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those who sought to cheat without resorting to violence. He himself had taught them the knack of intimidation by suggestion, a skill he’d been forced to perfect through his early years in the business.
    The den, in Soho, a recent acquisition, was having difficulties coming up to scratch in the matter of adhering to his standards of play; he had from his first foray into managing gambling establishments instituted a policy of no cheating, no card sharps, no weighted dice. In all his establishments, the house played fair—one of the principal reasons gamblers of all stripes flocked to his doors. His ironclad rule, backed by an inflexible will and an iron fist where necessary, had at first been regarded as a ridiculously naive ploy . . . until the results had started to show.
    Ten years later, those few others who owned gambling establishments in London knew that to compete with his premises, they had to provide the same uncompromising guarantee . . . which very few could.
    After due deliberation, he sent the den’s manager off with a flea in his ear, then called in one of his gambling specialists, an unprepossessing little man who could spot a cheat with remarkable and unerring accuracy. After dispatching Bowen to monitor the den for the next week, he spent half an hour with Jordan working out limits the exceeding of which would instantly trigger another, more urgent, review. Between Jordan’s financial vetting and Bowen’s practical vetting, Roscoe felt confident that if the den did not swiftly rectify its problems, he would be in a position to do so.
    The problem at the hell, off the Strand, was more disturbing, but more easily dealt with. Two female staff leaving from the back of the building in the early hours had been attacked. They’d managed to scream and guards from the hell had come to their rescue. Roscoe consulted with his bodyguards, Mudd and Rawlins, then dispatched them to hire additional men to monitor the alleys surrounding the hell sufficiently to ensure the female staff were safely away every night.
    Very early in his career, he’d realized that women were far better dealers and bankers; a very large percentage of those who ran his tables were female. As he reiterated to the hell’s manager, keeping his female staff safe and happy to work was critical to generating income; to drive the point home to the manager, his male staff, and the females concerned, Roscoe arranged to have several of the large, well-trained men he kept on retainer step in for a time to oversee the new recruits.
    By late afternoon, his desk was clear.
    Jordan gathered up the ledgers, saluted, and left.
    Roscoe waved Tomkins in in Jordan’s wake, then slouched back in his chair, stretched out his legs, and relaxed.
    His mind wandered . . . throwing up an image of a face far less striking than Jenny Edger’s, yet infinitely more riveting. Large hazel eyes under finely arched brown brows, a straight, no-nonsense nose, a mouth a trifle too large yet with lips luscious and full, pale, flawless, peaches and cream skin, brown hair glinting honey and gold, and a firm yet feminine chin, all set in an expression that held too much seriousness, too much . . . unrelenting sobriety.
    Why he should feel that he had no idea, but his instincts were rarely wrong.
    Why he was sitting there thinking about Roderick’s sister was an even greater mystery.
    Banishing the image, shaking free of the compulsive spell—the impulse to learn more about something he didn’t understand—he sat up and opened the center drawer of the desk.
    Extracting the latest missives from his family, one from his mother, the other from his sister-in-law, both delivered that morning, he briefly debated, then opened the packet from Caroline. After reading her brief note, he unfolded the enclosed report from Eton. Reading that made him smile.
    Setting those sheets aside, he opened the slimmer missive from his mother, one of her usual brisk communications bringing