Free Jack of Clubs by Bárbara Metzger Page A

whose mind was not on his cards. Jack would not take advantage of green boys or drunks or men with nothing left to wager. Everyone else was fair game.
    The house always won. Tonight it was going to win more.
    As he made the rounds of the tables, keeping a steady watch on his domain, Jack chatted with old friends and new customers.
    â€œHave you heard anything about that sister of yours?” a bald gentleman in a puce waistcoat asked him, pointing to the portrait of Lottie’s mother that was across the room, above a reward notice.
    â€œNot yet, but I have heard a lot of sad stories.”
    The man’s shiny pate glistened in the candlelight as he shook his head. “Bound to be a million orphans with amnesia, when a fortune is at stake. I’d wager every blue-eyed blonde in England lands on your doorstep sooner or later, ready to call you brother.”
    â€œGreedy and dishonest, every female, what?” Lord Harkness put in. “Can’t trust a one of them, can you?” he asked, his arm around a slender redhead, while his wife, to Jack’s certain knowledge, was home nursing Harkness’s sick mother.
    Jack did not try to defend womanhood, although he might have used his paragon of a sister-in-law as an example. Harkness had not come to a gambling parlor for a sermon. He’d come to satisfy his greed and flaunt his dishonesty.
    Jack smiled and moved on, wondering about Miss Silver. She’d taken his money at the expense of her scruples, but did that make her grasping, or simply needy? He doubted if anything else about her could be bought, not her loyalty, not her honor. Not that he was interested in anything else but her care for Harriet, of course.
    And he should not be thinking about Miss Prunes and Prisms while he was patrolling his parlor. He should be watching to make sure everything ran smoothly, and the money kept flowing.
    He whispered to one of the
vingt et un
dealers to discourage a young baronet whose pockets were known to be let. Jack was not a bank, extending credit; nor did he want any bankruptcies or suicides on his conscience. He peeled one of the serving girls off a colonel’s lap. Jack was no procurer, either. Pretty lasses in low-cut gowns were enough distraction for his purpose. He wanted the gents to put their money on his tables, not down those same low-cut necklines.
    He thought of Miss Silver upstairs—Again! Drat, the woman stuck in his mind like a burr!—with her collar buttoned to her chin. Her skin might have been purple, for all a fellow got to see of it, and her chest might be as flat as his own. Not that he cared, of course. It was just that the connoisseur in him hated to see such a confounded ugly waste. The woman could be pretty, he thought, if she were dressed properly. She ought to be gowned in sapphire or silver, to make the most of her glorious eyes, not the dull gray thing she had worn. And the fabrics ought to be light and lacy, emphasizing her fine bones. Her hair would need to be trimmed so that shorter curls framed her face, softening the severe lines until she added a few pounds. And she would have to smile. He detested giggles, but a warm, tender smile could make a man melt. Nothing made a woman more attractive to a chap than thinking that he had brought a smile to her lips, that she was enjoying his company.
    Not that Jack would ever get to see the schoolteacher smile, except when he paid her the bonus, perhaps.
    Not that he cared.
    He had a great many more important things to do than imagining that pattern card of propriety in elegant gowns…or out of them. He had a club to run, by Jupiter. Setting the priggish female firmly in the back of his mind, for the tenth time, it seemed, he continued his rounds. When he reached the far end of the room, he ducked through the service doors and checked on the wine stocks and the kitchens. A late supper would be set out in a smaller parlor, but other delicacies would be taken around on