Wicked and the Wallflower

Chapter Fourteen

She’d shocked him.

The unmovable Devil, all powerful and controlling, impenetrable and domineering, and she had shocked him. She knew it, because his eyes went wide and his jaw went slack, and for a heartbeat she thought he might have swallowed something too large. He looked to her, then the lock, then back again. “You did it.”

“I did,” she said, happily.

He shook his head. “How?”

She couldn’t control her proud grin. “Be careful, Devil. I shall begin to imagine you thought me without use.”

“You’re supposed to be without use!”

“I beg your pardon,” she said. “Ladies are not supposed to be without use. We’re supposed to speak several languages, and play the pianoforte, and needlepoint with aplomb, and lead a house party in a rousing game of blindman’s buff.”

He looked away and took a deep breath, making her think he might be searching for calm. “All so useful. Do you do all that?”

“I speak English and imperfect French.”

“And the rest?”

She hesitated. “I’m quite good at needlepoint.” He cut her a look, and she added, “I hate it, but I’m fairly decent at it.”

“And the pianoforte?”

She tilted her head. “Less so that.”

“Blindman’s buff?”

She shrugged a shoulder. “I can’t remember the last time I played.”

“So, we are left with lockpicking.”

She grinned. “I’m very good at that.”

“And is it useful?”

Not knowing where she summoned the brash courage, Felicity set her hand to the handle of the great steel door she’d just unlocked. “Let’s see, shall we?” She didn’t wait, too eager to see inside the warehouse and too afraid he’d stop her. She pulled at the door, using her whole weight to open it a half inch before he did just that.

The door slammed shut, one of his enormous hands splayed wide at her head. She fixed her gaze on that hand, its silver rings glinting in the dark, when he leaned in to her ear and said, “You should not have come.”

She swallowed, refusing to let him win. “Why not?”

“Because it is dangerous,” he said quietly, sending a shiver of belief through her. “Because the rookeries are no place for pretty girls with a breathless anticipation of adventure.”

She shook her head. “That’s not what I am.”

“No?”

“No.”

He waited for a long moment, and then said, “I think it is exactly what you are, Felicity Faircloth, in your pretty frock with your pretty hair high up on your pretty head, in your pretty world where nothing ever goes wrong.”

The words grated. “That’s not what I’m like. Things go wrong.”

He tutted. “Ah, yes. I forgot. Your brother made a bad investment. Your father, too. Your family’s poor enough to fear social exile. But here’s the rub, Felicity Faircloth—your family will never be poor enough to fear poverty. They’ll never wonder when their next meal will come. They’ll never fear for the roof over their heads.”

She turned her head then, almost looking at him, hearing the hint of truth in his words; he knew what that poverty was.

He continued before she could speak. “And you—” His voice grew lower. Darker. Thickly accented. “Silly gel . . . you come into Covent Garden like the fucking sun, thinkin’ you can take a walk wiv us and still stay safe.”

She did look at him then, cursing the shadows at his eyes, which made him a different man. A more frightening one. But she wasn’t frightened. If she were honest, the low voice and the dark profanity made her feel something very different than frightened. She squared her shoulders and replied, “I am safe.”

“You’re nothing close to safe.”

She might not know this place—she might never have known a life like the ones lived here—but she knew what it was to want beyond what she could have. And she knew that, right now, she had it in her reach—even if it was just for the night. Defiance flared and she lifted her chin. “Then we’d best get inside, don’t you think?”

For a moment, she thought he might turn her away. Stuff her into a hack and send her home, just as he’d done before. But instead, after a long stretch of silence, he reached behind her and opened the enormous door with virtually no effort, his hand coming to rest on her waist to guide her into the cavernous room beyond. It was best he did keep his hand there, as she came up short in the doorway, eyes wide and disbelieving.

She’d never seen anything like it.

What, from the outside, seemed like a large building, from the inside seemed to be the size of St. James’s Park. Around the outer edges of the single, massive room were racks of barrels and boxes stacked six or seven high. Inlaid in the ceiling at the outer edge of the racks were huge iron hooks, each attached to long, steel beams.

It was magnificent. She looked to Devil, who was watching her, more carefully than she should have liked. “It’s yours?”

Pride lit in his eyes, and something tightened in her chest. “It is.”

“It’s magnificent.”

“It is.”

“How long did it take you to build it?”

And like that, the pride was gone—extinguished. Replaced with something darker. “Twenty years.” She shook her head. Twenty years would make him a child. It wasn’t possible. And yet . . . she heard the truth in the words.

