Page 2 of One Dangerous Desire
Despite how his body twitched to life in response, Rex held his ground, resisting the urge to follow after the seductive swish of the widow’s hips as she sauntered away. He didn’t require the fine education most of these gentlemen had been given as a birthright to know that joining her in that room down the hall would be a mistake. He needed to find a wife, not pass an evening sating some gentlewoman’s urge for a quick, heated tumble in a dimly lit parlor. No matter how she might cry his given name when he tipped her over pleasure’s edge, the lady would have no interest in taking his surname.
Everyone in the room knew Mrs. Thackeray was just out of mourning and already promised to an elderly viscount.
If half a dozen gazes followed him before the widow’s approach, twice that number were on him now. Watching, waiting to see if he would spark a scandal before dinner was served.
He deposited his miniature goblet on a nearby table and stepped toward his cluster of devotees. “Don’t forget to breathe,” he whispered to the perpetually breathless one, and then strode out of the drawing room. Past the second door on the left. Out the front doors of the Bridewells’ Saint James Square townhouse. Out of the stifling focus of a dozen gazes tracking his every move.
London’s fog was a balm compared to the heated dinner party gathering, no matter what his early departure cost him. He’d send his apologies to the Bridewells and continue his hunt for a bride at the next upper-class soiree.
The dampness in the air stirred old aches—a years-old injury in his leg and the tracery of scars on his right hand—but other sensations put him on alert. A sick swell low in his gut. A pinprick tingle at the base of his skull.
Someone watched him and not with the lusty hunger of ladies in a drawing room.
Rex twisted his head right, then scanned left. London’s fog-shrouded streets abounded in dark corners, but he couldn’t discern any figures lingering in the murky glow cast by the street lamps. Jerking the collar of his overcoat higher, he tucked his head down and quickened his pace. With his dark hair and clothing, perhaps he could blend into the shadows too.
As he walked, the sense of being watched faded. Berkeley Square provided him with a fashionable rented address. Its manicured streets had never been a place where he needed to watch his back as he had in New York. These days, he reserved that sort of energy for his business ventures and drawing-room clashes with arrogant aristocrats. Four steps from his townhouse, he cast one more glance over his shoulder. Metal glinted in the moon glow, and Rex drew his mouth up in a smirk.
“Your stealth leaves much to be desired.”
“No stealth intended, sir. I’ve merely been awaiting your return.” When the man stepped from the darkness, brawny shoulders squared in his militaristic way, gaslight caught him everywhere—his metal buttons, the sharp edges of his lantern-jawed face, and the gold watch chain and fob dangling from his waistcoat. Even his close-cropped bronze hair gave off a metallic glint.
“Blast it, Sullivan.” Rex glared at his hired man. “I trust you’re less conspicuous when seeking information for me.”
Jack Sullivan, Rex’s private inquiry agent, dipped his head and then lifted it with a bold grin. “I am indeed, sir. And yet, perhaps I am more inconspicuous than you allow. You failed to notice me as I waited just an arm’s length away.”
Rex cursed his rusty senses. Too many years living in posh lodgings had turned him lazy and made him feel some semblance of safety. That disturbing thought stoked a hunger for his next challenge.
“In future, ring the bell and wait for me inside like any normal guest.” What the hell was he paying a butler, housekeeper, and a house full of servants for if not to deal with those who came knocking at his door? Though he’d instructed them to turn most visitors away, Mr. Sullivan was the one man in London Rex was always willing to see. The fellow brought him facts, and facts allowed him to develop strategies.
“Yes, sir.” Sullivan managed to make the obsequious acknowledgment sound like a retort.
Rex led him across the threshold and beelined for the ground-floor room he’d set aside as a study-cum-office, ignoring the approach of Mrs. Hark as she hurried to greet them. His housekeeper preferred every entrance and exit to be a bit of a ceremony, with certain niceties exchanged, and a sense of order as to the removal or donning of outerwear. His disdain for such formalities was only one of the ways his American sensibilities clashed with the older woman’s polite English rituals.
“Fire’s been laid in your study, Mr. Leighton. Tea for you and your guest?”
“Coffee for me. Sullivan?” Rex shed his coat and hung it over a chair just inside the door of his all-purpose room. Out of the corner of his eye, Mrs. Hark reached for it with ahrmph, slapping at the damp garment as if it needed to be chastised for offending the leather furniture.
Her noises were drowned out by the sound of claws scrabbling on wood and the tenacious yips of a black-and-tan wire-haired dog that scurried out from under his desk. Charlie hobbled as he ran, but his misshapen back leg never seemed to slow him down. Rex leaned to ruffle the dog’s fur before Charlie scampered toward Sullivan, resuming a round of high-pitched barks.
Mrs. Hark swatted at the dog. “Quiet, you little fiend! Shall I put the creature out, sir?”
“No, but perhaps you could take Charlie downstairs and give him a bit of supper.”
Charlie circled Sullivan’s ankles, sniffing and growling, seemingly determined to discover whether the detective hid something threatening under his trouser legs.
“And what of your supper, sir?” The housekeeper watched the dog out of the corner of her eye as if she didn’t trust him not to attack. “Cook has prepared your favorite, Mr. Leighton.”
“I’ve already dined at my club.”
The woman’s head began to nod, a repetitive bobble, jerking up and down on her stout neck. “Yes, sir,” she uttered in a kind of pained whine. “Very well, sir. I shall see to the tea and coffee.” She twisted her apron in one hand, and her jaw went so stiff with frustration that she fairly spat the wordcoffee, her tongue stuttering on the doublef’s.
As she started to back away, Rex exhaled a sigh. “Mrs. Hark, I’m sorry about supper. I hope the Wellington is still warm so that you and the downstairs staff may enjoy it.”
She nodded again, though thankfully not nearly as many times, and ushered Charlie ahead with a wave of her apron before pulling the door shut.
“You’ve named the mutt,” Sullivan said in an amused tone.
“I had to call him something.” No one needed to know he’d named the dog after a master thief, a kind of mentor he’d known in New York.
