Page 61 of Hazard a Guest
“This color,” he said as they reached the champagne glasses, touching the sleeve of her midnight-blue gown. “I love it. It looks very well on you.”
“Does it?” she replied with no small tone of mischief. “Shame it’s not the color I’m wearing tonight.”
He blinked, attempting not to freeze immediately in his tracks as she giggled, stepping ahead of him to retrieve the glasses. She handed him one and raised her brows. “Look at you,” she tutted, “accepting booze. And here I thought you were such a nice Quaker boy.”
“Did you think that?” he returned softly, unable to hide his smile as she slowly shook her head no.
“Did you get any mail today?” she asked him, finding a place on the wall to lean against while they watched the games. “I have a packet of things to get through. Something from Jones, something from Millie. I haven’t had a moment to breathe.”
“Nothing for me,” said Joe with a shrug, “but I was only in London for a day before I had to leave again. I probably won’t get anything new from Cain until I get back.”
She sighed softly. “At least you didn’t have to contend with a marriage announcement from Dom Raul’s side. Freddy would have smelled it on you the instant it reached your hand. Is he … is he quite all right, by the way? Obviously, he’s fine, but …”
“He’ll be all right,” said Joe. “I’m keeping an eye on him.”
“Aye,” said Ember, sipping from her glass. “So am I.”
They stood in silence for a bit, both of them finding their attention settling over Thaddeus Beck, who was apparently dominating thevingt-et-untable with a quiet precision that belied the blood on his knuckles. One by one, each of his contenders ran dry, slinking away in defeat.
Ember released a little sigh of disgust but did not look away. Her eyes flicked from him only once, over to Miss Lazarus standing near her father, gazing at Beck with something in her wide, young eyes that looked uncomfortably like worship.
“Oh,” said Joe. “Oh dear.”
“Hm?” said Ember, looking up at him for a moment and then back to the scene he’d just witnessed. “Oh, that. It’s nothing.”
“Is it not?” Joe asked her, not because of the blood on Beck’s knuckles and not because of the tightness of Ember’s tone, but because he recognized that look on Hannah’s face.
That was how he’d felt, once. That was how he’d felt every time he was in a room with Ember Donnelly.
It made him look at Beck again, this time for longer, this time with consideration.
Ember had told him that the only difference between Beck and herself was luck and timing. Was that true? Was Beck just Ember as a man? A very, very large man?
He frowned and turned back to regard the way she was watching him: with distaste, like an enemy.
WhyhadBeck punched that fellow?
The only thing that made sense, the only reason that would fit, was the one standing in that corner, wide-eyed and breathless, watching him like he had descended from Olympus directly to play in these rooms tonight.
“Stop it,” she muttered, tossing him a look out of the corner of her eye. “Stop that.”
“All right,” he said, but only because she had asked. He didn’t addfor now.
“If I go play with him, he’ll leave,” she said with irritation, tapping her fingernail against the champagne flute. “Even when I get close enough to watch, he pisses off somewhere else. What’s he hiding?”
Joe didn’t know. He thought he could have guessed, a few moments ago, but now he wasn’t sure at all.
“Have you tried asking him?” he said, looking over at her. “Might be easier than trying to pin him to a table.”
“Oh, Joe,” she said with a sigh, knocking back the remainder of her drink and handing him the empty glass. “Of course not. You’re the only one I want to pin to a table.”
She was already gone again before he’d processed her words, though she did throw one last look over her shoulder, obviously enjoying the way she’d rooted him to the spot, a glass of wine in each hand and pink in his cheeks, just like blasted Lord Penrose.
CHAPTER 21
She knew she shouldn’t have done it, but Ember had never been very constrained by the shoulds of life, and the timing had been too perfect to ignore.
Joe had been up at the hazard table, taking his turn to shoot the dice, and it just so happened that at that very moment, Beck decided to quit the gaming room for the night.