“How?”

He shook his head. That was all she would get from the Devil on that front.

She changed tack—moved back to safe ground. “What are the hooks for?”

He followed her gaze. “Cargo,” he said, simply.

As she watched, a man approached one of the hooks and swung a rope over it, pulling it toward the ground as two other men lifted a rope-wrapped crate up onto the hook. Once secured, they pushed it through the room with what looked like no effort at all. At the other end of the room, the crate was removed and placed inside one of the five wagons that stood closest to Felicity, each tethered to six strong horses. Surrounding them were dozens of men, some carrying bales of hay to the open ends of each wagon, others checking the hitches for the horses, and still more hurrying back and forth from the back end of the warehouse—which was too dark to see—holding great metal hooks carrying massive blocks of—

“It is ice,” she said.

“I said as much,” Devil replied.

“For what? Lemon treats? Raspberry?”

He smirked. “Do you like sweets, Felicity Faircloth?”

She blushed at the question, though she couldn’t for the life of her say why. “Doesn’t everyone?”

“Mmm.”

The low murmur rumbled through her, and she cleared her throat. “Is it all ice?”

“Does it appear that there is anything but ice in those wagons?”

She shook her head. “Appearances are not reality.”

“Lord knows that’s true, Felicity Faircloth, plain, unassuming, uninteresting wallflower spinster lockpick.” He paused. “What do your unfortunate, terrible friends think of your hobby?”

She blushed. “They don’t know about it.”

“And your family?”

She looked away, heat and frustration flaring. “They . . .” She paused, thinking twice about the answer. “They don’t like it.”

He shook his head. “That’s not what you were going to say. Tell me the first bit. The true bit.”

She met his eyes, scowling. “They are ashamed of it.”

“They shouldn’t be,” he said simply. Honestly. “They should be bloody proud of it.”

She raised her brows. “Of my criminal tendencies?”

“Well, you won’t find criticism of criminal tendencies here, love. But no. They should be proud of it because you’ve got the future in your hands every time you hold a hairpin.”

She stopped breathing at that, her heart pounding at the calm assessment of her wild, wicked skill. He was the first person who had ever, ever understood. Not knowing how to respond, she changed the subject. “What else is in the wagons?”

“Hay,” he said. “It insulates the ice at the back, near the door openings.”

“Oi! Dev!”

Devil’s attention snapped to the growl from the darkness. “What is it?”

“Tear yerself from the girl and ’ave a look a’ the manifests.”

He cleared his throat at the impertinent question and turned to Felicity. “You. Stay here. Don’t leave. Or commit any crimes.”

She raised a brow. “I shall leave all crime committing to you lot.”

His lips pressed into a flat line and he crossed into the darkness, leaving Felicity alone. Alone to investigate.

Ordinarily, if this were, say, a ballroom or a walk in Hyde Park, Felicity would have been too afraid to approach a location so teeming with men. Aside from pure good sense—men were too often more dangerous than they weren’t—Felicity’s interactions with the opposite sex rarely ended in anything that was not an insult. Either they rebuked her presence or they felt entitled to it, and neither left a woman interested in spending time with a man.

But somehow, now, she’d been made safe among them. And it wasn’t simply that Devil had wrapped her in the mantle of his protection; it was also that the men assembled didn’t seem to notice her. Or, if they did, they didn’t seem to care that she was a woman. Her skirts weren’t interesting. They weren’t judging the condition of her hair or the cleanliness of the gloves she was not wearing.

They were working, and she was there, and neither thing impacted the other, and it was unexpected and glorious. And full of opportunity.

She headed for the wagons, larger than most, and made not of the wood and canvas that was so commonly found on London streets, but of metal—great slabs of what looked to be flattened steel. She approached the nearest conveyance, reaching up to touch it, rapping at it to hear the sound of the full cargo beyond.

“Curious?”

Felicity whirled to face a tall man behind her. No, not a man. A woman, incredibly tall—possibly taller than Devil—and whipcord lean, lean enough to be mistaken for a man as she was, dressed in men’s shirt and trousers, and tall black boots that only served to elongate her, so that it seemed as though she could reach her arms over her head and touch the clouds themselves. But even without the height, Felicity would have been fascinated by this woman—by her easy stance and her obvious comfort. By the way she seemed to stand in the dimly lit warehouse and claim it as hers. She did not need to pick a lock to gain access . . . she possessed the key.

