Luck Be a Lady

by Meredith Duran

  “Oh, I . . .” Catherine blew out a breath, then locked her hands together in her lap, hunting for a neat summary. But the challenge overwhelmed her. Had Lilah appeared a day ago, how much simpler the tale would have been! She felt a pang of loss for the possibility she had glimpsed—the sweetness of a simpler conclusion. A . . . happy ever after, even.

  The opiates must have accounted for that wild hope. They had invested her with a foreign optimism, spinning a fledgling dream that now seemed bizarre and embarrassingly foolish. But yesterday, she might have said . . .

  She might have said that for the first time in her life, she had done something wild, and she had no regrets. None.

  “I married your uncle to save Everleigh’s.” That was a fine place to start.

  “Married him!” Lilah pressed herself back in her chair, as though to physically distance herself from these tidings. “You married him?”

  “Yes, that’s what I said.” Asperity seemed to open a road for her, show her how to advance. “Peter, you see, was planning to sell the auction rooms. And unless I was married, I had no authority to oppose him.”

  “And you thought Nick was the best choice?” Lilah covered her mouth with one slim hand, a diamond band glinting on her wedding finger. But her snort sounded suspiciously like a laugh.

  Catherine scowled. “It seemed a very fine choice. He promised not to interfere with me. He signed the very contract that—” She hesitated, suddenly conscious of the delicacy of this tangent.

  With her usual bluntness, Lilah pushed right through the pause. “The same contract my husband signed for you. It’s all right, Catherine; that was a strange time, back in the spring.”

  “So it was.” She offered a grateful smile. “And I rather thought the arrangement was . . . perfect, after all. Peter, you see, had everything to lose from such a marriage. We told him we’d keep it a secret from the public, provided he . . . behaved himself.”

  “Blackmail!” As Lilah arched her dark brows, she looked, briefly and powerfully, like her uncle, and the resemblance raised such a strong wave of feeling that Catherine turned away from it, fumbling for her teacup.

  It would be lukewarm by now. She blew on it anyway. “I hope . . .” She took a sip and winced. Oolong did not profit by cooling. “I hope we can remain friends.”

  “What?” Lilah leaned over to touch her arm. “What’s this? Why wouldn’t we be friends?”

  She turned the cup in her hands. No handle, floral motif in cobalt blue against white. Deep saucers, too. Dresden, eighteenth century. Five pounds at auction for this cup alone.

  Lilah was waiting. Catherine returned the cup to its saucer. “I know your uncle has not always been a friend to you.” Indeed, he had demanded certain favors of Lilah during her employment at Everleigh’s that might well have cost her position. Catherine swallowed, surprised by herself. How had she forgotten that? O’Shea had cast a spell on her, maybe, but now that she was free of the enchanted atmosphere of Diamonds, she remembered again. She clung to the facts. “He forced you to thieve for him. Had anyone discovered it—why, I would have sacked you.” The thought amazed her. “Had I learned of it before I knew you, you would have been thrown onto the street. You never would have met Lord Palmer, and . . .”

  Lilah’s face had darkened. “I don’t like to think on it,” she said slowly. “Of course, Nick’s the reason I made it to Everleigh’s in the first place. He funded my education. He took me in after my dad died. So . . . I’ve made my peace with him. He’s the only family I’ve got.” She blinked, then brought her hands together in a clap. “Why, but that’s not true, now. If you’re married to him—we’re family.”

  Catherine smiled. “Aunt to a viscountess? How I’ve come up in the world,” she said dryly, with a wave around the grand chamber.

  Lilah followed her gesture, and burst into a laugh. “Isn’t it ridiculous? A cream carpet! I can’t imagine where Christian found it.”

  But after a moment of shared laughter, Catherine sobered again. “You remember the betrothal contract, I think. There was a provision in it. You and I shan’t stay family forever. I only wish . . . your uncle remembered the terms.”

  “All right, then.” Lilah looked grim suddenly. “What’s he done?” Chair legs thumped as she dragged her seat closer. “Why were you locked in that room?”

