Chapter Four
The club had not yet reached full crescendo for the evening.
The players were rather tame. The tables were occupied by older gentlemen who would begin and end their night early and head to bed.
Then the younger set would drift in, intent to wash their throats with good bourbon and arrogantly cripple their finances, when the balls and soirees grew dull.
Some would lose until there was nothing left, or close to nothing, serving themselves on gleaming silver platters to the widow’s pleasure.
Others would compete in odd games and betting.
Beside him, Felicity kept close, not touching, but he could feel her presence.
The sight of her in the green dress that hugged her slender frame and highlighted her womanly curves had melted his mind.
The gold mask brought out the amber flecks in her eyes.
He’d forgotten everything he’d meant to say the moment he saw her.
The list of gentlemen he was to subtly point out to her was crinkling in his coat pocket, an annoying reminder that not only was he there to protect her from some unknown foe but watch as she considered other gentlemen worthy of her hand.
His stomach hollowed.
Bloody hell. He wanted her. Physically. This night would be torture.
Not only for the time spent on the gambling floor—the noise unbearable—but because .
. . because he wanted her for himself. It was that simple.
He was in the worst position to want a woman.
No money, no free time, and certainly not eligible enough for her to marry.
Once upon a time, it could have been different.
Perhaps that was what galled him. He was the second son of landed gentry.
Their wealth was not comparable to the offensive sums thrown about the club, but they had been well off enough to be respectable, in his mind.
Their house and farm had been in the family for generations and turned a comfortable profit.
His great-grandfather, grandfather, and father had worked the land themselves, aided by tenants, teaching their sons the value of a day’s hard labor.
It was his grandfather’s complicated past that made him cherish the simple joys of working his own land.
But it had only taken Colin two years to destroy it all.
He hadn’t wanted to farm land with his bare hands.
Work was beneath them, he’d claimed. He didn’t want to continue the traditions of their forebears.
He wanted to drink and gamble, pretending he was something they weren’t: English nobility.
Better than all of them. Tristan could admit he hadn’t been enamored of the idea of farming either, not then, when youth and arrogance had colored his vision.
Tristan had wanted excitement and danger.
Now . . . perhaps there was something to living a simple life, waking to the crow of a rooster, working the land with one’s own hands.
How beautiful the hills of Inverness would be this time of year—bursting with color, the coos chomping the grass, the bleating of new lambs.
What was once too banal for Tristan now sounded like a life one could only dream of. If he ever saw his home again.
“What are you thinking about?”
Tristan blinked to awareness. “I beg yer pardon.” He cleared his throat. His burr had slipped in there for a moment. “Nothing. Simply reviewing my responsibilities for the coming days.”
“One of them being me,” she murmured.
“Watching over you is a far cry better than most of the things I must do. I’d rather spend an evening with you than my other tasks.”
She blushed. “What sort of tasks?”
“Secret tasks.”
“To do with the Den?”
“Mostly.”
She softly smiled. “Secretly?”
“That is mostly what I do. Hold secrets for people and use them when the time is right.”
“Use them for whom?”
“Mrs. Dove-Lyon.”
Her fingers fluttered on his arm. “And you enjoy this?”
“No,” he confessed. He never admitted how much this work grated on him. Intrigue, lies, betrayal—that was a young man’s game, the boy he used to be. Tristan could admit now he’d been a stupid young man. “I have a bargain with the widow. I have my own secrets leveraged against me.”
Her silence was like the snap of a twig in a quiet forest. He couldn’t bear to look at her.
“You’re different tonight. You’ve been different since you learned my name. Different from the person who took me back and forth to Alston House, who exchanged banter with Lord Alston and Lady Amelia.”
He slowed their progress. They were in the ladies’ area, where generally he hadn’t been allowed. It was not nearly as busy as the main floor, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t someone to overhear them. He steered her toward the ladies’ gallery, away from the ladies’ gaming tables.
“One might say that my charm is a mask I use effectively.”
Her eyes dimmed. Or perhaps it was an effect of the wall sconce behind her that cast her face in shadow. Or the gold mask that hid most of her face.
“So, you’re not charming? You weren’t genuine with me?”
He gestured for her to sit and took the chair across from her. “I was working, Flick. I’m always working.”
