Chapter 30
Sam stilled her nerves, pressing them down as she moved through the room, hips swaying with each step.
Not that she sought attention; however, she did hope her sensual appeal had players letting their guards down and loosening their purse strings enough to afford Sam a few large hands.
Her coin purse dangled at her side, full of her monthly pin money—and the bit extra she’d taken from Marce’s emergency box in her office.
Elijah’s presence at her side, one step behind her, was felt by all in the room.
Her protector.
Why did that fill her with a sense of rightness?
Never had she needed another to look after her, care for her, or in any way feel responsible for her well-being.
“My enchanting marchioness.” His voice caressed her neck. “I fear the game will not begin at all this night with your presence distracting so many.”
It was true. Even the servants had stopped setting drinks before guests or shuffling cards and distributing chips.
Sam found a table with two open seats and started toward them.
If her confidence were going to last, she’d need Elijah close for the entirety of their evening.
The players at the table were total strangers as each followed the house rules, their faces covered with disguises of every shape and color.
Dominoes, fairies, butterflies, Grecian gods and goddesses, feathered and furred animals sat at each table.
It was like stepping into a dreamland…the princess of all with her prince at her elbow.
“Do sit,” a man called, motioning Sam to take the open seat next to him, the other vacant chair stood two players down.
Something in the man’s tone had Sam moving past the chair he’d motioned to and sitting between a portly man and a rail-thin woman in modest garb, leaving Elijah to take the seat next to the offending man.
She lowered herself into the plush, high-back chair as a servant set a flute of champagne at her elbow.
“Thank you,” she mumbled, unconsciously lightening her normally deep tone.
She caught Eli’s eye across the table after he too had accepted a drink—and quickly drained it before nodding for another.
Yes, the man was interesting. An entertaining distraction and an agreeable companion.
She stopped short of adding his talents for pleasure as her face heated at the thought. Thankfully, her golden mask did its job and hid her discomfiture well.
How had Payton known of such a gathering? Sam shuddered to think of her young sister attending without some sort of protection against the lascivious stares. She would think only of the game at hand, not about her safety.
“I am Viggo, my lady,” the offensive man leaned slightly forward, blocking Elijah from her line of sight. “May I request what I am to call a woman as beautiful as you?”
Viggo? Certainly not his true name.
“How, may I inquire, do you know that beauty lies behind my guise?” She hadn’t meant the question to be flirtatious, but the sparkle she noted in the man’s eyes told her he’d taken it as permission to set his attentions on her. “I could be pockmarked from disease or lacking teeth.”
Sam thought she heard Elijah chuckle at her outlandish words, though he was still blocked from view.
“It is your soul which is beautiful, my lady.” His words flowed sweet and easy as honey.
“And if I am not a lady?”
“You can still be beautiful, even with lacking pedigree.”
“She is my enchanting marchioness.” Elijah announced to the table at large.
But Viggo didn’t move his stare from Sam. “Your coquettish wordplay wounds me, my lady.”
It was hard to determine if the man’s words sounded more like a snake’s slither or a cat’s hiss.
Either way, both were repulsive. And it stung to think a man thought her so easily claimed.
Sam had come for a spot of fun, not to find herself on the receiving end of yet another scandalous proposition.
“Do tell me your evening is not spoken for.”
“Her evening is most certainly spoken for. And the one after that, and so on, Viggo.”
Sam gasped at Elijah’s thunderously booming voice.
He was angry, yet Viggo was harmless enough and was certainly no cause for drawing undue attention to them or reason to insult their host by disrupting his party.
Her stern look did nothing to keep Elijah in his seat as he stood, tapping Viggo on his shoulder to gain his full attention.
“My lord,” Sam purred. “Do sit. It is obvious to all who witnessed us enter I belong to you.” She put added emphasis on belong, suspecting Viggo did not seek a lady but more along the lines of a courtesan. “Let us enjoy a rousing game of cards.”
Elijah regained his seat, and Viggo turned his attention to the servant announcing the card game to be played. Vingt-et-un was simple mathematics, and Sam was admirable at figuring numbers in her head. The table next to them was set up for Hazard, favoring dice instead of cards.
