The Vixen

by Christi Caldwell

  Her brother immediately went tight-lipped.

  As strong as Broderick was, and for all the power he’d amassed, he had still not been born to the streets as Ophelia and her blood siblings had. Though Broderick did not speak of his past, and had certainly never confirmed or verified her suspicions, he needn’t have. His appreciation for the nobility and his periodic missteps marked him one not wholly of this world.

  Since the day he’d entered their midst with his fancy speech, she’d known precisely what to say to push him to the brink.

  One. Two. Three. Four—

  “First”—he stuck up a finger—“you are never again to storm into my meetings. Are we clear?”

  She silently noted his amended counting. That was why Broderick had found himself accepted and then respected amongst Diggory’s gang. For anything he hadn’t known, he’d committed himself to learning and then changing as he needed for his own survival.

  She folded her arms. “Do you truly believe I’m one who’ll take to being ordered about?”

  Naturally, that was always the limited opinion the world—her brother included—had of her. A pretty face and little more, only recently charged with meaningful responsibilities.

  “I was being truthful with him, Broderick,” she protested as he beat a path over to the sideboard. “I was not meekly accepting his midnight appearance as his due and his insulting questions of how I conduct myself, hiring the children I do.” She leveled him with a stare. “Not from Mr. O—Steele.”

  “You are familiar with Steele?”

  Her mind stuttered to a stop. What had he heard? Or had he picked up on that slight misstep when she’d entered the offices and first caught sight of Connor? Ophelia wet her lips. “I . . .” She shook her head, unable to get words out. Broderick grabbed a bottle of whiskey, assessed the label, and then poured himself a drink. She gave thanks for his distracted movements. What was she to do? Admit her connection to Connor O’Roarke? Explain that in helping him escape Diggory, it had been not Ophelia who’d paid the price but another of their beloved siblings? And now Connor was back in their lives—a threat to the Killoran world.

  After he’d set aside the bottle, Broderick shot her a puzzled look.

  She scoffed. “Of course I don’t know him,” she lied through her teeth. “How would I know a detective?” And more . . . how had he become the ruthless investigator feared by all in their years apart? How, when their kind dealt in vices that destroyed men and did not serve on the side of law that sought to bring justice to an unjust world?

  “You wouldn’t.” He paused, midselection of a bottle. Her brother briefly lifted his head and tossed her a penetrating glance over his shoulder. “Unless you were in trouble with the law.”

  Which she had been countless times. This, however, was not one of them. “I’m not,” she snapped. “You know my role. I find children to work here.” As she spoke, she neatly left out the truth of how she located some of the young ones in their employ. “And that’s the extent of my involvement.” Her sole focus was on saving them from the perils that existed for orphans. From there, those boys and girls fell to Gertrude’s care.

  Broderick lingered a probing stare over her.

  She forced herself to go absolutely still under his scrutiny.

  At last he returned his attention to the sideboard. “I assigned you that role in the club.” He grabbed a decanter and considered it. “I did not, however, give you carte blanche to insult an investigator who could ruin us,” he muttered, settling on the French cognac.

  He poured himself a drink. “It is in our best interest not to anger the man threatening our club.”

  His was a valid point. And yet . . . “We know nothing, and as such have no reason to fear him.”

  He scoffed. “Surely you don’t believe that? Do you think a bloody investigator would trust one of us?”

  No, she didn’t. Particularly not Connor O’Roarke. Having moved within their gang and then escaped, Connor knew precisely the type of people Ophelia and her siblings were. “It doesn’t matter that he would not find anything.” For he wouldn’t. In this, they’d done nothing. “If he so wishes, he could cast aspersions upon the club that we wouldn’t recover from.”

  A shadow settled over her brother’s eyes. Then where would they be? It hung real and unspoken between them.

  Ruined. They would be ruined.

  She shivered. For they might have the luxuries of the Devil’s Den as their residence, but when they set foot onto the streets, war raged all around, and they were even less safe than they’d been years earlier before their climb to security. They could not go back to that.