What must it be like to be a woman such as this, head now tilted to one side, staring down at Felicity. “You can look, if you like,” the woman said, one hand waving toward the back of the wagon, her voice carrying a strange, soft accent that Felicity could not place. “Devil brought you here, so he must trust you.”

Felicity wondered at the words, at the certainty that Devil would do nothing to harm this place or the people who worked within it, and something flared in her—something startlingly akin to guilt. “I don’t think he does trust me,” she replied, unable to keep herself from looking in the direction of the woman’s wave, wanting nothing more than to follow it and look inside this great steel wagon. “I brought myself here.”

A smile played at the other woman’s lips. “I promise you, if Devil didn’t want you here, you wouldn’t be here.”

Felicity took the words at their face, and moved toward the open back of the wagon, her fingers trailing along the steel, which grew colder as she reached her destination.

The woman turned to a man nearby. “Samir, this one is ready for you. You stay on the North Road and you don’t stop until daylight. Keep to your planned stops and you’ll see the border in six nights. There, you’ll be met by three others.” She handed the man a handful of papers. “Manifests and directions for the other deliveries. Understood?”

Samir, who Felicity imagined was to drive the wagon, tipped his cap. “Aye, sir.”

The woman clapped her hand on his shoulder. “Good man. Good chase.” She turned back to Felicity. “Devil will be back in no time. He’s just checking the loads.”

Felicity nodded, rounding the corner of the wagon to discover a wall of hay, loaded up to the top. She looked to the woman. “They don’t have a better way to bring ice to Scotland than through London?”

The woman paused, then said, “Not one we know of.”

Felicity turned back to the wagon and reached out to touch the coarse straw hiding whatever was inside. “Strange no one has realized that Inverness is directly across the North Sea from Norway.” She paused. “Which is where ice comes from, no?”

“Is she bothering you, Nik?” Felicity pulled back her hand and spun toward the question, spoken altogether too close to her ear. Devil had returned to inspect the open wagon, and Felicity, it seemed.

“No,” the woman named Nik replied, and Felicity thought she might hear laughter in the other woman’s voice, “but I’m imagining she’s going to bother you quite a bit.”

Devil grunted and looked to Felicity. “Don’t bother Nik. She’s work to do.”

“Yes, I’ve heard,” Felicity retorted. “Ensuring your ice is shipped the hundreds of miles back toward its origin.” He looked over her shoulder at that, and she followed his gaze to Nik, who was smirking at him. Excitement flared. “Because it’s not ice, is it?”

“See for yourself.” He reached past her, pulling a bale of hay down from the wagon, revealing a block of ice behind. He frowned.

Felicity’s brows rose. “Are you surprised?”

Ignoring her, he reached for another bale, and another, pulling them down to reveal a wall of ice the length of the wagon and rising nearly to the top of it. He looked to Nik, the wicked scar on his face gone white in the dim light. “This is how we get melt.”

The woman sighed and called into the darkness, “We need another row here.”

“Aye,” came a chorus of men from the darkness.

They came almost instantly, carrying great metal tongs, each bearing a block of solid ice. One by one, they passed the blocks to Devil, who’d climbed up onto the wagon and was fitting them carefully into the void left at the top of the shipment, ensuring as little space as possible was left.

Felicity would have been fascinated by the process if she weren’t so fascinated by him, somehow hanging off the edge of the wagon, heaving great blocks of ice up nearly to above his head as though he were superhuman. As though he were Atlas himself, surefooted and holding up the firmament. He wasn’t wearing a topcoat or a waistcoat, and the linen of his white shirt stretched and flexed over his muscles as they did the same, making Felicity wonder if it might tear beneath his strength.

Everyone was always on about women’s décolletages and how corsetry was growing more salacious by the minute and skirts clung too close to women’s legs, but had any one of those people seen a man without a coat? Good God.

She swallowed as he put the last block into place and leapt down, raising a strange, steel lip from the base of the wagon—approximately twelve inches high and so tightly fitted to the sides of the vehicle that the scrape of it screamed through the warehouse.

“What’s that for?” she asked.

“Keeps the ice from sliding when the melting begins,” he said, not looking at her.

She nodded. “Well, anyone peeking into this wagon would think that you were a very skilled ice deliverer, that is certain.”

He did look at her then. “I am a very skilled ice deliverer.”

She shook her head. “I would believe it, if it were ice.”

“Do your eyes deceive you?”

“They do, in fact. But my touch does not.”

His brow furrowed. “What’s that to mean?”

