The Last Gamble

[Dedication] (#ulink_e62e87c1-ae2e-5a82-979a-50e5ec0ebc1d)

This book is dedicated to dreamers.

We often are told to get our head out of the clouds.

If only they realized how lovely the view.

Chapter One (#ulink_70e5d01c-3fbe-5c93-afe1-9ae0aff73247)

A moonlit sky is a thief’s worst enemy. Lucius Reese, proud proprietor of one third of The Underworld, glanced upward in appreciation of the boon found in the night heavens, not a star visible in its velvet span. Owning an exclusive gambling hell provided endless benefits, one being the ability to become equal with the darkness. Dressed completely in black, he melted into the evening hours. His low-brimmed hat and high-collared coat made him nothing more than a shadow, a whisper of suspicion were anyone to notice an anomalous movement in the alley adjacent to Welbeck Street.

Reese was a man of many titles, none of them revered by the peerage: rakehell, philanderer, and bastard most of all. Which prompted a multitude of secrets and composed a complex nature that disallowed emotion, unwilling to maintain an intimate relationship with a woman for longer than a few days. And though he valued his friendship with Maxwell Sinclair and Cole Hewitt, his partners at the hell, Reese rarely confided anything of a personal nature.

Therefore no one knew he skimmed the brick wall at the rear of the three-storey town house owned by Viscount Dursley, intent on gaining entry and perpetuating a theft that would leave the stuffy prig in an apoplectic fit. The mental image urged a grin, but Reese nudged the desire aside. How unfortunate he would not be present during the moment of realization as Dursley’s worst fear actualized. Reese would enjoy few things more than thwarting his half-brother in the twisted game played at his expense.

In silence, he smoothed a gloved hand down the mullioned paned glass of the garden terrace doors and settled on the brass and strike plate. His fingertip located the keyhole and, with his left hand, he twisted the knob to confirm the lock held. Utilizing the expertise learned through his years on the street, he produced a short metal pick, inserted it into the lock, and gained entry two breaths later.

Stepping into the ground-floor drawing room, he allowed his stifled smile freedom. The withering embers of the evening’s fire simmered in the hearth and his first inhale brought with it the cloying scent of floral perfume as it lingered in the otherwise breathless interior. Aah, Dursley must have his mistress abovestairs. An intriguing development. His shrew of a wife preferred the countryside and the purposeful separation allowed Dursley inordinate liberties. Although Reese wouldn’t put it past the viscount to make free with a servant girl.

But no, tonight the servants were safe as the presence of expensive fragrance confirmed his first assumption true. Reese needed to enter the viscount’s bedchamber to retrieve the particular item of interest and having a female abed raised the stakes. A spike of challenge quickened his pulse.

He waited no longer and crossed the thick Aubusson carpet, his boot heels muted as he aimed for the centre stairs. With little effort, he located the newel post in the blackness and accomplished the steps to view an elongated corridor lit by single candle lanterns, the house ensconced in the pale shimmer of quietude. No matter it was the home of his half-brother, Reese had never stepped inside until now.

To the right he overlooked the downstairs foyer, but on the wall to the left a series of portraits, each one with a surly churl, led him straight to the master suite like a trail of fabled breadcrumbs. Outside the main rooms the fusty painting of his father, his expression stern and smug, watched in silent surveillance. Reese smirked with glorious mockery and entered the sitting area, which led into the bedchamber.

No conversation could be heard. His soundless breathing and the confident thud of his heartbeat assured the house slept soundly. Apparently, Dursley suffered little from his malevolent deeds, able to slumber without a troubled conscience, so much so the viscount paid a whore to warm his bed.

Reese had it on good information the item he sought rested with equivalent reticence in a wall safe secured by a mechanical lock. The rotating disks would need to be aligned in the proper order for the mechanism to open. He’d practised for weeks at home in his apartments until confident in his ability, detecting clicks and the pressured resistance that preceded release. Now success lay within reach. It would require all his skill and perhaps a spot of luck to go with it.

A feminine murmur, discordant in the stillness, gave him pause. He waited. Nothing short of murder would stop him from accomplishing his goal. Pity if the ladybird proved a complication. Shoulders pinned to the wall, he entered the main chamber, his eyes already adjusted to the dim interior. At the centre of the room, two figures, nothing more than indecipherable shapeless mounds, lay motionless atop the mattress. He at once located Dursley’s dour portrait, behind which the safe was hidden, as if it called to him, dared him and waited for his attention. The painting hung on the wall to the right, parallel to the female’s silhouette beneath the sheets.

As seamlessly as smoke surrenders its existence, Reese advanced across the room and removed the artwork to set on an overstuffed chair beside the end table. Dursley deserved worse than he would receive. The peerage possessed an extraordinary talent for overlooking scandal when it bent to their purpose. Those entitled protected the vaunted reputations of their own and lived by a code only superseded in strength by the oath of criminals and side-slips or otherwise discarded members of society. Fortunately, Reese belonged to the latter group.

