Chapter 2
A thick tension, better suited for an impending battle in St. Giles than a Mayfair townhouse, hung heavy in Ryker Black’s office.
But then, it was not every day the most ruthless fighters and leaders of the darkest streets of London gathered for a meeting.
Adair, Ryker, Calum, and Niall had assembled more than ten minutes ago with Broderick Killoran, a burly, ugly guard at his side, and Killoran’s sister Cleopatra. Since that trio’s arrival, not a word had been spoken. Each person stared mutinously back at one another in a silent dare of who would speak first.
Through that strained quiet, Adair passed his stare over the three people before them. Broderick Killoran sat as comfortable as a king in one of Ryker’s winged leather chairs. With his palms resting upon that fine leather and a familiar cocksure grin on his face, his ease was only belied by a fierce glitter in his eyes. The guard, a towering bear of a figure who looked more like a mountain than a man, stood behind his lord and master, hands planted on his hips. Adair flicked his gaze dismissively over the brute, nearly three inches taller than Adair’s six feet, three inches. He’d learned firsthand from countless street battles that even a child could take down a person three times his size with a well-placed blow, bite, or kick. He moved his focus on to the childlike figure alongside the brute. Not even a hair above five feet, her slender form was draped in fine satin fabric. Bespectacled and in possession of a mop of brown curls, she’d a fire in her eyes that promised death to all who crossed her.
Adair settled a hard stare on her . . . Cleopatra Killoran. Broderick Killoran’s sister. The one who’d arranged the truce between their families . . . who’d led them to Niall’s wife, Diana, so she might be saved. It had all been orchestrated to knock down their guard. And how easily they’d fallen into the trap. She had the look of a child, but she bore the evil of the street in her ruthless gaze. Only a damned fool would see nothing more than a bespectacled miss with a mop of drab brown curls when they looked at her. He’d marked her as trouble for them the moment she’d revealed herself.
Miss Killoran stiffened and glanced about. Her keen gaze missed nothing, touching on every corner and detail of the room.
Their stares clashed. Any other person would have had the sense to look away.
Cleopatra Killoran curled her lips up in the corners in a derisively mocking smile. Then, with a slight shake of her head, indicating she’d sized him up and found him wanting, she looked back at the front of the room.
A palpable hatred burned in his veins.
The faint groan of leather jerked his attention back to Killoran as he dropped an ankle over his opposite knee. He opened his mouth to speak, but Miss Killoran swiftly placed her right palm on the back of his seat.
The gaming hell owner, in his elegant wool suit better fitted for the fancy end of London than the slums he’d grown up in, glanced at his sister. A look passed between the pair.
A lord or lady of the ton would never note the silent exchange. Adair had learned firsthand a lesson in what came with opening one’s mouth in the streets. A person either perished, or learned a new language. That’s the one that was now being spoken before him. The slight arching of Killoran’s blond eyebrows, the tightening at the corners of Miss Killoran’s too-full lips.
Then Killoran reclined farther back in his seat and continued on with an intractable silence. The little hellion behind him looked back at Adair and smirked.
Smirked. A muscle jumped at the corner of his eye. He cracked his knuckles. Damn this family and damn this meeting.
In the end, the impasse was broken by the unlikeliest of people. “The deal is off,” Ryker announced in his low, gravelly tones.
Abandoning his earlier nonchalance, Broderick sprang forward in his seat. “We have a deal, Black.” The rival proprietor slammed his fist on the edge of Ryker’s desk. “A damned deal.”
And even as he damned his brother for conceding the first word in this war, a thrill of triumph went through Adair at yanking the one thing Killoran craved, that only they could give him. More specifically what Ryker and his wife, Penelope, could orchestrate for the bastard—respectability.
Miss Killoran caught her brother’s eye and gave a slight shake of her head. Cheeks flushed, Killoran jumped up. Planting his hands on the edge of the immaculate mahogany piece, he leaned forward. “You bloody bastard,” he spat. “If it weren’t for my family, that one’s . . .”—he jerked his chin at Niall, who stood to the left of Ryker—“wife would be dead.” The seething man straightened. “I should have left her to her fate.”
Niall’s primitive shout went up as he launched himself forward. Calum and Ryker quickly scrambled over, grabbing him by the arms. “Ya bloody bastard,” he thundered as he struggled to break free. “Oi’ll rip your entrails from your throat and feed them back to ya through your gutted belly,” he bellowed.
