One Good Earl Deserves a Lover

Unease settled in Cross’s chest, and he folded his arms, leaning back in his chair to level his partner with a cool look. “What is it?”

“Lady Philippa Marbury,” Chase said.

Unease turned to dread. Chase knew. It was not a surprise. Not really. Chase always knew everything. Still, Cross was not required to admit it. “Who?”

Chase cut him a look. “Is this how it is to be then? You’re going to pretend not to know to what I am referring?”

“No pretending about it,” Cross made a show of leaning back in his chair. “I haven’t any idea what you’re on about.”

“Justin let her in, Cross. Pointed her in the direction of your office. And then he told me about it.”

Goddammit. “Justin is a gossiping female.”

“Having one or two of them around can be rather helpful, I find. Now, about the girl.”

Cross scowled, his mood turning from dark to deadly. “What of her?”

“What did she want here?”

“It’s none of your concern.”

“But it might be Bourne’s concern, so I ask nonetheless.”

If he had my sister in his clutches, I’d consider doing his bidding.

Bourne’s words echoed through Cross on a tide of guilt.

“What she wanted is irrelevant. But it’s worth mentioning that Knight saw her.”

A casual observer would not have seen the slight stiffening of Chase’s spine. “Did he recognize her?”

“No.” Thank God.

Chase heard the hesitation in the word. “However?”

“She intrigued him.”

“I’m not surprised. Lady Philippa is an intriguing sort.”

“That’s a mild way of putting it.” He did not like the understanding that flashed in his partner’s eyes at the words.

“You haven’t told Bourne?”

For the life of him, Cross didn’t know why. Bourne was widely considered one of the coldest, hardest men in London. If he thought for one moment that Pippa was in danger, Bourne would destroy the threat with his bare hands.

But Cross had promised to keep her secrets.

The world is full of liars.

The words whispered through him. There was no reason to keep his promise to the lady. He should tell Bourne. Tell him, and be through with it.

And yet . . .

He thought of her earlier in the evening, smiling happily at her hound, the expression on her face sending a thread of warmth through him even now. He liked to watch her smile. He liked to watch her do just about anything.

He liked her.

Shit.

“I took care of it.”

Chase was quiet for a long moment before repeating, “You did.”

Cross resisted the urge to look away. “The girl came to me.”

“I remain unclear on those particulars.”

“You needn’t know everything.”

One side of Chase’s mouth lifted in a wry smile. “And yet, I so often do.”

“Not this.”

Chase considered him for a long moment, a battle of will. “No. It seems not.”

“You’ll refrain from telling Bourne?”

“Unless he requires telling,” Chase said, leaning back in the chair. “And besides, telling Bourne won’t help my end of the wager.”

He shouldn’t care.

But the echo of Pippa’s soft touch and her strange words had clearly made him as mad as she was. “What are the terms?”

Chase grinned, all white teeth. “One hundred pounds says she’s the woman who breaks you of your curse.”

His curse.

It took everything he had not to react to the words. To the taunt in them.

One golden brow rose. “Not willing to take it?”

“I don’t wager in the book,” Cross repeated, the words coming out like gravel.

Chase smirked, but said nothing, instead standing, limbs unfolding with an uncanny grace. “Pity. I thought for sure that would make me a quick hundred.”

“I did not know you were short on blunt.”

“I’m not. But I do like to win.”

Cross didn’t reply as his partner left, the sound of the large mahogany door closing softly the only sign that Chase had been there at all.

Only then did Cross release the long breath he’d been holding.

He should have taken the wager.

Chase might know more than most about the secrets of London’s elite, but there was one fact that was beyond doubt.

Cross would not touch Philippa Marbury again.

He couldn’t.

Pippa, it’s time to try your dress.”

The Marchioness of Needham and Dolby’s words—part excitement, part scolding—drew Pippa’s attention from where she’d been watching the mass of bodies weaving in and out of the shops on Bond Street. While Pippa liked the window of Madame Hebert’s shop very much—it afforded a rather spectacular view of the rest of the London aristocracy going about their daily business—she did not particularly care for dressmakers. They, like dancing, were not her preferred way of spending time.

But wedding dresses required modistes. As did trousseaus.

And so, here she was, at what would most certainly be the longest trip to the dressmaker in the history of dress shopping.

“Philippa!” She snapped her attention from the group of men across the street at the entrance to Boucher & Babcock’s Tobacconist and toward her mother’s sharp, excited cry from the inner fitting room of the shop. “Come see your sister!”

With a sigh, Pippa turned from the window and pushed her way through the curtains, feeling as though she were steeled for battle. The velvet drapes hadn’t returned to their place when she came up short, taking in Olivia, petite and perfect on a raised platform at the center of the room, in what had to be the most beautiful wedding dress ever made.