by Erica Ridley
“Stop it,” she whispered as she forced Dahlia’s weak knees into the closest chair. “I’ve lost every scrap of my innocence just from watching the two of you devour each other with your eyes.”
“You’re not innocent,” Dahlia muttered as her trembling hands fumbled for a serviette.
“Which means I know precisely what you’re thinking,” Faith reminded her as she smoothed out her own serviette. “Devouring happens in private. You will owe me an obscenely large favor, but I promise to aid you in procuring a few moments’ privacy the next time your inspector pays a call… provided that the two of you refrain from melting his colleague’s supper chairs from all of your heated glances.”
Colleague.
Dahlia snapped up straight. Stealing an hour or two of Simon’s company was not the only reason she was here tonight. She was also meant to make a positive impression on Simon’s friends.
Although she and Simon were not destined for a future together, he was on course for a long and decorated career. The last thing she desired was to make his work environment awkward in any way.
Or to let on how nervous being in a room with not one but two Bow Street employees made her.
She smiled at Mr. Webb. “Thank you for opening your home to us. Your dinner invitation is most kind.”
“And overdue,” came a merry voice as a rosy-cheeked woman bearing a platter of roasted meat emerged from the kitchen. “I have been after Mr. Webb for years to invite Inspector Spaulding to supper. We are delighted that he has brought guests.”
Dahlia’s gaze snapped down the table to Simon’s. He’d requested her presence at the first invitation he’d ever received?
He shook his head. “I am afraid the fault is mine. Your husband has been tempting me with tales of your fine cooking since the day we met. It is rare that I find myself with neither a dossier nor a prisoner in hand.”
“Wholly understandable,” Mr. Webb said firmly. “One becomes on the verge of being the highest-ranking inspector in Bow Street history through dedicated and impeccable police-work, not from accepting idle social engagements.”
“I, for one, am rather fond of idle social engagements,” Mrs. Webb said with a wink in Faith and Dahlia’s direction. “If you lads would rather return to your dark, dusty offices, I am certain we ladies can find some use for the new bottle of port in your study.”
“Never. Again,” Mr. Webb bit out with such horror that Dahlia couldn’t help but grin.
Mrs. Webb already sounded like the sort of smart, mischievous woman Dahlia absolutely loved to befriend.
The first course blurred into the second amid a constant stream of laughter and jovial conversation. Dahlia’s cheeks ached so much from nonstop smiling and verbal parries that she marveled any of them had been able to consume any of the meal at all.
“We must do this again.” Mrs. Webb placed a bowl of pudding with red currants in the center of the table. “Please don’t say I must wait another ten years before my husband can sweet talk you three into returning.”
“Surely it hasn’t been ten years,” Simon protested.
“Eleven,” Mr. Webb murmured innocently. “But who’s counting?”
Dahlia grinned. If there weren’t accounts to pay, mouths to feed, and a school to run, Dahlia would have happily agreed to dine with this witty, irreverent crowd every day, if they so desired. She could not recall the last time she’d had such fun at a supper engagement.
Her spoon paused halfway to her serving of pudding. It was true. She could not recall the last time she’d had so much fun at a dinner party, outside of her own family.
Dahlia’s list of past supper invitations read like a guide to Debrett’s Peerage, and yet the most enjoyable evening she’d spent around a dining table was not the sampling of delicate sauces created by a chef poached from French aristocrats or the stilted conversation of competing debutantes with little more in common than having been seated together by rank.
It was here. It was now. The best social engagement of her life was a handful of sharp-witted, title-less, ordinary people sharing a night of friendship and laughter around a bowl of currant pudding.
Her mother would be horrified.
Dahlia was glad she had kept her rank a secret. Society believed daughters of baronesses to have been born unsurpassably superior to the invisible ants of the working class.
What if the Webbs believed her an uppity toff who considered herself too good for the likes of them? What if Simon chose to honor their class differences by never speaking to her again, outside of his professional capacity?
