It took a couple of days to get to London, a couple of dusty, windy days with the July sun burning into my skin as the Channel ferry took me back to the sceptered isle. I reread Julian’s letter as I boarded the Dover-London train, skipping past all the usual letter-writing pleasantries to the only part I could think about.

…As for Molly, well, I don’t know if you’ve heard, but the word is that her company’s board has finally unveiled their plan for making her heel to their whims, something they’ve been trying to maneuver for years. They’ve declared that they will leave the company and sell their shares to the next-largest competitor if she does not marry within six months. Moreover, they want this man to be someone they personally approve of.

Naturally, this has sent every wealthy and connected dolt to London in order to woo both the company board and her. One can only imagine how furious and lonely this has made Molly…

I stopped reading, folded the letter back up, and leaned back in my seat, pinching the bridge of my nose.

Molly was in trouble. And not just any kind of trouble, but the kind where she was being forced to marry. Even though I didn’t love her, not one bit, not at all, the thought of her standing in a church with any man other than me dug a knife into my chest. It was easier leaving her last year, if any part of it could be called easy, when I’d imagined she would remain unattached and alone forever. That if I couldn’t have her, then at least no other man would either.

So this mass audition of potential husbands was, in the words of Edward Rochester, a blow.

A very strong blow. To my naked heart. With a blunt instrument.

Which was, of course, how any friend would feel about any other friend being caught in a web of misfortune. It didn’t mean anything special that I suddenly couldn’t think about anyone other than Molly. It didn’t mean anything special that I hadn’t been able to sleep the night I had read Julian’s letter, that I had tossed and turned in my bed, tormented by the memory of sky-blue eyes glittering with pain.

I should go to London, I’d realized that night, staring at my brother’s French ceiling. I should use this chance. To help her and to help myself with one single, golden opportunity.

And maybe, in the process, set things right between us. The only problem with that being that I had been the one to set things so very, very wrong in the first place.

Molly and I had known each other for years—almost a decade—and we’d kissed and fucked and frolicked like mad across Europe and back into England…no different than anyone else in our group. But then Julian had gone and fallen in love, and something had changed for all of us. I couldn’t describe it properly, not even to myself. I just knew that it was some sort of malaise, some kind of apathy, where what used to be fun and playful had suddenly grown dull. Was there a limit to how many beautiful women a man could fuck before he got bored? Five years ago, I would have said never. But now, after seeing the fierce, magnetic love between Ivy and Jules—someone who I never thought would fall in love again—I didn’t know anymore. Because whatever they had was palpably vibrant and intoxicating, and no amount of strings-free fucking would come close to that.

Molly had seemed to sense it too, or maybe I was projecting, but after the first time we’d met Ivy and seen the tense string of connection between her and Julian, Molly had started to withdraw. Into her business, into herself, and I only saw her a handful of times last summer, usually in passing and always in groups of people. Broken-hearted, people said. She’d always secretly loved Julian. It’s no surprise she wants to avoid our crowd.

But I wasn’t sure. In fact, if I didn’t know better, I would have said that she had been pulling away from me.

And then came that fateful day.

My hand went to my eye, as if about to probe a bruise, but the bruise had been gone for eight months now. Molly hadn’t said that she never wanted to see me again, she hadn’t said that she would never forgive me, but I had assumed all that was implied when she struck me.

And I hadn’t said I’m sorry. I hadn’t dropped to my knees and begged for her to forgive me, because I had assumed all that was implied when I’d let her strike me, when I’d turned away and left England.

I changed trains at the outer edges of London, settling in for the short ride to the station near Piccadilly Circus. And that’s when I heard a familiar pair of tinkling laughs.

I turned to see Rhoda and Zona walking towards me down the aisle, the swaying motion of the train barely perturbing the movement of the graceful creatures as they made their way to my row and sat down in a flounce of expensive silk and lace.

“Ladies,” I greeted them, taking their hands to kiss. “What marvelous luck to run into you on my first day back.”

“Silas!” Rhoda exclaimed with a smile. Both she and her sister were studies in pale—pale skin, pale blond hair, pale gray eyes. They looked like twin Nordic goddesses, tall and beautiful, and I felt a familiar tugging in my groin as I remembered the last time we’d been together. Mercy had been there that night too…

At the thought of Mercy Atworth, my mood simultaneously darkened and lightened. Mercy Atworth was part of the reason I’d left the country, part of the reason behind my black eye all those months ago. She was also one of the most beautiful women I’d ever met.

Somehow, as if reading my mind and its tangled, depraved thoughts, Rhoda announced, “Oh, here come Mercy and Hugh.”

I turned, my heart closing with something like panic while my dick started to stiffen, as if the two organs were controlled by different brains. What were the fucking odds? On this train, on this day, at this particular hour, that I should run into the one singular reason why Molly and I fought, why Molly and I never became a we or an us.

Which is a good thing, I reminded myself. You don’t love Molly. Maybe you never really did love her. It was a moment of weakness, a moment where you confused friendship with something more, and you should thank Mercy for proving that to both of you.

Mercy Atworth smiled at me as she came closer, her black hair piled in rich coils on top of her head, her long eyelashes fluttering as she looked down and then up at me. Mercy was beautiful in a very physical sort of way; every feature and every curve could have been lifted entirely from a classical marble statue. But there was something about the secretive press of her mouth and the hooded veil of her eyelids that really made a man (or a woman) take notice. It was like she held ancient, esoteric knowledge, and she wanted you to come discover it inside her. She was seductive and silky and eager to please, and all of a sudden, I felt like Silas from last year, carefree and intent on fucking someone immediately.

Our gazes locked, and for one ridiculous moment, I imagined that I was staring into a pair of blue eyes instead of brown ones. That a different woman was walking toward me with that sultry smile on her face. And then I wanted to scream at myself. I came back because of Molly but not for Molly.

I came back with a business offer.

I wasn’t in love with her.

At all.

Hugh Calvert handed Mercy into the seat next to me while he continued to stand. Like the sisters, Hugh was tall and blond, but in a rich, buttery sort of way. I’d never liked Hugh very much. He was a viscount—the only titled one among our set other than Castor Gravendon, whom we usually called ‘The Baron’—and even though we all had money to spare, there was something in his demeanor that indicated he felt slightly above us all. But Molly had liked him, and what Molly said went, at least for Julian and me, and so he’d become permanently fixed in our circle—for better or for worse.