“A pencil,” he repeated flatly.
“Exactly,” she said with an enthusiastic nod that sent drops of water flinging from her wet hair. Dark tresses with a thousand shades of brown to them. “How else was I to write down the remedies for Mr. Bram?”
The remedies? . . . Mr. Bram?
As a boy avoiding street lords determined to make him part of their gang, and escaping the cold, he’d taken to hiding inside various Covent Garden theatres. A number of kindly actresses and actors had taken mercy on him and let him hide above the rafters, high above the stage and the audience, watching from afar. This moment, with Verity Lovelace, felt a good deal like one of the many farces that had played out before him.
Malcom jammed his fingertips hard against his temple. What in God’s name was happening here?
“I understand why you’re angry,” the young woman murmured in soothing tones better fit for a child. “You’re upset I was snooping, and I’d have you not take it out on Mr. Bram.”
Malcom’s self-control broke. “His name is not ‘Mr. Bram,’” he bellowed. The lady jumped several inches off the floor. “His name is Bram. Just ‘Bram.’”
She paled. Her body trembled. She did not, however, back down. “You needn’t be so angry about it, my lord,” she shot back, her breathless timbre ruining whatever courage she otherwise displayed.
My lord.
There it was again.
Malcom sneered. “You’ve made the mistake of confusing me with someone who is safe. And why is that, hmm?” He caught the ends of several dark strands that hung, twisted and tangled, down her back. Twining the curls about his fingers, he held her effectively trapped. “Because you take me for an earl?”
The blood slipped from her cheeks, leaving them an ashen hue. “Release me,” she whispered, resistant through and through.
He didn’t relent. “Because you, like all the world, believe those men are fine and good and no harm can befall you as long as you’re with one of those vaunted lords?” Malcom twisted the lock once more. “You believe the title ‘earl’ affixed to a man’s name somehow erases who he is.” Who I am. Malcom lowered his head until their brows touched and their eyes were aligned. “What he is.” He placed his mouth close to hers; their breath mingled and danced. “Well, if that is the case, you’re about to be disappointed, Verity.”
They remained locked in silence, warring with one another.
Malcom’s gaze dipped to her mouth. To those provocative lips that existed in a perpetual pout and, because of it, flayed his logic. Desire took on a lifelike energy, crackling and hissing like ten thousand embers that burnt in a hearth.
Then she darted the pink tip of her tongue out, hers a siren’s temptation. “Are you the Earl of Maxwell?” she repeated.
“And if I am?” he countered, unable to look away.
“Then I’ve been searching for you.” There was a lilting quality to her words as she spoke, a lyrical singsong, pure and unsullied by the dirt-clogged streets, and it heightened the reminder of all the ways in which this woman, this stranger, was different. And it was because of that maddening pull she had over him that it took a moment for him to hear that admission.
“You’ve been searching for me?” All his defenses went up, swiftly dousing the maddening haze of lust that had clogged his damned senses.
She gave a hesitant nod.
Oh, the bloody fucking irony! He tossed his head back and erupted into a harsh, guttural laugh. He’d stumbled upon one of those bastards seeking him and his story. At numerous points, he could have been on his way and free of her. But not once but twice, he’d gone back to the blasted termagant’s side, and then brought her into his residence.
And at last, the minx edged away from him, displaying a belated but justified fear.
“What do you want?” he asked flatly, unfurling so that he towered over her more diminutive frame.
She backed up another several steps.
Did fear send her retreating? Or the need to look him directly in the eyes? He’d known the minx for barely four hours, and he’d wager the life he’d built as a tosher that it was, in fact, the latter.
“My name is Verity Lovelace,” she began.
“You said as much,” he said icily. “What were you in search of? Handouts?”
She sputtered, “Of course I didn’t come looking for charity. I work for The Londoner.”
“The Londoner,” he echoed, dumbly. Oh, God in the heaven he didn’t believe in.
This time, they are reporters with newspapers . . . And according to the people talking, they’ve begun searching the sewers for you . . .
Impossible. She couldn’t—
“It is a newspaper.”
“I know what The Londoner is, Miss Lovelace,” he snapped. “And I’d hardly call it a newspaper. It’s nothing more than a gossip column.”
By the slight pout of her lips, she took umbrage with his opinion, and yet this time, the damned virago managed to retain control of her usual obstinacy. She cleared her throat. “Although I disagree—”
“You have two minutes.” And then he was tossing her out on her deliciously rounded buttocks.
Verity cleared her throat again. “Yes. As I was saying, I work for The Londoner.”
“What manner of work do you do there?”
The woman bristled. “Do you find it so hard to believe that a woman would have honest employment?”
“A fine one like you?” He flicked a finger at the puffed sleeve of the gown he’d given her. “With your fine speech and lily-white, unblemished skin, I’ve you marked as a lady.”
She swatted at his hand. “First, my garments should not factor into any assessment of me. I’m merely wearing them because you destroyed mine and provided these. Secondly . . .” A pretty blush blossomed on her cheeks. “I’m not a lady.”
“Some fancy lord’s by-blow, then?”
The color flamed several shades of red brighter. “We’re not talking about my past, my lord,” she said between her teeth.
Ah, he’d struck a nerve. Invariably, he discovered his opponent’s vulnerabilities. Verity Lovelace was no different. Not in the ways that mattered. “So that is it, then? Hmm?” And the gaze she leveled this time upon his chest was so direct it ran through Malcom. Sightless, unseeing.
She held her mouth with such tension, white lines formed at the corners of her lips.
“Tell me this, Miss Verity Lovelace,” he whispered. “What makes you think you’ve the right to probe into my life, and yet insist on privacy and secrets for yourself?”
“My life is of no interest,” she said, her voice so hushed he had to lean close to make out what she said. “But yours? Yours is a tale of injustice and wrong and—”
“Do not presume to make your efforts out to be any sort of social crusade,” he hissed, and Miss Lovelace tripped over herself in her haste to move away from him. “What you are in search of is gossip, is it not?”
“No. Yes.” She wetted her lips again.
“Which is it?”
“Both,” she elaborated. “There is, of course, a desire for society to learn about your identity, and additionally, it would do well for the world to see that Polite Society is not so very—”