“I was bored, too,” Leo piped up. “So Bert is teaching me to play loo.”

“Good God!” Richard growled, ignoring the boy. “I’m not paying you to play card games.”

“Ain’t paid me naught yet, and ye best not cheat me o’ my fair share.” Bert narrowed his eyes. “Even if the duke refuses to hand over the blunt.”

“He won’t dare,” Richard said, pacing restlessly. “I made it very clear in the note that the boy’s life hangs in the balance.”

“Mr. Duke will catch you. He’ll punch your face.” Leo swung a miniature fist in Richard’s direction. “Pow!”

Clayton would relish doing that, Richard thought with a lurch. Blister it, he mustn’t panic. He just needed a distraction to settle his nerves until he could collect his five thousand. Pulling up a chair, he snapped, “Deal me in.”

He reached for the gin bottle, fussily wiping it with his handkerchief before taking a swig. The rotgut burned down his throat and almost made him gag. Despite the liquid courage, however, the memory of his cousin’s furious expression continued to plague him.

As a precaution, Richard took out the small pistol from inside his coat and placed it on the table within easy reach. It paid to be careful, though there was really no cause for alarm. None at all.

Clayton couldn’t possibly find him here.

Chapter 27

Keeping an eye on Wymark as he parked his vehicle in an alley across the street, Hadrian swung off his mount and kept to the dense shadows beneath a tree. His instincts as to where the viscount would go had proven correct. Not home, where he could be easily caught, but straight to his ticket out of debt. Leo would have been stashed someplace cheap and reasonably close, in a neighborhood where the locals wouldn’t blink an eye at strange doings or even kidnapped boys. Since traffic had been relatively light at this late hour, it had taken only a few minutes before Hadrian had spotted the distinctive phaeton with its yellow wheels barreling east along Oxford Street, heading toward the slums of Seven Dials.

He quietly secured the reins to the spindly tree trunk and waited for Natalie to join him. The viscount might be fool enough not to realize when someone was tailing him, but not Hadrian. He’d glimpsed her behind him halfway here. It was hard to miss a lady riding ventre à terre with her filmy skirts fluttering in the breeze.

She dismounted a short distance away and walked the horse so as not to alert Wymark. His chest tightened to see her gliding like a slender wraith through moonlight and shadow, her elegant ballgown, elbow-length white gloves, and diamond jewelry looking incongruous against the decrepit brick tenements. As she tied her horse near his, he noted the lack of a saddle.

Despite his tension, he felt a twist of humor. “Bareback?”

“It’s how I rode as a girl,” she whispered. “Look, Wymark has gone into that house.”