  “This is why you should not have stormed in.” His jaw flexed. “Damn your impulsivity.”

  That stung. It was a condemnation that had never, nor would ever, be tossed out at Cleopatra. Cleopatra would never taunt and bait a detective. She’d know better.

  Shoving aside that needling thought, Ophelia planted her hands on her hips. “He asked if I knew anything. I told him I did not,” she said, impatience slipping in.

  From over the rim of his glass, he frowned. “He will return with questions for you.”

  At that ominous prediction, an eerie echo of her earlier thoughts, another shiver iced Ophelia’s spine.

  Her brother shook his head and, with an air of finality, strode over to his desk and sat. “It is time.”

  “Very well.” Ophelia turned, relieved to be done with this exchange. Her stinging palms still required tending, and her brother still had not noted the injury.

  “You misunderstand me,” Broderick called after her.

  She continued on, but his words registered, bringing her to a slow stop. Warning bells went off in the back of her mind. Ophelia turned. “What is that?” she asked guardedly, fearing . . . and knowing, all at the same time. Her palms made reflexive fists, and she winced as her nails grazed the wounded flesh.

  “We require that match, and you fielding questions from an investigator”—Broderick took a sip, the insolent calm of him setting her teeth on edge—“will help nothing. It will only hurt.” He met her gaze. “His presence here has only highlighted our need for noble connections.”

  There it was.

  All the air left her on a whoosh.

  As he sat sipping his brandy and wisely avoiding her eyes, the weight of his betrayal hit her squarely in the chest.

  Of course, it had been inevitable. She’d always known his plans and intentions . . . for her and the entire family. And yet, with the additional responsibilities he’d ceded, she’d been lulled into a false sense of peace.

  As her brother set aside his drink in favor of a sheet of parchment and pen, Ophelia watched on, feeling like a voyeur in someone else’s life.

  That rapid click of his pen struck the page over and over, near deafening in the thick silence, until she wanted to clamp her hands over her ears.

  She, who’d not fainted after some blighter had cornered her in an alleyway and yanked up her skirts, or faltered when Diggory had beaten her senseless for an imagined slight, felt her legs shift under her. “What?” she whispered breathlessly, the steady beat of her heart drowning out that muffled demand.

  “It’s overdue, Ophelia,” he said, not deigning to glance up from the task that occupied him. “You know that.”

  Ophelia surged forward. Planting her palms on the surface of his desk, she leaned forward. “I will not do it.” In that, mayhap, she’d proven the reason all power and confidence had been given to Cleopatra. For even she had attempted to fulfill the expectations Broderick had for their family.

  Broderick lifted his gaze not higher than her white-knuckled grip. “Very well.”

  Very well? She furrowed her brow. She’d not survived by being lulled into a false sense of security. The one time she had, it had found her against a wall and a nobleman with his hands under her skirts.

  Her mouth went dry as the hated memory slipped in. She desperately fought it back.

 
; Focus. Do not let him in . . . not now . . . not when my brother has waged war and I need my wits about me.

  Ophelia slowly straightened. “Very well?” she repeated, examining him closely.

  “Yes. Very well, you may oversee your responsibilities, and you are absolved of joining Cleopatra and . . . and”—he grimaced—“her husband for the London Season.”

  Under any other circumstances she would have found hilarity in his inability to bring himself ’round to using the name of their longtime rival and now brother-in-law, Adair Thorne. “It cannot be that easy.” He’d never abandon his goals.

  “Yes. Sometimes it can.” He grabbed his glass and took a long swallow. “This is one of those times,” he said after he’d set the tumbler down.

  Her heart quickened. Ophelia swept her lashes low. “What game do you play?”

  “This is no game,” he pledged, adding his flourishing signature to the bottom of that sheet.

  She’d have to be deaf not to hear the emphasis placed there, one that suggested they spoke of something so much more than a London Season and her being spared from taking part in it.

