All I Want

All I Want

Erica Ridley

A free
Dukes of War
short story!

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:

A sneak peek at
Lord of Chance
,
 

the first book in the brand new

Rogues to Riches
series!

All I Want

He taught her to trust. He taught her to love. And then he left her behind without a word. Tonight he's back. Whether for a moment or forever depends on the turn of a card. Twenty-one to win—or to lose it all. Their future hinges on her dealing him the right card...

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ISBN: 1939713579
ISBN-13: 978-1939713575

Copyright © 2016 Erica Ridley
 

Photograph on cover © DepositPhotos

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the author.

Chapter One

Another elegant soirée, another flesh-crawling proposal from a money-hungry suitor old enough to be Matilda’s father.

Despite her heeled slippers, Lady Matilda Kingsley fairly sprinted to the gaming parlor. She wanted nothing more than to run home and forget her troubles in the comfort of a good book. But to get there, she needed Cousin Egbert. She’d been his ward for most of her life.

He’d been a wastrel for all of his. He was a fixture at every gaming table and gambling hell across the city. Worst of all, he had the devil’s own luck. He wouldn’t leave a table until everyone else’s coin clinked inside his pockets, which sometimes took well past dawn.
 

Matilda’s footsteps slowed. Was that Cousin Egbert, swathed in cigar smoke and wrinkled linen, standing with one foot inside the gaming parlor and one foot out? Was he motioning her
forward
?

She stopped walking. Usually
she
was the one found hovering at a doorway, vainly trying to signal him she was ready to leave, without letting her toes cross the thin threshold from proper ballroom to scandalous gaming parlor. To do so would be to court scandal. And yet, here he was—beckoning her to join him. Something was very peculiar. Her neck tingled. All her senses were on high alert.

She ventured only as far as the doorjamb, and laid her hand on her cousin’s arm.

“I want to go home,” she murmured. “Please, cousin. It’s been a long night.”

Their unspoken arrangement was that if she managed to catch his attention, he was obliged to take her back to the townhouse. But this time, he shook his head. His eyes were cold and hard, his easy smile distorted and mean. Her stomach twisted. She hadn’t seen that expression on his face in years, but she well knew what it meant: there’d be no talking him out of whatever trouble he was brewing. And he meant to involve her in the thick of it.

“
Please
,” she repeated, though she knew it was useless. His eyes were too glassy. But she had to try. “The music is over. Can we not go home?”

“Of course,” he said, but his harsh smile only widened. “I’m just finishing a game of chance. If you’ll play my last hand, we can be on our way.”

Her heartbeat stuttered, then sped to new heights. What could he mean? If crossing the threshold was scandalous, gambling would be ruinous. It could only be a trick. But why? And on whom?

“You…wish for me to wager?” Her throat was too dry to swallow properly.

He smiled. “Just play one hand. Then I’ll take you home. I promise.” He gripped her by the wrist and pulled her into the candlelit parlor.
 

Her muscles locked up. She shouldn’t be anywhere near this room. Or these men.
 

Smoke rose from the fingers and mouths of every gentleman present, making the air thick and sickly sweet from the fumes of their cigars. A gaggle of dandies encircled what she assumed to be a gaming table. Two dozen sotted spectators in linen superfine and buckskin breeches surrounded the whole.
 

They parted to let her through.

The table was small, round, and empty, save for a folded slip of paper and a set of playing cards stacked to one side. A soldier sat at one of the two wooden chairs, his back to Matilda. His broad shoulders and defined muscles filled out his pristine red coat. Golden epaulets and matching stars marked him as an officer. She jerked her gaze toward her cousin. His vicious smile etched deeper into his face as he hauled her in plain sight of the soldier’s face.
 

Owen Turner
.

The roiling in her stomach bubbled over into nausea. She reached out to steady herself. Someone shoved her into the empty chair. She tried not to look, not to stare, but her eyes had hungered for the merest glimpse of him for so, so long…

He was beautiful. The first friend she’d ever made. The only boy she’d ever loved. A good four years older since last she saw him, his heartrendingly familiar face now belonged to a man she no longer knew.
 

