Jack of Clubs (15 page)

So she described what she had found, and why she was in the kitchens, with a glance toward the sleeping child. She told how she had not seen or heard anyone else on the main level of the club.

Downs and Calloway had come to listen to her narrative too, and Jack had his hand on the back of her seat, just inches from her neck. Allie knew her nightrobe kept her more covered than her day gowns, but she was still aware of his closeness, and her dishabille. He had thrown on a Prussian blue coat, but wore no waistcoat or cravat, and his hair was tousled, curls falling onto his forehead. He smelled of smoke and brandy and some spiced cologne. For the first time in hours, it seemed, she felt safe.

Calloway had his coat on too, but without a shirt under it. His thick muscles, and softer, hairier belly rippled in fury as he described what he would do to the varlet who had started the fire.

“I'd bet it was that dirty dish, Sir Jethro Stevens,” he said now, “what you threw out of the club t'other night for cheating.”

The Runner wrote down the name. “Anyone else give you trouble recently, Captain?” he asked. “Anyone lose a big bundle at the tables, who might think he wouldn't have to pay if the place burned down?”

“We do not take vouchers here. No one leaves without paying their debts. If they owe their fellow gamblers money, that is between the gentlemen, but it is nothing to do with the club.”

“What about Rochelle?” Downs asked. “She was as mad as a wet hen when you turned her off.”

The Runner raised an eyebrow.

“That's Rachel Potts, who fancies herself Rochelle Poitier,” Darla put in, “Cap'n Jack's mistress afore Miss Silver got here.”

After writing the woman's name and direction, the Runner looked more closely at Allie in her plain flannel robe and unadorned virginal night gown, with her hair in a single long braid.

“But Rochelle took her revenge by spreading slander in the gossip columns,” Jack quickly stated, seeing the speculation in the Bow Street man's eyes, “defaming our Miss Silver, who is my ward's governess, nothing more.”

The Runner did not write that down, but he duly noted the steel edge to his employer's voice.

“I cannot see Rochelle coming to start a fire before dawn, either,” Jack went on. “She was never one for early rising, or getting her hands dirty.”

“She might have hired a bully boy,” Calloway said, already savoring what he would do to the hired torch man.

“Anyone else?” Rourke asked.

They all looked at each other, then shook their heads. The Red and the Black was a popular spot, and Jack was a popular host. They had never been busier, which must mean customers enjoyed the club.

The Runner flipped through the pages of his Occurrence book, checking to see that he had missed nothing. “Well, it might have something to do with Lady Charlotte's disappearance, then.”

“A child who disappeared fifteen years ago?” Jack asked, disbelieving the connection.

“Crimes were committed. Serious crimes. We know the man who caused the coach accident is dead, but he might have had helpers. Someone stole the heiress, and that someone could still hang. Mayhaps that person doesn't like you asking so many questions, or raising the reward money so high. This might have been a warning, like, telling you to back off the investigation.”

“Never. If the club burns down I will open another and another after that, until I have the answers to my questions.”

The Runner nodded, but looked around, at Harriet, Miss Silver, the pretty girls and the loyal men. All of them would be in jeopardy too.

“I'll hire night watchmen and more guards,” Jack declared. “But I will not shut the club and I will not quit looking for my sister.”

Allie tried to clap, but her hands hurt too much. “Good for you, Captain.”

The Runner closed his book. “Well, there is always the possibility that the fire was set by a reformer, someone who just wanted to close down your club. There are those who do not approve of gambling at all, gaming parlors especially.”

Jack's hands closed on Allie's shoulders. “Ah, but the one who disapproves most is the one who put out the fire.”

The Runner stared at Allie again, making her cheeks turn warm—or was that the feel of the captain's touch? No, it must be the brandy.

Officer Rourke seemed to be done and Harriet was stirring, so Allie said, “We really ought to be going to bed.” She hurried to add, “Harriet and I. In the room we share. Upstairs.”

Rourke put his pencil in his pocket. “Right, and I'll have another look around the place, talk to the neighbors to see if they heard anything suspicious, that kind of thing. Good day, Captain. I'll report back if I find anything. Pleasure to meet you, Miss Silver, even if under such conditions.” He bowed and left, and the others drifted away to help with the clean-up, or to seek their own beds.

Allie asked Calloway to carry Harriet for her, but Jack said he would do it. Then he said, “I have not properly thanked you, Miss Silver. Allie.”

“It was nothing, really. I just acted without thought. Anyone else would have done the same, if not better.” She added, “Jack,” liking the sound of it on her tongue. Calling him by his first name could be no more improper than conversing in her nightclothes, practically alone except for a sick child and a half-empty bottle of brandy. Not much could be more improper, Allie thought with a slight giggle. Now that had to be from the brandy, she told herself.

