Until he met Mr. Seamus Shaw.
One evening, it had amused Lord Whitsby to invite Dev to a supper party. He’d inquired about Dev’s studies and explained to the gathered friends and family that he was having Dev educated to be his future estate manager. Whitsby met the praise of his guests with smug satisfaction. When Dev began explaining his mechanical interests, Whitsby’s demeanor turned into the condescending and dismissive with statements like,Young Dev’s little inventions litter the entire estateandThere’s no mining on my lands.
After dinner, Mr. Shaw approached Dev and asked him to explain his steam engine invention in further detail, which Dev happily did. At the end of the conversation, Shaw offered to enter into a business partnership with Dev.
Dev had yet to reach his nineteenth year.
Within twelve months, he’d repaid Whitsby for his education, plus interest. The baron had groused about young men not knowing their place and friends poaching servants, but he’d accepted every last farthing.
Ten years on, Dev had never once regretted that turn in his life. With his experience running factories, Shaw had proven an excellent partner.
“Now, the ladies parading around this room. They think blunt grows on trees.” Shaw tucked his thumbs into his waistcoat pockets and rocked back on his heels, a habit of his. “They don’t understand a working man’s mind.”
Dev knew to the syllable what Shaw’s next words would be.
“Not like my daughters.”
Shaw’s daughters… The man had three of them—and he would be most obliged if Dev would take one to wife. He wasn’t fussy about which.
Which Dev had no intention of doing.
A flash of brown sun-streaked hair with a jaunty little bonnet perched atop caught the edge of his vision.
Imogen.
He knew it from the instinctive tightening of every muscle in his body.
Imogen had been at that fateful dinner party, of course. After all, Whitsby was her father. Though a few years younger than Dev, they’d grown up alongside each other.
Further, they’d had an understanding.
Or so he’d thought.
He felt the usual pull—to gravitate toward her and enter her orbit. That pull was as familiar as the sound of his own voice.
He resisted—which had also become familiar.
Imogen was another man’s wife.
Not his.
Not yet, anyway.
A sudden frisson of excitement shimmered through the crowd. The horses had begun assembling at the starting line.
Before this season, Dev had never attended a race meeting in all his life. Then one night, he’d won a Thoroughbred off a dissolute, young earl named Clifton in a card game. Dev’s first thought had been to sell the beast. Given the room’s reaction to his acquisition of the famous Little Wicked, he’d known he could get a pretty penny for the filly. But he’d picked up a particular scent in the air—opportunity.
The owner of a Thoroughbred would have access to society of a higher tier than Dev had yet achieved, for he hadn’t moved past associating with lords in gambling den card rooms. However, as the owner of Little Wicked, he would be mingling with the elite.
Thetonwould have to begin taking him seriously.
So, he’d hired the best trainers and grooms his money could buy—even succeeded in wooing the Duke of Richmond’s favorite jockey into his stables.
And the gambit had worked.
Dev was immediately christenedLord Devil, as much for his black hair and piercing blue eyes as for his mountainous pile of blunt—and was invited to all manner of society soirées, musicales, and balls.
To be sure, he was a novelty for theton, but he was being allowed into the room and that was the point.