She set her coin pouch on the table and withdrew a note to exchange for playing chips, several other players doing the same.
The first hand was dealt, and both Sam and Elijah were forced to give up their ante for the round.
The next several hands went in much the same way with Viggo winning far more than he lost. Blast it, Sam should have listened more when Payton instructed her in card play: what hands to discard, and which to stake a sizeable pot on.
Before long, only a half-dozen chips were stacked before her, and she was worried her evening would end far earlier than desired.
A miserable failure.
Not that Sam expected to win, but her first time gambling outside Craven House should last longer than a walk in Hyde Park, certainly.
Elijah’s chips were at least triple hers.
One more hand and she’d request Elijah escort her to another game table, one more to her liking.
The servant dealt two cards to each player, and Sam quickly picked hers up, holding them close to keep the other guests from seeing her hand. Two tens.
A total of twenty points…the optimal hand was twenty-one.
Marvelous.
Though no one could see behind her mask, she knew the importance of not giving away her hand, a tell as Payton would say. The upturned corner of the mouth, the nervous twitch of an eye, or even the fidgeting of cards were enough to signal your confidence in your cards. She would win her first hand.
The guests either threw in their cards, added a wager, or passed to the next player.
Elijah passed, not raising the chip count, and then it was Viggo’s turn.
He threw added chips in just as often as he discarded his hand—however, this time, Sam was lucky.
He pushed his entire stack into the center of the table.
It was easily four times as much money as she’d brought with her—and ten times more than what was stacked in front of her.
“It is your turn, my lady,” the portly gentleman on her right said.
Sam bit her lip. She still had a few coins in her handbag, but even with that, it was not enough to match Viggo’s wager. Her hand went to the opal bob dangling from her ear. She’d brought nothing else of value with her.
Twenty was a better hand than most that’d won the past dozen hands.
“I am happy to lend you enough coin to match my wager,” Viggo said gallantly. “If you win, you can return my funds. If you lose…” He let his words trail off, but Sam was in no way disillusioned to the fact that the man would demand she pay her debt in less reputable ways.
She took one last look at her hand before setting her cards face down and removing her opal earbobs and pushing them to the middle with the other chips. The woman next to her gasped, her hand pressing to her covered bosom as if to keep her erratic heart in her chest.
Elijah cleared his throat in an attempt to gain her attention. Though it would anger him, she avoided his stare and smiled behind her mask.
“I think my opals make the wager even,” she said. “Do you agree, Viggo?”
The other players threw their cards down in defeat, Elijah with them.
“Show your hands,” the servant called.
Sam gulped when Viggo triumphantly showed his cards—an ace and a ten.
Twenty-one.
Sam slid her cards across the table, face-down.
Viggo chuckled, knowing he’d bested her. “It is a shame you will lose such a precious keepsake,” he tsked as if remorseful for being the one to take her opal earbobs.
“Do not fret. I was well aware of the risk involved when I placed them upon the table.
“I wish all men played with as much grace in losing as you, my lady.”
She stood and noticed Viggo’s eyes narrow behind his mask when Elijah also pushed back his chair to depart.
“Do not go,” Viggo said. “Mayhap you can fulfill your debt and retrieve your jewels.”
Sam didn’t like the insinuation in the man’s tone, and feared Elijah knew exactly where the man’s thoughts lay when he growled.
“Come now, pretty lady,” Viggo coaxed. “I am certain you do not wish to return home without your treasure. I only ask for a private moment with you.”
Elijah had had bloody well enough of the vile, despicable man and his inappropriate comments. “Viggo, you have overstepped the bounds of propriety. You will apologize at once for your audacious behavior and crude manners. No noble gentleman speaks to a proper lady in such a disrespectful tone.”
His knuckles turned white from his clenched fists when Viggo only let out a loud cackle. Three men at the table stood, deciding another game would not be had at this table anytime soon, and moved off to find vacant seats at other games.
“Proper lady?” Viggo continued to chuckle around his words.
“Your enchanting marchioness has already admitted she is no proper lady. And if I am honest, it would not be hard to ensure she becomes my enchanting marchioness—at least for one evening. I will call her any title she desires as long as she fulfills my desires.”