Sharp Love (Gambling on Love)

by March, Ava

  They found two empty stools next to each other and near one end of the table that was shaped in a half-circle. Jack took the stool with the best view of the roulette wheel. The moment the dealer picked up the deck to begin a new game, Will’s attention shifted to the cards. His posture was one of casual nonchalance, elbows resting on the edge of the table and shoulders slack, yet a fire could have broken out in the room and he would not have noticed.

  For the first two games, Will kept his bets surprisingly low. Which was a good thing, as he lost one of those hands. But on the third game, he tripled his bet. And won. And continued winning. Jack couldn’t figure out how Will was doing it. Wasn’t as if Will was dealing the cards. The man had no control of the deck.

  Whatever his trick, Will was certainly faring better than himself or Tilden. From the way Tilden’s face fell when the croupier called out “Black twenty,” he had clearly lost, and judging from the whole body slump, it hadn’t been his first loss.

  “Evening, Drake.” A man of indistinct middle-age and with oily dark hair sat on the recently vacated stool on the other side of Will.

  Rather than try to remember the best tactic for a nine and a six, Jack waved a hand over his two cards, signaling a stay.

  Will cast a quick glance to the fellow, gave him a single nod, and tapped a finger once on the faded green baize, requesting another card.

  It was no surprise to Jack when the dealer snatched his own single chip from the table and pushed a respectable-sized stack to Will.

  “Table to your liking?” the man asked, joining the next game.

  The fellow received another single nod from Will, who split his two tens and came out the victor yet again.

  “I’ve won a few spare coins.” As the man reached forward to grab the chips he’d won from the dealer, he leaned closer to Will. “Care to earn them?” he asked in an undertone that made its way to Jack’s alert ears.

  Pardon?

  “Didn’t rain last night,” the man continued in that same low tone, chin tipped down, gaze on his winnings, as he righted his stack of chips. “No puddles in the alley.”

  Every muscle in Jack’s body went taut. It was all he could do to keep from reaching across Will and grabbing the bastard’s throat. If he started throwing punches, he would get himself evicted from the hell. Only the need to complete his errand tonight, to be able to deliver a report to Viscount Rawling before dawn, kept his right arm at his side.

  Will was capable of setting the bastard to right without employing his fists. Of simply unleashing his sharp tongue and correcting—

  “Not tonight,” Will replied, with a short shake of the head. He pocketed his stacks of chips and stood.

  Jack’s head snapped to his friend, who appeared completely unconcerned.

  What the bleeding hell?

  Was Will still doing that, too?

  “Let’s head to the cashier,” Will said to Jack.

  It took a moment for his meaning to penetrate the shocked outrage swamping Jack’s mind. Then he pulled his gaze off Will’s face and to the cashier’s cage situated along the opposite wall. A man clad in a navy coat and with chestnut brown hair stood before the counter. A quick check of the roulette wheel confirmed Tilden was no longer at the table.

  When had the man left?

  Damnation.

  With a firm reminder to keep his focus on his errand, Jack grabbed his three chips and pushed from the table.

  Over the heads of the other patrons and through the haze of cigar and cheroot smoke that always seemed to linger in such establishments, Jack saw Tilden turn from the cashier’s cage and walk toward the main door.

  As they wound around the roulette table, Jack touched Will’s upper arm to get his attention. “He’s leaving.”

  “Not to worry. We can return later to exchange our chips.”

  They left the hell. The moonlight peeking through the clouds provided enough light for them to spot Tilden heading east along the walkway. Keeping a good twenty paces or so behind him, they took up pursuit.

  What Will did with himself was not Jack’s concern anymore. It had stopped being his concern a decade ago, when Jack had finally obtained a paying position at Gillworth’s livery and moved into the livery’s garret with the other grooms. When he couldn’t take another day of worrying whether Will would make it back to their tiny hovel of a room.

