Men came here to fight, to brawl—to win. But it wasn’t an ordinary boxing club either.
It was whispered that this was a place where every patron who walked through the door knew—hoped?—that if they were chosen by the victor of tonight’s bout…they would go willingly and eagerly to the winner’s bed.
Bess shivered, a potent blend of nerves and longing trailing down her spine like a touch.
Touch. She wanted it so badly—she couldn’t remember the last time she’d received anything more than a casual brush of a hand passing a mug of ale across the bar. Perhaps an impulsive hug from Lucy, or a friendly hip bump from Lucy’s older sister, Gemma, as the two women passed each other going about their duties at the coaching inn Gemma owned, where Bess worked as a cook.
It was enough to get by, Bess supposed. It didn’t necessarily have to be about passion—though she couldn’t deny that a wish to be desired as a woman was part of it.
There were simply times she felt as light and insubstantial as a puff of flour, and as easy to blow away. Her body ached for a touch that would make her feel real, seen, wanted…alive. And as an unmarried woman with no close family living, she had nowhere to turn for it.
Leastways, nowhere proper.
And here in London Town, far from Little Kissington and everyone who’d known her since she was knee-high to a bumblebee, Bess Pickford was ready to take a risk to get what she needed.
A boisterous group of women jostled her as they pressed closer to the boxing ring set up at the center of the low-ceilinged room. One of them cursed as she bobbled her drink, sloshing a light spray of beer over Bess’s bare arm.
“Pardon me, luv,” the woman cried, her eyes wide and dark behind the cream-colored velvet mask that contrasted luxuriously with the rich brown of her skin. “Ever so sorry, did I get your gown? Here, let me…”
Bess laughed and waved her off. “Pay it no mind. If I worried over every drop of ale spilled on me, I’d not last a day back home. I work in a?—”
The Black woman held up a hand to stop her, smiling wide and friendly all the while. “Careful! We all like our privacy here; I’ll warrant you’re no different. And whatever it is you do for a living that gets you regularly splashed with beer, I apologize just the same. Quite the crush in here, isn’t it? Well, to be expected, I suppose.”
“Is it?” Bess used a plain white handkerchief to wipe her arm dry, glad of the chance to cover how at sea she was…and how relieved she felt that her new friend had kept her from blurting out that she was the cook at a coaching inn called Five Mile House in Little Kissington, north Wiltshire!
She might as well take off her mask and toss it on the rubbish heap for all the good it would do her if she planned to tell all and sundry where she lived and worked. Good Lord.
“Of course,” the other woman said confidently, her glittering gaze sweeping the crowd with what looked like satisfaction. “Once the word went out he was coming back tonight, when usually we must wait weeks between appearances, well! It was all but guaranteed there’d be barely room to breathe in here. Especially after that bout last night. What a corker!”
“I don’t know who is supposed to be here tonight,” Bess confessed with a little laugh under her breath. “I don’t really know what I’m doing here.”
“Ah, a virgin,” her new friend purred, putting out a hand for Bess to shake. “You’ve bumped into the right person, luv. Or rather, the right person bumped into you. You can call me Madame Leda. I happen to be the proud proprietress of this fine establishment. Wait!”
Bess, who had indeed been about to introduce herself with her real name, closed her teeth with snap and felt her cheeks heat.
Madame Leda shook her head, giving Bess a sharp look. “You really are shiny new, aren’t you? And pretty, too. Dear me. Do you have any notion what goes on in this place?”
Uncertainty thrummed through Bess, but she didn’t let it show. “I don’t know everything that will happen tonight,” she said quietly, meeting Madame Leda’s watchful gaze. “But I know enough. I’m ready. I want to be here.”
After a long, charged moment, Madame Leda smiled and looped her arm through Bess’s crooked elbow. “Just remember you can always say no.”
Bess frowned. “I thought—I was told, once one walked in the door, one has agreed to…”
“Serve as tribute?” Madame Leda shrugged one slim shoulder. “Some people enjoy that idea, but the truth is, no one here is obliged to do anything they don’t like. Aside from the masks, that’s the only real rule. Do what feels good—to you and to whoever you’re with. If you don’t like it? Don’t do it.”
Unsure whether that rule made her feel reassured or not, Bess smoothed her damp palms down her skirts. She worried she’d spent most of her courage on merely getting to The Nemesis and deciding to enter. She’d been counting on the house rules to make her go through with the rest of it.
“Tonight isn’t a bad night to try the old Nemesis on for size, anyhow,” Madame Leda decided, turning her attention back to the crowd. “You’ll get a taste of the action with less chance of getting swallowed up yourself.”
“What do you mean?”
Around them, the noise of the restive spectators began to rise, whispers and gasps turning to shouts and wild applause and cheers.
“It’s Red Jack,” cried a young man at Bess’s elbow, his voice cracking with excitement.
Everyone in the room seemed to surge forward at once, a wave of humanity pressing Bess forward and nearly lifting her off her feet, catching her up in the tidal swell of hungry expectation.
“Because the main fight tonight will be spectacular, guaranteed,” Madame Leda crowed over the din as, on the other side of the ring, a beefy man with the brawniest shoulders Bess had ever seen pushed through the crowd.
