Page 41 of To Sketch a Scandal (Lucky Lovers of London #4)

Warren watched Matty carefully as he wetted his lips, looked Noah right in the eye, and said, without any hint of Noah’s humor, “Yes, actually. That is exactly what I’m saying. I am in love with him. I’m glad to see you understand the situation, Mr. Clarke.”

To hear those words aloud, declared to a third party, was so warm and thrilling that Warren could barely keep from scrambling across the bed that separated them and kissing Matty right then and there.

It was also, admittedly, very embarrassing.

If he ever stopped smiling, he would have to start worrying about how he would ever live it down.

Before his joy could get the better of him, though, Noah turned a look of pity on Matty. “Oh, Detective, you poor thing,” he said awkwardly. “And has he…led you to believe that’s reciprocated? Because he’s been telling us for years that he’s incapable of that sort of sentiment.”

The very fire in the grate seemed to fizzle and chill as a shadow of possible realization crossed Matty’s face.

It was the last thing in the world Warren wanted to admit to Noah right now, that Warren Bakshi the barkeep had gone and fallen in love like they’d all said he would.

That he was a sap and a lovebird and all the other names he’d called his friends over months and years of watching them pair up and settle in comfortably under each other’s wings.

But he’d be a monster if he let Matty think, for even another second, that he’d found himself in a one-sided affair. He’d probably forgive Warren if he let Noah believe what he wanted, and explained himself later. But he’d forgiven enough elsewhere, it seemed.

Warren needed to do the right thing from the start this time around.

Finally, he crossed around the bed so he could slip a hand around Matty’s waist and look Noah square in the eye.

“I’ve let him believe it because it’s true,” he said. “I love him dearly, Noah, and it’s fucking killing me that Forester’s making it difficult for us when he’s always bending over bloody backwards to enable every other pair of lovers to cross his path.”

Noah stared at them, his amusement slowly dissipating as he came to understand that they were serious.

“You two have put me in quite a situation, then, haven’t you?” he said at last.

“Are you going to tell Forester you found us here together?” Warren asked.

“I have to,” he said, like he was stating a long-held law of the universe.

“I’ve been telling that man everything since sodding eighteen seventy.

You’ve gone and betrayed his trust, but I won’t.

That said…” He sighed. “There’s nothing he loves more than a good romance.

If I rush off and tell him like I normally would, he might respond poorly to the news. That temper, you know.”

“Oh, I know,” said Warren.

“He might just wind up the villain of a love story. He wouldn’t like that, in the long run, because you’re right—he’d prefer to enable than hinder.”

“So you won’t tell him?”

Noah came at Warren with the fan this time, poking him in the center of his chest. “ You will tell him,” he said sternly. “You will tell him tonight.”

“Tonight?” Warren balked. “No. You’re mad. I’m not telling him tonight.”

“Why not? What difference does it make?”

“How bad it looks.”

Noah smiled, catlike. “It does look bad.”

“I was already of a mind to tell him, alright?” He glanced at Matty, who nodded his testament that the subject had been bought up. “It won’t help to have you at our heels, giving us the knobstick wedding treatment with your bloody fan.”

Noah looked pleased at Warren’s metaphor and tapped said fan against his opposite palm a few times.

“You make a decent point, especially since I have to give the fan to Annabelle,” he admitted. “But you know I don’t like to keep something like this from David.”

“Not even for me?”

“For you? Warren, glad as I am to see a friend find happiness, I will tear apart ten sets of lovers to please my own without a second thought. You know that as well as anyone.”

Warren sighed. There was only one person in the world Noah Clarke willingly put before himself, and it was, unfortunately, the bloke in question.

“What if…what if David would be better off for the waiting?” Warren blurted. He had no idea where he was going with that, but Noah looked intrigued, so he tried to dredge something up from the dustiest crevices of his mind. “What if…”

He came up blank. What benefit could waiting possibly offer?

“What if we could promise you,” piped up Matty, “that it would be an exceptionally romantic declaration?”

Warren and Noah turned to stare at him. Neither had expected that polite voice to cut in. Particularly not with such an odd idea.

Noah pointed the fan. “Go on.”

Matty looked a little blank, like he’d said all he had to say already. He looked pleadingly at Warren, who scooped up the buck.

“Forester responds well to that,” Warren said, suddenly understanding where Matty was coming from. “He loves a good, sappy declaration, don’t he? Not only will he be more likely to see us favorably, but he’ll have a lot more fun with it if we make a production out of it, don’t you think?”

The end of the fan was returned to Warren, and one of Noah’s brows was reaching for the ceiling. “ You are going to make an exceptionally romantic declaration in order to convince David to let your little bobby through the doors?”

“Special Investigations detective,” Matty interjected. “I’ve never done street work.”

Noah ignored him, still focused on Warren. “You? Of all people. Our resident cynical slattern is going to make an exceptionally romantic declaration ? Here? In front of everyone ?”

Noah was right. The notion was completely out of alignment with Warren’s reputation. To stand up in the middle of the club and swear devotion after years poking fun at anyone so afflicted by sentiment would be like downing shots while he read the mail with his mother.

But Noah was ruthless. The fact that they’d scraped together a plan to keep him from blabbing immediately was no small feat. And Warren certainly didn’t have any better ideas.

“Yes,” he said. “I’ll do it.”

Noah paused, cogs turning again behind his sharp eyes.

“Fine,” he said. “You will tell him as publicly as possible, as soon as possible, and with all the sentiment you can mus ter. I mean it, Warren. I better be weeping by the end of this, if I’m going to risk angering David over it, do you understand?”

Warren rolled his eyes, trying to cover his sudden nervous reluctance. “I’ll be sure to entertain you, Penny.”

“Not just for me,” Noah clarified. “It’s for your own good as well. I don’t want to keep something from him over nothing, and it will take a very convincing love story once he hears you’ve been sneaking around behind his back.”

Warren crossed his arms, indignant. “When you insist on putting it that way—”

“Is it not that way ?” Noah challenged. “Is there some other way that it is, Warren? Because sweet and fun as it may seem from your side, you are going against explicit instructions that were put in place for member privacy and safety, putting us all at an enormous security risk. And something tells me today’s not the first time you two have done it. ”

He knew better, by now, than to try to bluff on Noah Clarke’s watch.

“Your spin must be proportionate to your betrayals,” Noah went on.

“If it’s not, he will not listen to you.

And if he does not listen to you, he’s going to be furious with me for colluding on it, and he’ll have every right to be.

If you do not genuinely try to move him—either because you don’t actually care for your detective that much, or because you prove too proud to do it right—we will both be in a lot of trouble.

And I will make sure, as first lady of The Curious Fox, that if he doesn’t sack you immediately, you’re going to wish he did. Is that clear?”

Matty looked alarmed, but Warren couldn’t help a half-smile.

“You’re bloody terrifying, anyone ever tell you that?”

“Why, yes, I get that one regularly,” said Noah, adjusting his hat. “Can’t thank you enough for noticing, amore .”