Eight for Losing, One for Loving (Wicked Sons #9)

Chapter 1

Leo

I’m getting married. To a vicar’s daughter, if you can believe that. I am undoubtedly a lucky dog, and so you shall see if you can bestir yourself all the way to such a heathenish place as Scotland.

I shan’t expect to see you but figured you might like to know you’re invited.

―Excerpt of a letter from The Hon’ble Hamilton Anderson (son of The right Hon’ble Gordon and Ruth Anderson, The Earl and Countess of Morven) to Mr Leo Hunt (son of Mr Nathanial and Mrs Alice Hunt).

21 st June 1850, Albany, Piccadilly, London.

Violetta stared out of the parlour window that faced onto the street and scanned the road in both directions. So far, so good. The embroidery in her lap lay untouched. Her adopted mama, Lady Trevick, had gone to see Lord Trevick off on a visit to his club, so there was no need for pretending she was doing anything but keeping a lookout. She only hoped her mama had since gone upstairs for a little nap to gather her energy for the ball tonight. Not that Mama seemed ever to have anything less than boundless energy. Unlike Vi. Of late, she’d felt lethargic and out of spirits and Leo blasted Hunt was not helping matters.

She gave an anxious look up and down the street, tentatively hoping that he would not come today. He’d come three times every week for the last three months, however, and today was Friday, so…

Vi started as she glimpsed sunlight glinting on hair the colour of ripe barley. Heads turned as the fashionable tilbury drawn by a beautiful grey horse trotted smartly past. Two young ladies on the pavement almost walked headlong into a lamppost as they stared. She couldn’t blame them. God—or more likely the devil—had excelled himself when he created Leo Hunt. Blond and blue-eyed, he had the looks of angel combined with the body of an athlete, and a smile that could make females from toddlers to aged dowagers giggle like complete ninnies.

Giving an exclamation of frustration, Vi shot to her feet, letting her embroidery fall to the floor and disregarding it as she hurried out of the room.

“Button!” she shouted, startling their poor butler so thoroughly he almost leap from his skin.

“Miss Spencer?” he said, gazing at her as though he expected an announcement of a flood or a plague of locusts at the very least. A smart rap on the front door had him looking away from her and Vi cried out desperately.

“Don’t answer it!” she said, though she knew at once that was entirely ridiculous. The knocker was up, and everyone knew they were in town. “That is to say… I am not at home,” she added, putting up her chin and trying belatedly for dignity.

The butler sighed. “Mr Hunt is a… a rather forceful young man, Miss Spencer,” he said hesitantly.

“He is a thorn in my side, Button, a stone in my shoe. I. Am. Not . At. Home.”

“Very good, miss,” Button said gloomily, squaring his shoulders as he headed for the door.

Vi scurried back to the parlour and closed the door, and then opened it an inch and peered out, knowing she had completely lost her mind. This, then, was what the dreadful man had reduced her to.

She could not see the door from here, but she could eavesdrop on the conversation at least.

“Good afternoon, Button, how do?” Leo’s cheerfully irreverent voice reached her, making her idiotic heart give a little leap in her chest. “You’re looking fine as fivepence, old man. New cravat?”

“No, Mr Hunt.”

“You’ve cut your hair, then?”

“No, Mr Hunt.”

There was the sound of fingers snapping. “I’ve got it, you’ve found a new recipe for shoe polish. I can see my face in those. Must give me the recipe.”

“Certainly, Mr Hunt. I’m afraid Miss Spencer is—”

“Well, don’t keep me on the doorstep, Button. Vi’s expecting me. Is she ready?”

“No, Mr Hunt, I was just about to explain that Miss—”

“Don’t worry about showing me in, I know the way.”

Vi gave a squeak of alarm and leapt away from the door, hurrying to stand by the fireplace and trying her best to adopt her best ice maiden demeanour.

“But Mr Hunt, Miss Spencer is not at home today,” Button said frantically, just as Leo pushed the door open. Leo grinned at Vi and then turned to the beleaguered Button. “Sorry to contradict you, old man, but she’s right there. Plain as a pikestaff, I should say, though a good deal prettier.”

“Miss Spencer,” Button exclaimed in despair.

Vi let out a sigh of resignation. “Never mind, Button. Not your fault. He’s dreadful and there’s nothing either of us can do about it.” Button glanced between them and fled before things got difficult, as they generally did when the two of them were in the same room.

