PROLOGUE
LONDON, 1816
Archer Tierney was a despicable arsehole, the sort of cull who would as soon stick a knife in your back as smile to your bleeding face. The tongues wagging about him in the East End claimed he’d killed his own mother with his bare hands for stealing from him. It was no secret that those who owed Tierney funds and failed to recompense him found themselves paying instead with their blood.
He was also one of the last men who had seen Logan before he’d vanished. The need to find out what had happened to his beloved brother, despite Tierney’s hang gallows reputation, had brought Hart Sutton to the devil’s lair.
He ground his molars and held still as one of Tierney’s minions searched him for weapons. He’d brought none. He was many things, but fool wasn’t one of them. Meeting Tierney on his own territory, without a blade or a pistol to protect himself, did not exactly set him at ease. But it was necessary if he wanted an audience.
The scarred guard patting his trousers, coat, and boots straightened, apparently having satisfied himself that Hart was indeed defenseless. “Tierney will see you now.”
Hart nodded, then grimly followed the man as he led him down a shadowy corridor to a door. Three subtle knocks were delivered in quick succession.
“Enter.”
The guard opened the portal and looked to Hart, nodding toward the threshold.
He stepped inside, keenly aware of the man at his back, but willing to take the risk. He had no other choice. Each day that passed without knowing what had become of his brother was akin to a dagger in the heart anyway.
Tierney stood by a window, hands on his hips. He was dressed in black, nary a hint of lightness to be found on him, not even in his neck cloth. His eyes were twin obsidian discs, glittering in the low light.
“Sutton,” he greeted, unsmiling. “What do you want?”
“My brother,” he said, venturing just deep enough into the chamber that he could hold a conversation, but not too near.
Tierney was like a serpent, ready to strike. Lethal.
“You’ll be needing to specify, Sutton. You’ve a lot of damned brothers.”
“The only one who’s missing,” he elaborated, clenching his jaw as the lingering pain, never far from the surface, shot through him. “Logan.”
“Can’t say I’m familiar with the name,” Tierney replied smoothly.
“You’re lying.” Hart maintained his calm, despite issuing the accusation.
Tierney’s mask of cool confidence slipped, and his lip curled in a sneer. “Careful, Sutton. I don’t like being called a liar. I’ve killed men for lesser slights.”
Hart had no doubt the villain had. But he also knew Tierney would not dare to start a war with the Suttons. Not because of battered pride. There would need to be greater provocation, and Hart would give him none.
He inclined his head. “Let us be honest, Tierney. I know you trade in tipping the cole to swells who need blunt to fund their gambling debts.”
“Indeed.” Tierney strode slowly forward, almost as if he were engaging in a leisurely stroll. His accent was well-educated, suggesting he had not always dwelled in the bowels of the East End among thieves and molls as he did now. “As far as I am aware, you and your family are responsible for providing those poor swells with a place to lose all their funds. We are, in a sense, business partners.”
It rankled Hart to be placed in the same league as a coldhearted villain like Tierney. But there was no sense in arguing the point.
“I’ve been told you saw my brother the day he disappeared,” he said instead.
Tierney stilled. “By whom?”
He was not going to surrender his secrets. “It ain’t important.”
“It is to me.” Tierney’s tone was laden with lethal promise. “I make it my business to know which coves are leaky and which can be trusted.”
Hart had no doubt of that. Nor did he doubt that the poor culls who could not hold their tongues found themselves with the blade of one of Tierney’s henchmen in their sides.
“And I make it my business to use leaky coves to my advantage,” he countered.
Tierney’s expression was hard, his nostrils flaring in a brief sign of displeasure. “If you won’t tell me, then I won’t be helping you.”
Hart knew that revealing the source to Tierney would only lead to the source being killed. But even had he wanted to reveal who had told him about Tierney and Loge’s meeting the day Loge had gone missing, he could not do so.
“I overheard it at The Beggar’s Purse,” he said.
“Convenient,” Tierney quipped. “The home of drunkards, whores, and fools. Tell me what was said.”
“That Loge was seen with you,” he answered swiftly. “I want to know what he was doing here and why.”
Tierney smiled. “No one comes to me with demands, Sutton.”
He was not going to cower. Archer Tierney did not scare him. Nothing and no one did. He was determined to find out what had happened to his brother.
Hart raised a brow. “I just did.”
“You’re either exceedingly brave or stupid,” Tierney said, strolling to his desk with the slow, deliberate motions of a predator assessing its prey.
“Mayhap a bit of both,” he acknowledged. “But I want answers about what happened to my brother, and I’ll not leave until I have them.”
Tierney extracted a sheaf of what appeared to be vowels from his desk, dropping them to the surface. “I’m willing to help you, Sutton. For a price.”
No price was too great to pay for his brother’s life.
“Name it,” he said without hesitation.
* * *