She turned her head away, looking out over the floor. “I thought . . .”
“That doesn’t mean I lied to you. I did not feign my enjoyment of your company.”
“Then what is different?”
Everything.
“Your name. Your station. Your circumstances.”
Her face whipped back to him. “What do you know about my circumstances?” Her tone was sharp.
“You’re not a simple nurse. You’re not just another employee of the Den. You’re not like me. You’re a bridal prospect for one of these gentlemen, which means the social norms of your station should be upheld. I cannot treat you like I did before. It would not be appropriate.”
She scoffed. “My father is a vicar in a small, impoverished village.”
A vicar? His father had wanted him to join the clergy, but religion had never sat well with Tristan.
He’d become a soldier instead—which wasn’t all that different.
He’d still taken orders from a higher power.
If she were just a vicar’s daughter and he still had Lark Hall, he’d be a respectable choice for a husband.
He bit the inside of his cheek. “Be that as it may . . .”
She laced her gloved fingers together. “I’m not better than you. I’m not better than anyone.”
She shook her head like she couldn’t fathom the idea that they were too different.
“Flick, it doesn’t matter. We should get to the matter at hand.”
She looked back over the floor. “All of these men seem . . . old.”
“The younger set will come in later. I wanted you to get a feel for the environment. Get comfortable with the varied chaos.”
“It doesn’t seem too ribald.”
“Not yet.”
“Yet? What happens later?”
“Some would say rousing amusement and sophisticated debauchery. But the truth is men come to waste money doing stupid things.”
“You really don’t like gambling.”
“No. It cost me far too much.”
She studied him. Her eyes a mere glint behind her mask. “What did it cost?”
“That’s my secret to bear. As yours belongs to you.”
She dropped her chin and guilt stabbed at him.
What was he doing? Why was he acting like a blackguard?
Because she’d been acting too, and it bloody hurt his feelings.
Useless feelings he didn’t want to be bothered with, but there they were, downtrodden and forlorn over a woman he couldn’t have.
She could have told him, at least. He was the widow’s master spy.
If anyone could keep her secrets, it was him, but she hadn’t trusted him.
He was used to the widow being cryptic with information, but Flick?
She’d been a sorrowful, beautiful young woman with an open heart, and he’d come to look forward to the challenge of making her smile at least once a day.
She had not intentionally fooled him, he knew that.
But his sole purpose was to protect her, and she hadn’t trusted him.
That was the wound he carried. He may not be a saint, but he had thought she trusted him, spoke more freely in front of him.
All those things had made him feel like more than the spy, the shadow, the widow’s dog.
Watching over her had felt like something worthy of doing.
That there was something there that could grow—something light and beautiful to warm his cold, dark heart.
A riot of laughter drifted up from the floor. Someone had made a bet, not on a table, but challenging another to a—Tristan leaned over the railing to better hear the particulars.
“The first to finish a bottle wins the dancer.”
“Those are the only two bottles in existence, my lord,” the waiter said. “They’re fifty years old.”
“And twice your yearly income, Sanders,” the first gentleman said.
The room quieted as the widow appeared at the top of the stairs, her black dress as elegant as it was somber. Her lace veil shielded her from prying eyes and added an air of otherworldliness as it gently swayed as she descended the stairs. She held the room captive.
“It’s only whisky,” Sanders said, flustered.
“It is the rarest Caledonia Highland Whisky and one of my favorites,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon said. “I won’t have it wasted on you.”
“Then the bourbon,” his challenger said.
Sanders narrowed his eyes. “Hardly worth the challenge.”
Tristan rolled his eyes. Flick briefly glanced at him and leaned back in her chair, taking her attention away from the spectacle below.
“See? Barm heids.”
Her lips twitched. “What is a barm heid?”
“An idiot. A fool. There is foam where their brain should be.”
She covered her mouth as she laughed. “I think I understand. Are you Scottish, Mr. Chase?”
Tristan rolled his neck, a flush likely giving him away if she could see it in this lower light.
“Perhaps.”
“Is that knowledge a secret?”
Tristan raised his hand to summon a footman and ordered tea. “Maybe another time I’ll tell you.”
“Why not right now?”
“You should focus on looking over the gentlemen.”
