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“Gentlemen!It is time to place your buy-in.Please step forward when your name is called.”There was a general murmur about the room.“Lord Downey.Please step to table one.”
“Here!”
Matthew glanced at Alice, but she was busy instructing Downey to count out his bundles of bullseyes and the stacks of gold.
There was Sandhurst, a half-a-head taller than those at the back of the room.And Lord Liverpool was standing to his left and behind him.Satisfaction was a strange emotion.Except in this case, it was like having a cigar and a whiskybeforehe had sexual intercourse.Liverpool had taken his message seriously; maybe being the subject of a potential assassination was proper motivation after all.
Someone bumped his shoulder.Matthew recoiled.“Welliver, what the hell are you doing here?”
Byron was dressed to the nines.He seemed out of place in the den, primarily because Matthew understood the man did not partake in such activities.Well, he couldn’t according to their grandmother.“I heard about the game.Stake me.I’m a very good player.”
“Professionally or recreationally?”
“Both.”
“You know I can’t do that,” Matthew said.This wasn’t one of the income-producing suggestions he had provided to his half-brother.
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Both.You can’t beat professional players worked into a frenzy by a kitty worth more money than any of them have seen in their lives, most especially you.Look around.Eyes glazed over, even those who aren’t playing.They are practically frothing at the mouth.”
“You asked about ideas—this is an idea,” Byron said.
“It’s an idea based on a wink and a prayer.I need to pay attention to what is happening.Stay and watch if you will but I’m going to be seated soon.”
“I’d wish you luck, but you seem to have it in spadefuls,” Byron said, green with envy.
Matthew hated weakness and if he would give any advice to his brother, it would be to stand tall.“And for God’s sake, stop feeling sorry for yourself.”
“Your Grace, the Duke of Pelham.Can you step forward?”Madame DuPuis called.
Well, shit.Matthew actually liked Pelham and hated to think he was going to be taken in their rigged game.
Lord Chester was called next.Prickles ran down Matthew’s neck.He glanced around.There were women present, mostly the girls Alice paid to keep her clients happy.He did not see Lady Chester, and his real concern, his own wife.Surely Rose had not found out about the evening’s festivities.
“And Rose, the Duchess of Sandhurst.Are you here?”
The crowd parted and his wife, the beautiful Rose Elliston, dressed in a gown he had never seen, a bright red silky concoction with a proper flowing skirt and a high waist.She wore a carefully placed pelisse adorned with fur.The necklace she wore was a single teardrop diamond.Her hair was bunched upon her head in a glorious mess.She didn’t glance in his direction but responded to Alice’s request, and there was Raleigh carrying Rose’s buy-in money.
Oh, she was a proper heller when she wanted to be.
When and how did she find out?
“And that completes Table One,” Alice announced.
How much did Rose know?She knew about the necklace’s importance to the game, certainly.She couldn’t know the whole night was rigged.Matthew glanced around the crowd again.Lord Crawford, Lord Whiley, Lord Tremont.Several nobles from their gala.But they couldn’t have heard about the game at that time because it hadn’t been scheduled yet.
He’d allowed too much time to pass, and that time had allowed additional people to hear about the rich gambling and the incredible prize.
Rose and the three others took their chairs.Madam DuPuis called two more names, both single earls whom Matthew did not know.Then Sandhurst was called forward and finally it was Matthew’s turn.
Alice caught his gaze—he raised a brow, she lifted one shoulder.Sandhurst and Matthew were to be at the final game at their table.Oh, shit.He held his breath for a moment.He was now in a position where he had to lose to Sandhurst because there would be one winner from each table gambling for the final prize.
Had Alice made her own plans?Had Rose intervened and finagled her way to the finals?Or was it a ruse to get Liverpool into the final?No.No, this had nothing to do with Cato Street.Except it did.
Matthew wasn’t happy that his household was going to lay fifty-thousand pounds on the table.His stomach twisted.He hated being made a fool of, but the truth was, he didn’t know who had directed the changed game or how it was going to play out.
Other than Alice had said it would work out.
