Sophie walked through the doors of Vega’s two nights later with some trepidation. She was not hopeful that Jack would have persuaded Philip to leave her in peace. Every time she went, he’d been there, as if waiting for her, watching everything she did.

It was both alarming and puzzling. Surely he couldn’t have felt such an attachment to her based only on their convivial habit of gambling together. As Jack had pointed out, she won more from Philip than he won from her. He himself had been the cause of the scene that led to Jack’s outrageous wager. If anything, he ought to have apologized to her when next they met.

Instead he was suspicious and possessive in a way he had never been before. It all made her believe that his anger was more at Jack than at her. Sophie had never had a sibling, and a small piece of her heart ached that the two brothers seemed permanently at odds now, after a close youth. Unfortunately, she couldn’t say any of that to Philip without belying her claim to have been ill in bed instead of off in Chiswick making love with his brother, and since that prospect was what had enraged him so . . . She was helpless.

Tonight she headed for the whist tables. Hazard had lost all appeal, and faro was nearly as bad. Whist was quieter, and somehow more peaceful—­she had to keep her mind focused on the cards to play well, which prevented her thinking about Jack, and how he had crossed the room in two strides to take her in his arms and kiss her, and how she would have begged him to make love to her one last time there on the desk if someone hadn’t knocked on the door and startled her out of the haze of desire. She’d thought, after a few days apart, that her attraction to him would have lessened, or at least been manageable. Instead, it flared hotter than ever the instant she set eyes on him.

“Mrs. Campbell!”

She gave a violent start at the exclamation. “My goodness,” she gasped, clapping one hand to her breast. “You startled me, sir.”

Fergus Fraser grinned. He was charming enough, though terribly shallow. His grandfather was a Scottish lord, and Mr. Fraser had been living on that connection as long as Sophie had known him. She suspected his purpose at Vega’s was similar to her own—­to win a fortune, or at least a decent income. “ ’Twas not my intent. I only came to deliver a message from a mutual friend.”

She tensed. They had several acquaintances in common, but chief among them was Philip Lindeville. “Oh?”

He handed over a folded note with a flourish. “I’m to bid you to read it privately, and if you wish to send a reply, I shall be pleased to deliver it.”

It was Philip’s handwriting on the front, spelling out her name in swooping letters. She tapped it against her palm and gave Mr. Fraser a smile of dismissal. “Thank you, sir. That is very kind of you.”

With a lazily elegant bow, he excused himself and wandered away. Sophie watched where he headed from beneath her eyelashes. The vingt-­un room, one of Philip’s favorites. Stepping closer to the wall, she broke the seal on the note and read it.

It might have been from a different Philip. I have been a fool, he wrote. Through trying too hard to be your friend I have lost your favor, and now feel lost without your company. Say you forgive me, dearest Sophie, and we shall be as we ever were—­for now. You must know I care for you, but I am prevented from even speaking to you by one who has neither of our interests at heart. No one shall ever keep my thoughts from dwelling on you. Ever your servant, P. Lindeville

One who has neither of our interests at heart . . . Heart suddenly leaping, she edged closer to the vingt-­un doorway. It was relatively early still, but several tables were full. After a moment she picked out Philip, his dark gaze moody as he tossed aside a card and motioned for another. But behind him . . .

Stood Jack.

He wore his more forbidding ducal expression, his sensual mouth flat, but he was here. And Philip hadn’t dared approach her.

Her heart swelled until she gave a little gasp. Jack hated gambling, despised Vega’s, and yet here he was. And it could only be for her. For a moment she couldn’t keep herself from gazing at him, wishing she could cross the room and thank him—­acknowledge him—­throw herself into his arms and see him smile down at her before he kissed her—­

“I heard the Duke of Ware had applied to become a member, but I didn’t expect to see him here,” remarked Giles Carter beside her.

Sophie hadn’t even heard him approach, and almost jumped out of her skin at his voice. It was a blessing in disguise, for it gave her a chance to cover her lovesick gazing at Jack. “Has he?”

“Apparently it was granted on the spot.” Carter gave a humorless huff. “Privilege of a dukedom, I suppose.”

She managed to smile wryly. “Then he’ll be here regularly?”

“No doubt.” Mr. Carter turned probing eyes to her. “Does it distress you, or please you?”

She froze in apprehension. “What do you mean by that?”

“I mean you and he had a very public scene, which ended with him sweeping you into his carriage. And neither of you was seen for several days afterward.”

“I was home,” she said carefully. “Ill in bed. I told you.”

He nodded. “You did. And I believed you. But just now . . .”

“What?” she asked sharply. “What are you suggesting, sir?”

He held up one hand. “Only that his presence here again might be an unforeseen opportunity to you.”