Jack seemed to be feeling the same lightness of spirits, for he grinned at her. “No one could have done better, my girl. You were a true heroine. You saved the club, and might have saved lives.”

“Nonsense, Calloway or Cook would have smelled the smoke soon enough.”

“But you did it, you, Miss Allison Silver, and I owe you my eternal gratitude.” He was so relieved and so happy—and more than a little drunk with brandy and exhaustion—that he picked her up and twirled her around in an exuberant circle. “You are magnificent!” He laughed as she yelped in surprise, and bent to kiss her cheek before setting her back on her feet.

But Allie had turned to reprimand him. First names were one thing; embraces were quite another. Her face turned, his face turned, and instead of kissing her cheek, Jack found his lips were on hers. It was as if by magic, or fate, or sheer luck. It was like nothing either had felt before.

She did not scream, so he did not take his lips away. He added more pressure to the contact between their mouths and held her closer, against his body. Her lips softened under his, and his body hardened next to hers.

Allie told herself this was like the fire: don't think, just do it. So she did, because she might never be kissed by a rake again, certainly not one who could make her feel so alive and important, not one who could start a fire in her blood with a mere kindling of a kiss. She kissed him back, ignorant despite all her education, but willing to learn, to experiment. Heaven knew how long the lesson in lovemaking might have lasted, or how far she might have let his hands wander. Hers were too clumsy in their bandages to do more than cling to his shoulders. His were pulling apart the braid of her hair, spreading the curls with his fingers down her back.

But then a thin little voice asked, “What about me, Papa Jack? I helped save the club from that cheat, didn't I?”

Allie jumped back, mortified that the child had seen such a display. But Jack smiled and went over to Harriet's chair. He picked her up, blanket and all, and twirled her around, the same way he had Allie. “You are magnificent too, poppet. And I am the luckiest man on earth to have the two of you.”

He twirled Harriet again for good measure.

Which might not have been the best idea of what to do with a sick-to-her-stomach child.

Chapter Fifteen

Great golden gods, he'd kissed Miss Silver! Jack had not meant to, of course, no more than he'd meant to have a bath at dawn. Here he was, though, sitting in a tub of tepid water because there was no time to heat more.

Gads! Kissing the governess ought to have been like kissing his smelly old dog on the lips, only it wasn't. The kiss had been delightful, delicious, and Jack was dying to do it again.

The water in the tub was not cold enough to keep his body from remembering how she had felt in his arms, her unbound breasts against his chest. Who would have thought Miss Silver had breasts? And such soft ones, as soft as her lips under his, as soft as her sweet breath, as soft as those dark golden locks flowing through his fingers. Lud, he was not soft at all!

Jack was astounded, besides aroused. He'd had scores of Rochelle Poitiers, women who were nameless and faceless a month or a week or a day later—but he had never felt like this. He'd never been so heated, for so long afterward, by a mere kiss. From a mere old maid. He must be losing his mind.

For sure he should be using his time to think of who wanted to destroy him and his club, rather than how Miss Silver was destroying his equilibrium. Miss Silver, Allison, Allie. He rolled the names around as he used the wash cloth. No, that was his fresh towel, leaving him nothing to dry himself with. His wits had truly gone begging. The woman was truly devastating his carefree life.

Carefree? Now he had a child to care for, a business to run, numerous dependents to safeguard, a charity to finance, a search to pursue, and ends to meet. He also had an uncomfortable urge for an unbeddable woman. Fighting the French was carefree by comparison.

He tried to bring his thoughts, and his throbbing, under control. Who was starting fires at his back door…and did he have to marry the woman? He'd already destroyed her reputation, through no fault of his own, and he would have decimated her virtue, stopping through no restraint of his own. No, Jack told himself, he would not have made love to Miss Silver on the craps table. He was still that much the gentleman. At least he would have carried her up to his bedroom.

No, no, no! She would have stopped him, Jack knew. She would have slapped him. The only reason she had not was the brandy, and the moment. The kiss they started by accident was a celebration of life after near death, a confirmation of pleasure after the dread of peril. He'd seen it in the army after battles, when men went crazy with lust for a woman, to slake the lust for blood. He was no berserker, though, no madman with no control over his appetites. He would have come to his senses. Or so he prayed.

Or she would have. She'd gone all starry-eyed after one kiss, though. The woman was so ignorant of passion that she might not have protested if his fingers unbuttoned her nightgown, reaching for satiny skin. In her inexperience, she might not have noticed if his hand trailed down her thigh, lifting the flannel. The devil take it, she might have been as bewitched as he was, recklessly sharing in her own seduction, forgetting who she was and where she was.