The ugly guard at Killoran’s side took a step forward.
Adair quickly yanked his gun out and trained it on the towering brute, halting the man in his tracks.
Most women would have cowered and shook at a gun being brandished at a man a foot away from her. Cleopatra Killoran tipped her chin in Adair’s direction and held his gaze squarely as she moved herself between the muzzle of Adair’s gun and the guard.
He stitched his eyebrows. The hellion was either mad, fearless, or a lackwit. She’d put herself between a bullet and a man in her brother’s employ? Mayhap she was a combination of the three.
“Cleo,” Killoran said sharply.
That swift change from unaffected bastard to a man poised for battle marked his weakness. Killoran cared about the girl behind him.
She angled her shoulder, presenting herself full-forward to the room. “Did you truly expect a Black, or anyone inside the Hell and Sin, to honor their word?” She spat on the floor at Adair’s feet.
A muscle jumped in the corner of his eye as the tension thickened.
In the street, a man was only as good as his word. It was a currency more valuable than gold.
Killoran shouldered himself before her. Again, like the London thief she no doubt had once been, she ducked out from behind him and took a place at the head of the desk. She stood there, arms akimbo, engaged in a silent battle with Ryker.
Adair rocked back. And by God, for the first time in his life, he doubted his brother’s ability to win a particular fight . . . and against a slip of a Killoran, no less.
“Our agreement ended the day a fire was set to the Hell and Sin,” Ryker said in steely tones.
“Pfft, your patrons were better for it.”
At the young woman’s brazenness, Adair’s mouth fell open and fury stirred to life.
“But we didn’t need to burn down your club to destroy it. You all”—she gestured to Adair and his brothers—“managed to do that on your own. Marrying yourselves fancy ladies.”
“And isn’t that precisely what you want for you and yours?” Adair called over to her. “Pretending ya are different from what ya, in fact, are,” he taunted, deliberately using those Cockney tones as a reminder of just what she and her kind were.
The young woman laughed, and the droll, derisive edge to it sent heat climbing up his neck. People, regardless of station, size, or gender, hadn’t ever dared laugh in his face. As a boy, he’d beaten another boy for it. There hadn’t been a girl brave enough or stupid enough to attempt it. That a bloody insolent Killoran now should grated.
“Men without loyalty, I didn’t suspect should have a brain in their heads, either. Polite Society turns an eye to their men marrying our sort. Black was pardoned because he’s a duke’s bastard. But you”—she jabbed a finger at Niall—“and you”—she pointed to Calum—“marrying duke’s daughters?” She chuckled. “The arrogance of you whoresons marrying as you did. It’s one thing for a lord to sell himself for a title . . . but you, binding yourselves to their kind? You may as well have struck the torch to your building the day you signed your marriage documents.” She paused and looked between them. “That is, I take it, if Black can read?”
Ryker’s cheeks went red, and he glanced to Calum. Together longer than any of their brothers, those two had always served as the one and two of their family and club. Calum puzzled his brow and looked helplessly to Niall and Adair. Bloody hell, the chit had confounded them all.
“Am I to take that as a no?” the relentless Cleopatra Killoran posed to Calum.
Niall whistled. “Your sister is mad, Killoran,” he said, with a shockingly pitying glance for the other proprietor.
Killoran stiffened. “As one whose mother-in-law landed herself in Bedlam, and you who found yourself in a family given to madness, I expect you’ve a good grasp on insanity, but I assure you Cleo is far cleverer and stronger than you or the rotters you call brothers.”
All earlier commiseration faded as Niall launched himself across the desk at Killoran. The room descended into a flurry of shouts and curses as Adair’s brothers gripped Niall by the legs and dragged him back.
And through it all, Miss Killoran stood on with a wide, smug smile. She jerked her hand at her brother. “We’re done here, Broderick. I told you they’d renege on their pledge.” The young woman marched toward the door. The surly guard instantly sprang into movement.
Broderick Killoran, however, remained resolutely fixed to his spot. “I’m not leaving,” he said with a smile. He reclaimed his seat. “They promised me something, and I’d have them honor their word.”
A little growl escaped Miss Killoran, and she wheeled back. With jerky movements that would never be considered even a hint ladylike, she stomped back over, jerked out the chair alongside her brother, and sat. She glowered at Killoran, but he gave no indication that he either saw or cared about her displeasure. With his usual casualness, Broderick Killoran drew off his leather gloves and beat them against each other.
