“And thank God for that. And that I could get to you in time to stop you.”
Lucy tried to ignore the implication that she couldn’t have helped the situation and merely would have put herself in danger. She still thought her plan had merit.
“I’ll call on you tomorrow.”
Lucy leaned toward him, reaching out to curl a hand around the lapel of his coat. “Please be careful.”
He leaned in and offered her a too-brief kiss. “I promise.”
With that, he slapped a hand on the polished wood of the cab’s side, letting the driver know it was time to depart.
She glanced back as the hansom rolled away. Part of her still wanted to speak to Mr. Archibald Beck, and all of her hated the idea of leaving James to deal with the man alone.
Lucy reached up and knocked on the carriage wall. When the driver opened the small door above her head, she asked, “Would you be so kind as to turn around and take me back to where you collected me?”
Chapter Twenty-One
Patience wasn’t a virtue James had ever learned.
In business, that had served him well. Waiting too long to take a meeting with a potential client or jump on a new venture might cost him an opportunity. Of course, it contributed to his downfall too. He’d been too eager to trust Beck’s promises.
Over the past year, he’d tried to teach himself the value of waiting, reminding himself that the best things in life took tenacity and determination and, very often, time to achieve.
But when it came to Lucy, all those fresh lessons seemed to come apart at the seams.
He adored the woman. Loved her. He wanted to marry her. Logic told him they might have to wait some time to wed. Her father would wish to see that James had the sort of financial security and respectability that Lucy deserved in a husband.
And, of course, if Hallston got the slightest whiff of James’s trouble with a man like Beck, he doubted he’d ever win favor with the earl at all. Never mind that he was an earl now too. Hallston was favored by their queen. James was a failed businessman in debt to a con man.
Dealing with Beck had to come first.
Which was why James found himself standing on the street in front of the Helix Club, five minutes after the hansom cab driver had departed to take Lucy back to the safety of her family and home.
It was late, but early enough for those who didn’t sleep until dawn. Guests were still stepping out of carriages and into the polished brass doors of Beck’s club.
James joined the throng. He made no mention of Beck, just gave the doorman his title. After a long perusal, the man allowed him inside.
It was a very long shot to think Beck would happen to be in attendance tonight, the very night James had impulsively decided to confront him. But he felt compelled to try.
He searched the guests mingling through various lavishly appointed rooms for a face he might recognize, but, of course, his vow to avoid dealings with noblemen meant he recognized no one.
Until he did.
Not a nobleman, but one of the men who’d come to his home that day before he’d departed for Scotland. The quiet, bulky one.
The man hadn’t noticed him. He was too busy sweeping an assessing gaze over the club’s main salon of round gaming tables.
James studied the assembly a little longer, hoping to see one short, balding man with an overmanicured mustache and a rosebud in his buttonhole. Beck had once told him that he rarely played at hisown tables, but he appeared now and then just to surprise guests and hobnob with the upper crust who deigned to visit.
Tonight, it seemed, was not one of those nights.
He made his way back toward the club’s entrance, then slowed when he swore he heard someone speak his name. Not his uncle’s title. His name.
Turning toward the sound, he couldn’t make out who’d spoken or see anyone who’d noticed him or made their approach.
“Come to pay us a visit, Pembroke, or just to pay your debt to the boss?” The man spoke from behind him and stood far too close. James froze when the stranger jabbed something into the small of his back. “Keep walking and head toward the gold door on your left.”
The gold door was half-hidden by a long velvet drape. James and Beck’s associate made their way toward it awkwardly, with the object at his back disappearing and then punching at his coat again. At one point, the man trod on his ankle.
