The Widow Wager Read online

  The Widow Wager

  (The Notorious Flynns Book 3)

  By

  Jess Michaels

  The Widow Wager

  The Notorious Flynns Book 3

  Copyright © Jesse Petersen, 2015

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  For more information, contact Jess Michaels

  www.AuthorJessMichaels.com

  PO Box 814, Cortaro, AZ 85652-0814

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  Email: [email protected]

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  For Michael, who helps run all the things. This is truly the “family business” and I couldn’t do it without you. And for the readers who have helped me live this magical life.

  Chapter One

  July 1814

  Crispin Flynn came awake in throbbing, painful inches. His head burned like it was on fire and his stomach churned with bile and whatever God-awful spirits remained there from the previous night’s revelry.

  Or had it been revelry? In truth, he couldn’t remember much after the moment where he got on his horse and rode out from his home, hell-bent on drink and women and gambling and…well, utter self-destruction. None of that sounded as fun as revelry, especially not in the cold light of morning, which he could feel burning against his still-shut eyelids.

  He hesitated to open those eyes, firstly, so he could avoid that light a little longer, but, secondly, because he was never certain anymore where he would find himself after a night out. He had awoken in gutters, in his carriage, and once in the bed of an obliging duchess with whose husband he had only just avoided a duel.

  And the third reason he avoided opening his eyes was that once he was alert all the troubles of his world came rushing back, crushing him and drowning him in their wake.

  Yet he could not pretend he was dead forever, so he gingerly opened one bleary eye. He flinched at the burning light of the sun that pounded down on him from the window he faced.

  He was not in a bed, but on his settee. He recognized the brocade fabric that his mother had chosen for the chaise what seemed like a lifetime ago. He let out a sigh of relief. At least if he had managed to stumble home, he could not have done too much damage.

  He opened his other eye and swallowed back the rush of vomit that greeted him. His body would punish him for what he had done to it, but it was worth it to turn off his mind for a few blissful hours.

  Slowly, he moved, inching his way onto his back. Every muscle in his body hurt, which meant he had probably danced on a table, fallen off a horse or gotten into a fistfight. On a bad night, it could be all three. Certainly he would hear about it though if he had truly done any damage. He always did. He also always paid the tab without argument or question and with whatever semblance of an apology he could muster for the sins he committed when he was out of his right mind.

  He rolled a little further and froze. He could see his bed about ten feet away from the settee. And it was not unoccupied. A lump was under his covers. A woman-sized-and-shaped lump.

  He groaned. Now he was going to have to kick some lightskirt out of his house. Always entirely awkward.

  At the sound of his groan, the lump spun around to face him, and Crispin froze. The lady-shaped lump had the most beautiful face he had seen in years. She had bright gray eyes filled with intelligence and a slender face with full, pink lips. Her hair was red too. Damn, but it would be. He’d never been able to resist a redheaded woman who offered to perch herself on his knee.

  He sat up. “Morning, love,” he drawled, happy he didn’t cast up his accounts or pass out thanks to the wildly spinning room.

  She said nothing, but also sat bolt upright to reveal she was fully clothed in a wrinkled green gown. She pushed herself across the bed, as far away from him as she could get.

  Crispin covered his forehead with one hand and tried to maintain some of his dignity at least. He attempted a smile.

  “If I owe you blunt, you can collect it from the butler on your way out,” he said.

  Her eyes went wide at first, then narrowed to angry slits that barely revealed the sparking gray beneath.

  “I am not a lightskirt, Mr. Flynn,” she snapped.

  Crispin was distracted for a moment by the musical quality of her voice, which even when angry was probably the prettiest thing he’d heard in an age. But then he realized what she’d said in that beautiful voice, and he stiffened.

  “Aren’t you?” he asked.

  She folded her arms. “Certainly not.”

  He cleared his throat and managed to get to his feet without toppling over sideways. It seemed he had succeeded in getting himself into quite a pickle, indeed, last night. This one might be harder to extract himself from than the usual paying for a broken vase or returning a stolen phaeton.

  “Damn. See here, miss, I was deep in my cups last night and I may have said or done things I don’t recall.”

  She was watching him still, wary and seemingly ready to run. “You must think me very stupid,” she all but growled.

  He shook his head. “Honestly, miss, I do not remember a damn thing.” He looked at her a little closer. “Seeing you, I wish I did, actually.”

  Her brow wrinkled and a fetching pink color filled her cheeks at the compliment. Then she tilted her head. “Are you being truthful, then? Do you really not remember last night?”

  A sinking feeling worked its way through Crispin. A feeling that screamed he had really done it this time.

  “No,” he said softly.

  She held his gaze for a moment, as if she were reading him. As if she were determining his honesty with just a sweep of her stare. He shifted beneath the intimate quality of the exercise and then watched as she rose to her feet. She had as pretty a figure as she did a face, with a lovely bosom and the hint of a flare of her hips as her wrinkled gown fluttered around her.