  Catherine hesitated. “He has never abused me—”

  “No, of course not. It’s not in him to abuse a woman,” Lilah said readily. “But it isn’t like him to lock her up, either.”

  Catherine sighed. “I think I must tell you the whole story.”

  And so she did—omitting nothing, not even the fact they had been intimate, though she mentioned this in a delicate euphemism, which Lilah showed she understood only by the slight widening of her eyes. By the time Catherine finished, the light had faded from the long windows overlooking the park across the street, and Lilah sat in slack-jawed silence, her astonishment so clear that it almost embarrassed Catherine to look on her.

  “I’ve made a hash of things,” she admitted softly. “Our . . . entanglement was never meant to be so . . . profound.”

  “Catherine.” Lilah shook her head. “I’ve never . . . the way you speak of him. You sure it’s just about a contract now?”

  She took a deep breath and reached for her courage. “Perhaps it . . . might not have been. But the terms of that contract are not incidental. Lilah, I won’t have my will suborned, my freedom compromised. And he has shown now that he will do so. That he will override my judgment when he sees fit.” She bit her lip, frustrated by how flimsy her objection seemed when spoken aloud. After all he had done for her, it would be no wonder if an onlooker faulted her for taking exception to his attempt to keep her safe.

  But . . . “You know me, Lilah. How can I trust a man who would do that? For nothing about my life seems safe and civil to an ordinary man. I deal with strangers constantly at my work. Sometimes I speak with gentlemen in private, without chaperonage. I travel the streets without escort. Everything else I hold dear depends on my independence—”

  “Everything else?” Lilah asked softly.

  She grimaced. “A slip of the tongue.”

  But perhaps a telling one.

  “Catherine.” Lilah was gazing at her with transparent sympathy. “I can’t tell you that my uncle will be bound by a contract. He’s got a code, all right, but it was never one and the same with the law’s.”

  “I know that,” she said quietly.

  “And he’s stubborn as a mule. If he decides something is the right thing to do—if he sees a way to make things work out as he wants them to—he’ll take it. He won’t pause to ask your feelings about it.”

  “That is very clear to me now.” How bitter those words tasted!

  “But it will always be in your favor,” Lilah added. “He talks a hard business. But for all that he’s twisted my arm in his time, he’s never done me wrong in the end. Why . . . he even helped Christian, when it came to it, though there’s no love lost between them. He did that for me. He’d do anything for the people he loves.”

  Catherine crossed her arms. The room suddenly felt very cold. “He hasn’t spoken that word. I’m not sure it’s in his vocabulary.”

  “Is it in yours?”

  She closed her eyes. It was there. It sat in her throat like a hard knot she could not swallow. She had no practice in speaking it anymore. In her childhood home, that word had been measured out like toxic medicine, used only in moments of direst necessity—save with her father.

  But she had known how to earn his love. She’d been well equipped for that. And she’d asked nothing in return for it. A child had no right to do so.

  But if a woman had any respect for herself, she must make such demands.

  “You look tired,” Lilah murmured. “You’ll stay here, won’t you? For as long as you like. It’s safe here. Your brother won’t guess it.”

  “I’ll have to confront him. I need back into Everleigh’
s. I have an auction to arrange.” She opened her eyes. “Unless your uncle withdraws his estate to punish me.”

  Lilah’s face softened. “That’s not his way, Catherine. And I think you know it.”

  “Yes,” she said after a moment. “I do.”

  “I’ll talk to Christian about arranging a guard for you.” Lilah rose, taking Catherine by the hand to draw her up. “But what should I say if Nick comes knocking?”

  The thought caused a thousand butterflies to flutter through Catherine’s stomach. “You think he will?”

  Lilah rolled her eyes. “With what you’ve told me? I give him another two hours at most.”

  The butterflies, this solid lump in her throat . . . she needed time to digest them. “I’ll speak to him when I’m ready,” she said. “But it will be my own decision, not his. And it won’t be tonight.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Five days in a row, Nick went knocking on the door at Palmer’s townhouse in Grosvenor Square. Five days in a row, hat under his arm, clothes brushed, collar starched, every button fastened, like a goddamned idiot he walked up those steps and let Lily’s bloody butler turn him away like trash.

