“Anything.”
“You won’t tell anyone who I am.”
Which name was forbidden? Titan (his Lyon’s Den name), Lord Lucifer (his boyhood nickname), or Luke (his real name)? It didn’t matter. Elliott would not be party to deceiving a man’s family. “Your brother is my friend. Your whole family is in hell wondering if you’re—”
“They think I’m dead. They’ve accepted it.”
“But you’re not!” Elliott took a step forward. “And your mother definitely hasn’t—”
“Believe me, she has. Or if she hasn’t, she’s praying that I stay away.”
“That isn’t true.” But then Elliott remembered his summer at Wolvesmead Castle. Luke’s mother had never been a warm woman. She had a critical eye, a sharp tongue, and an unrelenting anger toward her eldest son. Elliott never asked the reason for it, but he couldn’t deny it. “Think of your brother, then, and your father.”
Luke’s head dropped, and he began picking at the guitar again. “Find someone else,” he said over the plunking notes.
Elliott stood there a while, too aware that he had no other options. He still tried to find a different way. He pulled up an old stool and squatted down on it as he tried every manipulative technique he knew. He employed reason, wielded guilt, even took a stab at patriotism. None of it worked. In the end, he gave in to Luke’s demands. Diana was worth the sacrifice, though he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was betraying one of his oldest friends in order to save his sister.
“Very well,” he conceded. “How quickly can you start?”
“Immediately,” Luke said as he set aside the guitar. “But you can’t have them call me Titan. You can’t mix your sister with the Lyon’s Den.”
An excellent point.
Luke grabbed his hat. “Call me, Mr. Lucifer.”
Elliott snorted. “Don’t be ridiculous. Mr. Dunderhead would be more fitting.”
Luke grabbed a pair of knives and slipped them into unseen pockets. “You never understood the intimidation of a good nickname.”
Very true. Names meant nothing to him, and a nickname was less substantial than smoke. Still, he trusted Luke to know his business, and if that meant calling him Mr. Lucifer, then he would oblige. Besides, Elliott was anxious to get back to Amber and didn’t want to waste the time to argue. “Take whatever alias you like so long as you’re there tonight to protect Diana.”
“From Geoffrey? My pleasure,” Luke said. Then he smiled in a way that seemed truly Satanic. “I shall keep her as safe as a vestal virgin.”
Elliott opened the bedroom door with a snort. “You’re mixing mythologies, you know. Greek, Christian—”
“Vestal virgins are Roman.”
“Fine. Roman and Christian.”
Luke adjusted his clothing, his body limber despite his ruined hand. “We can make plans as we take your chariot to Diana’s temple.”
“Good God, when did you become so fanciful?”
“I gave up reality when forty-eight thousand men died at Waterloo.”
Elliott winced. “I thought the number was twenty-three thousand.”
“Is it any less horrendous because the other twenty-five thousand were French?”
No, it wasn’t. Every man had a mother, and every death marked a loss. In the end, Elliott had nothing to say but, “I’m sorry.” He had not fought in the battle. He had not seen the blood, smelled the gore, or heard the screams. He was not haunted as Luke so obviously was. But he could still grieve the destruction even as he lay the blame fully upon the Corsican emperor. “Thank God it’s over.”
“Is it?” Luke challenged.
No, it wasn’t, but that was why Elliott was working so hard to get his resolution passed. He needed to end the misery for so many, including the newest member of Diana’s household --Mr. Lucifer.