With a fleeting glance to the imposing four-poster bed at the centre of the room, he removed his left glove and placed his fingertips upon the dial. As practised for endless hours, he rotated the knob until a dissonant click sounded, the featherlight vibration unmistakable.

A rare set of circumstances had placed him in his half-brother’s bedchamber this evening. A deed that would go punished once Reese located his son, the five-year-old lad stolen by Dursley almost a year prior. Reese refused to contemplate what his half-brother might have told Nathaniel. He knew his son would question the why and where of his father’s absence, but his yearlong search had yielded little aside from dead-end leads and mistaken identity.

Max Sinclair owned The Underworld with Luke, and Sinclair’s wife had unknowingly met Nate at the Marine Society several months before, but by the time the information came to light the trail had gone dark. All confrontations with his half-brother had ended in violent threats, Reese all too aware of his vulnerability were the courts to deliberate the matter. Meanwhile, each passing day brought further heartache and hopelessness. Drastic times, drastic measures and all that. He would stop at nothing to locate his son, and tonight, after he stole Dursley’s journal, he would at last have the factual information needed to pursue Nathaniel’s recovery.

With a flick of his fingers he rotated the dial in the opposite direction. Once, twice, and then the slight pressure of resistance. Click.

Someday these newfangled locks would be perfected to a point where any common thief couldn’t help themselves to the contents of the safe the mechanism intended to protect.

Another rotation, another click, and Reese eased the metal door open, the greased hinges as noiseless as his satisfaction.

He didn’t waste a moment collecting stacks of bills or pouches of jewels. He possessed more wealth than he’d ever spend in a lifetime. Instead, he slid the pounds aside and wrapped his fingers around the leather journal buried at the rear of the compartment. There lay the treasure, only recently come to light. His heart pounded, rushing blood thick in his veins, as his pulse thrummed at his temple. The journal promised the information required to find his son. He swallowed emotion at the weight of that realization and slid the book into his breast pocket, before he carefully closed the door and secured the dial with a slant of his wrist.

Replacing the poorly done painting, Reese was poised to leave when the smaller lump beneath the sheets, the misguided mistress, sat up, swung her legs over the edge of the mattress and padded past him without a stitch, most likely in search of the bourdaloue and a bit of privacy. He needed to pass the same screen divider to gain access to the sitting room and hall, down the stairs and out the door. Perhaps she might not notice him. When she’d left the bed, he’d hugged the shadows only five paces away. Still, suspicion suggested she would be more fully awake after completing her personal ablution.

Taking a chance, how he loved to raise the stakes, he crossed the room with hope to avoid the confrontation if only by a narrow margin, but the drowsy miss re-entered the bedroom at the precise moment he intersected, her confused mien upon coming chest to chest with his person priceless. He allowed her one confused blink before he grasped her around the waist and stole a fast, hard kiss.

Then he went out like a snuffed candle.

Georgina Smith gathered Biscuit, her pug named for his similarity to the toasted treat, tight in her arms and settled in the pillow-stuffed window seat of her Coventry cottage. Posing as a governess had proved exhausting. If Lord Tucker hadn’t decided unexpectedly to shuttle his family off to London for a week of personal family business, she wondered when she’d have next experienced a bit of freedom. How foolish to assume all governess employment, and all charges for that matter, were similar. The last assignment had proved enjoyable compared to her current situation, but she was in no position to complain. Whether dowager companion or governess, there were few choices for earning wages as an unprotected female. She would survive until she sorted out her future. Too many questions needing answering and she was in no mood to address them this evening.

Stroking Biscuit’s velvety coat, she reclined against the nook with a long exhale, and snuggled the dog deeper into her lap. The wrinkly pug was more friend than pet and, as expected with his usual intuitive temperament, he licked the bottom of her chin in an affectionate gesture of empathy.

The night sky brought peaceful solace despite the absence of a glowing moon. Only nine months had passed since she’d escaped impending scandal in London, but living in Coventry had turned out better than she’d expected. Who would have guessed she would locate this lovely rental, find employment and settle into routine so quickly? Withdrawing from polite society brought with it the surprising ease of simple living that smoothed the distress of all she’d left behind.

She smiled against Biscuit’s warmth and dropped a distracted kiss to his fur. She was four and twenty, old enough to understand life didn’t always proceed as planned. Her mother and father meant well but remained locked in tradition, and while leaving behind her younger sister caused her heart to ache, it would all be for the best in the end. At least that was the lie she sustained each day with strength and determination.

She needn’t have worried over money. With the full purse she’d brought with her and immediate employment as a governess, she wanted for little, at least for the time being. Life in London was vastly different, her family active in a high-standing social sphere, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t find peace here. Hope stayed with her. She wasn’t one to bemoan her situation overlong.

