Starlight (18 page)

Funny, that hadn’t been the case when Alex watched her so closely.

“I’m actually here looking for a man. He owes my da money.” She looked up through her lashes. “Been on the lam ever since. If I find him, I can make sure it’s worth your while.”

Again that greedy look toward her bosom, her hair, her plastered smile. “In coin or . . . ?”

“Whichever means more to you. My da needs his money, and Jack Findley needs a good thumping. With that one in the booth, frankly, I was hoping to manage both tonight.”

“Findley, eh?” The bartender’s eyes became as glassy as marbles. Completely unreadable. A shiver chased up Polly’s back. “Didn’t realize he was in the habit of bilking gutter trash of imaginary fortunes.”

“Imaginary? More like our life savings! We’re Mac-Clerichs, a sept to the Camerons,” she said, nodding to the tartan on the wall. “We’re practically cousins. You wouldn’t turn your back on one of your own, would you?”

The bartender made a face. “I don’t believe a word out of your pretty little mouth, girly.”

“At least tell me where he’s from. I won’t bother you again.” She hooked a thumb back toward Alex. “And I’m sure I can make it worth his while to leave an extra fat tip.”

The barman leaned in. Their mouths were almost near enough to touch. With a quick nod, he indicated her bodice. “Three buttons. Right now.”

Her face flushing hot, she straightened. She didn’t dare look toward Alex. If he knew what she was about to do, he would pound the bartender to a sick pile of meat. Polly had no doubt.

A jaded smile shaped her mouth. She
felt
jaded. That such a man would make a request shouldn’t have surprised her beyond a flush of embarrassment, but she had been of a mind to think the best of people too long. Swallowing her disappointment and contempt, she unbuttoned one, two, three buttons. Not too quickly. She put on a nice show.

The bartender poured a shot and swallowed it quickly. “Squat man. Not much taller than you. From one of the textile mills. An overseer, I think. He won’t be interested in the likes of you, my doxy.”

“Ach, no more for you, then, if you’re going to be so prickly.”

Polly buttoned her gown, picked up the three shot glasses in one hand and the pint of bitter in the other. Not that she hurried back to the booth, but she certainly didn’t dally. The bartender’s words had curled a nasty ball of dread in her stomach. With the barest of details, she and Alex were suddenly back on opposite sides.

If an overseer was responsible for the sabotage, who would believe Tommy over his word?

She had barely set the drinks on the table before Alex resumed his eager façade. The hands that always surprised her—strong, capable, yet without a single callus—grabbed her around the waist. Momentum plunked her squarely in his lap. She straddled him face-to-face, with her skirts rucked up to her knees.

He palmed her jaw and cheek. Another kiss. Hotter still. His lips had barely finished a quick plunder before moving down to her throat. Polly shivered,
and shivered again. His enthusiasm was undeniable, right beneath where she burned hot and wet.

“What did he say?” he whispered against her skin.

Polly forced a laugh, which was tinged with giddy excitement. She probably sounded half-drunk already. He had that effect.

She turned and grabbed one of the whiskey shots. It burned down her throat, all liquid fire and instant relaxation. The tension seeped out of her bones. She pushed fully against Alex’s broad chest. “Your turn. Then I’ll tell.”

He didn’t hesitate, nor did he let go. Restless fingers cupped her breast. He swallowed a shot with a single gulp. That muscular throat deserved to be kissed. She licked from his collarbone to the dimple behind his ear.

Alex’s shoulders shook beneath her hands—just one hard shudder. Then he, too, eased back into the booth’s warped leather. Her quick glance toward the bartender and a few other men revealed what she had hoped: interest without suspicion.

“Now,” Alex grated out. “Tell me.”

He was sounding more brutish by the minute. She chuckled against his cheek. Knees spread wide, she fit herself more snugly against his thick manhood. “Or what? You’ll kiss me again? That’s hardly a threat.”

He caught her loose bun in his fist. Fire blazed hot and shocking in his gentleman’s eyes. “Don’t make this a wasted trip when I have to haul you out of here by your pretty red hair.”

Alex was breathing hard. He ached, and Christ, he was tempted.

“I don’t doubt that you would,” she whispered. “And wouldn’t that make for an interesting time?”

“I saw what you did at the bar.” His voice was a low growl. He bared her shoulder and kissed her there—anything to ease the need to mark territory he did not own. Yet each touch urged him to risk more. “You unbuttoned your gown for that stringy waste.”

“I did. And now I know Jack Findley is a textile overseer. I’d give you a description of him, but I doubt you’d be able to keep the details. Not right now.”

She wiggled her bottom. Alex moaned in her hair.

Somewhere deeper, where his thinking mind still resided, he wondered how far she was willing to go. With regard to
anything
. She was either very skillful or very brave.

Alex held more of Polly than he knew what to do with. His body operated on vital, pumping instinct. He squeezed both of his hands: one at her breast, one buried deep in her hair. Her little wince shot straight to his cock, as if he needed a stronger reminder of his raging arousal.

“Easy now, master.” She smiled sweetly. “I’m done teasing, and so is the bartender. He seemed doubtful that Findley would owe a dockside girl any money. Called him too posh for a doxy like me. That was my ruse, you see.”

“I’m enjoying our ruse.”

At the thump of a door being thrown open, she gasped and turned in Alex’s arms. “But all good things come to an end. We need to go.”

Out of reflex, Alex had tightened his hold on her waist. Four constables had entered the pub. Their scowls and assessing stares meant they hadn’t stopped in for a drink. “Are they after you?”

“Polly Gowan specifically? No. Women strewn across the laps of paying customers? Yes. We must protect our fair city from vice, you see.”

