Ian blew out a breath. “Do we know what they are planning to stake?”
“Contracts, most likely. Construction projects across Milan and Zurich. Our informant claims Il Corno is putting up railroads across Portugal and Italy. And Costa’s three warehouses are his personal stake.”
“Personal stake?” Diana echoed.
When neither man met her eyes, she stepped between them and whirled on the duke. He’d concede to her nonverbal admonishment quicker than Ian.
“There’s a price of admission,” Sunderland conceded as he pulled on his overcoat. “You two will need to decide what you’re willing to bet. And I know you’re going to row over it. So I’m moving camp to the Porta Rossa. Send word if you settle it before morning.”
He left them standing in the townhouse foyer, with Ian’s hands balled into fists and Diana’s head spinning.
“How long have you known there was a personal stake?” she asked when she found her voice.
“I didn’t intend to keep it from you.”
“That means from the start then.” She shook her head. “What is your plan?”
He hesitated. “A false contract. Exclusive shipping access between London and Istanbul. Sunderland has excellent forgers in his employ.”
“When they find out it isn’t real, they’ll kill you for trying to dupe them.” Her voice shook. She detested how weak it sounded.
Ian’s was heartbreakingly calm as he replied, “That is a risk we’ll have to take.”
After everything they’d endured together, he’d stake his own life before asking her for the money.
Diana swallowed accusations about his inflated pride and outsized sense of duty. She wanted to shake him for thinking it would protect her when the only way she felt truly safe was with him.
“Signorina?” The majordomo approached. “Some parcels have arrived for you. And Cook is asking about tomorrow’s menu?”
Diana slowly turned away, relieved for once to be attending to something domestic. Left alone with Ian, with her fury seething, she’d say or do something she would regret. “Please show me,signore.”
After she finished with the staff, she resisted the urge to cool her temper by stepping into the back garden. Ian was somewhere upstairs, likely pacing and brooding over what he would stake in the game, and they needed to have it out between them.
A stillness had fallen over the house as she traversed the open hallways surrounding the atrium. When she didn’t find Ian in his room, or hers, she doubled back to the drawing room.
Moonlight streamed through the open curtains. It splashed over the Persian carpet and rococo furniture, and across the large tapestry hung on the wall. Ian stood in front of it with a glass of whisky in one hand. He carried tension in the tight pull of his shoulders and his punishing grip on the glass. It was a stark contrast to the softness of his face and the languid way he’d looked at her when they’d shared a bed, and each other’s pleasure, in Monte Carlo.
The possibility that she might never see him that way again choked her breath.
In an instant, her anger dissipated. She was tired of acting as a catalyst, constantly spurring him toward a fight.
She approached him and stopped to look at the tapestry. “If you’re considering pilfering that to stake, I don’t imagine any of thefamigliewill accept it.”
“Too many holes,” he agreed.
He swiveled to face her and extended his arm to offer her the glass of whisky.
She accepted it and took a small sip to steel her nerves. And so that her lips could linger over the spot his had just occupied. “There’s so much to sort out andmy mind is a complete muddle. We will quarrel over what you’re staking for this bloody game, but can it wait until morning?”
As a peace offering, she handed him back the glass.
Ian took it with a terse laugh. “I don’t have the heart to argue tonight either.” He tasted the whisky. “We will have our work cut out for us tomorrow, though.”
Diana kept her voice steadier than her nerves. “Tomorrow, we must also agree on what happens after the game.”
“I’ll belong to the Tarka.” Ian rubbed the spot on his chest where the tattoo branded him. “Do you understand now why I had to involve Sunderland? He can protect you afterward. The only way I can be sure you and those we care about are safe is if I disappear.”
She came within a hair’s distance of railing at him. She wanted him to feel as raw and enraged as she did about all of it.