Ryker hesitated, and Adair silently willed his brother to turn this trio out on their arses. To have them thrown into the street for what they’d done and for what could never be undone. Ryker, however, sat.
Cleopatra Killoran leaned back in her seat, her small frame lost in those large leather folds. She glanced over, lingering her gaze on his still-extended pistol, and the young woman snorted. “You can lower your pistol, Thorne.” She winged a thin eyebrow up. “That is, unless you’re afraid? Then I advise you to carry on as you are.” Killoran’s sister lingered her gaze on the head of his pistol. “Remember, you’ve just one shot. I’d choose wisely.”
He blinked slowly. By God, she’d called out his family’s honor, laughed at him, and now questioned his courage. If she weren’t a damned Killoran, the woman would have earned his appreciation. As it was, he’d sooner choose the one shot she referred to on himself than admit as much. “You tart-mouthed—”
“Well, get on with it,” Niall growled, silencing Adair with a sharp look.
Again, Adair went hot. A person didn’t lose control . . . to do so and show that weakness, particularly before one’s enemy, had the potential to destroy a man. What was it about this sharp-tongued vixen? It was not only her Killoran blood but also the effortless way in which she wielded her tongue like a sharp blade.
Killoran steepled his fingers and rested his chin atop them. “I didn’t set fire to your club.”
“You’re as responsible as those under your control—”
Cleopatra Killoran sat upright in her chair. “Our family isn’t controlled.”
“I can see that,” Calum muttered under his breath.
The bear of a guard who’d taken up place between the Killorans choked on a laugh. Both Killorans quelled him with a look.
Ryker’s mouth tensed. It was the mark he’d finished with the discussion. “Your people . . . your”—he grimaced—“family, answers to you.” What an odd concept. These vile foes they’d battled for years were also one another’s family. But then, everyone born to the streets ultimately found others to help one survive, and the ones who didn’t, perished. “Just as when you were tied to Diggory, you owned that man’s crimes.”
“And you own what he did to my wife,” Niall said tightly, stepping up behind Ryker’s left shoulder.
Cleopatra Killoran peeled back her lip in a sneer, answering before her brother. “And what did we do? Save her from being carved up like a Christmastide goose? Next time, we’ll not interfere and let your family suffer their fate.” She made to rise. “Come on, Broderick—”
“Did you just threaten my family?” Ryker whispered, halting the young woman midmovement.
And it would seem even the stupidly brave Cleopatra Killoran had sense enough to know some fear. The color leeched from her cheeks, and had Adair not been studying her closely, he’d have failed to note the slight tremble to her hands. The hellion did know fear. Of course, everyone did. Even the most vicious fighters in St. Giles.
“My sister was not—”
“I don’t make veiled threats,” she pronounced, a surprising strength in that retort. “I don’t mince words. You’ll know when you’re threatened, Black,” she vowed.
Ryker sized her up for a long moment, then shifted his focus back to her brother. “Someone set the blaze.”
Killoran dropped his negligent pose. “I give you my word that not a single one of my kin or myself are to blame.”
Adair’s body coiled tight. Surely his brother wasn’t naive enough to trust a Killoran for a second time. And yet . . . by the way in which he carefully eyed the man across from him, that is precisely what he did. Weighed his words and measured their worth.
Adair looked to Niall and found the same fury and frustration reflected back in his more hardened brother’s features.
And Killoran caught that weakening, too, and pounced. “We had an agreement,” Killoran pressed. “Why would I sacrifice that?” He chuckled. “I’d at least wait until my sister makes her match.”
That misplaced levity earned equal glowers from Adair, his family, and the man’s sister.
Ryker captured his chin between his thumb and forefinger and rubbed.
Don’t you dare, Ryker, Adair thought. Don’t you dare cede a goddamned inch to these bloody bastards . . .
“You’ve already proven you aren’t to be trusted,” Ryker said at last, and Adair straightened. “Aligning yourself with Diggory marked the value of your pledge and the depth of your honor.”
If looks could kill, Miss Killoran would have scorched Ryker with the fire burning in her brown eyes. “Bastards,” she hissed, jumping to her feet so quickly she knocked her spectacles askew. “We’re done here, Broderick. We need nothing from a Black. Nothing.” She directed that to the men assembled. “It’s clear they never had any intention of honoring the agreement reached.”
“I was not in London last Season,” Ryker said tightly.
No, Calum had stepped in and filled the role of head proprietor when Ryker had been at his country estates for the delivery of his first babe.
