Page 15 of Seduced

Cerberus usually loved this, rubbing his orange little snout against the leather of Alexei’s boot, but right now he was ignoring the gesture in favor of the boy’s wet pantaloons.

“Leave him be!” A small, shrill-sounding voice interrupted him, and Alexei turned around to behold the lad turned chalk-white and shaking violently. “He belongs to me now,” the boy said in his annoying little voice. “I saved ’im, didn’t I? Well, he’s mine now.”

“No, you did not. And he is not.” Alexei snapped, feeling bone-tired. “If you had been left to your own devices, you would be at the bottom of the Thames right now.” A shiver shook his spine. “I saved you both. Calm yourself, will you, for heaven’s sake, I won’t harm the cat. Or you,” he added as an afterthought.

What a little actor the boy was.

I should have let the river take him.

The boy lifted his eyes to Alexei’s face. They were strangely brilliant under the flickering lamp’s light, and Alexei couldn’t shake the strange sensation that he was being examined. He couldn’t look away either.

“I’ll not let ye hurt him,” the youth said, his pale lips wobbling. “I am taking him home with me, Your Worship, and don’t you dare touch him!”

Alexei had to fight the increasing urge to throw the boy to the Thames himself. It might wipe the stupid, frightened expression from his heart-shaped face; then again, the expression looked quite permanent. It might not. But the terrified expression had to go, one way or another. It made Alexei’s insides turn.

“You are going nowhere,” Alexei said, “except with me, you little cheat.”

“I am not a cheat!” the boy practically yelled.

“I was watching you,” Alexei retorted, “all night tonight at the club, and last night as well. You have been taught by a gambler. A gambler and a scoundrel, I’ll bet my fortune on it.” The boy trembled. Alexei guessed it had been the lad’s father who had taught him; that was usually the way.

But what was the reason the young man was gambling alone, in disguise, with his father nowhere to be seen? It was bound to be a sad, sordid story. And also, Alexei couldn’t care less.

“You are an expert cheat,” he went on, “I’ll give you that: It takes one to know one.”

“I have not cheated in me whole life,” the boy blubbered, but Alexei lifted a hand to stop him.

“Please,” he said. “Do not insult both our intelligences, my own superior one and your limited one.” The boy looked scared. Good. “You are a cheat, but no better than me. Not to mention that you were spying on me. Therefore, you are now my prisoner.”

The boy started to reply, something nonsensical undoubtedly, but was interrupted by a cough that made him double in two and left him reeling, barely able to stay upright.

Alexei feared that he would be forced to grasp his elbow to keep him from keeling over.

Let’s hope it won’t come to that.

“That’s it,” Alexei said, disgusted. “I’m calling a hackney.”

five

Poppy

Being nearly drowned had not been the worst part of her night: the Slavic prince had shown up, Hades himself, to pullher from the water, a minute before she was plunged in it. But she had been frightened badly, both for herself and the cat, and had nearly exposed her gender, not to mention her name.

Why did these things always happen to her?

The fallen angel called a hackney, and they got in. It didn’t occur to her to object or ask where they were going. She kept her arms firmly wrapped around the cat, and fell to pondering the myriad of sins she had committed in the space of a single night.

She had put on a man’s clothes.

She had snuck out of the house.

She had walked alone, unchaperoned, at night.

She had gambled.

She had cursed—often and colorfully.

She had grown angry, disobedient, defiant…She had felt all the emotions, really. All of them. It would be exhausting to list them all, but she had to, she had to prepare.

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