Page 26 of One Night with an Earl

She started from the masculine voice. She stood just as Oliver walked from around a hedge. The glass slipped from her fingers into the grass. Every fiber of her body warned her against him. With great effort, she depicted an ease she didn’t feel.

“If you are searching for Lady Penelope, she is inside, in the ballroom, my lord.”

“I’m well aware of her whereabouts since I just left her after our dance. But I suspect you know that, don’t you?”

“Pardon?”

“I admit you are quite good. I didn’t suspect you during my first visit to Lord and Lady Malvern’s home.”

“There must be some mistake—”

“Even during that boring ride in Hyde Park, I had an inkling about you but dismissed it as implausible. But I’ve learned never to ignore my instincts, and when I saw you again tonight, my eyes were fully open, and I knew.”

“I don’t know what you are talking about, my lord. Perhaps you have indulged in one too many glasses of champagne.”

“The dowdy gowns and that hideous lace cap are a brilliant disguise, Lady Scarlet.”

Her breath stalled in her throat. He knows! Was there any sense in denying it any longer? He looked at her the earthy way a man should never look at a lady.

But she wasn’t a lady any longer. Those days were a distant memory. She’d reinvented herself as Miss Gardner, and no one, not even the Earl of Drake, would destroy everything she’d worked so hard to obtain.

She raised her chin. “I’ll deny it to my dying breath.”

His lips twitched. “I never thought you would stand on this bench and announce it to the world.”

“Good. So we have an understanding.”

“No. We do not. You were a very difficult woman to find. You should know I returned to the Silver Chalice the day after we met.”

He had? If he went to such trouble, then did that mean their night together meant more to him? How much more?

Was he fascinated that she’d been a virgin? Or was he furious he had been duped into believing he’d spent the night with an experienced ladybird only to learn she hadn’t been employed at the brothel after all? Either way, she was at risk.

No, the truth, the real truth, was cleverly hidden. She attempted to calm her racing heart. He could not know who she truly was—the daughter of Lord and Lady Woodbridge, a woman of mixed race who’d once been on the fringes of society. Someone whose family name was sullied by her father’s suicide. He only knew her as a chaperone, a little miss nobody, a woman far beneath his station.

She faced him, her fingers knotting in her skirts. “Why bother to return to the Silver Chalice at all?”

He took a step closer, his movements smooth and confident. “Why? I’ve asked myself the same question a thousand times over. I did not lie when I said I don’t frequent brothels. I attended the brothel that night out of obligation, then I saw you and everything changed for me. Our evening together was entirely unexpected. Even more unexpected is that I wanted to spend one more night with you.”

She blinked. “My lord, I—”

“Imagine my confusion when Madame Crescent wouldn’t tell me anything, and I was left to my own devices to try and find you. Then to my complete surprise, I discover you’re a companion to Lady Penelope.”

Fear surged through her, and she grew more frantic. He may not know everything about her, but he still had the ability to destroy her. His father had taken everything from her family, his older brother had insulted her in the worst way imaginable, and now Oliver would finish her.

And she’d unwittingly chosen him to be her lover.

Of all the rotten luck.

“What do you want, my lord?”

“I told you. I thought to share what we had once more, but then I discovered your identity as a chaperone. I no longer know what to think. You were a virgin. Why choose me?” He leaned close, very close, until she could feel his warm breath on her cheek. Her pulse quickened, and despite everything between them, every damnable and painful fact about the past, a tantalizing tingling began in the pit of her stomach. What was wrong with her?

Her heart leaped in her breast. “I told you then it was of no consequence.”

Beneath the light of the moon, his gaze darkened, and she’d feared she had foolishly provoked him.

“I do not agree, madame. It is of consequence to me. I do not make it a common occurrence to deflower ladies. Nor do I like to be made a fool of,” he said.