Free The Gilded Scarab by Anna Butler

concluded this silent telegraphic speech and were smiling at each other, “that regretfully I can’t stay the night. I’m leaving Londinium tomorrow for a while, and I’ll have to go at around two.”
    Damn! Well that was a disappointment on two levels, both the immediate and for developing the acquaintance if our encounter proved enjoyable. Which I hoped it would.
    Edward made another little grimace. “I’m sorry, Rafe. I should have mentioned it earlier and given you the opportunity to find a companion whose time is not so constrained. It’s still early, if that will prove a problem for you.”
    “No. No, it won’t. I don’t deny I’d hoped for more, but I’m glad of your company so long as you are here.” After all, Margrethe’s lounges would still be busy when Fairfax had to leave, if I decided to try and make the acquaintance of anyone else. I pulled my watch from its pocket in my waistcoat. “It’s barely ten. We have four hours. I suggest we make the most of them.”
    Again Fairfax’s mouth did that very kissable little twitch. “Very direct of you.” He got to his feet and dropped his napkin on the table, along with a gold sovereign for the waiter.
    I joined him, hooking my arm through his as we strolled toward the lobby. The dining room was crowded now. More than one couple glanced up at us as we passed. Their expressions were appreciative, but they were focused mostly on each other and the glances were fleeting. The dark man from the Praecipias Lounge sat, still alone, at a table near the door. He looked more closely at us as we went past. Not at Fairfax much, though, after one hard glance, but at me. Odd. He did look a little familiar. Perhaps someone I’d met at Margrethe’s or one of the cheaper molly houses the last time I had been home. And odd, too, he hadn’t picked up someone. Margrethe’s was an expensive place if all a man wanted to do was eat and drink.
    Charles the concierge offered us Room 12 and assured us we’d find every convenience there. Edward took the room for the night and had the costs put on his account.
    “No, I insist, Rafe,” he said. “It’s the least I can do for curtailing the evening. You needn’t hurry away tonight because I must.”
    I made some token protest, but truth be told, it was a weight off my mind. I could pay my way, of course, but it would leave finances tight for the rest of the month. It was kind of Edward. Considerate. In return, I paid for dinner. We climbed the stairs in a mood of mutual esteem, I think, at each other’s generosity.
    The room was dimly lit and very richly furnished, all polished mahogany and dark green velvet. The curtains closed out the night, and a fire made merry in the polished steel grate, the firelight glancing off shining wood and glass. The bed was ready, the counterpane already turned down to show the clean linen sheets, and an array of scented oils in cut-glass bottles stood on a small cabinet at the head. Very inviting. Very hedonistic. I could take to the sybaritic life with gusto, really, given half an opportunity.
    But Edward appeared strangely hesitant, now that we were at the point of no return. Or almost there, anyway. He stood near the fireplace, resting one arm along the mantelpiece, staring down into the fire. His other hand was fisted into his trouser pocket. He looked defensive. He didn’t look at me.
    “Edward?”
    He drew a breath so shaky I heard it from where I stood beside the bed. And another. He turned his head toward me at last, and the firelight sprang up to light the side of his face, limning his cheekbone in red-gold, sliding its way across the side of his neck and pooling shadows in the hollow of his throat, slipping more shadows under his cheekbones and edging the line of his jaw.
    The firelight loved Edward Fairfax, breathed living gold into him.
    The breath caught in my throat. He was beautiful in this light. Very beautiful.
    “I said I’d been away a long time, just as you had,”