“Only that if this entire steel wagon were filled with ice, the entirety of the outside would be as cold as the rear two feet.”

Nik coughed.

Devil ignored the words, reaching to swing the large rear door to the wagon closed, latching it in three separate places. Felicity watched carefully as he closed the locks and delivered their keys to Nik. “Tell the men they’re ready.”

“Aye, sir.” Nik turned to the men assembled. “That’s a go, gentlemen. Good chase.”

At the words, the men scrambled, the drivers leaping up to their blocks, seconds joining them. Felicity watched as the one closest to her slid a pistol into a holster attached to his leg. Two other men hefted themselves up onto the rear step of the wagon, pulling wide leather straps around their bottoms.

Felicity turned to Devil. “I’ve never seen anything like those—seats for outriders? To keep them from having to stand the whole trip?”

He watched as one of the men lashed himself to the wagon with the strap. “Partially for comfort,” he replied, turning to accept something from the man to his left. “Partially because they might need their hands for something other than to hang on.” Moving forward, he handed a rifle up to the outrider, and another to the man’s partner.

“Ah, yes. I see now that it is all ice,” she said dryly. “Why else would it require so many armed men?”

He ignored her. “Aim true, boys.”

“Aye, sir.” The reply came in unison.

“Yourselves above all,” Devil said, and her gaze snapped to his face, registering the seriousness of his words and something else—something like concern. Not for the cargo, but for the men. Felicity’s chest tightened.

“Aye, sir.” They nodded, strapping the weapons across their chests and checking the fastenings on their seats before banging on the side of the wagon.

Down the line, other young men were similarly preparing, lashing them to the wagons and strapping rifles to their chests. Metallic thuds echoed through the great room, until every wagon was ready to leave. A great scrape sounded as several men slid an enormous steel door open—large enough to pull a wagon through.

“The border,” Nik called, and the wagon closest to Felicity leapt to movement, pulling through the open door and into the night. She backed into Devil, his arm coming around her waist to steady her as Nik said, “York.” Another wagon moved, and it occurred to Felicity that she should step away from his touch. That another woman certainly would do so. Except . . . she didn’t want to.

Next to him, with the horses stomping their feet and the men shouting their orders, she felt like the lady of a medieval keep, skirts billowing in the Scottish wind as she stood next to her laird and watched her clan prepare for war.

“London First,” Nik shouted above the racket of wagon wheels.

It seemed a little like war. Like these men had trained together, becoming brothers in arms. And now they sojourned together in service to a greater purpose.

To Devil.

Devil, whose arm held her closer than it should. Stronger than it should. And precisely as she found she wished. As though she were his partner, and he hers.

“Bristol,” Nik called, spurring another wagon to motion. “London Second.”

Before the last of the vehicles left the warehouse, the door was sliding closed, several men moving forward to place a great wooden beam against it to prevent it being opened from the outside. At the thunder of the heavy lock, Devil released her, stepping away, as though his hold had been nothing more than a fantasy.

She tried for levity. “And so, your ice is beyond your control.”

“My ice is well within my control until it reaches its destination,” Devil said, watching as another man approached, this one dark-haired, with golden-brown skin. “I would remind you, my lady, that I am able to wield considerable power with or without physical presence.”

The words, a low rumble, sent a shiver through her—reminding her of the way he had seemed to exude power from the moment she met him. He’d somehow prevented the duke from denying her claim of their engagement. He’d discovered her family’s secrets without even trying. He’d made her safe in Covent Garden even when he wasn’t with her. Perhaps he was the Devil, after all, all-powerful and omniscient, manipulating the world without struggle, collecting debts along the way.

But he hadn’t yet collected her debt.

The duke might have offered her marriage, but a marriage of convenience was not her plan. And so she was here in this magnificent place like nothing she’d ever seen, ready to face the Devil once again. And remind him that his end of the bargain had not been met.

“Not enough power,” she replied.

He snapped his attention back to her, his narrow gaze setting her heart racing. “What did you say?”

Before she could reply, the other man joined them, also in shirtsleeves, rolled up along his forearms, revealing a pattern of black ink that Felicity would have considered more seriously if the man hadn’t stepped into a pool of golden light that revealed his face—beautiful beyond measure. The kind of face that painters assigned to angels.

She couldn’t hold back her gasp.

Both men looked at her.

“Is there a problem?”