No, things weren’t as dreary as she’d feared, and at least she’d escaped London undetected. London. Just thinking the word made her shudder. London was the very last place on earth she wanted to be.

Luke startled awake. He lifted his head from the desk where he’d fallen asleep after accomplishing the most important theft of his life. As promised, the journal held a bounty of information, most interesting, some amusing, one page vital. He’d come to The Underworld, the gaming hell which was more a home than his bachelor apartments at The Albany, and rifled through the pages with desperate acclivity. His half-brother’s handwriting left much to be desired, a scrawled mess similar to the manner in which the viscount led his life, but with perspicacious acuity, Luke deciphered a notation seemingly connected to where Nathaniel was possibly held. After collecting his thoughts and formulating a plan, he’d downed a brandy and slept through the earliest hours of morning.

Now he glanced at the wall clock and huffed a breath. Clubs, spades, diamonds and hearts. The hell would be vacant aside from the working girls who let apartments on the upper floor. He’d need to discuss his proposed trip with Max and Cole, but that conversation would keep, his friends aware he would travel at a moment’s notice if information surfaced concerning Nathaniel’s whereabouts.

Smoothing a palm down his face to rid the last vestiges of slumber, he shoved his chair backwards and unlocked the desk drawer spanned against his waist. He’d taken no chances with the journal’s safety, however paranoid that might have seemed, and secured it away before he slumped over the desk in protection. Now he flipped the book open to the desired page he’d marked with a worn playing card, the five of hearts, and examined the notes left by his half-brother.

Georgina Smith, governess.

Smith. It was likely a false name, the most popular in all London, and he knew that from a life spent on the streets. Every gel and bloke became a Smith when they wished to remain anonymous, lost, unfound or otherwise undetected. If it wasn’t for the address printed below the name, he’d have wasted his time sneaking into Dursley’s bedchamber, impossible to locate one chit named Smith in an infinite population.

Instead, and foolishly, his half-brother believed his methods infallible, and with ill-conceived confidence upheld that his title would protect him, never to be questioned, in turn committing to the journal all the information Reese needed.

Things were about to change.

He passed a fingertip over the looping script.

17 Hill Street, Coventry

It had to be true, this single piece of damning evidence he’d searched for for months, because he refused to believe any harm had come to Nate, effectively ignoring any unspeakable paths that suggested the child had come to danger or worse.

Coventry was less than two days’ travel if he rode alone on horseback in good weather. It proved no challenge. His Arabian, Snake Eyes, was the finest breed of expensive horseflesh, fourteen hands high and built for speed and endurance. Once Luke had seen the animal’s white coat mottled with a streak of black down his back, he knew the stallion was meant to be his, the name conjured by the dark markings which portrayed a snake slithering atop the horse’s spine.

As soon as Luke had collected his things, he planned to set out. Resolved in this, he rose from the chair, slid the journal into his pocket, and locked the hell behind him. He would have liked to travel this morning at first light, but despite his desperate yearning to reunite with his son, a few matters needed to be attended first. He wouldn’t jeopardize his son’s safety. Nathaniel remained the only thing left in his life of any worth.

Chapter Two (#ulink_631e2bec-4c02-53a2-8148-7917c51013e4)

The first thing Luke noticed upon entering Coventry and locating a stable for his horse was the diminutive size of the main thoroughfare and adjoining roadways. He’d spent sufficient years in London that the city’s energy lived in his blood. One reason he preferred time whiled at The Underworld was the frenetic pace, the pulse of action and risk through the night hours while most of London slept, rather than the staid predictability of The Albany where he kept bachelor rooms.

Upon securing Snake Eyes in a stall, he spent no time on a brush-down and instead paid the stable hands generously to perform the task. He took a room at the only inn available and noted the second obtrusive difference in the modest town centre. Pedestrians were friendly. Strangers passed with a smile and the population appeared cheerful despite, as far as Luke could see, the town offered sparse entertainment or amusement. A different world, as it were, only two days’ travel away.

He crossed through the main square on foot, past a tall cathedral and closed mercantile, and followed the directions supplied by the vociferous innkeeper to arrive at the corner of Hill Street only twenty minutes later. Two jackdaws startled from the walkway as he approached, cawing in objection like lackadaisical guardsmen who’d drunk too much ale.

On his two days’ journey, he’d contemplated a variety of ways to approach Miss Smith in an attempt to locate Nathaniel and at the same time not alarm the woman. Any governess worth her salt wouldn’t allow a strange man to approach their charge, nor would a genteel woman speak to a man of his ilk. He’d changed his clothes at the inn and washed the dust from his face and hands, but even now he wavered in his tactic. He couldn’t mount the steps to house number seventeen and simply knock on the door. A governess wouldn’t have her charge with her. At least, that’s not how such arrangements worked in London. Who knew what his half-brother contrived here in this remote country town?