He nodded his head in her direction, and she flushed, looking away instantly. He wanted to crow his success. She wanted him. He was willing to bet nearly as much as he wanted her.
And they would both have what they wanted tonight.
He itched to touch her. He’d thought of little else since the moment she’d turned to him in the park the prior day and said, “I choose you.” Christ, he’d wanted to lift her into his arms and carry her into the nearest copse of trees and lay her bare and worship every inch of her with every inch of him, damn the world into which she’d been born and the one in which she’d chosen to live.
I choose you.
It did not matter that she’d likely said the same words to a dozen other men in her life. That she likely knew their power and wielded it like an expert.
When she’d said them to him, he’d been hers. Instantly. Filled with a dozen ideas of how to make her his. His desire had been primitive at best – he’d wanted her. Fully.
And tonight, he’d have her.
“Did you receive my note?”
He stiffened at the words, turning to face the Earl of Tremley, now at his shoulder. “I did.”
“You have not run the article we discussed.”
The war in Greece. Tremley’s support of the enemy. “I have been busy.”
“Gambling and socializing are not business. I do not like being ignored. You would do well to remember that.”
Everything about the words angered West, but he knew that the marquess was angling for a fight. “I am paying attention now.”
“Because one word from me and every one of these people would happily turn up to see you hang.”
West hated the truth in the words – the fact that, no matter the reasons for what he did, no matter the outcome of the actions, no matter the power he now wielded as a newspaper magnate, he was not one of them.
He never would be.
He ignored the thought, turning back to the ball, pretending to care, as he had for more than a decade, about this world that would never be his. “What do you want?”
He asked the question as a collection of young men passed, no doubt looking for a card game to pass the time at a ball their mothers had forced them to attend. Several of them turned to acknowledge Tremley and West, finding nothing strange about the two men deep in conversation.
They both held important positions – Tremley, as an advisor to King William, and West as a newspaperman to whom much of Society was beholden. There was only one other man who shared their influence.
The man Tremley had come to discuss. “I want Chase.”
West laughed.
“I fail to see the humor in it,” Tremley said.
West raised one brow. “You want Chase.”
“I do.”
He shook his head. “You and the rest of the known world.”
Tremley smirked. “That may be, but the rest of the known world doesn’t have you.”
That much was true. For a decade, West had been funneling information about Society to Tremley as blackmail payment for the earl’s silence about his past. About their mutual past.
And every day, every piece of information he shared and printed killed West a little more. He was desperate to get out from under this vicious man. Desperate for the information that would free him.
Years of practice kept him from revealing the fury and frustration that roiled in him whenever Tremley was here. “Why Chase?”
“Come now,” Tremley said, the words low and nearly teasing. “There are only two men in London who come even close to having my power. One of them is in my pocket.” West’s fists clenched at the words even as Tremley continued. “The other is Chase.”
“That’s not enough for me to go after him.”
Tremley laughed, cold and full of hate. “I like that you think you’ve a choice. He’s shown an interest in my wife. I don’t like being threatened.”
Anger flared as West considered Tremley’s treatment of his wife. “Chase is not the only man who might threaten you.”
“Surely you don’t mean yourself.” When Duncan did not reply, the earl continued. “You can’t ruin me, Jamie.”
The whisper of the name, decades old and unused, sent a thread of unease through Duncan. It made him itch to destroy the smug earl. It made him willing to do anything for the information Lady Tremley had offered for her membership to The Fallen Angel.
He took a breath. Affected calm. “You think I have not looked for Chase before? You think I am not aware of how well that reveal would sell papers? While I’m flattered by your confidence, I assure you, not even I can gain access to Chase.”
“But the whore can.”
The words – the word – rocketed through him, and it was only the ball whirling around them that kept West from sinking his fist into the earl’s smug face. “I don’t know whom you mean.”
“You are tiresome when you wish to be,” the earl sighed, feigning interest in those dancing past. “You know exactly who I mean. Chase’s woman. Now, apparently left over. To you.”
West stiffened at the description, at the way she was tossed about as nothing more than an accessory. At the way he referenced her – cheap and used and unwanted.
She was the daughter of a duke, for Christ sake.
Except she wasn’t to Tremley. Just as she wasn’t to the rest of London.
“There’s no use denying it,” the earl continued. “Half the ton saw you steal into a private room at the casino the other night. I’ve heard three different stories that say Lamont stumbled upon you up her skirts. Or was it she who was down your trousers?”