Free Ashlyn Macnamara by A Most Devilish Rogue Page A

pockets, at least sometime in the near future.
    “You’ll have to accept my marker.” Leach pressed a slip of paper into his hand.
    “What’s this then?”
    Leach’s cheeks took on a ruddy flush, more so than could be attributed to any ale he’d consumed. He mumbled something too low for George to hear over the chatter in the taproom.
    “Come again?”
    Leach cleared his throat. “I said unless you’d like to make an arrangement with your sister.”
    George closed his fist around the marker. “Here now. What’s Henrietta got to do with an agreement between gentlemen? You’ve no call dragging her name into it.”
    Leach’s eyes narrowed, the merest tightening of the muscles above his cheeks, the movement nearly imperceptible in the shadows of the taproom. “She cleaned me out last night, all right?”
    Revelstoke burst out in a fit of false coughing, which only served to darken Leach’s expression.
    “Cleaned you out?” George drummed his fingers on the table. “How did you get those kinds of stakes past Julia?”
    Leach shrugged. “Don’t suppose she was paying close enough attention.”
    “That’s what you get for letting Henny win.”
    “I didn’t let her win,” Leach grated.
    George ignored the warning note in Leach’s reply. This was just too delicious. He threw back his head and laughed. “In that case, I owe you thanks for teaching her properly. If it weren’t for her reputation, I’d have to think of a way to spirit her into my club. I might reverse a few of my own fortunes.”
    “That’s it.” Wooden chair legs scraped loudly on planked flooring as Leach unfolded himself. “I’m off.”
    George studied the other man as he turned and stalked out of the taproom. His pack of cards still lay spread on the table. The tightness about his mouth and the rigid set of his shoulders spoke volumes.
    Turning to face the others, George picked up his tankard and swallowed the last of his ale. “And where did he come from? I can’t recall ever coming across him before, and you’d think, among friends, I’d know the other guests.”
    Revelstoke sat up a bit straighter, his gaze panning toward the door. “He’s an acquaintance of the Wentworths’. At least, he came out from Town with them. I wasn’t about to turn him away, as a friend of invited guests.”
    “Rather touchy for a hanger-on, don’t you think?” George said. “What do you suppose his problem is?”
    Highgate leaned across the table. “Did you have to rub it in?”
    “The man’s clearly an overdressed idiot.” Georgepushed his tankard aside. “What does it matter?” He smoothed out Leach’s crumpled marker to admire the amount. The man’s writing was just as flamboyant as his manner of speech and dress. “Soon as he pays me, you’ll have your loan back,” he added to Revelstoke.
    Not only that, he’d be able to pay off that ape Padgett and still have enough left over—to invest in his strategy to bring down Redditch.
    Revelstoke leaned forward in his seat. “You don’t have to pay me back. Keep what I gave you and apply it to Summersby’s debts.”
    Highgate reached into his topcoat and tossed a leather pouch onto the table. “You can add my contribution.”
    “And mine.” Enfield’s coin purse landed next to Highgate’s with a
thunk
.
    George sat back, unable to respond for a moment. “This really isn’t necessary. I never intended to start up a charity.”
    “Just shut up and take it,” Revelstoke said, gathering up the coin.
    “But I have Leach’s marker.” Without a thought, he gathered the cards and put them in his pocket. “It’s a start.”
    “Aren’t you assuming a bit much?”
    George closed his fingers about the coin purses. “What’s that?”
    “That he’s good for it.”
    P OCKETS jingling, George strode across the lawn, his gaze fixed on the groups of young ladies dotted about the grass. Some of them had set up easels to capture in watercolor the neat ranks of flowers bordering