“I’ll walk the rest of the way, Dawkins.”

“Are you sure, sir? It’s—down from there, you son of a whore—a bit rough.”

Leo smiled grimly, and opened the carriage door.

Amazing what a bit of brawling could do for one’s humor. As Leo wended his way up Queen Street and then turned on to Poultry, he shook out his fist. Fortunately, he knew how to throw a punch, and the ache in his hand had already begun to subside. No one in that melee had expected a gent in a fine private coach to come out swinging. But he had, and laid out three big men for their trouble. He had cleared a path for himself.

Now he had to stop himself from whistling. He hadn’t been able to obtain physical release with his wife, but fighting in the street offered more brutal means.

He reached the entrance to Exchange Alley off Cornhill. Three men waited for him. Hellraisers. Bram made a tall, dark shape against the sunlit street, and both Edmund and John glanced around with tense, strained expressions.

“What in the name of God has you out of bed so early?” The hour had barely reached eight o’clock. “Unless you haven’t been to bed yet.”

“Bram and John roused me from mine,” Edmund muttered.

The shadows under John and Bram’s eyes confirmed that neither had gone home last night. Leo realized that, for the first time in ... as long as he could remember, he hadn’t joined in for the evening’s debauchery. He had been at home. With Anne.

And he hadn’t missed going out, not a bit.

“It’s business hours, lads,” he said. “If there’s carousing to be done, it must wait ’til later.”

Bram shook his head, and Leo saw that the drawn cast that honed his friend’s already sharp features came not from a night’s dissipated revels, but something else. Something troubling.

Nerves tightened along the back of Leo’s neck and his pleasant mood burst like a blister.

He glanced around. Men of business who knew him well were casting him and the other Hellraisers speculative glances. Leo’s presence at the ’Change was common, but his dissolute friends’ attendance was noteworthy.

“There’s a tavern in an alley off Threadneedle. The Cormorant. I’ll meet you there in a quarter of an hour.”

His friends dispersed, trailing shadows. Leo spent a few minutes chatting with acquaintances, maintaining the illusion that all was well, even as he knew otherwise. Eventually, he drifted away and toward Threadneedle Street. He hated missing any potential deals, but he had no choice. The Hellraisers would not seek him out at this hour unless the situation were dire.

Less crowded than a coffee house, the Cormorant tavern still held a few patrons. One man slept with his head on the table, beside his tankard. Another puffed on a pipe by the fire, watching smoke rings drift up to the stained ceiling. The Hellraisers occupied the settles in the corner, and they stared at their mugs with hard, wary expressions, as if anticipating an attack.

Leo sat next to John. He grunted his thanks when the tapster brought a grimy mug of ale, though he had no thirst for it.

“Whit’s been spotted,” Bram said without preamble. “Here, in London.”

Leo clenched his hands into fists. “When?”

“Don’t know. John and I only heard about it last night.”

“We ran into Chilton at the Theatre Royal,” said John. “He asked why Whit wasn’t with us, as he had seen him just that morning on Westminster Bridge, with a pretty Gypsy girl on his arm. Whit asked Chilton about us, wanted to know what we had been doing.”

“And Chilton told him,” added Bram.

Leo swore. He considered taking a drink of his ale just to steady himself, but something floated on the drink’s surface, and he pushed it away.

Damn it. Damn.

“What do you think he wants?” Edmund gnawed on his thumbnail, as he always did when anxious.

“Same as he’s always wanted—to take our gifts.” John’s fingers beat a staccato rhythm on the tabletop.

“He hasn’t the power to do so.” Yet Bram did not sound as confident as his words attested.

“Not that we know of.” Leo crossed his arms over his chest. “It’s been months since Bram saw him in Manchester. Not even Mr. Holliday has been able to keep track of him. Anything might have happened in the interval.”

“We can’t let him take our gifts. We cannot.” A note of panic threaded into Edmund’s voice. Unlike the broader-reaching gifts that John, Bram, and Leo had received, Edmund had received one, and one alone: Rosalind.

Bram scowled. “Just last night I used my gift to persuade my way into Lady Hadlow’s bed. She was always too devoted to her husband, even if he’s in India.”

“As a married man,” said Edmund, “I find your actions deplorable.”

“Because, before Rosalind, you only fucked widows and courtesans?” Bram snorted. “You forget, I once saw you sneaking off with the very married Augustine Colford.” When Edmund continued to sulk, Bram added, “For all her fidelity, Lady Hadlow did not complain when I brought her to climax four times.”

“There’s more at stake than your damned cock.” John growled. “Yesterday afternoon, I read the mind of the Earl of Northington, the damned Lord Chancellor, and learned his plans for the treaty with France. Without Mr. Holliday’s gift, I wouldn’t know a bloody thing. I’d be merely another normal man,” he sneered.

Dissention was never difficult to come by with the Hellraisers, but Leo needed to stop it before they degenerated into an outright scrum. “No one is taking anything. There are four of us, and one of him.”

“And the Gypsy,” added John. “The ghost, too. If she has reappeared.”

“Doesn’t matter,” said Bram. “Between us four Hellraisers and his less-than-reliable confederates, the odds favor us.”

“Whit always did like steep odds.” Leo smiled darkly. “But this is one gamble he cannot win.”

“You have a scheme in mind,” said Bram.

“Continuously.” Leaning forward, Leo braced his elbows on the table. “Whit might not be able to mount a full-scale frontal assault. He knows that he cannot beat us all. If I were him, I would seek out allies, wherever I could find them. All that remains to us is to ensure that he makes no allegiances.”

John’s fingers slowed their beat as he began to understand Leo’s intent. “Ostracize him.”

“If Whit is not received anywhere in London, if he becomes a pariah, then he is left to his own frail resources.”

Still, Bram looked skeptical. “Frail was not the word I would have used to describe Whit in Manchester. He had no magic, ’tis true, but he seemed stronger than ever. Especially with that damned girl at his side. As if he could level mountains with thought alone.”

John snorted. “False confidence engendered by a bit of quim. Doubtless he has begun to realize that, outside of the bedchamber, a Gypsy girl makes for an inferior companion. He could be weakening even now.”

“We cut Whit off from any source of support,” said Leo, “leave him with nary a friend, so he has no reinforcements.”

Clearly heartened by this idea, Edmund brightened. “That should not prove overly difficult. His habits at the gaming tables seldom won him friends—beyond us, of course.”

“A few well-placed tales of cheating and theft,” Leo continued, “and the deed is done. There’ve already been rumors about him ruining lordlings and reckless gentlemen. Some more kindling on that fire, and we will smoke him out.”

Yet Bram was not entirely satisfied. “And then?”

“And then ... when Whit has nowhere to turn, he will either flee, or attempt to make a stand. At which point”—he smiled grimly at the other Hellraisers—“we will render him no longer a threat. By any means at our disposal.”

A sheet of paper awaited Anne at breakfast. On it, in Leo’s bold, masculine scrawl, was a list of names. She took her tea and rolls in the upstairs parlor rather than the cavernous dining chamber, and as she sipped from her cup, she considered the list.