The Price of Desire - Jo Goodman

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it because there was no good word from Paris? Have you now given up hope on everyone?”

      Griffin was aware he was being drawn in and still could not hold his tongue. “You told Pettibone. That was not your place.”

      “It is my place. Your wife—”

      “My wife is nothing to you.”

      “But if she’s dead—If you can prove that she’s—”

      “It changes nothing.” In contrast to his eyes, which were hard, his voice was dangerously soft. “She is already dead to me, and it makes no difference. I will not marry you, Mrs. Christie.”

      “Have I spoken of marriage?”

      “Even you have moments of restraint.”

      Alys’s nostrils flared. He’d raised the point of restraint at the very moment she was rearing back her hand to throw her glass at him. She caught herself and drank half of what she’d poured instead. Above the rim of the tumbler her pale blue eyes glittered. It was rare that there was heat in her anger. What she invariably felt was ice cold, and this was no exception. The whiskey did not warm her.

      “What of your business?” she asked. “Have you considered at all what I said last night? We are partners, Breckenridge. You cannot deny that I have been an asset to you in the operation of the hell.”

      “I do not deny it. It does not make us partners. Your contribution was not financial, and it was not asked for.”

      “God’s truth, but it was not refused,” she snapped. “You appreciated my presence in your place. You even were moved to remark that your patrons wagered in a most excellent fashion when I was in the room. That was more of the ready in your pockets, Breckenridge.”

      “And you were recompensed handsomely for it. Never say to me that you did not benefit from our arrangement. You have a house for which you owe nothing. Fine clothes. Jewelry that you may keep or sell at your pleasure. Your staff receives their wages from me and your allowance defines the very word generous.”

      Hearing his voice begin to rise, Griffin took a leveling breath. “The house. The clothing. The jewelry. All of it is yours, Mrs. Christie. I will see that your allowance continues throughout this quarter, but you will have to pay your household accounts and staff out of it. It is still a most liberal settlement, I believe.”

      It was not enough, not nearly enough. What she said was, “It is nothing! What you offer is an insult!”

      “Do not pretend that you haven’t been preparing for this day, Mrs. Christie. You may have allowed yourself to hope for a different end, but you are an intelligent woman who is well able to assess the risk of doing naught but hoping. I cannot help but think you have made some profitable investments. Certainly you asked for such advice as I was able to give on a number of occasions. If you but heeded half of it, you will have amassed a tidy sum. It also occurs that you will have already set your sights on another gentleman to take my place, and I do not fault you for it. If you can bring him up to snuff and put yourself in the society you crave, then I will be happy to dance at your wedding.”

      Griffin picked up his coat and folded it over his arm, then retrieved his hat and gave it a tap against the side of his knee. “Our arrangement has never been more than what it is, Mrs. Christie. It was predicated on a mutual appreciation for what we can do for each other, not for what we can be to each other.”

      There was no mockery in the slight bow he made her. He gave her this final respect as her due, then began walking toward the door.

      “Bastard!” She flung the tumbler at his back and was angry when it missed him, angrier still that he must have anticipated she would do it and didn’t trouble himself to flinch. “You will regret putting me aside, Breckenridge.”

      He paused on the point of leaving to glance back at her. “I know you believe that, but I am certain now of exactly the opposite.” His dark eyes narrowed briefly on her frozen attitude of outrage. “It was the ring, Mrs. Christie. Or did you think I didn’t know?”

      He stepped over the fallen tumbler and puddle of whiskey and let himself out.

      Olivia appreciated that her second and third day in the gaming hell proceeded uneventfully. Mason escorted her on a walk twice each day, making certain that she went unmolested. He was not given to many words and after she had exhausted the topics of weather, Malthus, and the butler’s frustrating, ultimately fruitless search for a suitable maid for her, there was nothing he cared to talk about.

      The snow ceased to fall on the second afternoon. As much as she had appreciated it, she was concerned that it would delay Alastair’s return. If he meant to return at all. That niggling thought would not be permanently quelled. She hated that the viscount must be thinking it also. He had to have already calculated the length of the journey Alastair would make to reach Sir Hadrien as well as the time it would require. Sir Hadrien detested town and spent almost the whole of the year at his estate in Sussex. With no mishaps, she could expect Alastair to be gone at least five days. If their father proved difficult—and it was almost a given that he would—it seemed unlikely that her brother could return before a full sennight had passed.

      She finished the essays by Malthus and began Brown’s. Soon after she mentioned to Mason that it might be pleasant to write down her own thoughts on the philosophy of the human mind, Foster appeared at her door bearing paper, quills, and a full bottle of ink. The small table he’d procured for her earlier so that she might take her meals in comfort also served well as a desk. She wasn’t sure what she might put to paper concerning philosophy, but she heard enough coming from the floor below each evening to venture some thoughts about the human mind.

      On the evening of her fourth day, Olivia had a surprise waiting for her when she returned from her late outing with Mr. Mason. It had not occurred to her during the walk that the valet’s rather jovial mood—which regarding Mason meant that he tipped his hat and ventured a smile when he greeted her—had anything to do with his knowledge of what would be taking place during their brief absence.

      Immediately upon her arrival at the threshold to her room, she knew something was different. She could quite literally smell it in the air. The breath she drew was changed by the scent of lavender and moist with steam from—could it truly be?—the water-filled hip bath.

      Olivia had been so moved by this gift, knowing what pains had been taken to haul so much heated water to the tub, that she was possessed by the urge to throw her arms about Mr. Mason’s shoulders and plant a kiss on his cheek. Had she given into the impulse it would have been a novel experience for both of them, but her own natural restraint was reinforced when Mason, having some sense of how she might be moved to express her gratitude, cautiously stepped back out of arm’s reach.

      As she thought about it later, a smile tugged at Olivia’s lips. She slipped lower in the tub. She doubted Breckenridge had ever known an urge to hug his valet.

      In the end she had never properly thanked Mr. Mason. Although she felt as if she were dancing in place with excitement, she had in fact simply stood in the doorway unmoving. What she offered him was a watery smile, hardly an adequate demonstration of the gratitude that was in her heart.

      The scent of lavender rose deliciously from the bath as Olivia stirred the water with her fingertips. She tried to imagine whose idea it had been to add bath salts. Similarly, someone had thought to line the copper tub with linens. Sitting almost shoulder deep in warm and fragrant water was as decadent a luxury as she had known.

      Olivia picked up a sponge and sliver of soap and made a lather that she applied to her arms. She set her mind once again to wondering at the origin of the salts and linens. Owing to the fact that she was a curiosity, she’d had brief contact with most of the staff. It wasn’t that a woman had never stayed in the gaming hell that made her an unusual guest and the subject of speculation. It was the mystery surrounding her presence that created the stir.

      Mrs. Christie, the woman whom Breckenridge had named as a friend, Olivia had learned was a frequent visitor to the hell but only

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