The Hellion (Wicked Wallflowers #1)(26)

A half laugh, half snort filtered from her lips. Without hesitation, she joined him at the cluttered desk. He’d been so damned busy overseeing the construction and this one here that he’d really neglected his makeshift office.

“You really should tidy your space, Adair,” Cleopatra said, unerringly following his very thoughts.

“Shut it, Killoran,” he said without inflection. “Or don’t you want to see my hell?”

She wrinkled her pert nose. “I want to see it,” she conceded.

He stretched out the plans before them, laying the long sheet out for her viewing. Adair cast a sideways glance over and found her squinting hard. Quitting the place beside her, he crossed over to the nearest sconce. Carefully lifting the candle, he carried it about the room, setting the other candles alight, until the room was doused in light. Feeling Cleopatra’s eyes on him, he looked over.

The glowing candles played off the surprise in her eyes. “Do you think me so much a bastard that I’d have you squint to see the damned plans?” he asked gruffly.

“Yes,” she said softly. “I did believe that.”

Blowing out the one in his hand, he rejoined Cleopatra. “My family is not evil.” Unlike hers, who’d been loyal to the Devil. Just like that, he shattered the easy camaraderie, and a formal relationship between them was restored.

Angling her body away from his, Cleopatra examined the finalized plans for the renovated Hell and Sin. As she leaned forward, scraping her gaze over every portion of the page, the implications of what he’d given her access to registered. His brothers would kill him—and with good reason—were they to see him with Cleopatra even now. It didn’t matter that when the hell opened, there would be men of Killoran who infiltrated and reported back. His stomach queasy, he made to grab the page.

“This is all wrong,” she said, moving her finger up and down the hazard and faro tables stationed along the right portion of the club.

“Beg pardon?” he blurted, her observation instantly staying his hand on the sheet.

“You have your private tables set up here.” She drifted the tip of her index finger to the area in question.

Do not engage her . . . you’ve already shared enough with a Killoran. “And?” The question came as though pulled from him. For the truth was, he’d made enough sacrifices in his life that he wasn’t too proud to take advice proffered.

“Pfft.” The bold minx lifted her gaze from the designs and arched an eyebrow over the rim of her spectacles. “And?” she asked, and had her tones been mocking, it would have been far more palatable than the painful emphasis there. “You have your gaming tables separate. That means they have to walk”—she jabbed the page as she spoke—“one, two, three, four, five, six . . . twenty paces before they get from their private tables here”—Cleopatra swiveled her judgmental finger to each point in question—“to here.”

As they had for years. “Noblemen prefer to have a place to converse with peers over drinks, separate than where they play.”

“Of course they prefer it. A fancy toff doesn’t know what he wants by way of seedy lifestyles.” Cleopatra gave another skyward point of her eyes. “It doesn’t matter what they want or prefer. It matters what you get out of them. They’re too accustomed to their fancy clubs.” She paused and searched about, muttering incoherently to herself. “Ah.” Killoran’s sister grabbed a charcoal pencil. Over his sounds of protest, she etched small Xs upon the plans, marking the sheets. Adair lowered his hands on the table and leaned closer to assess her work. The scent of her—a hint of apple and strawberries—filled his senses, and he took it in, breathing deep.

“You paying attention, Thorne?” she snapped, glancing up.

Heat slapped his cheeks, and for the first time in the whole of his damned life . . . he was . . . blushing. “I am.” A liar.

“Look here.” She refocused all her attention upon the desk.

All the while I stand here sniffing her like a damned rose pushed into my hand by a London peddler, he thought, disgusted with himself.

“You place drinking tables here. One here, and here,” she continued, writing on the page. “All through it, interspersed with your gaming tables. This way your patrons are drinking all evening, and the wagering is always a step away.” Her spectacles slipped, and she paused to push them back into place.

Adair dusted a hand over his jaw, contemplating both her opinion and the markings she’d made. “Many lords come to discuss business.”

“Then you give them a place for that,” she said before he’d even finished. “Apart from your main floors. You don’t let the handful of ones there for nondrinking, whoring, and wagering drive the whole club.” She wrinkled her nose. “I forgot. You don’t have whores.”

Since Ryker Black had wedded a lady and had ultimately made the decision that they’d no longer offer the services of prostitutes for their clients, their profits had taken a blow. For Adair’s appeals to his brothers, they’d been adamant to continue on without those services offered. “You think it’s foolish,” he predicted.

“My brother does,” she automatically answered.

Interesting. “And you?”

The young woman paused. He shot her a side glance. Cleopatra chewed at the tip of her finger, and indecision raged in her eyes. Again, it occurred to him . . . for Cleopatra Killoran’s bold displays and unwavering confidence, there was still a vulnerability to her. It was far too easy to forget that the snarling, hissing hellion was, in fact, a young woman. Perhaps that was why he even now spoke in depth and at length with Killoran’s sister about the Hell and Sin. What else accounted for trusting her in this way?