Flawless (38 page)

Smoothly, Adam swiveled the weapon to ward off Elden’s bodyguards. “My lord, you might want to come away now.”

“I was winning, Mr. Nolan.”

“It’s a trap. Constable Mansfield is being notified as we speak. Your whip is here on my belt.”

Miles stood slowly, still watching his opponent’s expression. He was reminded of that long-ago wagon master—beaten, yes, but not without the capacity for violence. Holding a whip felt much more natural now than a hand of cards, especially if what Adam claimed was true.

“Unless you wish to add a piratical scar to your appearance, I suggest you tell your bodyguards to remove their side arms.”

Elden joined him in standing. “Weapons away, men.” His expression was deathly smooth, his shoulders relaxed. That
ease didn’t change, not even when a dozen armed men filed in from the kitchen. “We’ve been accosted by brigands who will be divested of both their liberty and their property. Perhaps this was the best way to end our game after all.”

Miles held his breath. Law and order would be wholly welcome, if only he knew who they had come to detain.

“Neil Elden, we’re placing you and your bodyguards under arrest,” came the voice of Constable Mansfield.

“On what charges? If anyone should be arrested, it’s this viscount.”

“On charges of fraud, conspiracy, and murder.”

“That’s preposterous!” As the bodyguards laid their guns on the card table, constables moved to secure Elden.

Miles lifted his brows and sought answers from his man-servant. “Murder?”

“Her Ladyship found links,” Adam said. “They deserve hearing out.”

Warm joy spread through his chest. “And she didn’t come for me herself? I feel I’ve made progress in a task I hadn’t thought to undertake.”

“Taming your wife?”

“Not in this lifetime, even if I wanted to.”

“You don’t care a thing about this town,” Elden shouted as the police bound his wrists.

“I doubt even Kimberley brooks coercion and murder. And although I cannot speak for the rest of the nobility, most of us quite frown on threats. You made this very personal when you threatened Mr. Nolan. Oh, and when you kissed my wife. Don’t forget that.” With a casual flick of his
wrist, he turned over his cards to reveal a full house. “Out of curiosity, what did you have?”

Elden shrugged off his captors with the dignity of a man born to wealth, not made by it. He turned over three queens.

“You didn’t rig the last hand,” Miles said.

“No.”

“Well, I give you that much credit, at least.”

“At least.”

Miles saw a glint of silver and moved without thought. The whip cracked as loud as a gunshot in the close confines of the club. Elden shrieked and doubled over his bleeding wrist, which grew too weak to hold the small derringer he’d pulled from his sleeve. The constables who had briefly permitted his dignified turn of cards withdrew those niceties. They cuffed even his wounded arm and dragged him toward the front door.

Everyone in Kimberley would see him brought low.

A scuttle of relief did nothing to ease his pulse. He could be dead. Realizing just how close he’d come to losing everything—not just a fortune—caused his vision to gray at the edges.

“My lord?” Adam nodded toward the kitchen. “Her Ladyship promised to stay out of danger. She’ll be back at the servant’s entrance.”

Thoughts of Viv halted his slide toward worse case scenarios.

“Would you be so good as to bring around the carriage? I should like very much to go home. All of this work, you understand . . . it’s exhausting.”

“Right away, sir,” Adam said, grinning.

Miles stalked through the kitchen and down a flight of stairs toward a small wooden door.

The woman he met was Vivienne, Viscountess Bancroft, but he was still taken by surprise when she barreled into his arms. He smiled into her wind-tossed hair as she kissed his cheeks, his neck, his lips.

“Oh, God, you’re all right. You’re all right.”

He tightened his arms. She seemed to need something steady. He was glad he could be that something. Then she launched into an explanation of the clues she had pieced together. In stunned silence he listened. The shock returned . . . then ebbed away. Elden was through. The brokerage was saved. And Miles held the woman he adored.

Could this be real? Now? Truly?

He touched a finger to her lips. She still vibrated in his arms, but he waited until he had her complete attention.

“Vivie, I don’t know what we’ll endure for the rest of our stay. The brokerage will thrive or fail. That bonus will be ours or it will slip away. But tell me I have you. After so many false starts and missed chances, tell me that you’re my wife.” With his hopes and his dreams right there for her to see, he said, “I love you, Viv.”

