Robin Schone by Gabriel's Woman (10 ebook reader TXT) 📕

for five pounds, not one

hundred and five.

Sudden recall smashed through Gabriel’s consciousness: of a French maison de rendezvous instead of

an English night house; of a woman in luxurious purple satin instead of a woman in a dark, worn cloak.

Twenty-seven years ago the madame had sold his virginity for two thousand, six hundred and sixty-four

francs.

One hundred and five English pounds were equivalent to two thousand, six hundred and sixty-four French

francs.

The woman could only have gotten her information from two men: Michael or the second man.

Gabriel did not doubt for one moment from which of the two she had gained her knowledge.

He manually cocked the revolver with his thumb.

“ ’Ere now!” Malice unveiled a female prostitute’s Cockney origins. “Ain’t no fish bladder worth one ’

undred five pounds, dearie!”

Light and shadow jittered in a burst of masculine and feminine laughter.

The cloaked woman did not laugh.

Did the second man?

Did he train a revolver on Michael while Gabriel aimed his pistol at the woman, or did the cloaked

woman slowly squeeze the trigger of a gun through her reticule, unaware of her fate?

Had the woman come to kill an angel... or had she come to distract one?

“I assure you, madam,” the woman coolly returned, “my maidenhead does not come from a fishmonger.

I am indeed a virgin.”

It was possible.

Circumstances forced chaste, educated women out onto the streets, just as it did gay, uneducated ones.

It was of no consequence.

A weapon wielded by a virgin was just as deadly as one wielded by a streetwalker.

Curved metal cradled Gabriel’s middle finger.

“Then remove the cloak, girl, and show us what you’re selling,” Lord James Ward Hunt, earl of Goulburn

and home secretary, crudely challenged.

Gabriel did not spare him a glance.

In the candlelight, the man’s greased hair shone like black oil.

Shadow turned red into black.

The woman’s blood would shine like the home secretary’s hair.

“I see no reason to exhibit myself, sir,” the cloaked woman calmly rejoined. “It is not my body that is of

value, but my virginity.”

Shock halted the remaindering snickers.

Whores desiring purchase did not refuse to show their wares.

Gabriel knew that because he had been a whore for over twelve years.

Dressing. Undressing.

Enticing. Seducing.

Sex had seemed a small price to pay for food and shoes and a bed to sleep in. In the beginning.

In the end he had fucked merely to prove that he wasn’t the whore he had been trained to be.

The second man had proved him wrong.

“By jove, she’s got bottom!” Gabriel focused on the woman instead of the newly elected parliament

member who spoke. “I’ll give you twenty pounds, eh, what?”

“A woman’s virginity is her dowry,” the cloaked woman said evenly, body turning away from Michael

toward the parliament member. The change of position revealed the dark object she clutched: it was a

reticule, not a weapon. “Is that all that a woman’s maidenhead is worth to you, sir? Twenty pounds? Would

you sell your daughter—or sister—so cheaply in marriage?”

Disapproval turned the tide of masculine interest.

Male or female, prostitutes did not compare their worth to those of the ton.

No matter how high of a price their flesh commanded.

Trilling laughter sliced through the candlelit darkness.

An English gentleman and a London prostitute climbed up the plush red-carpeted stairs that edged the

saloon, black coattails flapping, bustled silk gown sashaying.

They had reached an agreement while sipping vintage champagne; their flesh would seal the bargain in

an upstairs bedroom.

Gabriel’s body coiled to fire the Adams revolver while the heat and the scent and the sound and the sight

of men with women squeezed his testicles.

Gabriel did not fear for his own death this night.

That would come later.

Watching Michael die would be his punishment; death would be his reward.

For the pain, for the pleasure...

“I will give you one hundred and five pounds, mademoiselle, for your... innocence,” volunteered a silky,

masculine voice.

Electric awareness tightened Gabriel’s scalp.

When he had last heard that voice, it had spoken fluid French instead of clipped English. There was no

mistaking who it belonged to: the second man had bid on the cloaked woman.

Black and white movement slashed through his peripheral vision.

Gabriel’s head reflexively snapped toward his right, heart pounding, left hand steady, the waiting over.

A man in a black dress coat leaned across a white silk tablecloth. Blue and orange fire flared between a

blunt cigar and a tapered candle. Gray hair shone in the dual play of light, disappeared in a wreath of

smoke.

He was not the man who had bid one hundred and five pounds.

He was not the man whom Gabriel would kill or be killed by.

A distant bong penetrated the wood, the glass, the throbbing sexuality and the pending death that the

House of Gabriel was built from: Big Ben announced one hour, two, three . . .

“I bid one hundred and twenty-five pounds.”

A balding pate shone like a gibbous moon above gleaming gold studs.

“I bid one hundred and fifty pounds.”

Teardrops of fire ricocheted off crystal and glinted off dark hair.

“Mein Got.” Baron Strathgar shouted from the middle of the saloon. His round face was dark from

alcohol, his German accent heavy with excitement. “I bid two hundred pounds.”

The feel of Michael’s keen alertness squeezed Gabriel’s chest while the second man’s anticipation fisted

inside his stomach.

Low murmurs rose to a dull cacophony, the sound of two hundred voices raised in conjecture.

An auction