Chapter 1
Dear Fezzimore,
Mrs. Dundlebottom insists we remain silent through her lessons on propriety and decorum. I tried, Fezzi. I truly did. Alas, propriety and decorum are highly overrated.
Penny, age 11
Somewhere between Ryker Black’s rise from guttersnipe to ruthless owner of the Hell and Sin Club, the world had learned—you did not cross him, interrupt him, or interfere with his dealings.
Ever.
That rule went for the lords who tossed away fortunes at his tables, and the other proprietors of the club who’d proven more brother than had their blood been shared.
That also went for Calum Dabney, the second in command of the Hell and Sin, who stood at his shoulder now.
Standing on the fringe of the Hell and Sin, Ryker surveyed the club. Dandified fops and jaded lords in their bright silk fabrics flooded every corner like an overstuffed drawer. “Tell her to make an appointment,” he ordered, in low tones. Raucous laughter and the sharp clink of coins filled the hell, nearly deafening in its volume.
“Your sister is here, at this hour, requesting a meeting, and you want me to tell her what?” the other man choked out, incredulity filling his tone.
Ryker remained silent. He’d grown up on the life lesson that to say too much and to speak too loudly found you gutted on the streets with a blade in your belly. Instead, he studied three vacant places at a hazard table, and frowned.
There was no place for anything less than excellence.
“I am not telling Helena that,” Calum said, flexing his jaw. “I may be your second, but I’m not your blood lackey, my lord.”
Ryker’s hackles went up. With those taunting words, his brother plucked at a frayed nerve. After saving the now Duke of Somerset from death in the Dials, Ryker had been duly rewarded for his efforts with a bloody title from the Prince Regent. A bloody title his brothers had found great humor in, and never lost an opportunity to have fun at his expense over. “Tell her whatever you wish, then,” he said icily, not rising to Calum’s baiting. He’d not allow himself to be distracted by what had brought the other man over to his side.
Then, Calum and the others had always coddled Helena. The only sibling to share Ryker’s blood, he’d rescued Helena from the streets when she’d been a child of six. But not before she’d been scarred by life on the streets. Years later, she’d risen from master bookkeeper of the club, to now Duchess of Somerset. Ryker peeled back his lip. For all Helena’s loathing and disdain for the nobility, for having seen their mother whore herself to a duke, she’d ultimately chosen life amongst the haute ton.
A loud shout went up, and Ryker looked to the roulette table where a cheering dandy was being slapped on the back by a fellow patron. Ryker scowled. Where the patrons reveled in their wins, there was not a sound the owner of a gaming hell detested more.
“You sent her away,” Calum pointed out, refusing to abandon their argument. “You were the one to send her away from Diggory’s clutches, and now you’d punish her for making her way in a new world?” There was a sharp accusatory edge there.
Diggory, the late owner of their rival club, The Devil’s Den, had been a thug who’d tormented them all on the streets. He’d extended that warfare years later, into their gaming hells. Having learned of Helena’s skill with the books, Diggory wouldn’t have rested until she was dead. In the end, Diggory had paid the ultimate price for his greed, and Helena had carved out a life amongst polite Society. Ryker rolled his shoulders. “She chose,” he said, the matter at an end.
“She is one of us,” Calum retorted. He lifted his gaze to the glass panel that only the proprietors knew of that oversaw the gaming floor. “You owe her.”
That handful of words left a charged tension in their wake. For in a world where he was not driven by emotion, feelings, or any sentiments that could weaken, Ryker did honor the code of the streets. For the decision she’d made to join the ton, Helena had once been a member of their street family. She’d scrapped and clawed alongside them. And more, when he, Calum, Adair, and Niall, the other members of their clan, had struggled with the skills needed to survive in their new world, Helena had proven adept in ways they never had, or would ever be able to. Her business acumen had singlehandedly helped build their empire. With a silent curse, he stalked off.
“Adair showed her to your office,” Calum called after him. Since Helena had left, Adair looked after the books. On a good day, Adair could never be Helena with numbers on a bad day.
Gaze trained forward, he marched through the clubs. Averting their gazes, lords hastily stepped out of his path.
No, Ryker didn’t welcome, or accept, interruptions to his daily routines. Helena had been schooled in that. They all had. And yet, something brought her here.
He exited the gaming hell floor, and made his way up the stairs to the offices. The wood stairs groaned in protest at his shifting weight.
Had Diggory’s men, bent on revenge for Helena’s act that day against their revered master, found their way into polite Society? He reached his office and froze.