“Oh, Miles, I love you, too.” She flung her arms around his neck and held on tightly. Then she began to whisper words powerful enough to bring tears to his eyes. “To have and to hold, my darling husband. For richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do we part . . .”

New York City

January 1, 1883

Vivienne stared at the portrait
of her father and softly smiled. A span of more than two years had done nothing to mollify his discontented scowl. The somber painting remained unchanged, as did the oppressive library. But Viv had changed. She’d turned herself inside out. A more contented, confident heart beat within her chest.

“Are you nervous?”

And she had Miles now. Together, with his skill and his unexpected ideas, he had discovered the key to saving the business. She’d kept the books, he’d wooed their clients, and Smets had appraised tiny piles of fabulous diamonds. But a steady trade in industrial carbons paid the bills—so well that Ike and Alice now lived in a house, not a hovel. Through all their hard work, Christie Brokerage was officially in the black.

They had
won
.

Elated as always by that thrill of victory, she found her husband standing by her side. Immaculately dressed, wearing a coal-black suit and an expertly tied silver-and-navy-striped ascot, he brought to mind the long-ago waltz they’d shared in Lady Galeworth’s ballroom. It seemed Adam’s engagement to Chloe had done nothing to diminish his efficiency.

Miles’ss tan remained vibrant after their long sea voyage back from the Cape, and the brilliant white of his sharply pressed dress shirt heightened his rakish coloring. A light slick of pomade added the finishing touch to a man who was perfectly groomed, perfectly suitable. Perfectly breathtaking.

Only his eyes gave him away—dark eyes that made promises she couldn’t wait to let him keep. She never tired of the way lightning sizzled outward from her belly, anticipating their next touch of skin to skin. She’d become brave enough to leave her fear behind, trusting this man, trusting what her heart and her body and her mind all declared.
I love him.

She smiled. “I confess to being a little nervous, but not in the least like last time.”

Chin lowered, he slowly shook his head. “Last time. I hardly care to think about that.”

“Then let’s not.” She cast a final look at her father’s stern expression, then eased into the safety of her husband’s arms. “Now . . . well, now I’m more curious than anything else. Miles, what if Gwen and my brothers haven’t fared so well? I cannot stand the idea of walking out of here with a million dollars if they leave with nothing.”

His long fingers gently soothed the stiffness from her upper back. “I promise, Viv, your family will not go hungry. I won’t let it happen.” His dear features resumed their customary teasing. “But have a little faith. After all,
we
managed . . . and we were near to hopeless.”

She laughed and pressed her cheek against his shirtfront, inhaling the warm, sharp scent of him—Marseilles soap and a dash of spicy aftershave. All very civilized. But she’d swear that the dry, yellow dust of the Karoo was a part of him now.

“What will we do after this? Do you wonder?”

“There’s always Mr. Framholt,” he said. “He insists there’s money to be made in manufacturing his design. But he’ll need financial backers.”

“An investment opportunity? Intriguing.”

“We’ll make sense of it in time. But come now.” Miles took her hand and led her to sit on the nearby settee. “I have a gift for you.”

“A gift?”

“I find it a remarkably simple thing, darling, to spend your money.” He produced a rectangular jewelry box wrapped in burgundy velvet. “Here. I meant to give it to you this morning, but, well . . .”

At the fresh memory of their decadent morning in bed, Viv sucked her lower lip. His lean muscles and bare torso had been her table as she’d indulged in chocolate-filled croissants and candied fruits. Afterward, starting with the crumbs at the edges of his mouth and working her way down, she’d licked him clean. Potent male had mingled with bittersweet chocolate and crystallized sugar. Only once Miles had given
her the gift of his salty release had she stretched out on her back, gasping as he returned the favor.

“I distracted you?” she asked innocently.

An uncharacteristic blush tipped his ears. He cleared his throat. “Open it.”

Viv pried open the spring-hinged box and blinked. Inside, nestled among folds of black satin, rested an exquisite bracelet. Intertwined circles of filigreed gold formed the links. A single rounded charm provided its only adornment. Only, it didn’t twinkle in the light, nor did it shine with radiant color.

