Free Devil’s Kiss by Zoe Archer Page B

the chamber. He paused in the hallway, and she saw him pick up her ring, then put the bauble into the pocket of his waistcoat before walking off.
    The room felt oddly empty without him in it. Of course it would, she reminded herself. The Whit who kept her here was her jailer. The dark magic of the Devil swirled around him like a cloak. She might not reach the uncorrupted man beneath that cloak, which meant she was alone, merely a Romani girl held against her will, far from home, far from her family and friends.
    With him gone, exhaustion filled her, weighting her limbs. Zora sank down to the plush carpet. Rest. She had to rest. The night had been long, filled with events she still could not fully comprehend. Had someone told her yesterday that she would come face-to-face with the Devil himself, that she would become the prisoner of a handsome, wealthy gorgio who was himself a prisoner of the Devil’s magic, she would have laughed and chided the person for telling stories too outrageous to believe.
    Now she knew differently.
    She rose up onto her knees when she heard the door open. Servants came trooping in, holding blankets, pillows, a chamber pot, a folding screen, a nightstand. Two footmen carried a narrow bed, but the quality of it was fine, the mattress thick. It hadn’t been taken from a servant’s room. As she watched, amazed, the large round card table was pushed to one side, and the servants began to set up everything as if the game room were, in fact, a bedchamber.
    “Why’d the master want this stuff in here?” a footman asked.
    A maid shrugged as she tucked sheets into the bed. “Gentry. Who knows why they does anything?”
    “It’s for me,” Zora said.
    “Is someone goin’ to sleep in here?”
    “Me,” Zora said again, getting to her feet. She scuttled aside as another footman came in bearing a tray covered with delicious-smelling food. The servant very nearly walked right over her, almost as if he hadn’t seen her standing right in front of him.
    “Your master is holding me prisoner,” she said. She turned to the maid, who shook out a blanket and laid it atop the bed. “Please help me.”
    The maid continued on in her work, paying Zora no mind.
    “Can’t any of you help me?” Zora spun to the footman with the tray of food. He set it atop the card table.
    “Don’t make no sense to me,” the footman muttered. “Make up a full breakfast with no one to eat it.”
    “I told you.” The maid adjusted the placement of the pillow. “He’s gentry. They get all sorts of odd notions in their heads. He wants the gaming room made up for some pretend honored guest, we just nod an’ say, ‘Yes, my lord.’ ” She marched to the window and shut it with a slam.
    Zora whirled around, frantically searching the faces of the half dozen servants preparing the room. “Please—”
    An immaculately dressed man appeared at the door. “Is everything attended to?”
    “Yes, Mr. Kitson,” answered the footman who had brought in the food.
    “Who’s this for, Mr. Kitson?” asked the maid.
    The well-dressed man scanned the room, his gaze passing over Zora without as much as a blink. “I’ve no idea, and it’s none of your concern. If you are finished here, then I suggest you leave in anticipation of the guest’s arrival.”
    The servants sighed and filed out of the room, with the finely dressed man shutting the door behind them. Zora was alone again.
    She stood by the bed, dazed. Somehow, the magic that held her in this place kept the servants from seeing or hearing her.
    In truth, she hadn’t been counting on the servants. She counted on herself alone. Always had. For if anyone could figure out a thorny situation, it was her, and she had seen herself through some very sharp thickets.
    She would not allow herself to be touched that Whit had seen to her needs, instructing his servants to make the gaming room more comfortable. As if one should appreciate a captor using silken cords rather than coarse