  “Then I suppose I should start by saying good morning, Mr. Flynn,” she said, but did not extend her hand. “My name is Gemma. I’m your wife.”

  Crispin’s stomach churned higher and he slumped back onto the settee with a moan. “No.” He shook his head. “No, that cannot be true.”

  She pursed her lips. “I’m afraid it is very much true. We married in the middle of the night. Despite my protests.”

  Crispin jerked his stare back to her. Protests? Had he forced this woman? She was dressed now, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t. Great God, he would never forgive himself.

  “You are my wife,” he said slowly.

  She nodded, her jaw set with strength even as tears sparkled faintly in her eyes. “Yes,” she said on a gasp.

  He swallowed hard. “Gemma. Is that what you said your name was?”

  “Yes,” she whispered a second time.

  He nodded. It was a pretty name to go with her pretty face. A pretty face that seemed to entirely hate him, which gave him even more pause about what he’d done in his stupor.

  “Gemma, I need you to tell me exactly what happened last night.” He shook his head. “I need to remember.”

  Chapter Two

  One Night Before

  Crispin staggered as he retook his seat at the gaming table and set a full bottle of scotch beside him. There was a tiny voice inside of him that screame
d at him to stop. But, as always, he ignored that voice. Lately it had gotten smaller and smaller, as if his conscience was finally being drowned in booze.

  Good riddance to bad rubbish.

  He looked around the room as the cards were dealt out by another player. It was a ragged place, indeed, not like the Donville Masquerade where he used to spend his time. But he didn’t go there anymore. Not since his sister had married the proprietor just a few weeks before.

  Annabelle had sacrificed herself for him. Yet another life he had destroyed. Yet another reason to take a long, burning swig from the bottle before him. He did so with relish and then shoved thoughts of his family from his mind. He already knew how much they disapproved and likely despised him. There was no use lingering on it.

  He focused instead on the cards before him. He didn’t have a good hand, in truth, but he examined his comrades, just three other men, before he placed a bet. He didn’t know any of them well, just from gambling with them. Two were thugs, dangerous men from London’s underground, but the third was a knight or some such thing. Sir…Oswald Quinn, he believed it was? The man was always loose with his cards and lost more than he won.

  Which meant perhaps Crispin would stay a while, try his luck. He pushed some blunt into the center of the table and grinned at his companion.

  An hour later, the other two men had faded away, but Quinn had stayed and the pile of money between them had traded back and forth several times, though at present it was all on the knight’s side of the table. Crispin tried to lift his head and focus on his cards, but the empty bottle, which had now been joined by half of a second, made it harder to do so.

  “I’ll put it all in the center,” Sir Oswald said with a thin smile as he shoved the blunt in front of Crispin.

  He stared at the pile of money and back at his cards, which were spinning wildly in his hand.

  “You know I can’t call you,” Crispin muttered. “I don’t have enough.”

  Quinn leaned back in his chair, tucking his cards into his jacket pocket as he did so. He watched Crispin closely. “Yes,” he finally said, “Your lack of blunt makes it a difficult hand, doesn’t it?”

  Crispin shrugged and the movement nearly put him out of his chair. “So what do you want? My phaeton? My horse?”

  Sir Oswald laughed. “No, thank you. I’m certain they are both very fine, but they won’t get me out of a particular bind I’m currently in.”

  “Which is?” Crispin said with a hiccup. He asked only because it seemed expected that he would, not because he was particularly interested. He was more interested in ending this hand and limping home.

  “I have a daughter, Mr. Flynn,” the other man said. “Two actually, but the elder is my current problem. She was married and she…well, her husband is dead, that is all. But she wasn’t settled well and now she has become a drain on my household. Not to mention that the circumstances of her husband’s passing have made her less marriageable than she was the first time around.”

  “What do you want me to do about it?”

  Sir Oswald leaned over the table. “If you lose, you marry her.”

  Crispin’s eyes went wide. He had to be very drunk and misunderstanding. Or else this was a very strange dream. Certainly this man couldn’t be serious.

  “Marry your daughter?” Crispin repeated.

  Sir Oswald nodded slowly. “Immediately.” He leaned over and poured a drink from Crispin’s bottle. He shoved the glass toward him. “What do you say?”

  “And if I win?” Crispin asked.

  “You get back everything you lost tonight, of course,” Sir Oswald said as he motioned to the pile of blunt. “And then some.”

  Crispin downed the drink he’d been offered and tried to think. Thinking was so hard right now, but he had to do it. It was a lot of money on the table and if he was honest with himself, he could use it. The past few weeks since his sister’s marriage had been a blur of guilt, wild bets and lost money.

  But if he lost…

  But he couldn’t lose. He stared at his cards again. It was a winning hand, for certain.