  As he lifted the lid from the crystal bottle and sprinkled pounce upon the ink, Ophelia squinted, attempting to bring those words into focus.

  Cleo,

  Tomorrow, I will be sending . . .

  Ophelia saw, tasted, and heard red. It flooded every corner of her, an all-consuming fury and rage. With Cleo recently married, Broderick had wasted no time. She whipped her head up so sharply the muscles wrenched down her neck. “Gertrude?” she screeched, trying to order her spiraling-out-of-control thoughts.

  Broderick flicked his hand. “In the event you are unable to join Polite Society, Gertrude indicated she would spare you from going and see to it herself.”

  “Did you just . . . flick your hand?” That callous gesture restored order to her jumbled mind.

  He’d sacrifice Gertrude . . . Gertrude, who’d already lost so much.

  Because of me . . . she lost so much because of me.

  He wisely lowered his palm. “I have already spoken to her.”

  “I don’t believe you,” she shot back. He’d ceded even less control to their eldest sister than he had to Ophelia. His was surely nothing more than a street trick to gain her acquiescence. “When did you speak?”

  “After Cleo’s wedding.”

  She rocked back, feeling like one who’d taken a bullet to the chest. They had spoken of it then. They had both assumed Ophelia, with her disdain for the peerage, would be unable to move forward with Broderick’s plan and discussed Gertrude’s alternate role?

  Bitterness tasted like vinegar in her mouth.

  First Cleopatra should have their brother’s ear, and now he’d bypass Ophelia for Gertrude. It didn’t matter that Gertrude was the eldest; it mattered that Ophelia had forever been overlooked by all—her blasted kin included.

  What was worse . . . they’d both believed she would be unable to go through with something, and another would have to act in her stead. She fell back a step, and another, and another, and then stopped her retreat.

  Frantically, she scraped her gaze over Broderick’s immaculate office. How to make him see that it was not about her being unable to enter the world of Polite Society. It was about having a choice. Choosing something more than a path Broderick thought was their only one. Choosing a future of purpose that she made for herself. Simply . . . choosing.

  But did it truly matter?

  For now she’d been given the ultimate choice—control of her fate and future, or to sacrifice her sister Gertrude.

  Ophelia made a final attempt at reasoning with him. “Why is this so important to you?” she pleaded. “We have wealth. We have power.”

  “And we have already seen how easily it can crumble,” he put forward with an uncharacteristic gravity.

  The Hell and Sin. First by the proprietors’ marriage to ladies of the ton . . . and then by fire.

  She looked away.

  The quiet shuffle of her brother folding that page that would seal her sister’s fate was the only sound.

  Ophelia closed her eyes.

  The obstinate part of her that had never bowed to him or anyone wanted to tell him to go hang. And yet there was something else there, too: fear. Her stomach muscles clenched, and she folded her hands over her belly to ease the tension there.

  Her efforts proved futile.

  Could she do it? Could she bind herself to a nobleman? One of those lecherous, vile lords? Her chest moved up and down quickly with the force of her rapidly drawn breaths.

  Take ’is lordship back there and read ’is palms. Yar da would wont it . . . Get back there.

  Ophelia’s gaze went to that glass of spirits on Broderick’s desk as past lines blurred with present ones, together melding to create a horrifying future.

  The stench of brandy. A hand scrabbling with her skirts.

  You want it, my lovely. Now spread your legs for me . . . Ah, you like it rough, then, do you? Even better.

  Ophelia’s breath rasped loudly in her ears.

  “Ophelia?”

  Broderick’s concern-laden tone yanked her back from the brink.

  What is he saying? What are we debating?

  Then it came back to her. Connor’s visit . . . and the chore her brother would turn over to Gertrude.

  Nay, he’d do so only if Ophelia was unwilling.

  I’m going to be ill.

  She focused on Broderick’s lips as they moved but could not make sense of the words coming out.

  Rubbing the ache at her temples, she wandered over to the windows. Peeling back the rich gold-brocade curtains, she looked out into those darkened streets she’d raced through only a short while ago.