But in the morning? Hell, he would not want to face Allie Silver after a night of illicit passion when the brandy wore off and her scruples woke up.

For that matter, Jack would not want to face himself in the morning if he'd tumbled the lady in the casino. Or his bedchamber. Or the back yard. He was no despoiler of innocents. Usually just thinking of his missing sister, unprotected by either father or brother, being deflowered by some dirty dish was enough to confirm his code of conduct. Introducing Harriet to his employees was a breach in that code, but it had been unavoidable. Seducing Miss Silver was not unavoidable, despite his body's protests. His principles could easily overcome his prick, couldn't they?

But what, a sneaky, snaky voice hissed in his inner ear, what if the lady wanted to be seduced? What if under those shapeless gowns and prim bonnets was a siren waiting to be stirred? She was not too old to have urges of her own, and who said all spinsters were happy in their untouched state? Miss Silver was an educator. Maybe she wanted to learn more about life for herself. Books could not begin to describe the rapture, nor paintings depict the ecstacy of lovemaking. Jack could be the one to teach her.

And then he'd be the one to walk her down the aisle.

Which realization cured his ardent imagination and his arousal at the same time.

*

Goodness, she'd kissed a rake! Unfortunately, there was nothing whatsoever good about the experience. Oh, it was mind-numbing and toe-tingling and quite the most exciting sensation of Allie Silver's life, but kissing Jack Endicott was so bad as to be sinful.

Allie was not surprised he was proficient at it. A womanizer who could not please women was a contradiction in terms. The captain was practiced and polished and perfectly capable of making a female's legs turn boneless so she had to cling to him or fall on the floor in a puddle of passion. No, his prowess was no surprise. What was, was Allie's own shocking response. She'd kissed him back.

He had not meant to kiss her, she knew. Their lips had met by accident and he, experienced seducer that he was, had taken advantage of the happenstance. But she had not pulled out of his embrace, had not protested, had not made him stop. She knew she could have ended the intimacy with a word or a gesture, without resorting to a slap or a well-placed knee. She had not. What she'd done was clutch his shoulders, press her body against his, and mew for him to deepen the kiss.

If Jack thought she was a wanton now, Allie could not blame him. She felt like a wanton, panting and perspiring after a mere kiss. Why, just recalling the moment made her heart beat faster and her lungs work harder. And it was only a kiss! To him, it must have been a chance encounter. To her, it was cataclysmic.

The problem—one of the problems—was that she wanted more, a lot more. Which, of course, was how girls—and mature women who ought to know better—were led down the primrose path. The vicar was not waiting at the end of that path either, only a lifetime of ruin and regret.

So she had to leave.

Allie even had an idea of where to go this time. The lofty grandfather she never knew never missed a session of Parliament. He'd be in London now. Unless he never read the papers or listened to gossip, which Allie doubted, Lord Montford would now know that she was in London too.

He would take her in rather than leave a stain on his family's escutcheons. He was too proud to do otherwise, she reasoned. She would have to swallow her own pride by going to him, the man who turned his back on his flesh and blood, but a marquess's approval could eradicate any blots on her own copybook. If he accepted her, the rest of the world would have to also.

The marchioness had passed away decades ago, unfortunately, or Allie's grandmother could have been a bigger help than Montford. Women were better at smoothing ruffled feathers and spreading propaganda. Then again, if Allie's grandmother had been alive, in touch with her daughter's family, Allie would not be in this fix now.

It was not as if Allie were asking the marquess for a competence or an allowance. She had no intentions of asking for a dowry, either, or the presentation she never had, in order to find a husband. At her age that would have been ludicrous. After this contretemps, a come-out would have been impossible, even for a marquess to manage. No, she wanted nothing more from the man than the respectability of his house, a place to stay until she found another position as far from London, its pitfalls and temptations as possible.

Heaven knew Montford House was enormous enough to have a spare room for her. From her father's tales, the pile could host half the king's army. Allie might even have passed it on her way through London or to the park. She'd find it easily enough.

The marquess's heir, the Earl of Montjoy, was seldom in town, Allie knew. Her mother's brother preferred to stay in the north country and as far away from his domineering father as possible. Allie had never met her uncle, his wife, nor their two sons and a daughter, her cousins. She suffered no loss, her father had always said, since they were ninny hammers all.

Allie had great hopes, now that she had settled on a solution, that the marquess would take Harriet in too. Any right-thinking gentleman would understand that a gambling club was no place for a child. The wealthy marquess could easily win at court if he petitioned for guardianship of the orphaned girl. No judge would choose a ramshackle rogue over a trusted member of Parliament, an advisor to kings and princes.