  Yet he couldn’t keep the comment from coming out of his mouth. He was, though, able to keep his voice down. Sound traveled quite a bit at night. “That man back at the vingt-et-un table, his offer didn’t bother you in the slightest.”

  To which he received no response from Will. Not even a hitch in his loose stride.

  “You’re still doing that, aren’t you?”

  Will shrugged. “Far be it for me to turn down an opportunity to earn a few coins.”

  He had suspected, but to actually hear Will confirm the truth? And for Will to be so blasé and unconcerned? Back when they were living on their own, after they’d ran away from their hell of an apprenticeship at the coal mine and had made a pact never to return to the St. Pancras workhouse, Jack had known Will sometimes disappeared down dark alleys with strange men. Jack had hated it. Hated knowing his friend was selling his mouth to keep them from spending their nights huddled in some doorway. But there hadn’t been much Jack could do about it then. Their options for honest employment had been nonexistent.

  But they weren’t adolescents with dirty faces and empty bellies anymore. They were grown men of six-and-twenty.

  And there was absolutely no doubt in Jack’s mind—that man back at the hell had been offering to pay Will to suck him off, and on at least one instance in the past, Will had taken that man up on his offer.

  “There are other ways to earn money,” Jack reminded him, not making any effort to keep the censure from his tone. “Honest ways, that don’t include selling yourself. Have you no self-respect?”

  The line of Will’s shoulders tightened. He shot Jack a glance, full of hurt and fallen pride. “Not everyone can be as perfect as you, Jack.”

  Only Will could make him feel like a condescending arse in the blink of an eye. “I still worry about you, Will.”

  “You needn’t bother.”

  But he couldn’t help it. Couldn’t stop the innate need to protect Will, to keep him safe. He had hoped moving away from Will would cure him of it, but living at the livery had made it worse. Both of them in the same area but only seeing Will sporadically, fretting he’d find Will’s lifeless body in some gutter, and the occasions when he’d had to come to Will’s aid had not helped in the slightest. Even the horses’ soothing presence hadn’t eased the near-constant worry. When the duke had offered Jack a position at his stables six years ago, Jack’s eagerness to accept hadn’t been borne solely out of a desire to secure such a respectable position, but also to put more physical distance between himself and Will.

  Problem was, distance hadn’t cured him. The need was lodged deep in his bones, in his very soul, and being with Will again, being near him again, fanned that old need back to a full, overpowering force.

  “Doesn’t change the fact I do worry about you, Will. I wish you wouldn’t accept such offers. You don’t need to do that anymore.”

  “How can you know what I do and do not need to do?” Will stopped in his tracks, effectively pulling Jack to a stop without laying a hand on him. “You left ten years ago.”

  Jack sighed. “It was for the best. We were arguing more often than not, remember?” By the time they were sixteen, his worry had begun venting itself through anger and frustration. Frustration at Will for not even making the barest of efforts to secure an honest position. And anger at Will for putting himself at risk, for continuing to choose dishonest and dangerous means to keep that roof over their heads, no matter Jack’s protests.

  For the longest moment, Will stared at him, mouth pressed in a hard line.

  “He just turned the corner,” Will stated.

  Jack quick
ly glanced over his shoulder. Tilden’s shadowed form was nowhere to be seen.

  “If you don’t go after him, you’ll lose him.”

  Was Will still upset with him for leaving to work at the livery? Or had he merely thrown that comment out to push the topic off himself?

  “He turned left.”

  Will continued to stare at Jack with what was more than a bit of challenge. His blue eyes narrowed, his expression almost...defiant.

  Was Will pushing Jack to choose between himself and Tilden? Was that what this was really about? No, couldn’t be. Will knew he was working. He hadn’t come to the East Side to take in the sights. He had an errand to see to, and he needed to complete it. Will understood that.

  With each second that passed, Jack could feel Tilden slipping away from him. Feel his failure approaching ever quicker.

  A growl rumbled Jack’s throat.

  He turned on his heel. His long strides had him around the corner in a moment, just in time to catch Tilden enter a building on the other side of the street.