Broderick Killoran chuckled. “How very convenient? Is it not, Cleo?”
“Indeed.”
Brother and sister shared a jaded, humorless laugh.
“My brother said we’re done here.” Adair took a step forward, tired of this game they played. “We’re done. We’ll not ask you again. Get—”
The door flew open, and as one, everyone sprang to attention, unsheathing their knives and training weapons at members of the opposing family. Adair briefly contemplated Broderick Killoran but ultimately settled his gun on the man’s unpredictable sister: a sister who already had her small silver pistol pointed at his head while brandishing a jewel-encrusted dagger in her other hand.
Ryker’s wife sprinted into the room. “What is the meaning of this?” Penelope cried out. It was a testament to Lady Penelope Chatham’s courage that she’d not run off, screaming and crying in terror, but rather advanced deeper in the room, past the strangers and family leveling their knives and pistols.
“Penelope,” Ryker commanded sharply, “we are in the midst of a discussion.”
The lady stopped in the middle of the room, two feet away from Broderick Killoran.
Adair took a step closer toward his sister-in-law, and Cleopatra Killoran waved her weapon in his direction. “Not a step,” she commanded.
“This is most certainly not a discussion,” Penelope said in beleaguered tones better suited for a governess scolding recalcitrant children than for addressing a room of London’s most ruthless kingpins. “Discussions are over tea and biscuits and not . . .”—she motioned to Miss Killoran’s hands—“knives and guns.”
Everyone eyed one another. No one made the first move.
“Ryker,” Penelope said sharply.
He shook his head.
And an unspoken language passed between the married couple. Only this wasn’t the language of the street. This was an intimacy of two who loved one another. Even as Adair loved his siblings as if they shared his own blood, this closeness was one he didn’t know, or understand.
Ryker entreated her with his eyes.
“Down,” she mouthed.
Her husband briefly closed his eyes, then slowly lowered his weapon to his side.
Penelope glanced about, lingering her gaze a long while on Cleopatra Killoran. “All of you, now.”
The bespectacled hellion was the last to comply. She dropped her pistol into the pocket sewn along the front of her gown. Then, hiking her skirts up slightly, she sheathed her knife inside a peculiar pair of black boots.
What manner of woman is Killoran’s sister? Adair’s sister, Helena, had been raised in the streets, but she’d never have gone about lifting her skirts before a room of strangers—and certainly not the enemy. Adair’s gaze lingered on Miss Killoran’s trim ankle.
The young woman straightened and glared at him through her perfectly rounded spectacles. “Did you want a longer look, Thorne?” she taunted.
And despite his annoyance with the saucy chit, his lips twitched. The women he’d always favored had been curved in all the places a woman should be curved, and yet, if the feisty baggage before him didn’t have the name Killoran attached to hers, he might have found in her the exception to his usual preferences. He touched the brim of an imagined hat. “Not at all, Miss Killoran.”
She narrowed her eyes.
“They are just leaving,” Ryker said in frosty tones as he moved around the desk to meet his wife.
“No, they are not,” Penelope said. The stubborn set to her shoulders was one Adair recognized. After all, this was the same woman who’d not only wrapped Ryker around her finger but also transformed the rooms of the Hell and Sin and struck down prostitution in their establishment. “We gave our word to this family.”
“They burned our club,” Niall gritted out.
“Did they confess as much?” she shot back, then looked around. “Did you?” she posed that to Broderick Killoran. “Destroy my family’s club,” she clarified.
Surprise marred Cleopatra Killoran’s face, but she quickly concealed it behind her mask of drollness.
“Surely you don’t expect the truth from these people?” Adair said with a growl, earning another black look from Killoran’s sister.
With a charm better suited for a gentleman in a London ballroom, Broderick Killoran swept an elegant bow. “My lady, I assure you, I neither set that fire nor ordered a man, woman, or child to see to it.”
“He’s a damned liar,” Adair called to Penelope, earning a slight frown.
“Do you have proof?” she shot back. Silence descended over the room. Penelope smiled. “Then I daresay it would be wrong to break our word on nothing more than past hatred and resentment.”
Adair swiped a hand over his face. His damned trusting sister-in-law. She’d spent all but two years of her life in the fancy streets of London, unscathed by the world’s ugliness.
“Penelope,” Ryker began quietly.
