He made as if to put his hands on her again, and Anna turned to fully face him.
“Touch me, and I’ll do worse than bite.”
The man startled.
There was a husky laugh from Mrs. Dove-Lyon. “There is no need to fret, Titan. You may return to your duties.” A shift of the woman’s body had Anna’s feet rooting to the spot. “MissGreeneisn’t going anywhere.”
Anna swallowed hard at the emphasis on her last name.
Mrs. Dove-Lyon waited until the big brute had left the room before she said, “YouareLord Brixby’s sister, are you not? Miss Annabeth Greene?”
“You are well informed, Mrs. Dove-Lyon,” Anna admitted. Of course she was. The woman was said to have files on everypeer and extended family in London—apparently, that included newly minted viscounts as well.
Mrs. Dove-Lyon rested her hands on the arms of her leather chair, her actions casual. “I was saddened to hear of your brother’s disappearance. You must be quite distraught. How many days has it been? Six?”
“Eight,” Anna gritted out between clenched teeth. As if the woman didn’t know.
“I take it you were not satisfied with Bow Street’s inquiry into my establishment?” She waved toward the closed door. “Hence the need to break into my private office.”
Anna didn’t balk, didn’t prevaricate. “You used a double so everyone would believe it was you on the floor.” The woman had known someone would break into her office.
Blast, but how? Anna had watched from a distance, never setting a single toe on the cobblestone sidewalk on Cleveland Row. And Elise... There wasn’t a woman alive more suited to avoiding notice when she chose to become invisible. Which meant the Lyoness suspected retaliation for some grievance. Gambling and high-stakes deals... Kidnapping wasn’t that far of a stretch.
Anna would get nowhere without the woman’s compliance.It shouldn’t be too hard.
Subtlety, charm...Too bad she’d learned charm the same place she’d learned propriety: her papa.
“Whatever half-truth you told, whatever bribe you paid out, I’m not so easy to brush off as the men at Number Four Whitehall.” Anna winced at the venom in her tone and softened it tomildly biting. “Will was last seen coming out of this gaming hell.”
A tense pause. A predator’s stillness. “A word of caution, Miss Greene: to my friends, I can be as kind and accommodating as a spring day in the countryside.” An edge entered the woman’svoice. “Call me a liar a second time, and I will show you an ice storm in June.”
Anna was many things: worried over her brother’s disappearance, angry at Mrs. Dove-Lyon’s unwillingness to divulge information, frightened at what constituted as “meat” in the pies off Hart Street. She was not, however, a fool.
Charm. Like the insipid Miss Kendell who’d constantly flirted with Anna’s brother at every society function. Anna adopted the other woman’s slightly whiny tone and withdrew a handkerchief from her reticule to dab at her bone-dry eyes.
“Apologies, Mrs. Dove-Lyon.” If it took playing the woman’s game to learn what had become of her brother, she’d do it with all the mock contrition the other woman could stomach. “You are correct. Worry over my brother’s safety has left me quite out of sorts and willing to go to drastic lengths, even seeing conspiracy where there surely is none.” Lengths to which she’d go again without a second thought. “I beg your forgiveness and beseech you for any assistance you can provide regarding his whereabouts. If there is anything, perchance, you remembered since the Runners questioned you?”
A single gloved finger tapped against the chair arm. Once. Twice. “Seems youcanbe civil if you try.” There was a smile in the woman’s voice alongside the insult. “All those tutors your brother hired to raise your speech and comportment weren’t a total waste.”
Anna crushed the bit of laced linen in her hands.How did she know?
A sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach said Mrs. Dove-Lyon and her brother had shared more than a passing game of Hazard.
“I did withhold something from Bow Street,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon admitted.
Anna stepped forward, her heart a drum playing to a new beat. If Will was in danger, she’d stop at nothing to see him home safe. God willing, before her uncle and cousin got wind of his disappearance. “Tell me.”
Mrs. Dove-Lyon tapped her finger on the armchair again, the action relaxed, calculating. “I run a business, Miss Greene. Valuable information is as much a commodity as a roll of the dice.”
Anna scowled. “What do you want?”
“That depends. What are you willing to give?”
Anna wasn’t some silly lady without a clue. She’d been raised at the knee of her father, a worldly man with his locksmith’s shop in the heart of London. A shop she’d visited frequently with her brother when her elderly chaperone had permitted.
Men from all walks of life would hire Henry Greene—the man who’d patented many of the locks used around the city—lords, clerks, and less savory characters. Criminals with persuasive smiles.
“The information first,” Anna said.