“Oh, come now, Vi,” Leo said, shaking his head at her. “I’ve been positively angelic for months now and all you do is tell poor Button you’re not at home. I’ve called three times a week for months and have successfully escorted you out on precisely four occasions.”

“You took tea on five others,” she pointed out.

“Only because Lady Trevick was here and wouldn’t let you throw me out.”

“One would think under those circumstances that you would give up and go away,” she replied tartly, turning to the mirror over the mantelpiece and studying her hair with more interest than she was feeling.

“Faint heart, Vi,” he said, meeting her eyes in the mirror and returning a rueful smile. “Come on, love. It’s a beautiful day. Come for a turn about the park with me. We won’t be gone above an hour. You can stand me for that long, can’t you?”

“Oh, Leo, why are you doing this?” Vi demanded impatiently, turning back to face him. “I wish I knew.”

Leo shrugged. “I think I’ve made that obvious enough, Vi. I can’t help it if you don’t believe I’m sincere.”

“Really?” she said sceptically. “When you’ve never been sincere about anything in your life before?”

“Harsh, Vi,” he said, frowning over her words. “I was a young man with money and the good fortune to know how to enjoy it. But I’ve grown up. I know what’s important and—”

“Leo!”

Vi groaned inwardly as her mama came into the room. She was still a lovely woman with a naughty twinkle in her eye and never failed to say things that made Vi blush. She adored the woman, though, who had taken her in when her own parents had tragically died and loved her like her own daughter, and with such generosity of spirit that Vi could never say no to her. Sadly, her mama adored Leo and was determined they were a match made in heaven.

“Kitty, you wicked creature. What have you been up to now?” Leo asked her, hugging her as if she were his own mama.

“Why, what can you be meaning?” Kitty said with a laugh, patting his cheek fondly, her Irish accent giving the playful words a lovely lilt.

“You look divine, love, which tells me you’ve been up to no good. You don’t sparkle like that unless you’ve been naughty,” Leo told her, setting Kitty off into whoops as he always did.

“Well, you are perfectly right, of course,” she said confidentially. “But I can’t breathe a word.”

“Of course you can’t,” Leo said with a grin. “I’ve come to take Vi for a turn about the park, but she won’t come,” he told Kitty with a sigh.

“I never said I wouldn’t come,” Vi said in a rush, which was blatantly untrue, but she did not want Mama to scold her for her rudeness.

Leo lifted an eyebrow, and she blushed a little.

“Well, of course she will go! Vi, hurry along and get ready. I shall talk to Leo in the meantime, but where is Mau?” Kitty asked, looking about the room for the huge cat that Leo took everywhere with him. He had caused rather a stir during his last visit, frightening Mama’s ancient spaniel, who had barked wildly until a footman came and rescued her from the corner under the stairs that Mau had stalked her into. The footman, a new fellow by the name of Pembury, had been badly scratched for his trouble. She did not think he had forgiven Mau for it either, or Leo, judging on the icy glare he’d given on his next visit.

“He’s sleep on the seat of the tilbury, the lazy creature,” he said, smirking as Vi shot him a look of pure exasperation and hurried out.

Resigned to her fate, Vi made quick work of changing her gown and readying herself for a drive. She may as well get it over with, she told herself. Yet she could not deny the little thrill of anticipation as she made her way back down the stairs. Leo was a marvellous whip and much admired. He was, in fact, one of the few people she found she could relax with. Her parents had died in a terrible carriage accident and if the driver did not pay complete attention, she found herself increasingly afraid, twitching with the desire to take the reins herself. Driving with Leo was different. He might risk his own neck, but with her he drove with the utmost precision, aware of her anxiety. With him she could relax and driving out became a pleasure. Too much of a pleasure. It would be so easy to let herself believe he was in earnest, that he really wished to marry her, but it would be a terrible thing to allow herself to hope for something which she had always known was out of her reach.

“Well, here I am,” she said curtly, pulling on her gloves as she walked back into the parlour.

“So you are,” Leo said, his gaze running over her in a way that made her skin feel hot and most peculiar. “That’s a lovely outfit, pet. Most becoming.”

“Thank you. Shall we go?” she replied, refusing to allow his words to please her, for he said such things all the time and such flattery came far too easily to his lips.

“Yes, do run along and have a lovely time,” Kitty urged them.

