Page 37 of Dare to Love a Duke
His father had willingly gambled with the welfare of his family, courted scandal. And Tom would never know why the late duke would take such a risk.
Greyland faced him. “The manager intends to blackmail you?”
“She’ll maintain her silence,” Tom said with certainty.
His friend began to walk again and Tom kept pace beside him. In a clipped voice, Greyland said, “You’ll need to decide your next course of action.”
“There’s the hell of it,” Tom snarled. “I don’t know what to do.”
“While Ellingsworth—I mean, Lord Blakemere—knows military strategy,” Greyland said, “I’m an expert when it comes to navigating the treacherous waters of Society. Every step must be considered, weighed, analyzed.”
“Not my usual modus operandi,” Tom said wryly. “This entire world of respectability is not on my map.Here be dragons.”
“The dragons will swallow you and your family whole if you’re not careful, and do it all with a haughty smirk.” His friend shot him a measuring look. “The safest course would be to shutter the club immediately.”
“The safest course,” Tom said grimly, “isn’t necessarily the kindest action.”
“You have your family’s reputation at stake.” Greyland frowned. “What other factors need to be considered?”
Lucia’s plea spun around Tom’s head in dizzying circles. Her dark eyes haunted him—as did the feel of her skin.
Grant me one favor. Come to the club tomorrow night.
“For the first thirty-two years of my life,” he said, stopping beside the dry fountain, “I’d done everything I could to ensure my life was as uncomplicated as possible. Now I’m trapped in a maze. In the dark.”
“Whatever your choice,” Greyland said with surprising kindness, “I know you’ll act with the best of intentions.”
“And pave the road to Hell with them.” Bitterness coated Tom’s words.
“You need not be perfect, Northfield,” Greyland said. “What matters is here.” He knocked the side of his fist into Tom’s chest, and Tom rocked back slightly from his friend’s strength.
“Mayhap you won’t be the best,” Greyland said sagely, “but you’ll do your best.”
Sudden emotion thickened in Tom’s throat. “So it’s true, then.”
“What’s true?” His friend looked puzzled.
“That Her Grace performed the same magic as Aphrodite did for Pygmalion. Turned cold ivory into flesh.”
Greyland’s frown deepened, yet amusement in his gaze softened its severity. “I wasn’t made of ivory, goddamn it.” His lips quirked. “I was granite.” His expression sobered. “I don’t know if I provided you any solace.”
“An opportunity to vent is always welcome.” In truth, though nothing had been resolved, Tom noted how the punishing weight of secrets felt a little lighter, his breath coming easier.
His friend’s low, quick laugh turned to vapor in the chill air. “Let’s repair inside for some excellent brandy before our nethers become frostbitten. You’ll stay for supper, of course.”
A night watching Greyland and his duchess trading secret, loving smiles? Tom would much rather be in bed with Amina—Lucia—disporting themselves until sunrise.
Good Christ, she wasin his employ.
Yet for all the complications between them, he needed to decide what to do about the club. It would be so much easier to simply pretend there was only one risk associated with it—the threat to his family—but Lucia had been adamant that he consider the livelihoods of the establishment’s staff.
Though he’d seen the masked men and women who provided refreshments and kept the place orderly, he knew nothing about them. And he would never know, unless he took Lucia up on her offer and observed how the club truly functioned. To see it as a business.
He’d often accused his father of not seeing the other side of an argument, and willfully sticking to one version of the truth. If Tom didn’t go to the Orchid Club to see it behind the scenes, he’d be guilty of the same determined ignorance—andthat,he couldn’t tolerate.
His resolve firmed. On the morrow, he’d return to the club, not as a guest, but as the owner.
“My thanks,” he said, trailing after Greyland as they climbed the steps to the terrace. “We will have that supper together some other time. I’ll make for poor company tonight.”
