“I said, sit, Reggie.” He unhooked the cuffs of his shirt and shoved his sleeves up. “No man, woman, or child who works for me comes back looking as you do now. Not without someone paying a price.” And particularly not this woman, who’d become his closest confidante outside of his sisters.
Grudgingly she released the cloth. It landed with a plunk, pinging drops of water over the edge of the porcelain bowl and marking the oak side table.
“You’re making something out of nothing,” she muttered after she’d sat.
Time should have given him plenty of lessons on how to handle—or rather, deal with—this woman. Reggie, however, wasn’t one to be handled, by him or by anyone. She possessed a calm pragmatism and control over her speech that could have run circles around the best barristers in London. And if she wished to hold on to a secret, she’d clamp her lips shut and deny herself breath before conceding to the one putting demands to her.
“Here,” he urged. “Let me see.” Taking her chin, he tipped her head sideways so he could assess the extent of her injuries. His heart twisted, and in that instant the sword hanging over him and his family was forgotten. “Reggie, you look dreadful.” Dried blood splotched her cheeks and caked her hair. At some point, it had also formed a paste that matted loose strands to her face.
“My, aren’t you the charmer,” she said drolly.
Grabbing the forgotten cloth, Broderick washed the grime from her cheeks. His hands shook with a staggering weakness that should have appalled, but instead fury, frustration, and something worse weighted him: fear.
When staff changed, Reggie had been the steadfast one inside this hell. The scared girl he’d escorted from London Bridge had been so transformed over the years, into someone indomitable . . . or rather, that’s how he’d allowed himself to see her. What would I have done if she’d been hurt?
But she was safe. Here with him, still.
With me?
She winced.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured, steadying his palms.
He knew so much about this woman, and yet . . . how had he not known until now the satiny softness of her skin? And suddenly what had been a perfunctory task became something more. The air crackled around him. It sizzled like the earth right after a lightning strike. And damn if he hadn’t always been drawn to that danger.
He released the soggy cloth.
Hooding his lashes, Broderick tucked the clean strands behind her uninjured ear and availed himself of an unobstructed view of her heart-shaped face.
The first time his guards had discussed Reggie Spark had been three years ago when Broderick had first inherited the Devil’s Den from the scourge of the Dials. Seated around the breakfast table, awaiting Broderick’s first meeting to commence, the kitchens had buzzed with bawdy talk about the different girls on staff.
Four guards had made the mistake of speaking ill of Reggie, deeming her too ugly to bed and too clever to marry. They’d been tossed out on their arses—they had worked their last day at the Devil’s Den.
That had also been the last time anyone had spoken ill of her.
As an employer who’d vowed never to take advantage of those females on his staff, he’d been outraged at the bastards who’d besmirched Reggie’s reputation. Now he saw past that fury to something else: the truth about how wrong they’d been.
The mass of loose curls drew his gaze to Reggie’s face. Her wide eyes were a beguiling blend of greens and blues. Those aquamarine pools beckoned in their depths the crisp Cheshire countryside, blue skies and rolling emerald hills all at once.
Her crimped red curls, always drawn tightly back, now lay in a tangle about her shoulders, framing her face. What was once severe was now softened by that crimson waterfall. A pert nose, high cheeks, and a wash of freckles splashed upon luminous skin. Her rounded lips with a peaked Cupid’s bow, made for kissing and more.
Reggie stared back with a question in her wide aquamarine eyes. “What is it?” she whispered.
Look away. Look away from whatever this momentary madness is.
And yet—Broderick swallowed hard—he’d proven weak in ways he’d never believed himself. “Reggie,” he croaked, barely recognizing that gruff voice as his own, incapable of offering anything other than her name. The name of this woman who was a friend and confidante and employee. She was that, too. Nonetheless, he slid his fingers through her hair, those silken curls caressing his palm. Reggie’s thick crimson lashes fluttered.
Hunger sang in his veins like a discordant symphony that made no sense and never would, but it was one he wanted to continue playing forever.
Her lips parted, and the softest of sighs slipped past her lips, a breathy invitation. Or did he merely hear what he wanted? Then, she tipped her head back, and there could be no mistaking that unspoken invitation.
Like the sailor drawn to the siren at sea, Broderick lowered his head, closer, closer. Craving something he’d never known he wanted . . . or needed . . .
And in this instant, it didn’t matter that in lusting after Reggie Spark, he was devoid of honor. Only this need to feel something other than the fear that had gripped him these past days took hold and would not relinquish him.
I am my father . . .
Choking on his swallow, Broderick yanked away, drawing his hands back.
And mayhap he’d merely conjured her response out of his own yearnings.
Those crimson lips which he’d just been lusting after tipped at the corners into a troubled little frown. “That bad?” She felt around her head. Slightly crooked front teeth worried at that flesh, making a mockery of his notice.
Bloody hell. “It’s not,” he said in hoarsened tones. I am. Lusting after a friend and woman on my staff. Broderick gathered up the cloth and tossed it back into the wash basin.
Avoiding his gaze, Reggie came swiftly to her feet. “Then I’m finished.” The spindly legs of her chair scraped along the floor.
“Stop.” He encircled his hand gently about her wrist. “You’re not. I’m not, that is.”
She puzzled her brow. “What?”
“Through inspecting your wound,” he clarified. By God, he was rambling. And all because he’d realized that Reggie Spark was . . . a woman. Of course it was natural to note those details. In fact, one might argue that it was unnatural that he’d not noted them before now. Guiding her back into her seat, he made to release her but stopped. “What in blazes happened here?” Broderick raised her palms closer, inspecting one and then the other. A faint dusting of scratches and bits of gravel remained embedded in the creases of her palms, those bilateral wounds indicating she’d come down on her hands. And by the hint of black and blue forming there, she’d come down hard.
At her silence, he looked up.
She shuttered her expression. “I fell.”
“What rot.” Regina Spark moved with an elegant grace at odds with every other woman who called this hell home—his sisters included. “You’ve never so much as stumbled or missed a step as long as I’ve known you.”
“You’re misremembering,” she muttered.
“I don’t misremember anything.” Broderick gathered her heavy hair slicked with blood; those luxuriant tresses slid between his fingers like the fine satin sheets he’d commissioned for his bed upon taking ownership of this hell. Threading his hands through her curls, he drew them away from her face. Desire bolted through him. Shocking in its intensity and shaming for who it was he sat here lusting after, a woman who’d been like another sister . . . and when she was injured, no less.
Only, there was nothing fraternal in this desire to continue running his hands through the crimson tangle that was her hair.
Fighting that dangerous pull, he focused on his task. After all, not even Broderick himself operated under any illusions that he was a gentleman—in any way. Using the loose pins scattered on the table, he proceeded to tuck the strands into a messy topknot.
With Reggie still stubbornly silent, Broderick continued to probe, inspecting her scalp and cheeks for further hint of injury. Each mark a clue that he filed away. He trailed the tip of his index finger along her right lobe.