“Well, it’s been close to twenty years since all of that. I guess you’ve found other means of practice?”
It was a carefully worded question about his past liaisons. He loved the urgency in her tone, the way her eyes wouldn’t move from his while she waited for his response.
“Hardly any,” he conceded. “I tried with two other models. Neither of them gave me a second chance to further my skills.”
“How shortsighted of them,” she murmured. Her blush deepened. “Of course, I have little perspective.”
“No?”
“In the past, I’ve only ever seen to it myself.”
He’d been the first to wring that pleasure from her, and his satisfaction in it shook him to his core.
As he placed the last pin, he couldn’t resist grazing the bare nape of her neck with his finger.
She spun around to face him, and his attention centered on the blush rising over her cheeks.
“You never said what your father staked with the emeralds. You promised to tell me.”
Denying it would be a waste of his breath. “The Tarka took the lion’s share of the winnings, but Father had staked his dockside holdings in the game. They’re still tied to the emeralds.”
Diana lifted a hand to her mouth. In all the years he’d known her, he’d never observed her so visibly surprised.
“Jared knew nothing about it,” he added. “As the current custodian of the gems, he may play for them if one of thefamigliechoose him as their player. If he plays, he will undoubtedly lose.”
“But you won’t let him,” she insisted. “Because losing the docks would mean more than losing Holt & Company.”
Ian adored her quick mind, her ability to fill in the gaps left unsaid. And as badly as he wanted her for his partner in the many crimes he would commit vying to winIl Gioco, the idea that she’d be terrified or hurt because of him, in defense of him, was intolerable.
Slowly, he stepped away. “Her Majesty’s government is monitoringIl Gioco.”
“You’re working with the Crown?” Diana huffed a short laugh.
“Sunderland convinced them I was their best defense.”
Her mouth hinged open in a delicious O shape, then her brows descended. “Trusting Leo Ashton would be a colossal mistake.”
Ian had no intention of revealing the bargain he’d made with the duke on her behalf; it would only make her want to settle the matter herself.
“InfiltratingIl Giocowill be complicated. Sunderland is in a position to help. This isn’t negotiable.”
A delicate snarl issued from her throat. “When Amelia finds out, she’ll throttle me.”
Ian didn’t know the source of the strained history between Amelia and the duke, and he doubted Diana would divulge it if she knew. “If one of thefamigliewins the title to the docks, it will give them the foothold they need to take London. With that leverage, their crime syndicate could spread to all of Britain.”
“But we’re going to stop that from happening.”
“Iam going to try.”
The cathedral bells chimed a quarter to the hour, drawing Diana’s attention to the clock on the fireplace mantel. “We must go.”
“Straight into the trap Birdie has laid for us?”
“There’s still a chance she’s not involved.”
“If you believed that, you would have told her the truth about Widow,” he countered.
Diana headed to the door. “I can reason with Widow—”