“Do you have proof, Ryker?” his wife cut in. “If not, then I expect us to honor our commitment. We offered them a Season. We”—she motioned to the small circle of people that was their family—“all of us. I’m not one who’d have us break our word.”
“Everything has changed,” Ryker gritted out.
“Has it?” Killoran piped in, wholly unfazed by the glowers trained on him. “Cleopatra promised to lead Marksman to his now wife.” He stuck a finger up. “Which she did. And you vowed to sponsor one of my sisters for a Season.”
Penelope nodded. “And that is precisely what we’ll do, Ryker,” she challenged.
A cocksure grin turned Broderick Killoran’s lips up, revealing a flawless white smile. “I am grateful to you—”
Ryker’s wife swiveled her attention over. “I don’t like you, Mr. Killoran.”
The proprietor’s mouth froze in a strained, befuddled grin. With his crop of golden curls and his rumored ability to charm the peers whose paths he crossed, he was no doubt unaccustomed to disapproval.
Ryker’s wife continued speaking. “You infiltrated my family’s clubs. When I was first married to Ryker, you provided a vile note to create conflict between my husband and I.” With each charge ticked off on her list, she raised a finger. “You sought to sow unrest in my marriage. So, do not mistake my decision for kindness. Are we clear?”
Even a Killoran had the good grace to blush. He bowed his head slightly. “We are, my lady.”
Adair stared at the other man humbling himself so with a potent disgust. How different this family, with their love of the nobility, was from Adair and his own brothers who, outside the women who’d married into their gang, despised the ton.
Penelope held her hand out. Killoran hesitated a moment, then sealed the agreement with a handshake.
“A Black with honor,” Cleopatra Killoran muttered. “Who could have imagined it?”
Killoran gave his sister a quelling look that the spitfire diligently ignored. “I will have one of my sister’s belongings readied, and—”
Miss Killoran and Ryker spoke as one. “What?”
“Her belongings?” Ryker barked, his nostrils flaring.
Cleopatra sprang forward on the balls of her feet, a look of horror stamped in her features, and a question in her eyes. The look was gone so quickly, Adair may as well have imagined it. Interesting.
Adair whistled. “You are mad, Killoran.” He earned another black look from the young woman. Surely the both of them had brains enough not to expect them to take one of their kind in.
“What are you on about?” Ryker demanded. “Surely you don’t truly expect I’d allow any of your family to sleep inside my home.”
The proprietor of the Devil’s Den drew out his gloves and casually pulled them on. “My intentions are an honorable match for one of my sisters.”
This time, worry lit the hellion’s eyes. So, she had like fears of them.
“I cannot have Gertrude returning each night—”
“No,” Adair said tightly.
“—to the same place those gentlemen will invariably end up.” There was a faint smirk to that subtle boast, and Adair curled his hands tight, despising the reminder of how far they’d fallen to the rival establishment.
“You’re not staying here,” Ryker said resolutely. He folded his arms at his chest.
Broderick Killoran chuckled. “Well, not me, of course. I could hardly live here. I’ve my club to see after. The eldest of my sisters, however, can and will.”
The bloody gall of the man. Adair took another step forward and jabbed a finger in his direction. “Those weren’t the terms agreed upon.”
“Sponsoring one of my sisters for a Season were the terms,” Killoran shot back. “I know enough to know that young ladies aren’t scuttled from one home to another when they have their Season.”
And that was even more information than Adair had about anything to do with the damned ton.
Penelope tapped a fingertip against her lips. “Very well.”
A curse exploded from Adair’s lips. “They aren’t to be trusted, Penny.”
Calum nodded. “He is right in this.”
From the corner of Adair’s eye, he caught the flash of outrage in Miss Killoran’s brown eyes.
“It’s not your decision, Penelope,” Ryker clipped out, his Cockney sliding back in. “They can’t stay here.”
“Their sister can and will.” Penelope looked curiously back at the younger woman. Miss Killoran eyed her warily in return. “You are?”
She is the Devil’s spawn and a demon incarnate.
“Cleopatra Killoran,” her brother neatly supplied. “I’ve two additional sisters.”
Two more like this tart-mouthed sprite before him? Adair shuddered.
“One sister,” Ryker snapped before his wife could speak. “One Season.”
“And then the debt is paid,” Niall said solemnly.
“We are done here.” Killoran dropped an elegant bow. “Gentlemen, my lady.” With that, he proffered his arm for Cleopatra Killoran.
Ignoring that offering, the girl marched wordlessly from the room, setting a path like the queen herself.