One Night Is Never Enough Read Online Free PDF Page A

pressing down to his elbow on the table, he looked across the table to observe Bennett Chatsworth more closely. The slope of the man’s nose. The set of his eyes, which at the moment were gazing at his cards in undisguised, drunken glee—more so the fool to continuously drink true spirits when desperation clung fiercely and pots grew large. A once-distinguished man, though more hunched and furtive now, there was a hint there, a promise, if one looked closely enough, of the beauty held by the girl this afternoon.
    A chair was abruptly pushed back. Roman let his hand fall and looked over to see Pomeroy stuffing a pocket watch into place. “Gads. Just remembered I’m supposed to be at the Winphors’. The missus is going to have my privates. ’Pologies about leaving midhand. Have an extra five crown on me?” He didn’t wait for a response, just tossed the coin into the pot. “Evening, all.” He rushed from the table like the devil was at his heels.
    Downing, at Roman’s left, threw his cards to the center as well. It was obvious that Chatsworth finally had a winning hand. Roman was about to throw his in too when he caught sight of Trant’s eyes, narrowed on Chatsworth, determination in their depths.
    Roman placed his cards facedown on the table instead, curling his fingers around the edges of the hard paper.
    “Pomeroy was nearly drained anyway. And Chatsworth, I see you are at the end of your night’s credit,” Trant said, after a moment of letting Chatsworth examine the hand he held. “But I’m feeling indulgent, and a bit reckless. What say we up the stakes?”
    “Oh?” Chatsworth’s eyes went from his cards to the pot in the center.
    Roman felt the rim of the cards denting his skin. The feeling that had been curling in his midsection, the tug, sent out sharp tentacles, waiting, on edge.
    A sliver of respect wound through him as, like the others at the table, he watched Trant. The man had finally taken a look at what opportunities surrounded the ladder, broken as it was with Chatsworth’s continued denials and the amounts of money it would require to force him to capitulate. All of the little tells on Trant’s face spoke to his excitement, to his determination and fierce motivation.
    Roman could have clapped.
    He might have, if his fingers weren’t clutching his cards.
    “Say my ten thousand . . .”
    Chatsworth’s eyes flashed and lit on his cards once more.
    “To your . . . oh, what can you put up . . . say, a night in your daughter’s company?”
    Movement at the table stilled. Downing carefully set his drink on the table. Too carefully. Chatsworth’s eyes narrowed on Trant but then turned shrewd and greedy as he reviewed his cards.
    Roman kicked back in his chair. “What an utterly tasteless suggestion, Mr. Trant,” he said, as lazily and indifferently as he could manage over the tug of fate, the pull, which was growing stronger, wrenching at him. “I’m shocked.”
    Trant didn’t look his way, his gaze concentrated fully on Chatsworth, the only person who mattered to him at the moment. Trying to determine how the man might respond so Trant could react accordingly. “I hardly think you could be shocked by something so banal, Merrick.”
    “Banal? This is the most exciting thing that has happened all evening. I applaud your tastelessness in earnest.”
    Downing shot both of them black, furious looks, to which Roman issued a lazy grin.
    “Chatsworth, don’t be a fool,” Downing said bitingly, turning his body, a cutting move against Trant. “More fool than you already are, that is.”
    Yes, Roman had always liked the man.
    Chatsworth’s jaw clenched, but there was a glimmer of pause in his drunken, watery eyes.
    “Downing, you are out of this hand,” Trant said quickly, and as dismissively as he dared. “You have no say in the wager. You turned down the gentle lady’s presence two seasons ago.”
    Roman stroked his finger along the edge of his cards, his dead hand that Trant,