No Good Duke Goes Unpunished (The Rules of Scoundrels #3)(85)

Outside of his embrace.

He wanted her home. Safe. Far from this place, and these villains. He wanted to be with her. He paused in the process of fastening the fall of a fresh pair of trousers, the thought throwing him.

He wanted to be with her in his home.

Not in his cluttered office, on his inferior, makeshift bed. At his town house. Where he’d never taken a woman. Where he rarely was in residence. Where the demons never ceased to threaten.

Pippa wouldn’t stand for demons.

One side of his mouth kicked up at the thought. Pippa would exorcise every one of his demons with her logical mind and her incessant questions and her impossibly sure touch. A touch he found himself rather desperate to experience once more.

He wanted her to touch him everywhere. He wanted to touch her everywhere. He wanted to explore her, and hold her, and kiss her and make her his in every imaginable way.

She wanted to understand lust? He could show it to her. There was time. She had six days before she married Castleton.

Not enough time.

Something tightened in his chest at the thought.

She was going to marry Castleton.

He sat to pull on his boots with vicious force.

I shall do it because I have agreed to, and I do not care for dishonesty.

Goddammit. She was engaged to the ordinary, uninspiring, idiot man.

Not so much an idiot now. He’d proposed to Pippa, after all. Snatched her up while the rest of England was looking the other way.

But she had come apart in Cross’s arms. Against his mouth. Did that account for nothing?

There was nothing he could do. Not to stop it. She deserved her perfect wedding with her handsome—if simpleminded—earl. She deserved a man without demons. A man who would give her a home. Horses. Hounds. Family.

Those children flashed again, the little blond row of them, each wearing a little pair of spectacles, each smiling up at their mother. At him.

He pushed the vision aside and stood, straightening his jacket.

Impossible.

Philippa Marbury was not for him. Not in the long run. He could give her everything for which she asked now . . . he could teach her about her body and her desires and her needs . . . prepare her to ask for what she wanted.

To ask her husband.

He swallowed back a curse.

Six days would be enough.

He ripped open the door of his office, nearly pulling it from the hinges, and headed for the library of The Fallen Angel, where Knight waited for him. Dismissing the guard at the door, Cross took a deep breath and entered, regaining his control. Focusing on the task at hand.

Knight was livid. A muscle in his jaw twitched as he turned toward the door, hatred in his ice blue gaze.

Cross took pleasure that, tonight, at least this had gone well—at least this was in his control. A thread of uncertainty tainted victory, however; Knight had not come alone.

A young woman sat primly in one of the high-backed chairs at the center of the room, hands folded in her green woolen skirts, eyes cast downward, as though she could will herself invisible. She was pretty enough—pale skin, tight black curls, and a little red mouth that curved up in a bow even though she looked nothing close to happy.

Indeed, it was her misery that established her identity.

Letting the door to the room close behind him, Cross looked to Knight, meeting his nemesis’s icy blue gaze. “Not very fatherly of you . . . touring your daughter about London’s better hells in the middle of the night.”

Knight did not respond to the insult, instead turning away from the sideboard where he stood, ignoring the girl entirely. “You think you’ve won? With one night?”

Cross folded himself into another large chair, extending his long legs and doing his best to look bored. He wanted this confrontation over and done with. He returned his gaze to Knight. “I know I have won. Your fifty largest players are right now losing at my tables. And with a word, I can keep them there, playing forever.”

Knight gritted his teeth. “You don’t want them. They’re too base for your precious club. The others will never allow the likes of those scoundrels on the books at the Angel.”

“The others will do what I choose. Your sorry lot is a sacrifice we will make to ensure that you understand your place. You are a product of our benevolence, Digger. You exist because we have not seen fit to take you down. Yet. It is time you realize that our club is more than yours will ever be. It is time you realize our power extends farther than yours ever could. Knight’s exists solely and completely because of my goodwill. If I want you destroyed, I can do it. And I will not be tested.”

Knight narrowed his gaze on him. “You’ve always liked to think of me as the enemy.”

Cross did not waver. “There’s no thinking about it.”

“There was a time when I was the closest thing you had to a friend.”

“I don’t recall it that way.”

Knight shrugged, uninterested in rehashing the past. “Have you forgotten Lavinia’s debt? She still owes me. One way or another.”

The sound of his sister’s name on Knight’s lips made Cross want to hit something, but he remained still. “I will pay the debt. You will refuse entry to Dunblade. Forever. And you will leave my sister alone. Also forever.”

Knight’s black brows rose, and he lifted his silver-tipped cane from the floor to inspect the finely wrought handle. “Or what?”