She shook her head. “No. It’s just—he’s very—” She looked to the man, realizing it was rude to speak of him as though he weren’t standing directly in front of her. “That is, sir, you’re very—” She stopped. Was it appropriate to tell a man he was beautiful? Her mother would no doubt dissolve into conniptions. Though, to be fair, her mother would likely dissolve into conniptions if she knew her daughter was anywhere near Covent Garden—let alone deep in one of its rookeries. So she was long past any semblance of understanding of what was appropriate.

“Felicity?”

She did not look at Devil. “Yes?”

“Do you intend to finish that thought?”

She remained transfixed by the newcomer. “Oh. Yes. I’m sorry. No.” She cleared her throat. “No.” Shook her head. “Definitely not.”

One black eyebrow rose, curious and assessing.

And familiar.

“Brothers!” she blurted out, looking from him to Devil and back again, then took a step toward him, sending him back a half step, his gaze flying to Devil’s, giving her a chance to inspect his eyes—the same mysterious color of Devil’s—somehow gold and somehow brown, and with that dark ring around them, and altogether, thoroughly unsettling. “Brothers,” she repeated. “You’re brothers.”

The beautiful man inclined his head.

“This is Beast,” Devil said.

She gave a little laugh at the silly name. “I suppose that’s meant to be ironic?”

“Why?”

She looked over her shoulder at Devil. “He’s the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen.”

Devil’s lips flattened at that, and she thought she heard a little growl of amusement from the man called Beast, but when she returned her attention to him, he hadn’t moved. She pressed on. “Your eyes are the same. The bones of your cheeks, your jaws. The curve of your lips.”

The growl seemed to come from Devil then. “I’ll thank you to stop considering the shape of his lips.”

Her cheeks grew warm. “I’m sorry.” She looked to Beast. “That was quite rude of me. I shouldn’t have noticed.”

Neither brother seemed to care about the apology, Devil already moving away, no doubt expecting her to follow. She supposed no one was going to stand on ceremony in a Covent Garden warehouse and make introductions, so she decided to do it herself. She smiled at Devil’s brother. “I am Felicity.”

That brow rose and he stared at her outstretched hand, but he did not take it.

Really. Were the brothers raised by a mother wolf? “This is the bit where you tell me your real name; I know it isn’t Beast.”

“Don’t talk to him,” Devil said, his long legs already eating up the ground as he headed across the warehouse.

“But you believe his name is Devil?” The question came low and graveled, as though the Beast was out of practice using his voice.

She shook her head. “Oh. No. I don’t believe that at all. But you seem more reasonable.”

“I’m not,” he replied.

Felicity probably should have been unsettled by the answer, but instead, she found she rather liked this second, quiet brother. “I wasn’t noticing your lips you know,” she offered. “It’s just that I’ve noticed his and yours are the same . . .” She trailed off when both his brows rose. She supposed she shouldn’t have admitted to that, either.

He grunted, and Felicity imagined that it was supposed to set her at ease.

Oddly, it did. Together, they followed Devil, who had already disappeared into the shadows of the warehouse—hopefully far enough away that he hadn’t heard her. As they walked, she searched for a topic that might make the unsocial man more willing to converse. “You’ve been running ice for a long while, then?”

He did not reply.

“Where does it come from?”

Silence.

She searched for something else. “Did you design the transport wagons yourselves? They’re very impressive.”

Again, silence.

“I must say, Beast, you do know how to put a woman at ease.”

If she weren’t paying such close attention to him, she might not have heard the little catch in his throat. A laugh of some sort. But she did, and it made her feel triumphant. “Aha! You are able to respond!”

He said nothing, but they’d reached Devil by then. “I told you not to talk to him.”

“You left me with him!”

“That doesn’t mean you should talk to him.”

She looked from one brother to the other and sighed, then waved a hand at the men dispersed around the enormous room. “These are all your employees?”

Devil nodded.

Beast grunted.

Felicity heard it and turned on his brother. “That. What does that mean?”

“Don’t talk to him,” Devil said.

She didn’t turn back. “I think I shall, thank you very much. What did that noise mean?”

“They are his employees.” Beast’s gaze slid away from her.

She shook her head. “That’s not all it meant, though, is it?”

Beast met her eyes, and she knew whatever he was about to say was important. And true. “The kind of employees who would walk through fire for him.”

The words fell in the darkness, filling the warehouse, reaching the corners and warming them. Warming her. She turned back to Devil, who stood several feet away, his hands thrust into his trouser pockets, a look of irritation on his face. But he wasn’t looking at her. He couldn’t.

He was embarrassed.

She nodded, then said, softly, “I believe that.”