  Relieved he hadn’t lost the man, Jack slowed his pace. Leaning a shoulder against a darkened shop front, he took up a spot in the shadows and waited. The building Tilden had entered didn’t look to be a shop or a gambling hell. Plain and nondescript, and distinctly in need of a carpenter. The sort that was littered about the east end of London. Most of the windows along its three floors were fully dark, and there wasn’t a single woman loitering near the door, attempting to lure prospective patrons. Likely not a nunnery, either.

  The sound of familiar footsteps approached. Relief coursed through Jack. If Will truly was still upset with him for leaving a decade ago, he wouldn’t have followed him.

  Will stopped beside him, close enough so his elbow brushed Jack’s when he crossed his arms over his chest.

  “He went in there,” Jack said, with a nod toward the building across the street.

  “It’s an inn. Though you can’t see it from here, there’s an old sign next to the door. I’ve stayed there a time or two. Decent, though the innkeeper’s a horrid cook.”

  A candle flared to life within one of the rooms on the second floor, the window going from blackest night to a soft golden glow. A man’s outline passed behind the window. Then the drapes were drawn, blocking out all but a thin line of light around the window.

  He could feel the tension between him and Will. Feel it hanging between them like a physical force. And he despised that feeling.

  “I’m far from perfect,” Jack said into the darkness surrounding them.

  Will made a noise under his breath, one that said quite clearly he did not agree.

  “If I was perfect, he wouldn’t have left me behind.”

  They were both orphans, he and Will. Will was a true orphan, his unwed mother dying shortly after giving birth to him, leaving Will to the care of the St. Pancras workhouse. Whereas Jack had been made one by his father’s choice.

  At nearly six years of age, Jack had knocked on St. Pancras’s imposing door, pushed there by an impossibly empty stomach and an all-consuming fear of being truly alone in the world. He had endured the board’s questions, told them he had never known his mother, and admitted his father had abandoned him. “I was too noisy.” It was the only explanation his younger self had been able to come up with.

  Twenty years later, and he still didn’t know why his father had up and left their room at the boardinghouse. Left Jack behind while he was playing with other boys in the back alley.

  “Maybe he didn’t leave. Maybe he died somewhere. You’ll never know, Jack, so stop blaming yourself.” Will’s voice held compassion and understanding, and also the repetition of a phrase spoken many a time.

  “He didn’t die.” He’d never admitted the truth to Will before. He had been too ashamed. “Well, he could have by now. I saw him in a tavern by the docks. Was about eight years ago. He didn’t recognize me.” He hadn’t given Jack more than a passing glance, the type given to any stranger on the street. But Jack had easily recognized his father. They shared the same height, the same build, the same rugged features, and the man also had black hair, though the years had added a liberal amount of gray.

  “Are you certain it was him?”

  Jack nodded. “One of the men at his table called him Morgan.”

  “Why did you never tell me?”

  “I was working at the livery at the time.” Jack shrugged. “Didn’t see you often.”

  “Well...at least you know.”

  Jack nodded again. The unknown had been full of doubt and darkness and uncertainty, but it had also held that slim bit of hope. Hope perhaps it hadn’t been a deliberate choice on his father’s part. Hope that had been ripped from Jack when he’d heard that fellow say, “Another pint, Morgan?”

  That window on the second floor went completely dark. Jack waited a few more minutes, just to be certain Tilden had gone to bed and wasn’t set to leave the inn anytime soon.

  “Can you write a note for me?” Jack’s handwriting was dreadful, and that was putting it mildly. St. Pancras told the parish they educated the children, but there had been scant time available for that between all the oakum picking. Will, however, had been a quick study and had a very good hand. “I need to deliver it to the viscount, let him know I’ve located Tilden.”

  “Yes, I can write the note, but in the morning.”

  “I don’t want to wait, Will. I need to deliver it to his lordship tonight.”