“Christ,” Alex whispered against her neck. “I’ll do what I can to influence them.”

“And reveal that you were here at all? Not much of a secret investigation, master.”

“Back door, then?”

“Let’s hope.”

Alex popped her off his lap and gave her a little shove. He was out of the booth in a flash, but not fast enough to escape shouts from the front of the pub. A quick look back revealed the bartender pointing them out with his gnarled finger.

“Go!” Alex said sharply.

Polly hitched her skirts and ran. Dodging tables and chairs, she used her shoulder to burst past a single door at the rear of the smoke-laden room. Alex stumbled after her, through the doorway. A taproom similar to the one at Idle Michael’s was filled with the usual boxes and crates, along with the foul stink of urine and mold.

His hand protectively at her waist, Alex kept his body between Polly and the door at their back. He stopped, turned, slammed it.

“Wedge it shut!” she called over her shoulder.

Using his back, he pushed a huge wooden delivery crate inch by inch toward the door. Fists slammed
against the other side as soon as he shoved it into place. Sweat lined his brow.

“Quick now,” he said again. “We don’t have much time.”

“Oh, no, master. I think I’ll take my time and have a chat with the nice lads.” Polly picked over the crates with her skirts bunched in white-knuckled fists. “What do you
think
I’m doing, Alex? I’m going as fast as I can!”

“You would argue with a storm cloud in the middle of a hurricane.”

“And I’d win.” She reached the back door. “Padlock. Damn.”

Alex spotted an ax in a cobweb-strewn corner. “Get back.”

She complied with gratifying speed by ducking behind a large crate. After a grip to position his hands, he took swing after swing against the rot that surrounded the lock. Chips flew. The wood splintered beneath his successive strikes.

He used his heel to kick their way free. The lock flew out into the night, along with part of the handle. Polly scampered out from her hiding place just as their escape door swung open. Cold, wet air smacked Alex in the face, a welcome relief after the tight heat of the taproom and his hard-earned sweat.

He took Polly’s hand without thought. They rushed to freedom.

Two more constables stood not five feet away, holding black, intimidating truncheons.

What use was thought when faced with an immediate threat? He swung high, but nearly lost his balance
on the slippery cobblestones. The ax slipped from his fingers and slid behind a cluster of shrubs.

Polly rolled low against a constable’s knees, then produced a slender knife from out of nowhere. A masculine bellow shredded the night as Alex struck the other constable—kidney, sternum, chin. With his palms flat and taut, he slammed them against the man’s ears, then punched him twice in the face.

“Go, Polly!”

But the man she’d stabbed caught Polly’s skirts. She grunted as she landed on all fours. The sound of skin and bone hitting the pavement unleashed a tide of violence from deep inside Alex. He kicked the constable square in the bollocks, then yanked Polly up with his arms around her waist. Neither looked back.

She hissed but her pace never flagged. “That way,” she said. “Left down that alley.”

The tight, high walls created a passage with no visible end. Darkness and fog swallowed the way out. Angered voices and heavy footsteps hurried close behind. With nowhere else to go, Alex followed her into the alley’s smoky black mist.

“Do you know where we are?”

“Not exactly.” She was breathing almost as heavily. “But I know which direction is home.”

More voices. This time at the top of the steeply descending alley. Letting the constables catch Polly was out of the question. He wasn’t through with her yet.

Her directions took them left, then right, then back to the right again. Alex was completely lost. He
only hoped she wouldn’t lead him headfirst into a wall.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“I
am
looking for something.”

“Could’ve fooled me.”

“That’d be too easy.”

Alex grimaced. “
Polly.
”

Limping slightly now, she felt along the brick. No gaslights graced such a place. No shining reflections from the Clyde. Not even a hint of illumination from the tenements that surrounded them like sullen giants.

“Yes, here it is.”

She probed a little notch in the side of a brick building. A trick door opened beneath her fingers and closed them into a space no larger than two feet square.

Her breathing mingled with his, both in warmth and in sound. “Not to say they were designed for escaping constables . . . ”

“But they were actually designed for escaping constables,” he finished with a grin.

Footfalls pounded along the cobblestones outside. The sound was wet and indistinct when heard from inside their little shelter.

The threat eased. Polly felt around on the floor. “Take off your coat,” she whispered.

More rustling noises as she stripped him, not even waiting for permission. His knuckles burned from those punches he’d landed. He clenched swollen fingers into fists, relishing the burn. She seemed to be . . . kneeling?

He let his head fall back against the wall.
Her
head would be . . .

Bloody hell.

A match flared to life. She lit a nub of a candle and wedged it in a corner. He began to protest—the light would be seen—but she’d shoved his coat along the bottom seam of the door. The tiny candle barely offered enough light to blink clear of the darkness. He could see her now, not just hear her breathless gasps.

And now, out of immediate danger, he could
blame
her.

He took both of her shoulders in hand and hauled her to a standing position. Pulling her close, taking her mouth—the most primal instinct. Her little cries edged him on. Whiskey, followed by unbridled aggression, had blunted his senses. Her kiss burned through that fog. The sweep of her tongue across his busted lip hurt like hell.

“More,” he rasped. “Give me more.”

“Yes, master.” She kissed him with matching ferocity.

He drove his fingers into her thick, damp curls. “Jesus, Polly. What the hell kind of man have you turned me into?”

A
dangerous
one,” Polly whispered. “I like it.”

Alex cinched an arm around her lower back. Their upper bodies came together in a rough crash. With his other hand he captured the base of her skull. If he meant to be gentle, he was failing completely. But she didn’t want gentle. She angled her head to one side and plunged into his hot mouth. His moan vibrated against her tongue.