A tall, broad figure stood outside his doorway. Arms clasped at his back, his brother-in-law, the Duke of Somerset, waited. “Black,” he greeted solemnly, this man who belonged to a people Ryker despised, and yet who’d also stepped in to save Helena. For that alone he had Ryker’s respect.
Ryker inclined his head.
“Helena is inside,” the other man murmured.
Ryker reached past him and pressed the handle. They may be joined as families now, but he’d never call Somerset brother. Wordlessly he entered the room and closed the door.
From where she sat perched on the edge of a chair before his desk, Helena jumped up. “Ryker.”
“Helena,” he said tersely, and made for the sideboard. Grabbing a bottle of whiskey, he poured himself a glass. “What do you want?” he asked, carrying his drink to his desk.
“It is lovely to see you, too,” she said with a wry twist of her lips. Unhurriedly, she reclaimed her seat.
Ryker sat behind the cluttered mahogany piece and got to the heart of it. “Diggory’s men?”
Her smile withered. “No. It is not that. Them,” she amended.
Some of the tension left his shoulders, but he remained tightly coiled. To let one’s guard down meant a man’s ruin. That wariness went for those you called family, and the thieves on the street.
Laconic as she’d always been, Helena smoothed her gloved palms down the front of her skirts, drawing his attention to the new attire she wore—elegant blue satin skirts adorned in crystal beading, befitting a duchess.
He peeled his lip back in a sneer.
Bringing her chin back a notch, she held his gaze. “I require a favor, and know the rule on the element of surprise.”
So that was why she came at this late hour. Cradling his glass between his hands, Ryker leaned back and inclined his head.
“I have not been . . . completely welcomed by Society.”
Burned on one cheek, the bastard daughter of a duke, and the sister of a club proprietor, had she expected she would be? “Oh?” he drawled.
Her frown deepened. “I didn’t expect it would matter to you whether I find my way amongst Society.”
She was only partly correct. Part of him, a weak, pathetic piece deep inside he’d sooner slay himself than admit to, did care. Still, he said nothing. You didn’t show your weakness. Not even to a sister, begging a favor.
“Questions surround our family,” she went on when he still said nothing.
He arched an eyebrow. “When did you ever give two damns what anyone said about us?” He’d raised her better than that. Disappointment filled him.
“I don’t,” she said pragmatically. “They can all go hang.”
If he were capable of smiling after all the sins he’d ratcheted in his life, this would have been the time for it.
“Society wonders about you,” she explained. “You are a duke’s son.”
“A bastard,” he said, bluntly. “I am a bastard.” He lifted his glass in salute. A child who hadn’t mattered a jot to the man who’d given him life. How easily his sister had forgotten that key distinction of her own blood, too.
Helena drew in a deep breath, and then spoke on a rush. “They also talk about my husband. Speculate there is bad blood between you.”
Ah, so this is why she is here. The Duke of Somerset. When he’d sent Helena away for her safety, never had he believed she would bind herself in name, forever, to one of those fancy toffs. “Ah.” Ryker turned his lips up in a humorless smile.
“He did not ask me to come,” she said, hurriedly. “Robert said the ton could go hang with their opinions.” The duke rose another notch in his silent estimation. Helena scrambled forward in her chair and turned her palms up. “But I care, Ryker. I love my husband, and they are saying rotten things about him.” Her mouth tightened. “They say he is ashamed of you because of your birthright and role at the club.”
When in actuality, it was Ryker who had no interest in any dealings with Somerset, title of brother-in-law be damned. Ryker took a bored sip of his whiskey and studied Helena over the rim. “What do you want?” The curt question brought his sister’s lips together, tightly.
“I am throwing a ball.”
A goddamn ball. How could she endure the frivolity of her new life? In running the hell, they’d created wealth and work here for many . . . where was her purpose now?
“I want Calum, Adair, and Niall there.” She paused. “And you. I want you to attend as well, Ryker.”
Ryker stilled. He’d misheard her. He’d not been paying attention beyond her mention of those frivolous entertainments.
“I want you there,” she repeated, with a quiet insistence. “I wish to show a—”
“No.”
“United front,” she continued over him. “I want the world to see we are truly a family and have them know Robert and I are proud of you.”
“A family?” he scoffed. Is that what she believed he was to the Duke of Somerset? All because she’d married the gent?
“Yes,” she said with a nod. “You are my brother, and Robert is now your brother.”
“He is no brother of mine,” he growled, and Helena jerked, her cheeks going ashen.
Taking another lazy sip, he arched an eyebrow. “Do not demand a meeting, enter my office, and feed me lies that this is for me,” he said coolly. This was for her husband, and her.
