Mr.Simon Rook, looking as though he’d served as the artist’s model for the mural’s dark, hulking Hades, leaned his hands on the balustrade and surveyed his domain.Even from a distance, Thorne could see the wicked scar that bisected his left brow, as though some long-ago enemy had tried to carve the man’s eye out.
Thorne imagined the unsuccessful attacker wished he’d never made the attempt before he met his no doubt grisly end.
Simon Rook wasn’t known for being forgiving.
Catching sight of Thorne, Rook gave him a slow nod of greeting.Lucy noticed Thorne nodding back and asked, “Who is that?”
“Club owner,” Thorne said, beginning a slow circuit of the room.“Stay away from him; he’s not someone you want to know.”
Lucy craned her long, elegant neck.“He looks as if he keeps a close eye on this place.”
“Nothing happens at Sharpe’s without his knowledge.”
“He must maintain a record of all his members,” Lucy said absently, her gaze still on the dark-haired man.“I’ll bet Mr.Sharpe knows every single person who has ever set foot in this place.”
“Mr.Rook,” Thorne corrected her.“Not Mr.Sharpe.And why do you want to know?”
“He’s not called Mr.Sharpe?”Lucy swiveled her head round to stare at Thorne.“This club isn’t named after him?”
“A man who is an expert card player, taking nearly every pot and winning every game, is known as a sharp.The play here is very deep, the sums wagered astronomical; many a young man has been ruined at these tables.Rook means the name of the hell as a warning to inexperienced card players to stay away—not that they heed it.And, of course, the house takes a cut of every game.So in a sense, the house always wins.Rook is the true sharp.”
“You almost sound as though you admire him,” Lucy observed.
Thorne shrugged.“He’s good at what he does.I admire him enough that I invested a significant amount of cash to enable him to open the hell.”
Lucy turned surprised eyes on him.“Does that make you a partner in his enterprise?Are you secretly a man of business, Your Grace?”
“Hardly.”He sniffed, looking away from her inquiring gaze.“I’m a man who likes to put his money to work, rather than himself.The club brings in a nice dividend, and Rook and I stay out of each other’s way.A successful investment all round.”
Before Lucy could reply, a fight broke out at the table they were passing.A skinny stripling of a lord uttered a low croak of dismay at the fall of the cards, and the friends who were with him rounded on the winner, a rotund older gentleman in a shabby suit of clothes and a pair of spectacles.
Thorne tensed, wondering if this was the opportunity he’d been hunting, but a couple of kicked chairs and shouted epithets later it was all over.
“Did that gentleman with the glasses cheat?”Lucy asked in an undertone.
Enjoying the tightness of her grip on his arm, Thorne glanced up at Rook’s impassive expression as he silently directed the action below.“No.Or Rook would be down here to throw him out.That little lordling merely found himself outclassed by a far superior player.”
They continued their slow tour of the room, pausing now and then to watch an interesting bet.Lucy became very involved in observing a game of hazard where a man with a nautical look about him, weather-browned and straight of spine, managed to roll seven multiple times in a row.The raucous crowd around him swelled as he won again and again, and even Lucy cheered lustily when he managed to roll seven for a sixth time.
“I can’t believe it,” she cried over the din.“Surely he can’t do it again.”
Jostled by the crush of gentlemen jockeying for a better view, Lucy was pressed hard into Thorne’s side, and he took immediately advantage.
Passing an arm about her shoulders, he hauled her in close, her back to his front, and leaned down to speak into her ear.“The odds of him throwing seven next time are the same as they were the first time he rolled.”
Lucy shook her head but didn’t attempt to move away from him.There were people on all sides, shoving and shouting, but Thorne planted his feet and kept them steady.
He loved how tall she was.If he tipped his head forward, his nose would touch the coronet of sable-dark hair coiled at her crown.Thorne inhaled deeply, taking the fresh sweetness of her scent into his lungs and holding it there like the smoke from a cheroot.Intoxicating.
“That can’t be right,” she argued.“That doesn’t make any sense.The odds must be fully against him now.”
“No more than they ever were.The dice don’t remember from one throw to the next,” he said.“They don’t care what’s been thrown before.They land how they land.”
“So there’s no skill involved at all?It’s only luck?”
“Hazard takes nerve more than skill.A cool head is an asset in any game of chance.As my uncle used to say, never allow emotion to overtake you.It’s the men who lose their heads that make mistakes and miss the obvious plays right under their noses.Pitiable, really.”
She turned her head slightly, giving him a view of her flushed cheek and the tendril of a curl at her temple.“Are you a sharp, Your Grace?”