The dark brown curls that had once fluttered in the morning wind and stuck to his forehead when caught in a sudden shower was now neatly clipped at the ears and nape, as befitting an officer. No. Not an officer. A
major
.
 

Clear blue eyes that had once sparkled merrily as they raced across moors or jumped into the river—those beloved blue eyes were now stormy and shadowed, no trace of merriment in their depths or etched at the corners. And why would there be? He’d fought Napoleon’s army for four long years only to find himself battling her cousin Egbert in a gilded parlor.

Her throat tightened. It had been Owen who taught her to skip rocks and climb trees, but for all his comparative worldliness, neither one of them had ever expected him to step foot outside North Yorkshire’s borders. Above all, she’d never thought he’d leave her. To see him here, a grown man, a celebrated soldier, even more dashing in the flesh than the stories upon everyone’s tongues…

Ah, the gossip.

She wasn’t the only one he’d dazzled. If half the rumors were true, those hard, beautiful lips had kissed every willing mouth between here and Paris. If it didn’t make her violently ill just thinking about it, she might appreciate the irony that the boy Society had once considered beneath them was now the primary reason smelling salts were in higher demand than breakfast tea.
 

He was known for giving pleasure to everyone and his heart to no one, vie as women might to catch the uncatchable. But there was no hope of corralling a force of nature. Owen was a tempest, not a summer rain. He was passion and power, a storm in the soul… and just as quickly gone.

She should know.

Other than keeping his piercing eyes focused on hers, he hadn’t moved since she’d sat down. Hadn’t smiled. Hadn’t offered his hand. Hadn’t even spoken her name. By all appearances, he neither recognized her nor cared for an introduction.

She knew better.
 

His very stillness was as telltale as other men’s nervous tics. Whenever he was on edge, a life in the shadows had taught him to go silent and still. Not like a deer or a rabbit. Like a lion. Eyeing his prey. Preparing to strike.
 

Whatever was going on here, she wanted no part of it. She pushed to her feet.
 

Egbert stopped her with one hand atop her shoulder. A cold sweat broke out beneath her stays.

“What’s this about?” Her voice trembled as she eased back into the seat.
 

“A gentleman’s wager.” Egbert waved his hand toward the table. “Except this
gentleman
dared question my integrity. Rather than meet him at dawn and sully a bullet with his blood, I have chosen to let an impartial stand-in play the final hand.
You
.”

Her jaw clenched so tight her teeth hurt. “I am scarcely impartial.”

Owen’s voice was smooth velvet, smothering as it caressed. “Whose side might you be on?”
 

“My own,” she snapped. Or meant to snap. She had loved him for so long and he had broken her heart so carelessly that his mere presence was enough to twist her into a knot of hate and desire.
 

“I see.” His shoulders relaxed infinitesimally. “I trust you.”

That slight movement twisted her heart. He
did
trust her, damn him. If only she could say the same. “What is the game?”

His eyes softened. “
Vingt-et-un
.”

Twenty-one. She took a deep breath.

One of the dandies elbowed his way forward. “That’s French for—”

“She speaks French, you ninny.” A different blackguard raised his voice. “I’d be a richer man if Lady Matilda would cease translating Parisian fashion plates to my sister. Now, if one of you gents would like to
explain
the game instead of translating the—”

“She already knows.” Owen’s voice was quiet, but laced with a thread of danger that silenced the entire room.
 

Matilda’s breathing slowed. He’d taught her to play as a jest, and regretted the decision when she took an immediate fancy. He hated games of chance. Which meant an exceptional turn of events must have driven him to this table.

She rubbed the back of her neck. “What are the stakes?”

Owen’s voice was even, his face impassive. “Addington bet five thousand pounds.”
 

She pinched her lips together. A pittance for Cousin Egbert, but unspeakable riches to Owen. “And you? What did you wager?”

“His
cottage
,” spat one of the onlooking Corinthians with disdain. “He hasn’t anything else.”

His companions rolled their eyes in agreement. “I can’t fathom why Addington would even want it.”

Matilda could.
 

The little cottage would mean nothing to a wealthy peer, but it was everything to Owen. A gift from his father to his mother. It was all he owned. His sole link to his heritage. The only place he could call home.