  “It has to be past three by now. By the time we make it to Mayfair, it will be beyond late. And what if he doesn’t employ one of those night butlers? Then the journey will have been for naught. We’ll do it in the morning. Now, we could both use some rest.”

  Reluctant to get into another argument with Will that night, Jack nodded his agreement. “But in the morning, not the afternoon?”

  Will clapped him on the shoulder, his grip firm and secure and full of a familiarity that brought a smile to the edges of Jack’s mouth. “Yes, yes. No lying in. I’ll drag my arse out of bed for you.”

  * * *

  A sleek racing curricle came down the street, passing Will’s spot along the walkway, the team of two moving at a smart trot, a polished young gentleman holding the lines.

  There was barely a cloud in the sky. The morning sun was making its way up the horizon. The air was crisp and cool and held that clean, untarnished scent he associated with Mayfair and wealth.

  It had been so nice to spend the last couple of days with Jack. To have his friend back. And he’d slept damned good with Jack in his bed. The need to keep an ear attuned for potential intruders gone. His mind able to fully rest.

  Yet from the instant he’d felt Jack’s strong presence standing behind him at that card table in the back room of the Spotted Pig, he had known this moment would soon come.

  Jack emerged from the viscount’s tidy, brown brick town house. A man in a proper black coat swung the door shut behind him.

  Heart heavy in his chest, Will pushed from the lamppost. He had no idea when he’d see Jack again. Could be eleven months. Could be years until another errand brought Jack to seek his help.

  Jack stopped before him. “I suspect His Grace will want to return to Hampshire on the morrow. Perhaps even today. So I best return to the carriage house, check on the team.” He reached into his greatcoat pocket and held out three gambling chips. “You can exchange them and keep the coins. I won’t have time to go back to the hell.”

  Will took the proffered chips. A pittance in exchange for giving up the opportunity to have Jack with him for a few more hours.

  “Thank you for your assistance,” Jack said, his black brows lowered.

  Will could only nod. His arms ached to embrace Jack, but he made himself do with a handshake.

  Jack’s large hand engulfed his. The handshake kept brief, not even long enough to allow the warmth of Jack’s palm to seep into his.

  And then Jack was turning on his heel.

  A big, empty hole re-ope
ned inside of Will.

  Unable to watch Jack walk away from him, Will turned and began making his way back to his small rented room.

  He needed to get the hell out of London. The city was bad enough on its own, but not living with Jack...

  The loneliness. The constant hunger, not for a meal but for...something else. Something more. Surrounded by so many people but not a one who cared a whit about him...

  He did not want to do it anymore. And the prospect of seeing Jack again in the future, at some indistinct point for a few scant hours or perhaps even a day or two, was no longer enough to keep him in London where Jack knew where he could be found.

  Perhaps he had saved enough already. If not, the hell with the risk. A few very healthy wins and he could be gone. Leave this godforsaken city forever and never have to watch Jack walk away from him again.

  Chapter Three

  A serving girl set a pint of ale before Will. “Want anything else?” she asked.

  “Not yet.” It was not even half past six. He had a few hours before anyone with a substantial amount of coin would make their way to a card table. In any case, he wasn’t fully hungry. No reason to waste money on a meal when it wasn’t yet a necessity.

  With a shrug, she turned from his table and continued going about her duties.

  He brought the pewter tankard to his lips and took a sip. A slow sip, not because he wanted to savor the ale that pushed against swill, but to increase the time until he would need to order another. Taverns frowned upon those who merely used their tables. But as long as his tankard wasn’t empty, the girl wouldn’t push him out the door.

  Will turned his attention out the nearby window. The dirt smudges and smoke residue on the glass weren’t enough to obscure the view. Not that the view was all that interesting. The last vestiges of twilight clinging to the sky and a streetlamp across the way illuminated horse-drawn carts and the occasional hackney cab going about their business, with the random young pickpocket darting among the horses. Men on foot passed the window on their way home from a day of work or on their way to grab a meal.