No. It was an unforeseen torment, a reminder of what she could never have. And no one must ever know that she even dreamed of it, let alone that once he had been hers. She forced her shoulders to relax. “An opportunity to humiliate myself again?” She shook her head. “I have learned that lesson the hard way, thank you.”

He was silent for a moment. “Women are mysterious creatures to me,” he said at last. “I have three sisters and four nieces, and I never can guess what any of them are thinking. The slightest things become tragedies worthy of Shakespeare, whilst weighty matters are brushed aside as piffle. When I met you, I thought you were nothing like them. Sensible and intelligent, I thought to myself, a woman with whom a man can be at ease instead of constantly on guard.”

She should be falling over herself to reassure him she was like that. She should be pleased to hear he had regarded her with such esteem, and doing everything possible to restore that esteem. After all, three weeks ago she’d put Giles Carter on top of her list of possible husbands. He was a gentleman, and she was a gentleman’s daughter with four thousand pounds. He didn’t know that last bit, but she’d been very careful to project an image of a woman with some money of her own. There was a very real possibility that Mr. Carter would marry her.

Jack never would.

Sophie knew this; she’d known all along. Not only was it utterly unthinkable for a duke to marry a woman who gambled for her living, Jack himself had said and done nothing to suggest otherwise. He’d told her directly that dukes, especially Dukes of Ware, didn’t marry for affection. He might still want her—­and wicked woman that she was, Sophie felt an irrational burst of longing at the knowledge that he did—­but only as his lover. At best, as his mistress. She was every kind of fool to want him anyway, even without accounting for her goal of marrying a respectable gentleman who could give her the security and family she craved.

With some effort she hardened her heart to her visceral reaction to the sight of Jack. The time for being foolish had ended the moment they drove through the gates of Alwyn House on the way back to London. “I fear you are about to say your feelings have changed on that,” she murmured.

“I am no longer as certain as I once was,” Mr. Carter acknowledged. “Not because of the scene at the hazard table—­I was witness to it all, you remember, and I know the duke was provoking and rude. Any man would have drawn his cork, and I don’t know many who could have resisted his goading challenge. But since you’ve returned to Vega’s . . .” He paused. “You’re not quite the same,” was his final conclusion.

It was stupid to lie. “No,” she agreed softly. “I suppose not.”

He gave a lopsided smile. “Then the only question is how you’ve changed. It might give a woman ideas, gambling with a duke. It’s not so different from a young lady scheming to dance with one, I suppose. Who knows what might result, once a man’s attention is snared, and dukes—­even the Duke of Ware—­are men of flesh and blood like the rest of us.”

Before she could stop herself, Sophie stole another glance into the vingt-­un room. Jack was speaking to another man, one shoulder elegantly propped against the wall. He smiled slightly at whatever his companion said, and glanced her way. For the briefest second their gazes connected, with the same lightning-­sharp jolt of awareness that she’d felt at Alwyn House. The world seemed to fall away for that second, leaving just the two of them, two complementary pieces of one whole. I’m in love with him, Sophie thought with blank surprise.

Then Jack looked away, his expression unchanged. Sophie made herself do the same, turning back to Giles Carter. “If you’re asking if I harbor hopes of attaching the Duke of Ware,” she said evenly, “the answer is no. The very thought defies disbelief. His presence here is very much a surprise to me. The last thing I want to do is cause another scene and revive any unpleasantness. I am thoroughly aware of how rashly I acted that evening, and have resolved never to do so again.”

Mr. Carter listened attentively. Sophie’s heart twisted; he was a good man, one for whom she had hoped to develop true affection. If Philip hadn’t been so stubborn . . . if Jack hadn’t swept in, furious and out of patience . . . if she hadn’t lost her temper and given in to the temptation of winning all that money . . . She would probably still be doing her best to flirt with Mr. Carter and bring him up to scratch. He met all of her husband requirements, and she genuinely liked him.

But he was not Jack, and he never would be. Those few fleeting days at Alwyn House had changed something inside her, like clay being fired in a kiln, and she couldn’t go back to the way she was before. She didn’t have it in her to deceive Mr. Carter any more than she had room in her heart for anyone but Jack. Perhaps in time that would relent, but for now . . .

She made herself smile. “You asked how I have changed. I believe I’ve become more calculating. Tonight I feel like winning a great deal of money, and I like you far too much to make you my prey. Shall we say farewell until a more genial evening?”

His face eased, and he even laughed. “I might say that’s proof you hold me in high regard,” he teased. “Warning me away to spare my purse—­and my pride!”

“The very highest regard, sir!” She tapped his arm with her fan. “Although you do lose so graciously . . .”