“A carbon?” She touched the slate-gray stone. It was smaller than her pinkie fingernail. Flecks of moss green and dull, muddy brown gave its surface an irregular texture. “I don’t know what to say. It’s . . . well, it’s . . .”

“Ugly. Unforgivably ugly.”

Viv giggled, one hand over her mouth. It truly was. Even the beveled gold setting couldn’t save that charm from ignobility.

Miles edged closer, sharing her view of the unusual piece. “But Penberthy tells me it’s one of the best he’s ever examined. No weak crystalline structures, no cleaving plains. Immensely durable. When it comes to industrial diamonds, it’s the highest quality that can be produced. Naturally, I had to have it.”

His grin fell at the corners as he took her left hand. Somberly, he ran his thumb across the radiant diamond on her ring finger. “The man who gave you this gem—he didn’t love you. It’s utterly flawless but holds as little sentiment as the signatures on our marriage contract. The tools of a
negotiation, nothing more.” He inhaled deeply. “Vivie, that’s not us.”

“No,” she said reverently. “We’re hard work and trust, arguments, passion, mistakes. And secrets . . . all the secrets that make us special.”

“Yes. Yes, exactly.”

She looked on the globular gray carbon with new eyes. “Thank you, Miles,” she breathed. “I’ll find a way to explain it when fine ladies spot it on my wrist and make rude comments.”

“Oh, dear God, woman. It’s an
anklet
.”

He knelt on the lush carpeting. Without waiting for permission, he grabbed her right foot and stripped off her slipper. Viv leaned back against the brocade settee and smiled as he fiddled with the delicate gold clasp.

Head bowed, his hair looked impossibly thick. “All that I am, I give to you,” he murmured. “And all that I have, I share with you.”

He’d spoken those vows years earlier as he’d endowed her finger with the wedding band she still wore. That he made the same vow again, now, with such a meaningful token of his love was more than enough to fill Viv’s eyes with happy tears. His palms gentled along the meat of her calf. The lightweight gold links shimmered atop her stocking. With every movement the charm tip-tapped the inside of her ankle.

“I never meant it to be shared,” he said, the words as intimate as a confession. He leaned over and placed a kiss atop her silk-wrapped shin. “It can keep company with your
stockings.” His sure, strong hands slid upward, cupping the backs of each quivering leg. “And your crinolines.” He dragged the hem of her gown higher, feathering kisses as he climbed. “And your drawers.” With his mouth hovering just above her thigh, his smoldering eyes met hers. “Something to be gloried in. Privately.”

Those flashes of lightning in her stomach gathered, strengthening, scattering caution like a hot summer gale. She caught his face in her hands and pulled. With his body braced above hers, both of them half sprawled on the settee, she kissed him deeply. The library dimmed as she reveled in this man,
her
man, and the wicked, beautiful passion they’d found.

“Or perhaps not so privately,” he whispered.

She furrowed her fingers into his very proper hair. Kissing again, she hooked a stocking-clad foot around his thigh and flexed, fitting his pelvis against hers.

“Vivie, enough.” His words sounded choked and dry. “We should—”

“Oh, good heavens!” Alain Delavoir stood in the library’s doorway, a portfolio tucked beneath his skinny arm. “I’ll return momentarily.”

The shame Viv expected to feel never came, only a naughty sort of humor. She grinned against her husband’s mouth. “No, not at all,” she said, half laughing. With steady movements she untangled her body from Miles and sat upright on the settee. “The fault is ours. Stay, please.”

Once her clothes and hair were in order, she and Miles arose. A chagrined smile shaped his lovely mouth.

“I never would’ve taken you for bashful, my lord.”

He leaned forward, for her ears only. “I despise interruptions.”

“Ah, but now is the time for business.” She reached up to retie his rumpled ascot. “What news of my siblings, Monsieur Delavoir? I’ve received but few letters and no updates of late.”

“I have no information to add, my lady. You are the first to arrive.”

She found Miles’ss hand and squeezed. Contentment washed over her, unlike any she’d ever experienced. But it wasn’t quite enough. She needed her family to be as safe, as protected, as cherished as she was.

“In the meantime, this paperwork is for you to approve,” Delavoir said.