The Duke is Wicked (League of Lords #3) - Tracy Sumner Page 0,39

hip and into the corner pocket. If he didn’t do something with his hands, they were going to be all over her. “It’s a sport I could trounce you at, much like I could billiards, I believe. And chess, I know after watching Simon make quick work of you. Not going to win any wagers at White’s with that level of play.”

“Simon cheated,” she answered hotly. “I swear he moved a pawn while I wasn’t looking, or maybe while I was. He has swift hands, that boy. A pickpocket, wasn’t he?”

Sebastian took a shot, banked the ball but missed the pocket. Her teasing snort followed just behind, thrilling him when it shouldn’t. “He used to be the sharpest cutpurse in London, in the vilest district. Amazing he didn’t get killed before Julian spirited him out of there at all of eight years of age.” Sebastian looked up from the table to find her gaze fixed on him, as tangible as her stroking her finger along his skin. “You don’t care, do you? That Finn and Simon bring none of the elements society finds necessary to the party?”

Conversely, did she care that he brought more than necessary?

She grasped a ball and flipped it between her hands. The seven, if he wasn’t mistaken. “Silly, isn’t it? This lord business. A man thinking he’s better for being born to a man born to a man who didn’t do much of anything but please a king.”

Sebastian chalked his cue, then propped the stick on the floor, turning to rest upon it. “Is it true your attic resembles a library at Oxford?”

Her grin was immediate, her eyes sparkling with delight, scuffed boots bumping against the table in her jaunty rhythm. He grasped the cue until his knuckles whitened, unable to look away from the daringly attractive picture she presented. “Keble College. When my attic used to look like this natty library in Charleston because that’s all I knew. I’ve only seen photographs, because Keble’s for student use, but it houses a world-renowned collection of illuminated medieval manuscripts. Which, to use one of your words, I fancy. They have stained glass windows that I worked into my vision, but it’s such a small space and with all the books…” Her lips tightened, her words fading. She threw a mutinous glare his way, realizing she’d said more than planned.

Score one for gin, Sebastian determined, his smile growing. Levering off the cue stick, he pointed it at her. “This is progress when I didn’t expect to accomplish anything without beating you blindly at a sport of your choosing. But here we are, with you admitting to having an attic full of texts in your mind. One you’re able to control the look of. We’re finally getting somewhere. If you’d only tell me what you know about the chronology and your extortionist, that would be brilliant. We could then, truly, get to work.”

“Are you trying to trick me?” She spun a ball away from her, bouncing it off the side of the table with a thunk.

He lined up another shot, tilted his head and tapped the cue against the ball with too much force, nipping the top instead of the center. “No, Temple, I’m trying to recruit you.”

She drummed her fingers on her knee. “To this League of yours?”

“It’s Julian’s, but yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re gifted. And alone.” He braced his knuckles on the baize and leaned in, imploring her to meet his gaze, to fight it out with him, if that’s what gaining her trust required. “Your brother can’t help you, can’t possibly understand what being different is like. Not a supernatural different. He may want to, he may even think he can, but we know better, don’t we?”

She dipped her head, but he caught the tear tracking her cheek, dropping from her jaw to bleed into her silken bodice. A knot of longing, affection and sympathy twisted inside him, followed by a flood of anguish. Before he understood what he was about, he’d dropped the cue and was standing before her, his hands going to cradle her face, lifting her shining eyes to his.

Never had he been more taken by someone, with someone. Wanting to dash every pulse of sorrow from their heart. Wanting to protect, when he didn’t, as yet, trust.

“I haven’t kissed a woman, Temple, laid one greedy finger on anyone, in months. My mind wasn’t suited for a relationship, what with the opium and the dreams, even one lasting only a night. A stolen hour more