Page 8 of The Devil Himself
The other eyebrow flew up despite himself. “He said that to you.” Then he frowned. “You’re already married.”
Luc’s face went dark, his cheeks a dull red, his eyes flashing. “I thought you kept up with the peerage. Word at White’s is you know everything about everyone who bears a title in case you need to use it against them.”
“Yes, and?” He had deliberately avoided anyone connected to his family.
“And yet, you did not know my father had passed. And you did not know that my lady wife died only a few years into our marriage during childbirth. Thatdidmake the scandal sheets.” Luc tossed back the whisky.
He stared, his own cheeks heating now. “I deliberately avoid news of my family and their closest friends. I don’t wish to know.” The temptation to do bad things with any information he gleaned would have been too much.
Rys knew himself to be a scoundrel. And Luc was not, so what would he have been able to use against the man? At any rate, Luc had married almost a year after Rys had left home, if the timeline of the betrothal had held, and he’d been very busy staying alive on the streets.
“I am heartily sorry for it, Luc. Truly. I had not heard about Viola. I always liked her.”
“So did I.” Luc sighed, shoulders slumping, but the moment passed, and Luc carried on. “That is neither here nor there. I have no more interest in marrying now than I did then, and I have an heir. So I can sit back and enjoy my dotage. What concerns me is that if he married Hannah, his brother’s widow, and killed off Gareth, Daffyd would have both the entailment and the dower property that Hannah’s father negotiated to return to her in the event of Owen’s death.”
Rys mulled that over, surprised to find that he felt a flash of anger in his chest on young Gareth’s behalf. But he tamped it down. “Surely you don’t think Daffyd would kill Gareth.”
“I think he would. I think he killed Owen for what he knew he would never get otherwise, and now he has a taste for it.”
He sat back, glaring into his brandy glass. Damn. Put that way, it made a horrible kind of sense. But he still had no desire to become embroiled in his family’s mess. They’d had no help for him when he was in need. And he would have none for them now.
“So, in short, I need some assistance.”
“No.”
Luc had the temerity to roll his eyes. “I am not asking you to aid me in my investigation of the matter.”
“Good. That is best left to Bow Street.” It was foolish in the extreme to bait a murderer, if there was one in the family. Foolish and dangerous. Desperate men did desperate things.
“They determined that it was a footpad, which you and I both know it was not.”
He did know it. Despite his protestations to Luc, since their first meeting, Rys had gotten Harris to amass all the information he could about Owen’s death. It was no failed robbery.
But he only shrugged, watching Luc lounge against his desk as if he owned it.
And they called him the devil.
Luc blew out a breath, then dragged a hand through his golden hair. “What I need from you is someone trustworthy to watch over Gareth at school.”
“A guard?” This man was constantly surprising him, and after his years on the streets and five owning a hell, Rys had thought that impossible.
“Yes. To watch over him as he goes about when he’s not in class, and when he’s in his dormitory at night. It’s been done before, with children who have kidnapping threats against them. So while it will not go unremarked, it will be a good solution.”
Rys tilted his head. “And why would you come to me?”
“You have men who could take the job. Ones you trust. I’ve made inquiries. Your people are fiercely loyal. A hired runner or some other sort of guard might be bribable.” Luc finished off his brandy and set the glass aside, crossing his arms over his chest.
Waiting.
Rys contemplated his options. He should send this bastard on his way, but the request was reasonable enough, and while hehad met young Gareth only a handful of times as an infant and toddler, Rys knew all too well how little choice children had in the ways of their parents.
“Very well.”
Now it was Luc’s turn to raise his eyebrows, his surprise showing in his slack lips and the way his arms dropped so he could lean on the desktop. “You agree?”
“I do. Come see me two days hence, and I will introduce you to a man who will do the job nicely.” He paused, letting his gaze narrow. “But not here. At my club.” He could not abide someone invading his home again. He deserved his sanctuary.
“Very well.” Luc rose, walking to the chair where he had left his jacket and coat. “What time?”
