“I suppose you require some token of my thanks.”
His gaze narrowed. “Stop.”
The word threaded through her, making her more nervous than she had been when caught up in the Baron Pottle’s arms. She did not know what to say. How to respond.
Reaching for her hand, he took control of the moment. As he had since he’d appeared only minutes earlier. She looked at the extended arm for a long moment, deliberately canting one hip and biting a red lip for their audience.
But Duncan West cared not a bit about their audience. He grasped her hand and pulled her away, into a curtained-off alcove, made for darkness and promise. Inside, he turned her to face into the light of the single candle mounted on the wall and then released her. The candles were designed to keep the space dim and seductive. To force any couple who found themselves inside to approach each other and have a closer look.
Right now, Georgiana hated that candle. It felt bright as the sun with its threat of revelation.
What if he saw the truth?
She resisted the thought. She’d lived as Georgiana, sister of a duke, daughter to one, exiled but periodically in town for years, shopping on Bond Street, walking in Hyde Park, visiting the London Museum. No one had ever noticed that she was the same woman who reigned over The Fallen Angel.
The aristocracy saw what they wished to see.
Everyone saw what he wished to see.
And cleverest newspaperman in Britain or no, Duncan West was no different.
She gave him her most wicked smile. “Now you have me here. What will you do with me?”
He shook his head, refusing the game. “You should not have been alone on the floor.”
Her brow furrowed. “I am alone on the floor every night.”
“You should not be,” he repeated. “And that Chase allows it does not speak well of him.”
She did not care for the anger in the tone. The censure. The emotion. Something had changed, and she could not divine precisely what. She met his gaze. “Had I not been summoned, sir, I would have had no reason to be accosted on the casino floor.”
Now the anger in his words was in his eyes. “It is my fault?”
She did not answer, instead saying, “Why call for me?”
He paused, and for a long moment, she thought he might not reply. Finally, he said, “I’ve a request for Chase.”
She hated the disappointment that flooded through her at the words. It wasn’t as though she should have expected him to ask for Anna for any other reason – but after their interaction the day before, she rather wished he had.
She wished he’d come with a request for her.
Which was ridiculous… in large part, because she was Chase, and therefore he had, technically, come with a request for her. But in slightly smaller part, because she had no skill whatsoever in answering men’s requests.
Unfortunately.
She did not like Chase’s name on his lips. He was a man who saw too much already. “Of course,” she said, feigning affability. “What would you like?”
“Tremley,” he said.
“What about him?”
“I want his secrets.”
Georgiana’s brow furrowed at the strange request. “Tremley is not a member. You know that.”
The Earl of Tremley was not a fool. He would never get into bed with The Fallen Angel – no matter how tempting the tables might be. He knew the price was too high.
The founders of the Angel had worked for years to establish the invitation to join the club as the most coveted offer in Britain – perhaps in Europe. Unlike other men’s clubs, there were no membership dues, and there was no allowance for vouching for friends or cohorts – members rarely knew why they were invited to the club, and they were encouraged not to discuss their membership. Few did, in part because of the high price of entry to the casino floor.
They were not willing to risk their secrets becoming public.
For years, Bourne, Cross, Temple, and Georgiana – masked as Anna and Chase – had been amassing secrets on London’s most powerful men and women, each piece of privileged, clandestine information given freely in exchange for membership in London’s darkest, most promising, most sinful gaming hell. There was nothing that the Angel could not give her members, and few requests that the owners of the casino would not accommodate.
That kind of luxury was worth unfathomable information, and information was the currency of power.
But the Earl of Tremley was too well connected to the crown to risk a connection to The Fallen Angel. “Try the clubs across the street,” she said, injecting her words with teasing. “White’s is more to the earl’s liking.”
He inclined his head. “That may be true, but I need Chase for what I’m asking.”
She was immediately intrigued. “What do you have on him?”
He raised a brow. “Does Chase have anything?”
The Angel had tried to hook the earl any number of times since King William ascended to the throne with Tremley at his right hand, but few were willing to talk about a man with so much political power. Was there something they’d missed?
If West was asking, there was. Without doubt. “There is no file on Tremley,” she said. It was the truth.
He did not believe her. She could see it in his eyes even here, in the dim light. “There will be when Chase invites the earl’s wife to the ladies’ side.”
She stilled at the words. “I don’t know what you are referring to.”