Things might have been different if Jack's brother had been named Harriet's trustee. Lord Carde was said to be a serious, sober gentleman, although rumor had it that he'd once had three fiancées, at one time. He was happily wed now, though, with a promising family, far from London.

Allie's grandfather was minutes away. Lord Montford had to take her in, for curiosity's sake, if for no other reason. She was his only daughter's child, and he had to be interested in her appearance at the very least. Allie knew she was curious to meet a man so stubborn he rejected a daughter who married without his blessings, so proud that a gentle scholar was not good enough to sit at his table.

Allie might have inherited her share of that pride, but she had also been at Mrs. Semple's School for years, beholden to her employer, bound to follow her dictates. So she understood humility, too. She would go to Montford House and introduce herself to the marquess, humbly, courteously, like a lady. Like her mother's daughter.

She would go to Montford House, Allie decided, right after the
London Lookout
printed a retraction.

*

They did not set out from the club until after two the next afternoon. Harriet woke up near eight, fully recovered and hungry, but after a coddled egg and some toast went back to a restful sleep. So did Allie. Used to making do with little rest, Jack spent the time marshaling forces to protect his property and his people. In a way he was glad, because now he could employ more veterans from his old army unit both as guards and carpenters to repair the damage from the fire and the firemen's axes. They were happy for the work, despite the pittance he could pay, and they were good, loyal men. The club was sadly back in the debit column, but the cost was worth it.

The small party stopped first at Mr. Burquist's office, where he had long, legal-sounding documents ready for them in response to Jack's earlier message. The writs threatened the scandal sheet's publishers, printers, editors and reporters with dire consequences. The solicitor also provided copies of Harriet's birth records, Hildebrand's so-called will, and Mrs. Crandall to act as Allie's companion in the coach.

Jack rode alongside, in case anyone was watching—or in case Harriet became sick again from the motion of the carriage.

James Coachman knew the way. He ought to, having driven Cap'n Jack to Rochelle Poitier's rooms on enough occasions. Allie tried not to think about that. Or the kiss. Or how handsome Jack looked mounted on a horse, sitting as effortlessly as a god, if pagan gods rode horses. She would have to look that up…when she was not thinking about her grandfather, the newspaper, or the man who had kissed her.

Neither she nor Jack had mentioned anything about last night this morning. They had spoken of the fire, of course, and the extra guards, the inconclusive report from Mr. Rourke at Bow Street, and Mr. Burquist's efficiency. They had not spoken of personal matters, thank goodness. Allie thought she might have expired from embarrassment if he'd apologized, or died of shock if he'd proposed. This way she was merely mortified. Alive, but mortified. Harriet seemed to have forgotten the intimacy, if she'd even noticed it, and the captain was so used to casual affairs that he could ignore it. Allie decided to leave the entire episode in the far reaches of her mind.

Unfortunately, she left his clothes there, too, leaving the image of him half-dressed all too near.

“Are you all right, dearie?” Mrs. Crandall asked when Allie started fanning herself with her bonnet. “You are not coming down with something, are you?”

“Nothing, thank you.” Just a touch of moon sickness, from which she would recover as quickly as Harriet had from her bout of indigestion. Allie firmly set her hat back upon her tightly gathered hair, made sure Harriet's ribbons were neatly tied, and stepped out of the carriage without taking the captain's hand when they arrived at the newspaper office.

Two people were visible in the small, cluttered office, a youth in a leather apron with ink-stained fingers, and an older, thinner man with tobacco-stained teeth. Jack approached the older man, a Henry Hapworth, at his desk. Only one chair faced the editor, so they all stood.

“We are here about an article that appeared in your…journal yesterday.” Jack caught himself before he labeled
The Lookout
a scandal sheet. That was what it was, of course, barely mentioning any news that was not salacious or startling. The truth was as foreign to the paper's pages as Hindustani would have been.

Jack placed his calling card on the man's desk.

Hapworth read it, then looked toward Allie, Harriet and Mrs. Crandall, who were crowded into the small area between rolls of newsprint and machinery. “Ah, that article. Very popular, it was. We had to print more copies. And it made us a nice bit of the ready, it did, giving the other rags a shot at the story while it was still fresh.”

Jack had wondered how the other gossip columns had the tale at the same time. “You sold the information to other reporters?”

“Gentlemen's arrangement, don't you know.”

“
Gentlemen
do not deal in slander,” Jack said.

Allie stepped closer, before Jack and the newspaper man could start trading insults. “The story was not true, sir, and we are here to request a retraction.”

The editor shuffled papers until he found yesterday's issue. “And you wouldn't happen to be Miss Allison Silver, the Marquess of Montford's unacknowledged granddaughter, would you?”