Leo got to his feet and then frowned. Vi followed his gaze and cursed inwardly as she saw her embroidery still in a heap by the window. Leo strode over and picked it up, smoothing out the fabric and deftly putting the needle through it to keep it safe. He walked back to the settee and placed it on the coffee table before following Vi out of the house to his waiting carriage.

“Anyone would think you’d been watching for me,” he murmured as he helped her up into the tilbury.

Vi ignored the comment and refused to look at him, fighting a blush.

“There’s someone in my seat,” she said, gazing down at Mau, who blinked sleepily up at her.

He was an enormous creature, far bigger than most cats, and solidly built. A handsome fellow, his torn ear did little to detract from his rather aristocratic profile and sleek coat of brown and black. Leo had become something of an eccentric figure among the ton , but everyone had grown used to him taking Mau almost everywhere with him.

“Mau, up you get lazy bones. Let the lady sit down,” Leo said, shaking his head as the cat got up and stretched, stalking across the seat and pushing his head against Leo’s. “Thank you,” Leo told him. Once Vi had sat down, he got up beside her and Mau lay across both their laps, making himself comfortable. Vi laughed despite herself, stroking the cat’s silky head.

“You are as dreadful as he is,” she told Mau frankly, but he simply began purring, a deep, sonorous sound that vibrated through her.

“Let him go,” Leo instructed his tiger, who had been holding the sleek gelding’s head. The man ran around and leapt onto the back of the tilbury as they moved off. Happily, the hood of the tilbury and the sound of the wheels on the road gave them privacy, and he did not overlook them. Vi watched with pleasure as his beautiful grey trotted in tandem, taking them down the road and into the busy city traffic.

They didn’t speak until they had reached Hyde Park, for the roads were overburdened with carts and carriages and people and Vi did not wish to distract Leo from his horse. He drove to an inch and Vi relaxed, knowing she was in the safest of hands. She turned her face to the sun, enjoying the warm breeze as he found a faster moving flow of traffic and gave the horse leave to move faster. They fast trotted along, moving beautifully, and she wished there were no traffic so he could let them go, for though she did not enjoy riding, she was not afraid of speed in Leo’s capable hands, and secretly rather delighted in the opportunity to go fast. Back at Trevick Castle, she had her own little gig and pony and often galloped along the paths when no one was about to see her. To experience any of Leo’s fine horses do such a thing, however, that would be quite something.

Once inside the park, Leo let the horse walk and turned his attention to Vi.

“That’s a charming bonnet,” he said appreciatively.

Vi let out a sigh of frustration. “Why are we doing this? Why aren’t you here with Miss Fellowes or Miss Saunders? They’re much more in your line.”

“Are they?” Leo replied with apparent interest. “How so?”

“They’re very beautiful, for one thing. They come from good families, but not so good they would frown on a connection with Hunters—”

“Ah, yes, mustn’t forget Papa’s dreadful gambling den, or The Sons of Hades,” he said, naming the club he part owned with his friends. “Quite shocking.”

Vi rolled her eyes and carried on. “They are nice, intelligent girls, and they are young,” she added, savagely repressing the stab of regret that hit her square in the chest.

“You mean, they’re not an old maid like you are?” he said with interest.

Vi stiffened. She knew very well that was what she was, but she had not expected him to tell her so. “Indeed,” she said coolly. “I’ve been on the shelf so long I’m gathering dust. It only astonishes me you’ve failed to notice until this moment.”

Leo snorted and shook his head. “Vi, you accuse me of being dreadful, but you’re a wicked creature.”

“Me?” she exclaimed, turning to stare at him in outrage.

“Yes, you,” he said, though there was amusement in his voice. “You know very well I do not think you are an old maid. Only you think that, so don’t keep on. You’re just fishing for compliments and then you’ll scold me and accuse me of turning you up sweet if I voice them.”

“I am an old maid,” Vi said stubbornly. “And I do not want your compliments or flattery when there’s no substance to them.”

“No substance!” Leo said, and Vi’s heart skipped at the obvious anger in his voice. “Why must you insist on believing me to be a frivolous boy? I’m no boy, Violetta. I’m a man who knows his own mind. I’m courting you with the intention of making you my wife.”

“You’re mad,” she said flatly, crossing her arms as if that might stop her heart from escaping her ribcage, for it was beating far too hard and too fast. “We’d kill each other before the honeymoon was over.”

“But what a way to go,” Leo remarked.

Vi slanted a glance at him, seeing a mixture of irritation and devilry in his blue eyes that made her feel rather nervous.