She knew how he felt about his brother. How Simon’s father had treated him and his mother. The last thing she wanted was for him to lump her in that same group.
Yet she had been raised to understand that was precisely what ought to happen. Countesses and harried footmen might both be inside Almack’s at the same time, but they weren’t there to be friends. One was meant to serve. The other was meant to enjoy.
The rules were no more the patronesses of Almack’s fault than they were her mother’s. From slaves to kings, the world had been divided into class-based strata since time immemorial. Society honoring those distinctions was far from shocking. Dahlia hiding her identity, on the other hand, would scandalize far more than the fashionable set if the truth were to come to light. She might not see Simon again.
It was not a complete lie, she assured herself. After all, she was not currently a practicing baroness’s daughter. She was…a simple headmistress.
And part-time thief. She swallowed uncomfortably.
“What do you say?” Simon’s smile bathed her in warmth. “Might your schedule allow for another such gathering at some point in the future?”
She wanted to say yes. Of course she wished to say yes. Instead, she stared back at him wordlessly.
Up until now, Dahlia had been so concerned about improving her girls’ lives, that she hadn’t had time to have a life of her own. She could not dare risk her thin ties to society by allowing a courtship—or even public knowledge of association with friends like these—but it was nice to have a private moment to do with as she pleased.
She could not make a habit of dinner parties at the home of a Bow Street secretary, but it was harder and harder to resist the allure of clandestine kisses in the arms of a certain inspector.
The more she fought her attraction to Simon, the more she dreaded the inevitability of giving him up.
He deserved to find a nice young lady who would wed him and dedicate her life to him, not a charity. And Dahlia couldn’t risk allowing him—or the law—to come between her and her school. Twenty-four wards were counting on her.
“I don’t know why you’re asking poor Miss Grenville if there’s room in her agenda, when it’s you who never has a moment to spare on frivolity,” Mr. Webb said, eyes twinkling. “How will you ever get your promotion if you halt your breakneck schedule for something so mundane as eating?”
“Promotion?” Faith raised a saucy brow. “I assumed he was the highest-ranking inspector on Bow Street. I feel so betrayed.”
“Almost,” Simon demurred. “Once I close one of my more insidious open cases, I am promised a new title. It’s nothing, really.”
Dahlia’s lips curved. Perhaps the classes weren’t so different after all. Nothing was worth more than a title.
“And a spot of reward money,” Mr. Webb said as if it were only just occurring to him. “And a pay increase. Oh, and a public commendation. Nothing, really. It’s not as if your career depends on it.”
“I would catch this criminal even if it did not.” Simon’s eyes were cold enough to chill the air. “He shall never leave Newgate.”
Dahlia shivered. “Is London home to a murderer?”
“Often, unfortunately,” said Mr. Webb. “But don’t you fear. Inspector Spaulding catches all criminals, no matter the crime. The current focus is merely a thief.”
“Not ‘merely,’” Simon growled. “The carelessness of th
ieves can cause just as grievous harm as a murderer. Most of the violence I see every night is due to altercations with footpads.”
“I do apologize,” Mr. Webb said with a glance at his wife. “I should not have mentioned work matters in front of ladies.”
“Nonsense,” Mrs. Webb said briskly. “I’m certain all the ladies at this table are aware of the dangers of footpads. You’ve only to open a newspaper to see the latest tale of highwaymen and other unsavories. We are lucky to have men like you rid the city of the bad element.”
Dahlia smiled at Simon, despite the uneasy flutter in her belly. “You risk your life for others every single night. The least they can give you is an improved title and a bit of a reward. You’re a hero. I’ve known it since the day we met.”
He shrugged away the compliment. “It’s my job. Once the Thief of Mayfair is off to the gallows, I can return to protecting all citizens of London, rather than chasing down pocket globes and miniature harps.”
Pocket globes. Miniature harps. Dahlia froze in horror as she realized the awful truth. God save her.