“Only to you.” He offered his arm. Sophie took it and let him lead her to the faro tables. Whist was too tame after all; tonight she did feel restless and reckless, and damn anyone who got in her path.

Her luck held through the evening. By the time the clock chimed two, she had won a tidy sum, just over one hundred pounds. She should have been pleased, and instead she only felt drained. It was time to go home. She bade her companions good-­night and headed to the reception hall to send for her cloak and have Forbes summon a hackney.

The hall was quiet at this time of night. Vega’s doors were open until dawn, but most people who meant to play tonight were already in the main salon. The hardened gamesters in search of excitement had usually departed for more depraved haunts by now, and the competition for hackneys at this end of St. Martin’s was minimal. The front door stood open, and a fresh breeze swept through the elegant hall as she entered. Sophie took a deep breath gratefully. “Mr. Forbes,” she began, approaching the tall fair-­haired man with his back to her.

He swung around. She stopped in her tracks with a gasp. It was not the major-­domo.

Jack’s face was as still as marble. “Mrs. Campbell.”

Of course. She mustn’t know him and he mustn’t know her. “Your Grace,” she murmured, dipping a curtsy. “I beg your pardon.”

“Forbes has stepped out to summon a hackney. They seem in short supply in this street.” His tone was cool and remote—­ducal.

She flushed. “Yes, they often are.”

They stood in awkward silence for a minute. She longed to say something to him, anything, but didn’t dare. All it would take was one overheard word, one sign of connection, and the rumors would roar back to life. And yet . . . standing here so near him was almost more than she could bear, especially tonight.

Fortunately Mr. Forbes stepped back inside, his brows rising at the sight of her. “Mrs. Campbell! Are you in want of a hackney?”

“Yes.”

He nodded once. “I’ll send for one immediately. Your carriage is waiting outside, Your Grace.” He motioned to Frank, the servant in charge of the cloakroom who was just hurrying back into the hall with a greatcoat over one arm and a hat in the other hand—­Jack’s, no doubt. “Fetch Mrs. Campbell’s cloak,” Forbes told him.

Jack shrugged into his coat and took his hat from Frank. “Nonsense,” he said coolly. “The lady must take the hackney.”

Forbes bowed. “As you wish, sir. I shall summon another at once.”

“No.” Jack set the hat on his head. “I find that I am in want of some fresh air. I shall walk.”

Sophie kept her chin up, but her gaze carefully away from his face. “That is very kind of you, sir.”

He tipped his head in regal acknowledgment as he tugged on his gloves. Without another word or glance he strode out into the night. Sophie inhaled sharply as the breeze swirled around him, carrying the faintest whiff of his shaving soap back to her.

“Are you well?” asked Forbes, watching her far too closely. “Was His Grace importunate?”

“What? No.” She gave a quick shake of her head. “I’m merely tired. His Grace was very kind to let me take his hackney.”

Forbes didn’t look entirely convinced. “If you’re certain . . .”

“Yes.” She smiled in genuine relief as Frank reappeared with her cloak. “Quite certain. And now I shan’t have to wait while a carriage is summoned, which makes me feel even better.” She tied the ribbons on her cloak, and Forbes offered his hand to escort her down the steps to the waiting hackney.

A covert glance up and down the street revealed no sign of Jack. Sophie stepped into the hired carriage, thanking Mr. Forbes for his assistance with a silver crown. The carriage started off, and she tried to calm her still-­leaping pulse. She would have to get used to seeing him, if Giles Carter were correct that he had become a member. When she had asked him to stop Philip harassing her, she hadn’t guessed he would do it personally. If she had known, she wasn’t sure she would have asked. It was a great relief not to see Philip watching her all the time, but it would be even more unsettling to catch fleeting glimpses of Jack. She leaned her head against the narrow window, thinking how farcical her life had become lately.

The hackney turned into the main road, and abruptly she jerked upright, then lunged forward. “Stop a moment!” she cried to the driver. He slowed the horse, and she groped for the handle. She pushed open the door just as the hack drew even with Jack on the pavement.

He stopped and faced her. Breathless, gripping the handle for dear life, she stared back at him. “This was meant to be your carriage, sir.”

“Yes,” he said.

“I would not have accepted your offer of it if I had suspected it would force you to walk.”

He took a step closer and laid his hand over hers on the door handle. “Perhaps we might . . . share the carriage.”

Her mouth was dry. She smothered the little whisper in her head, warning that this was a mistake. Jack’s voice had lost the cool, aristocratic drawl. Once more he sounded like the man who’d laughed with her at Alwyn House, and the way he looked at her made her heart leap. She nodded yes, sliding over on the seat to make room for him.