And she did. She believed this man who called himself Devil was the kind of man who could engender deep, abiding loyalty from those around him. She believed he was a man with whom one did not trifle, and also a man of his word. And she believed that he was the kind of man who held up his end of the bargain.

“I believe that,” she repeated, wanting him to look at her. When he did, she realized his eyes were not the same as his brother’s. Beast’s gaze did not make her heart pound. She swallowed. “So, they help you smuggle cargo?”

Devil’s brow furrowed. “They help us move ice.”

She shook her head. She didn’t believe for a second that these two men, with the way they fairly oozed danger, were mere ice traders. “And where do you keep this alleged ice?”

He straightened his arms and fisted his hands in his pockets, rocking back on his heels and looking at the ceiling. When he replied, his words were filled with frustration. “We’ve a hold full of it downstairs, Felicity.”

She blinked. “Downstairs.”

“Underground.” The word rang forbidden in the dimly lit room, spoken low like sin, as though he were the Devil, inviting her not only underground—but so far underground that she might never return.

It made her want to experience everything it promised. It made her ask for that experience, without hesitation. “Show me.”

For a moment, no one moved, and Felicity thought she had asked too much. Pushed too hard. After all, she hadn’t been welcome here; she’d picked the lock to make her way in.

But she had been welcome here. He’d let her pick the lock. He’d given her free rein of the warehouse, let her stand among his men and see the operation and, for a moment, he’d let her feel something other than alone. He’d given her access to his world in a way no man ever had before. And now, drunk on the power that came with that access, she wanted all of it. Every inch.

More.

“Please?” she added in the silence that followed her demand—as though politeness would impact his answer.

And it did. Because Devil looked to his brother, who revealed none of his own thoughts as he passed a large brass key ring to Devil. Once the keys were in hand, Devil turned away, making for a great steel plate set into the ground nearby, reaching down and opening it up, revealing a great black hole in the ground. Felicity approached as he reached for a nearby hook, bringing down a coat. “You’ll need this,” he said. “It will be cold.”

Her eyes went wide as she reached for it. It was happening. He was going to show her. She swung the great heavy cloak around her shoulders, the scent of tobacco flower and juniper encircling her, and she resisted the urge to bury her nose in the lapel. The coat was his. She looked to him. “Won’t you be cold?”

“No,” he said, reaching for a lantern nearby and dropping into the hold.

She came to the edge and looked down at him, his face shadowed by the flickering light. “Another thing you control? Cold does not bother you?”

He raised a brow. “My power is legion.”

She turned and climbed down the ladder inlaid into the side of the hatch, trying to remain calm, trying not to notice that her world was changing with every step. That the old, plain, wallflower Felicity was being left behind, and in her place was a new, strange woman who did things like pick locks that opened doors instead of closing them, and visit smuggler’s caches, and wear coats that smelled of handsome, scarred men who called themselves Devil.

But truth such as that was impossible not to notice.

There was something to be said for being in league with the Devil.

When Felicity reached the dirt ground, she spoke to the rungs of the ladder. “I am not certain you wield the power you think, sirrah.”

“And why is that?” he asked, his voice quiet in the dark.

She turned to face him. “You made me a promise, and you have yet to deliver.”

“How is that?” Had he moved closer? Or was it the darkness playing tricks? “From what you’ve said, it sounds like your duke is won. What was it you said? He dances like a dream? What more would you like?”

“You didn’t promise me a duke,” she insisted.

“That is precisely what I promised you,” he said as he climbed several rungs of the ladder and pulled the door to the hold closed behind them, throwing them into darkness.

She blinked. “Is it necessary to shut us in?”

“The door stays closed at all times. It prevents melt, and the curiosity of anyone who might be interested in what we do inside the warehouse.”

“No, you promised me a moth,” she said, not knowing where the bravery came from. Not caring. “You promised me singed wings and passion.”

His eyes glittered with his attention. “And?”

“The duke is under no risk of bursting into flames, you see,” she replied. “And I thought it only right that I inform you that if you are not careful, you are at risk of finding yourself in my debt.”

“Hmm,” he said, as though she’d made an important business point. “And how do you suggest I change that?”

“It’s quite simple,” she whispered. He was closer. Or maybe it was that she wanted him closer. “You must teach me to lure him.”

“To lure him.”

She took a deep breath, his warmth around her, tobacco flower and juniper drugging her with power. With desire. “Precisely. I should like you to teach me to make him want me. Beyond reason.”