Part I
Chapter 1
London, 1813
Lady Adele Saltisford’s virtue was a small price to pay for her brother’s life.
She reminded herself of the undeniable truth of this fact as she waited for London’s most dangerous man to see her. Her hands shook beneath her silk taffeta cloak, and she was grateful once more she had not relinquished her outerwear to the hulking manservant who had ushered her to this anteroom. Her veil, too, was firmly in place, shielding her face.
Not that she expected to know anyone at a gaming hell dubiously called The Devil’s Spawn to recognize her. Nevertheless, her brother had frequented this establishment. It stood to reason some of the society gentlemen who filled her dance card and flirted at musicales were also patrons. Difficult indeed to countenance, knowing what the fiend who owned it was capable of.
Maximilian had been badly beaten. Bloodied. The warning he had received had been dire. Mr. Dominic Winter did not care if Max was Marquess of Sundenbury, heir to the Duke of Linross. Max owed him an immense sum, and he intended to collect. One week was all he had left to repay. Adele was not meant to have discovered him as she had in his bachelor’s rooms. But when Mama had fretted over his failure to appear at supper one evening, Adele had taken it upon herself to pay him a call the next morning.
What she had witnessed had broken her heart. But Max had been determined he would not seek out their father for assistance with his plight. He had sworn he would find a means of repaying Mr. Winter before the villain’s paid ruffians revisited.
The man returned, his expression severe as ever. If murder had a face, Adele was certain this man’s was it. He was terrifying, and yet, his countenance was handsome in an unexpected fashion that had quite startled her upon first sight. Now, she eyed his fists, massive as ham hocks, and wondered if he had been one of the scoundrels who had beaten Max.
He crooked a finger, beckoning her.
Whilst the man who had initially answered the door she had rapped upon had been only too quick to speak, mistaking her for a woman of ill repute and informing her she had the wrong entrance, the giant before her had yet to utter a word. She eyed him, heart pounding harder.
Misgiving blossomed.
She was sure she ought not to follow this wicked-looking man anywhere. What if he had no intention of taking her to Mr. Winter? What if he led her to a private room and ravished her?
He made a guttural noise and stalked toward her. Adele told herself to be brave, but when he raised his hand, she feared a blow was forthcoming. She shrank into the wall at her back, hitting her elbow on the plaster in the process.
His hand wrapped around her arm in a grip that was not nearly as punishing as she had feared.
“Unhand me, you rogue,” she commanded.
But the manservant ignored her. Instead, he hauled her from the small room, pulling her into the hall with its gleaming wood floor and shocking, lewd paintings gracing the walls.
“Where are you taking me?” She attempted to wrest herself from the giant’s grasp to no avail. “I demand to see Mr. Winter. If you dare to harm me, I shall have the magistrate upon you.”
The man made another sound in his throat, part dismissal, part feral growl.
But he did not break his stride.
She felt rather like a mouse being carried off by a cat. This could not end well for her, in any instance. They reached a door at the end of the hall and the man paused at last, rapping thrice.
“Enter,” called a deep, masculine voice.
It was him.
Adele knew, instinctively, who the voice belonged to. She had a heartbeat in which to prepare herself before the manservant opened the door and tugged her over the threshold as if she were the spoils of the day’s hunt.
There stood her nemesis. Mr. Dominic Winter. His back was to her. All she noted was his coat—black, the cut fine, tailored to precision. If she did not know him for a heartless thief and murderer presiding over a vast empire of similar criminals, she could have mistaken him for a gentleman in any one of London’s most exclusive drawing rooms.
Except Mr. Dominic Winter was no gentleman.
Not by birth, and certainly not by deed.
The thought of her brother’s bloodied visage was enough to make her shoulders go back, her chin tilt up. Though she was the quietest of her siblings, she was not weak. She loved her family, and she would go to battle for any one of them. She could face this demon and save Max.
She had but seconds to summon every modicum of courage she possessed.
Mr. Winter turned. Slowly. As if he possessed all the time in the world. He moved with the innate grace of a large cat. With the predatory elegance of a lethal creature. But although she had imagined his countenance to be hideous—a reflection of his inner defections—she had not anticipated the reality of this man.