  On the sixth day, he kept himself in Whitechapel. A man’s pride could only endure so much. It didn’t stretch to sending her the letter he’d tried to write—half a ream of paper in the rubbish, his chicken-scratch scrawl growing more illegible at each pass.

  He wouldn’t apologize for what he’d done. He’d done enough, damn it, to prove himself to her. He’d broken her out of a madhouse. He’d made love to her until she couldn’t stand. He’d lain awake long nights beforehand, keeping his hands to himself while her eyes all but begged him to take her, but her lips still said no.

  And he was restraining himself from killing her brother, to the wonder of every man in his service, all of them rotating by lots through the watch they kept on Everleigh’s comings and goings, making clear to him, through their very presence at his heels, that he wasn’t to approach the auction rooms. Aye, Nick was keeping his finger off the trigger for her sake alone, though God knew the dog needed to be put down, because if locking her in a room for a couple of hours was enough to cast her into a cold, distant silence, then no doubt of it, putting her brother into the grave would drive her away forever.

  He distracted himself. He met again with Pilcher, this time at a gentleman’s club in St. James, a snooty place where you could hear a pin drop, or, for that matter, a man’s stifled belch—and by God, but these toffs were a bean-eating lot, by the sound of them.

  He’d outbid Pilcher by five hundred pounds in the end, and had been prepared to take it to the streets afterward if that was what Pilcher required. But the swell had surprised him. He’d written to Nick the next day.

  You have no reason to take mercy on me. I only lay out the facts for you now: I have rashly committed myself to a certain group of builders, accepting money from them that I cannot repay. They expect those parcels to be made available for development. I am ruined; very well. But they threaten my family now, and this is not something I know how to face.

  They have expressed an interest in dealing with you. Accordingly, and only with your permission, I would offer to make your acquaintance with these builders, so you might consider their offer. I believe they would be willing to revise their plans for Orton Street in a way that accommodated the two buildings you currently offer on lease.

  The arrangement would profit you handsomely. In full honesty, while I no longer bear any hope of repairing my own finances, I would also stand to profit, by the alleviation of the dangers currently posed to my family.

  In short, Pilcher wanted protection.

  At his club, they dined on an overdone roast that Nick’s own cook would have tossed into the rubbish. Pilcher, it was clear from the start, wanted to pretend that they were gentlemen, dining together as a matter of course.

  Nick had no use for the pretense. “A few things first,” he said flatly. “Catherine Everleigh.”

  “Catherine . . .” Pilcher blinked. “Peter’s sister, do you mean?”

  “Aye. You had designs on her. I want those scrubbed from your brain.”

  “Designs?” Pilcher’s fork sagged; he looked honestly baffled. “Peter did speak of . . . That is, for a time, I considered courting her. But that was when it seemed that her brother would make a profitable partner in business. Of course, if he pushes through the sale of that auction house, he may have the money—”

  “He won’t,” Nick said. “That’s been off the table for a while.”

  “Indeed?” Pilcher’s eyes narrowed. “Typical that I did not know it. Well, then.” He shrugged. “She’d be of no use to me now. Money is the thing, old fellow.”

  It was the coldness of his assessment that persuaded Nick. Just like a toff to evaluate a woman the way he would a stock. “All right, then. These builders. Who are they?”

  Gradually they worked out a deal. Nick knew the corporation; St. Giles men, who had built a music hall in Seven Dials that was doing brisk business. Pilcher was right to feel out of his depths, but Nick understood their kind. He proposed to cut a deal that spared Pilcher their threats; even offered to stand Pilcher the money to repay them, though his rate of interest caused Pilcher to choke. Or perhaps that was only the fault of the overcooked roast.

  In return, he wanted one thing. “You put Peter Everleigh off the Board of Works.”

  Pilcher considered this for a moment as he took up his brandy. “I might be able to arrange it,” he said slowly, swirling the glass. “He’s not popular; I believe I could muster the votes. But he will fight, of course. He’ll cling to his position like a cat to a wall.” He smirked. “He nurses political ambitions, you see.”