  “Fine,” he said. “I’ll take the bet.”

  Sir Oswald’s face didn’t move, but Crispin saw his eyes brighten enough that he questioned his decision. But it was too late now. He set his cards down so the other man could see.

  And then Sir Oswald’s face did change. He grinned as he set down his own hand.

  With a grunt, Crispin turned his head and cast up his accounts in the nearest waste receptacle.

  Gemma stared up at the cracked ceiling above her bed, just as she had every night for the past year since she’d been forced home after the death of her husband, the Earl of Laurelcross. Once upon a time, she had stared at that crack and imagined it was a slim opening to another world, a place where fairies danced and trolls made the tea.

  Now she was older and knew the crack was really just a symptom of the nightmare that was her family circumstance. There would be no dancing fairies to come out and take her away.

  “If only,” she murmured as she yanked the pillow out from under her head and pressed it over her face. The dark warmth was comforting on some level, but she knew it wouldn’t last. At some point, she would have to come out of this cocoon and back into a very uncertain real world.

  “How did I get here?” she muttered into the pillow.

  But she knew the answer to that question. She tugged the pillow away and gulped a breath of cooler air. She was here, back in her old childhood room, living under her father’s roof and rules, because of what she’d done. She’d put herself here the moment she caused her husband’s death.

  She deserved this. This was her punishment. As were the sleepless nights, the loneliness, the anxiety that seemed to dog her every move.

  She could have gone on, chasing her faults all over the room through the long night. Certainly, she had done just that many times, but she was interrupted in her reverie by a huge crash that echoed through the empty halls.

  She jolted into an upright position and clutched her pillow against her chest. She could hear faint sounds from downstairs, muffled voices, but she didn’t know the source. Were they being robbed?

  “A foolish home to choose, since we have almost nothing,” she muttered as she got up and began to search for something in the room that would make a good weapon. She could take it to Mary’s room and wait to see if anyone would come for them when the intruders realized that there was nothing of value in the house. Her younger sister’s innocence was likely the only thing anyone could barter with.

  And Gemma would die defending that if she was forced to do so.

  She sighed as she looked at the candlestick on the mantel. It was the best she would do, she feared. Without prying the half-melted candle loose, she swept it up. She began to move for the door but was stopped by a light knock from outside.

  Did blackguards knock? They would be very polite if they did.

  “Who is it?” she asked, hands shaking as she shifted the candlestick into a bludgeoning position.

  “It’s Kate, Lady Laurelcross.”

  Gemma relaxed. Kate was her maid, though she didn’t know why the girl would come all the way through the house from the servants’ quarters if someone was robbing them.

  She opened the door and found her maid in her dressing gown, hair askew and eyes bleary with sleep.

  “What is it?” she whispered, hearing the voices more clearly now. One sounded like…

  Her father.

  Kate shifted. “I’m sorry to wake you, my lady,” her maid said. “But—but your father insisted.”

  Gemma pressed her lips together and lowered her candlestick. “In his cups, is he?”

  Kate shook her head. “Not this time, my lady, no. But he…he wants to see you. He insists that you get dressed and join him and the other gentleman in the parlor.”

  Gemma stepped back and motioned her maid into the room. “My father wants to see
me in the middle of the night?” she asked, shutting the door behind Kate and leaning against it. Suddenly the exhaustion that would not allow her to sleep hit her all at once at the thought of facing her father.

  Kate nodded. “Come, I’ll choose a dress.”

  Gemma shook her head. “I just don’t understand. And you say there is another gentleman? Who is he?”

  Her maid took Gemma’s candlestick and swiftly lit the wick. She set it aside and opened the dresser, where she found a gown.

  “I didn’t see,” Kate said as she helped Gemma change with swift efficiency. “He sent Williams to fetch me, and you know the butler keeps his lips tight.”

  “So a mystery caller, loud voices, crashing sounds. I don’t like it.”

  Kate shrugged as she motioned Gemma into a chair and swiftly pulled her hair away into a loose bun. “Neither do I, but there is little choice, isn’t there? Your father will have his way.”

  “Always.” Gemma squeezed her eyes shut. Kate had been with her a long time and she knew the truth as well as Gemma did, herself, though the servant would likely only ever say it when it was just the two of them.

  As Kate stepped away, Gemma pushed to her feet and looked at herself in the mirror. She wasn’t exactly ballroom ready, but this was as good as could be done under such strange circumstances. She could only hope that whatever awaited her, she could bear it with some semblance of dignity.

  Sometimes that was all she had left.

  Chapter Three

  Gemma stood outside the parlor, staring at the half-open door. Inside she heard her father talking incessantly, his voice rising and falling, and frowned. He only spoke like that when he was very nervous or very proud. Either one of those things, coupled with her being called here in the middle of the night, was not a good sign.