Some ladies might have taken that experience to mean that gambling was abhorrent, and something she would never wish to do, or to associate with those who did. But Ivy took it as a sign that risking everything was the only way she would ever be happy.

“Someday, sister,” Octavia said in that “far too old for her seventeen years” voice, “you will find your own respectable future.” She tugged on Ivy’s sleeve. “I could wear a mask, you know. Nobody would know it was me. I know you’re short on staff. I could help.”

“Absolutely not.” Ivy struggled to maintain her stern tone. It would be fun to have Octavia here, she had to admit, but she wanted her sister to wait a bit before shutting the door that led to a respectable future. The gentlemen who gambled here would never choose a gambling house employee or even an owner as a wife.

That was a relief for Ivy, who wanted to be firmly among the regular people. But she wanted Octavia to have a choice, a wider choice than Ivy herself had had. One that didn’t depend—literally—on the turn of a card.

Ensuring Octavia’s security was the biggest motivation for working so hard to make the club a success—eventually, Ivy thought, she’d make enough money so she could buy a cottage by the sea for her and her sister, hopefully in an area where there were young eligible gentlemen. Gentlemen who wouldn’t know of their past life in London. Not for herself, of course, but for her sister—Octavia deserved to fall in love and get married. Ivy just wanted books, tea, and an excellent view.

Ivy heard voices and nudged her sister toward the door that led upstairs to their lodgings. “People are coming, you have to go.”

Octavia rolled her eyes again, accompanying the gesture with an exaggerated exhale, but she moved quickly, and was out of sight before the guests arrived. There would come a time, Ivy knew, when her younger sister would no longer follow Ivy’s commands, but at least that day was not today. Hopefully she could stave off her sister’s rebelliousness until after they’d moved to that quiet cottage.

Ivy approached the door as the two gentlemen arrived—and they were most certainly gentlemen. Men who worked for their livings, even ones who’d made fortunes, didn’t have the air of total entitlement these two had.

She recognized one of the men as having been in the club before, although she recalled all he had done the previous time was drink and grunt in response to any of the other guests’ polite overtures.