  Her brother would bind Gertrude or Ophelia to one of those reprobates. Men who took their pleasures where they would. She pressed her forehead against the cool pane.

  Ultimately, her brother would not be swayed. He might speak of Connor’s visit and the threat he posed, but it all came down to what Broderick sought—not just a connection to the peerage . . . but a respectable nobleman.

  A link to a lord.

  Leaning back, she stared blankly at the slight fog her breath had left upon the glass. With the tip of her finger, she traced a teardrop in that stain.

  Broderick coughed, bringing her blank gaze to his. “I believe we are done here?” There was an infinitesimal pause to that question that hinted at the very game he played. The weakness he used against her.

  Her spirit blazed back to life, and she opened her mouth to deliver another blistering diatribe.

  Her brother’s visage pulled into focus. The worry stamped in his features reflected back. This was an unfamiliar side of Broderick. One he shared with none and carefully concealed under the veneer of a practiced grin and urbane charm.

  If it is not me, he very well will use Gertrude as his pawn. “The London Season,” she forced herself to say. Her tongue heavy in her mouth made the words garbled to her own ears. Ophelia turned back. “I will do it.”

  Broderick started. “You will?” A pleased grin flashed briefly on his lips before he swiftly concealed it.

  I’m going to be ill.

  “But I am not living in Mayfair,” she said quickly, claiming some control of the arrangement.

  Her brother shook his head. “Absolutely—”

  “I am not. And you’ll allow it. Let us not play games. You always wanted me to go.” Back when he’d sent Cleo, it had really been Ophelia—never either of her siblings. Because to those in this gang, Ophelia was always the one for sale for her face alone.

  A guilty blush splotched his cheeks. “I sent Cleo first.”

  He made no attempt to deny it. That willingness to sacrifice her because he saw Cleo’s worth stung. “Because she demanded it.” She pinned him with her gaze. “Just as I am demanding it now.” As she should have done for her younger sister and now did for Gertrude. Guilt snaked around her insides. It didn’t
matter that her sister had come out happy for her arrangement; it mattered that Ophelia had sacrificed her. “So I’ll have a Season and make a match, but on my own terms.” She proceeded to lift a finger as she enumerated her list. “I’ll live in the Devil’s Den.” The only place she’d ever been comfortable. “I’ll decide on whom I . . . on whom I”—she strangled out the vile epithet—“marry. If I don’t wish to attend a certain event, I shan’t. I’ll be afforded the same freedoms as I am inside the club.”

  “Fine.” Surely it could not be that easy? Broderick matched her movements, ticking off on his callused digits. “Marriage to a lord. You choose the gentleman. You’ll be free to decline an invitation unless it is a respectable lord or lady issuing the invite.” He paused to adjust his already immaculate cravat. “I’ll not have the ton say we’re ungrateful.”

  “Oh, never that,” she drawled.

  He went on talking over her droll interruption. “No breeches. New dresses.” She glanced down at her modest, high-necked gown.

  Her stomach flipped over itself. Over the years she’d taken to wearing drab gowns which concealed her frame. Now, her brother would take away that layer of protection, too? “No.”

  Broderick flicked a pained glance over her skirts. “That is not negotiable. Furthermore . . .”

  The argument over garments instantly forgotten, she braced herself, knowing what was coming even before he uttered it.

  “You are not living at the Dev—”

  “I am not going anywhere. Or there is no deal.”

  She held her breath as they met at a tense impasse. Brother and sister, both warriors of the street, refusing to cede victory.

  He threaded a hand through his hair. “Oh, bloody hell. Very well. You may remain.”

  Ophelia released a sigh she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding. For the first time that night, a smile won out. It was quickly dashed at his next set of terms. “But you are to at all times act the part of a lady.”

  Act the part. “At least you recognize this for the farce it is,” she muttered.

  “It is scandalous enough, your living here and having a bloody Season. One misstep and your trunks will be packed and you’ll be sent to Cleo’s.”