Simon wasn’t hunting “a” thief.
He was hunting her.
Chapter 23
The last thing Simon had wanted was to walk into the Cloven Hoof and all but trip over his brother.
The good news—if, indeed, there was anything good at all about the current situation—was that with Hawkridge’s well-tailored back toward Simon, the marquess hadn’t noticed his illegitimate half-brother at all.
Hardly an ironic turn of events, Simon acknowledged from a dark corner of the main room.
Hawkridge had made an art form out of self-absorption. For years, Simon’s younger self had dreamed of surprising his sure-to-be delighted brother with his existence, only to discover the younger marquess had always known and never cared.
As for the previous marquess going so far as to boast about his bastard in order to manipulate his legitimate son… Well. Simon rather thought the bastard was their father. Although perhaps the old marquess wasn’t all bad. Simon had always assumed his father had deposited money for him and his mother out of the same sense of duty one might pay one’s cobbler or one’s tailor.
The idea that perhaps it wasn’t as black-and-white as that was mind-blowing. His father might actually have possessed a modicum of affection for both of his sons.
Simon had never touched the old account that had been left in his name because he would rather have his self-respect than a fleet of phaetons. If there was even enough for flashy purchases. He hadn’t looked at the balance in over a decade.
He made a mental note to have his solicitor make a few inquiries. Perhaps there would be enough to outfit Dahlia’s girls with new dresses and shoes that fit.
Once his promotion came through, he’d be able to do even more.
He settled into a shadowy nook in the Cloven Hoof and pushed his personal concerns from his mind. He was here to investigate Maxwell Gideon. Simon would view his half-brother’s presence not as a sharp reminder of unresolved family matters, but as emblematic of the sort of clientele Gideon sought to attract.
As luck would have it, Hawkridge’s decision to visit a gentlemen’s club of suspicious financial background on this particular evening was actually a boon to Simon’s investigation. The last few times he’d visited, the owner of the gambling den had either been off-premises, or hidden away in a back room, doing God-knew-what.
Not tonight.
Maxwell Gideon had been en route from the gaming tables to the passageway leading to his office when Hawkridge entered the club. Gideon spun an immediate about-face to join both Hawkridge and their friend Lord Wainwright at what was clearly the trio’s customary table.
Despite a visceral disinterest in knowing any details about his half-brother’s life, Simon would be forced to listen carefully, lest any hint of the club owner’s suspicious dealings enter the conversation. With a sigh, he tilted an ear toward the table.
“Lovely caricature of you in the morning paper,” Hawkridge commented to Lord Wainwright. “Something about, ‘his countess’s voice turns the Lord of Pleasure into a Puddle of Pleasure even after months of marriage,’ if I recall correctly?”
The earl’s hallmark rakish smile only widened. “And yet there was no mention of you in any of the pages. The hunt for an heiress must be going slower than planned. Oh my, I didn’t realize a marquess could find himself on the shelf.”
“Outright trickery does seem to be the only way for you to get a woman of quality to the altar,” Gideon put in helpfully.
“Thank you.” Hawkridge rolled his eyes. “Always a gentleman. I shall take your suggestion to heart, should more ethical methods prove fruitless.”
Wainwright brightened. “With luck, your bamboozled heiress will be a halfwit and hideously ugly.”
Hawkridge slanted the earl a flat look. “How is my marrying some repulsive idiot ‘lucky?’”
“Oh, not for you.” Wainwright straightened his shirt points beneath razor sharp cheekbones with exaggerated precision. “For me. One gets so tired of the society papers going on and on about how dreadfully happy, attractive, and in love one is with one’s wife. You being stuck with some rich, featherbrained shrew would be a refreshing change of pace, wouldn’t you say?”
“Absolutely,” Gideon agreed before Hawkridge could reply. “We’re all tired of hearing how blissful, attractive, and in love the two of you are. Since Hawkridge is sacrificing his future happiness anyway, he might as well do so in whichever way most amuses his fellow man. It’s positively patriotic.”
