Lucas slid his empty glass across the bar and nodded to indicate he’d like another. He didn’t normally imbibe to excess. It dulled the wits and made him vulnerable to any young upstart looking to make a name for himself by toppling the Devil of Duncraven. But if there was ever a time to drink, surely it was the night he’d lost his heart.
He didn’t even know when Persephone had stolen it from him.
The second he’d laid eyes upon her?
When she’d threatened to stab him with a paintbrush?
After she’d sobbed in his arms?
During their first kiss?
While he’d knelt beside her at the table?
Maybe it was all of the above. A culmination of tiny moments that had softened something inside of him just enough for her to slip through the cracks and steal his heart.
And he was supposed to be the thief.
With a bitter chuckle, Lucas downed the second gin.
“Getting right foxed this evening, are we?” Without invitation, Artemis Bishop, an old acquaintance, occasional ally, and general pain in the arse, slid onto the stool next to his and shoved her elbow into his ribs. “What’s the occasion?”
Desiring the Devil of Duncraven (Secret Wallflower Society Book 3) Page 6