Proving her mettle, Helena went toe-to-toe with him. “Very well, this is not solely for you. This is for all of us.” She skimmed her gaze about the room, and lingered her stare on the cracked, framed piece of art that hung above his desk; the only adornment to grace his room. “You have never truly trusted anyone, Ryker,” she said, pulling her attention away. “Oh, you may say you trust our brothers, but you do not truly. You keep us at arm’s length, questioning the motives . . . of those who would lay down their lives for you.” She gave him a long, meaningful look. “My motives are true. There is no lie in them. I’m not capable of that. But neither will I beg you to attend.”
He met her words with more silence. Silence was always far safer. It allowed a person composure of his thoughts and an opportunity to gauge and assess his opponents.
Helena glanced down at her toes, the first to break the impasse. “I’ll simply ask, and hope you see that I need you to be there for me . . . and my husband.”
Ryker withdrew his watchfob and consulted the timepiece. “I’ve to return to the floors.”
Helena came to her feet. “Of course.” She picked her reticule off the floor and fished inside. Leaning over, she set something on his desk.
Ryker froze, and stared blankly down at the words on that thick vellum. “It is Friday,” she clarified. “Consider this your formal invitation. I do not ask you to come for the entire event, but if you’d stand beside us for even a short while”—she held his gaze squarely—“then I would be forever in your gratitude.”
She could have reminded him of the years of service she’d given the club, and how she’d helped build this empire . . . but she’d not. It was a sign of her weakness. “Helena,” he said, lifting his head.
“Ryker.” Helena dipped hers in return and proudly marched out of his office.
As soon as she’d closed the door behind her, he let loose a curse. She’d ask him to step out of the only world he’d ever known and enter hers. To what end? To help Somerset. A sound of disgust escaped him. Though she’d not pleaded or reminded him of past favors she’d done the club, they lingered there.
His sense of street honor, where you paid your debts and did your due, was ingrained into him from the moment he’d been old enough to walk, and learned his place in the Dials.
A knock sounded at the door. What now? “Enter,” he barked.
Calum stepped inside and looked around. A frown settled on his lips. “She’s gone already?”
“Yes.” Ryker downed the contents of his drink, welcoming the fiery trail it blazed down his throat.
“Is it Killoran?” Diggory’s number two, now in command of The Devil’s Den, had yet to attempt his revenge for Diggory’s death. The time was coming, and Ryker braced for it. Welcomed it. It was the ruthlessness he knew.
“You want to know the matter of urgency that brought her here?” Ryker swiped the invitation from his desk and shoved to his feet. Calum stalked over and grabbed the invitation.
As he skimmed the page, his brow furrowed. “A ball?” the other man asked skeptically, turning over the invite.
With a biting laugh, Ryker tossed it atop his desk. “That is the pressing matter of business you called me away from the floors for.” He narrowed his eyes. “You’re growing weak,” he cautioned.
Calum flared his nostrils. With his volatile displays of fury in the streets against their enemies, and his worrying over Helena, he had always been vulnerable in ways Ryker never had been, nor ever would be. “Why does she want you there?” Calum asked, relentless.
“To silence the gossip about me and Somerset.” Registering Calum’s pointed stare, he snapped. “What?”
Offering an infuriatingly nonchalant shrug, Calum said, “Oh, I would simply expect given that Somerset watched after Helena and followed after her, taking a bullet surely meant for her, that there would be some sense of obligation.”
A thick, tense silence fell.
Goddamn it all. Where any bloody duke, baron, or any lord in between could go hang on any other day, Calum was right on this. Somerset had selflessly returned to St Giles, to come for Helena when Diggory had snatched her. It mattered not whose bullet had ended the bastard . . . but rather, who had taken a bullet that day.
Swallowing another curse, Ryker strode for the door.
“Should I send round your acceptances?” Humor laced the other man’s tone.
“Send my goddamn acceptance,” he bit out, as Calum’s laughter trailed after him.
Ryker stalked through the halls, and marched an angry path to the observatory that overlooked the casino. He’d survived more blades in his person, gunshots, and street fights than any man had a right to live and tell of. And he’d welcome any one of those tenuous situations to entering London Society.
Cursing his sister, Ryker found his place at the window and stared at the drunken dandies stumbling about his club.
Yes, Ryker had survived life on the streets. He could certainly survive an evening with these same brainless fops and their equally brainless ladies.
Then his debt was paid to Helena and Somerset, and Ryker was free to carry on an existence where the only need he had of the peerage was the coin they tossed down at his tables.