“He’s not…” His Grace said, trailing off before he waved away the thought with one hand. “Mr. Timothy Gregerson. Mr. Gregerson, Lady Davina.” He gestured between us, not taking his gaze from the lady.
“It’s Tom?—”
“And where have you been?” His Grace demanded of the lady.His lady?My heart ached in pathetic agony at the thought.
“I was with Cee,” she insisted. Then, she turned toward me. “Mr. Gregerson, it is an absolute pleasure to make your acquaintance.” There was something flirtatious in her tone that had me stepping back.
“It’s Mr. Gr?—”
“No. Absolutely not,” Rosehill asserted in her direction, once again ignoring my attempted correction.
“Xander! Don’t be rude,” she retorted with a petty stomp of her foot.
Xander…
He dragged a rough hand through his hair, mussing the perfectly coiffed strands enticingly. “Get in the carriage,” he ordered.
Lady Davina grumbled but still made to follow his instructions and flitted past him. One step. Two.
“Freeze,” he demanded.
Again she obeyed and paused mid-step without so much as a huff.
“Turn.”
The pivot on her heels was slow, deliberate. When she finally faced us, her eyes were wide with false innocence and her lips were parted.
Rosehill’s hand shot out in front of him, palm up. “Reticule.”
She rolled her eyes in answer before plopping the beaded bag in his palm with the previously forgone huff.
He loosened the drawstring and pulled out a glinting decorative snuffbox. Xand—Rosehill sighed and held the box aloft for me to take. I raised a hand unthinkingly and he plopped it in—gloved fingers brushing against my palm. My heart tripped a beat or two.
“Can you see this returned to its rightful place? Thank you so much, Mr. Granger.”
“I don’t”—he was already shooing the lady, whom I was beginning to suspect, with some relief, was the sister and not a romantic prospect, toward the door—“live here. And it’s Grayson. Tom Grayson,” I called after them pathetically.
The snuffbox lay in my open palm, delicate gold flowers and vines wrapped around a refined agate lid and sides.
Without considering the implications, I wrapped my fingers around it, slipped it into my pocket, and thought no more of it. At least, not until later that night when I snuck it from my pocket and into my bedside table where it would remain for some time.
One
WHITE’S, LONDON - JUNE 4, 1816
XANDER
White’s wasa hell I was forced to visit on occasion for appearance’s sake, a necessary inconvenience required to maintain the status required of my title. Nothing more, nothing less. To refuse to attend would be tantamount to a statement. One I had no interest in making.
Still, the effort was always a misery. I was not disposed to gambling, and the gentlemen there were prone to little else. At least Wayland’s didn’t offer a pretense of being anything other than what it was, a gaming hell, through and through. No, White’s played at being a social club, but the wagers were every bit as outrageous.
My timing was strategic. On a late-afternoon visit, enough members would be present to notice me, but not so many that I’d be pressured into absurd long shots.
My stomach dropped as I approached. There, in his usual seat at the bow window—free to be admired as he felt was his due—sat Mr. Beckett Beaumont. Unfortunately, peace would be difficult to find. The sight of his fair hair and cruel sneerwas almost enough of an irritant to have me skipping the club entirely.
But I hadn’t been in months. And the Hasket men had always maintained membership at White’s. Always. It was a matter of pride. One of the many rules for Hasket men my father had instilled from birth via drawn out, half-drunken lectures.
Except there was no pride to be found there, not truly. Last time I made the effort, the buffle-headed numbskulls had been wagering on raindrops clinging to the window—of all absurd things.