“According to you, they are not worth my time.”
He shrugged. “I can tell you who they are if one catches your eye.”
She dipped her head and bit her bottom lip. “Catches my eye? How am I to know what sort of men they are?”
Tristan could sense her rising panic. “I will tell you. I know everyone’s secrets, remember?”
“Except mine.”
He ground his teeth. How had she gotten under his skin? He shouldn’t care. It wasn’t personal. “No, not yours.” He reached across the small table and put his hands over hers.
She froze, her gaze on his hand.
Tristan pulled his hand away. “Apologies.”
“No—it’s all right. I’m just . . . To say I’m sheltered is an understatement.”
Now she revealed something. Would she tell him more? End this misery?
“Understandable, given your father’s profession.”
She softly shook her head, as if shaking a thought free. “The notion that I have to marry someone based on so little . . .”
“Marriages are arranged all the time.”
“Oh? You’d be fine with marrying a stranger?”
“Marriage isn’t something I can afford. I have more pressing matters.”
She huffed out a laugh and rested her cheek on her hand, elbow perched on the table. “Your pressing secrets?”
He could easily be irritated by that remark, but he watched her carefully. The stiffness in her shoulders, the fluttering pulse in her neck. If he revealed something to her, would she return that good faith? Was it worth the risk?
“See, how she leans her cheek upon her hand,” a voice called from below. “O, that I were a glove upon that hand, that I might touch that cheek!”
Her head snapped up and she looked down to the gaming floor. Tristan did the same.
“Sir Elliot,” Tristan grumbled. “Bloody Shakespeare?” The nobleman in question stood with his hand raised toward the gallery, toward Flick, his top hat over his heart.
“Your name, fair lady?” Sir Elliot entreated to the laughter of all the men below who watched his performance. He was on the widow’s list. The very widow who was watching them now. He could feel her penetrative gaze, waiting for him to react to this situation as he should and introduce Flick.
Flick looked back at him. “What do I do?” she whispered.
“Answer him, or he’ll keep going. Or I can, if you wish. Or we can just leave.” But they couldn’t—not really. Not with so many witnesses and Mrs. Dove-Lyon’s heavy attention.
“Tristan,” she said, her voice soft and pleading. Her voice sank through the stone wall around his heart, and he almost flinched.
“Whatever you want me to do, I’ll do.”
“I’ll meet him. I suppose that is what I should do.” A flush of red washed over her upper chest, and her breathing quickened. “I must face this.”
“You don’t need to.”
Sir Elliot was a perfectly fine gentleman. A patron of the theatrical arts. Two thousand pounds a year and only thirty-six years of age. Why was he here so early?
She stood, sending a smile to the fool. A cheer rose.
Sir Elliot began to climb the stairs dramatically, as if they really were on a stage, performing for his audience.
She smiled at his antics, and Tristan stood, prepared for the most grueling introduction he’d ever make, but the widow, still standing at the top of the stairs, beat him to it.
“This masked maiden is a special guest of mine, Sir Elliot. You may not know her name. You’ll have to earn it.”
Murmurs spread at her words, and Tristan bit back a curse. Flick was now a game for them.
Sir Elliot bowed low.
“Ay me!” she said.
His face brightened as he stood. “She speaks. O speak again, bright angel—”
“That’s enough,” Tristan cut in.
Sir Elliot glanced around her to him. “Mr. Chase, an unexpected pleasure.”
“Mr. Chase has agreed to squire my special guest around for a few evenings and ensure she has a lovely time,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon warned the gamblers.
“Indubitably,” Sir Eliot agreed.
Tristan rolled his eyes.
“May I escort you to the floor? How shall I address this fair maiden?”
“Uh, you may call me . . . Lady Mystery.”
“Perfect,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon agreed.
Tristan wanted to groan, but now he was relegated to follower as Flick accepted Sir Elliot’s offered arm.
She was still wound tight, a slight tremble in her voice, but she went with him.
As they descended to the main floor, she looked back once at him, briefly smiling.
Tristan smiled back. He couldn’t stop her, and he bloody well wouldn’t discourage her.
This is what she wanted—what she needed.
He had to accept it anyhow. It wasn’t as if he could offer for her himself.