  Nick did see. Suddenly he saw a solution for the whole mess. “Then you take him this proposal,” he said. “Can you get a pen and paper around here?”

  Pilcher snapped at a passing server, who fetched over a sheet. Then, in slow, methodical detail, Nick explained what he required if Pilcher wished to be spared the further attentions of the St. Giles crew.

  He’d always preferred strategy to bloodshed. In the past, finding that kind of solution would have left Nick well satisfied with his day’s work. But his mood was oddly bleak as he returned to Diamonds. Never count chickens before they hatched. He wouldn’t celebrate triumph, just yet.

  And maybe it would ring empty anyway.

  He hung over the railing as he waited for his supper, but the usual comforts—the resplendent luxury of the interior; the sight of the crowds, jammed shoulder to shoulder on the floor below—left him unmoved. He didn’t try to kid himself about the reason for it. He was a fool, but countless men before him had been struck down by the same idiocy. He might have stood there all night, staring at nothing, had Callan not interrupted him.

  “Note came,” Callan said.

  “Put it on my desk.”

  “Note from Mayfair.”

  Nick turned. “What’s that?”

  Callan passed over the envelope, handsomely stamped in wax. “Lily’s footman. Wore livery, if you can credit it. She’s risen high, ain’t she? Makes one wonder—”

  But Nick didn’t hear the rest. He was already making for the exit.

  * * *

  Nick had never stepped beyond Palmer’s entry hall. No interest in it. If Lily wanted to see him, he’d thought, they could meet at Diamonds or Neddie’s. Mayfair wore on his nerves. Wasn’t that he felt out of place here—he’d belong anywhere he cared to set foot, damn it. But the house felt lifeless. Too much marble, carpets threadbare. The rich in these parts liked to flaunt the age of their money. Nothing new, nothing bright. This house felt dead to him, cold and joyless, a testament to power with no care for comfort.

  But Lily seemed not to mind it. As she guided him down the hall, she even pointed out things to like. “That was Christian’s grandfather,” she said, gesturing to an oversized painting of a beady-eyed bloke perched stiffly on a horse. “He was a great rac
ing man. Six wins at Ascot.”

  He grunted. “Palmer’s done a lot of bragging, I see.”

  She looked over her shoulder to show him the twist of her mouth. “It’s called conversation, Nick. Some people speak openly of their family’s history, having nothing to hide.”

  “That right?” He caught up with her as she rounded a corner, disliking the feel of dogging her heels. “So what do you say when Palmer’s fine friends ask after yours?”

  She drew up by a set of folding-doors, facing him. “I tell them I don’t have much family to speak of,” she said. “But I have an uncle, who raised me as best he knew how. And then I throw in a joke about hopeless bachelors, and everyone laughs, and the subject passes onward.”

  He allowed himself a faint smile. That was a kinder reply than he deserved. “Hopeless, am I?”

  “Until recently.” She hesitated, searching his face. “But maybe you’ll surprise me. You told me once, Nick—I remember it like yesterday—that life will always give you a reason to look away from opportunities. But courage means grabbing them, no matter the circumstances. Do you remember that?”

  He did. She’d been seventeen, stricken with grief for her late sister. He’d been mourning, himself—battling with guilt over not having done more. Not having noticed Fiona’s pain earlier, when the surgeon might have made a difference.

  He’d been at a loss as to how to help Lily. Finally, he’d reenrolled her at that typing school that she and Fiona had favored. But she’d turned it down, saying there was no point in aiming higher, now that Fiona was gone.

  “You took that advice,” he said. By God, had she ever. “You took it further than I ever guessed you would.” He looked beyond her, at the marble walls, the statuary. In the distance, somewhere, a fountain made a musical splashing. “This place suits you, I guess. It’s what you deserved.”

  She smiled, the kind of soft, secretive, satisfied smile that belonged to a lady without any sharp edges. She’d been nothing but, once upon a time. If Palmer had smoothed those edges away, then Nick would find a way to rub along with him, no matter what it took.