“Out of the two, I think Miss Saunders would suit you best,” she continued, as if the conversation had not been diverted at all. “She’s a delightful girl, friendly but not bold, and she has a lively sense of humour. She loves animals too,” she added, stroking Mau’s head and feeling rather wistful that such a girl might have both these ridiculous creatures in her life.

“I see,” Leo said, as he took them past the Serpentine, which sparkled invitingly in the sunshine. There were boats out on the water and many people taking advantage of the lovely summer day. “Will she be at the ball tonight?”

“I expect so,” Vi said cautiously.

“Very well. I shall dance with her and see what I think.”

“Good,” Vi replied, though there was a leaden feeling in her chest that made her feel every bit the old maid she told herself she was.

“Good,” Leo agreed, and they trotted on in silence.

Leo gritted his teeth and counted. It was something he’d had to do remarkably often over the past few months and, not for the first time, he wondered why he was bothering. Once the surge of annoyance had diminished a little, he glanced sideways at the impossible girl by his side. She was a girl too, he thought as his irritation vanished at the sight of her. No matter her insistence that she was too old and on the shelf, she looked no more than two and twenty. Her skin was the finest porcelain, her eyes a pale crystalline blue that never failed to capture his attention. Lord, but she was beautiful. He’d always known it, but in an abstract fashion, like the fine painting that you saw every day and knew was lovely but did not stop to appreciate. But one day he had stopped, and he had appreciated, and he had cursed himself for a fool at having wasted so much time.

Mau shifted on his lap, digging his claws in, and Leo winced. He glanced at the cat whose head was pillowed in Vi’s lap—lucky devil—and large yellow eyes regarded him with something that looked like pity. Leo sighed inwardly. He felt like he was running out of time with Vi. Not because she was too old—curse her for getting that idiotic thought in her head—but because she would bolt, eventually, and keep him away from her with whatever means she could manage. He knew he was on thin ice. If he put a foot wrong, she’d use it as an excuse never to see him again. Not that he intended to put a foot wrong, but his life had always been adventurous, one where he took chances and went where the wind took him rather than following any plan. Having made a plan to court Vi and win her heart, he was finding it harder than he imagined to stick to it.

At this moment, for example, instead of taking her for a sedate little jaunt about Hyde Park, he wanted to whisk her away to a hidden corner of London she would never have seen in her life before. He wanted to show her shops that sold wonderful silks from India in the most marvellous patterns and colours; he wanted to take her to the river and get her to try jellied eels and show her a dozen other things that would shock and delight her, but you couldn’t do that with a proper young lady.

If only he had nine lives like a cat, perhaps then he’d be able to figure out how to get it right before his luck ran out.

He’d used one up this morning, he knew. What a fool, for he should never have said he’d dance with Miss Saunders. He’d wanted to bite his tongue off the moment the words had left his mouth, but Vi made him do and say things he’d had no intention of doing or saying just seconds earlier. It was true they drove each other distracted, just as she said they did, but in a good way—or at least Leo thought so. He loved her sharp wit and the way she challenged him, and never tired of crossing swords with her, but he wished she would soften towards him, just a little. He felt certain she cared for him. He had seen fleeting evidence of it: a glance in his direction when she’d thought he wasn’t looking, a smile of such warmth when he'd finally done something she approved of, and… and a million tiny things between two people who had known each other their entire lives that could mean everything or nothing.

“Would you like to go to Gunter’s? I’ll buy you an ice,” he offered, knowing that Vi adored sweet things, especially strawberry ice cream.

He watched her face, amused despite himself as he saw her wage an internal battle between getting out of his company as quickly as possible and her favourite treat.

“Very well,” she said grudgingly.

Leo let out a sigh of relief. He’s not been sure even ice cream was enough to keep her beside him for a minute longer.

“I won’t dance with Miss Saunders,” he told her, wondering if he was being a fool for trying so hard and finding he didn’t care if he was.

If he hadn’t been looking at her as he said the words, he knew he would have missed the look of sheer relief that flickered in her eyes, there and gone in an instant, but not before he’d noticed. Relief flooded him too. She hadn’t wanted him to dance with Miss Saunders; she didn’t want him to give up on her. Vi had her own battle to fight, one that must allow her to believe that Leo could love her and her alone for her own sake, and not for any foolish reason she’d convinced herself of. For that, though, she needed time. She needed to see that he could be sensible and well-behaved, and Leo was going to give her that if it killed him.