Hawkridge’s smile flashed before clenched teeth. “Do you know what would amuse me?”
The arrival of a barmaid fortunately saved both Wainwright and Gideon from whatever blistering set-down Hawkridge had planned.
Despite the bitterness Simon had long held toward his brother, he could not repress a flash of pity. Inheriting a destitute marquessate left Hawkridge no choice but to wed any given woman in possession of the largest dowry.
Whereas Simon was born with a variety of choices Hawkridge would never have. Simon had the freedom to fall in love, to find employment he enjoyed, to marry the woman he loved—or, if he so chose, to never wed at all. The most important decisions any man would ever face were completely up to Simon, in a way that those same decisions would never be up to Hawkridge. A marquess’s job was being a marquess. Marrying a certain class of woman who possessed a certain level of money.
No matter what the marquess’s heart might desire.
Simon, on the other hand, could do as he pleased. No, an officer of the law could not woo some high society debutante. But within his own class, Simon could wed whomever he wanted. The only prerequisite was that the woman also want him.
He forced the memory of soft, pink lips and large, expressive eyes from his mind. He was here to observe a club owner, not moon over a trouser-wearing headmistress.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Gideon was saying to Hawkridge. “Let me buy you a glass of wine.”
“I told you,” Hawkridge bit out, his cheeks flushing. “No charity. I’ll buy my own wine or I won’t have any at all.”
“Wainwright!” shouted voices from over near the Hazard table. “Gideon! Come put a crown on Underhill’s next roll. He’s had three eleven’s in a row!”
Laughing, both men rose from the table and disappeared into the milieu to see what the ruckus was about.
Hawkridge remained behind, a single man at an empty table.
Simon presumed the reason the marquess hadn’t moved was the same reason his name hadn’t been called with the others. He didn’t have a crown. He didn’t have tuppence. Every visit to see his friends was likely one more deathblow against his pride.
Blast. Simon rubbed his temples. He couldn’t leave his brother sitting there, alone in a crowded club. Stoic despite the slights.
He was going to have to extend an olive branch.
In all likelihood, Hawkridge would bat away any attempt at p
atching up the insurmountable differences between them. But Simon had never backed down from doing what was right.
Dahlia had pointed out whether Simon and his brother lived out the rest of their lives as strangers was largely up to Simon. Hawkridge had been in a stormy mood even before Simon had blocked his path to force an introduction. The marquess did not shoulder complete fault for how disastrously that conversation had turned out.
Simon had avoided this moment long enough. A man of strong character would not hesitate to apologize for his portion of the blame. He pushed to his feet with a sigh.
At least Hawkridge had no drink to toss in his face.
Simon approached the marquess’s table well aware of the infinite other possibilities for embarrassment. Unlike last time, they were not in the private enclave between the gaming section and the back office. Hawkridge was seated at a rear table in the primary salon. Halfway between the bar and the Faro tables. In direct sight of anyone entering the club.
In direct sight of everyone currently in the club, as a matter of fact.
Hawkridge glanced up as Simon neared the table. The marquess’s eyes widened in recognition.
Simon cleared his throat to make room for a difficult apology. “I—”
“Sit,” Hawkridge interrupted. “Don’t loom over me like a mathematics tutor when there are perfectly fine seats all around this table.”
Simon blinked. “Your friends—”
“Are betting on the toss of the dice,” Hawkridge finished. “If he wagers a crown a minute, Wainwright will be dead before he runs out of fortune. Sit. If he misses his chair, he can buy another.”
Simon sat.
“I suppose I should be glad you’re here,” Hawkridge continued moodily. “I owed you an apology and really disliked the idea of having to present myself at Bow Street just to deliver it.”
If any other peer had made that statement, Simon would have assumed apologizing in a place as public as the court would have been too embarrassing. Yet here they were, in a far more crowded room, among far more important and well-connected individuals.