Page 13 of A Contracted Spouse for the Prizefighter

A male impersonator? Clem nearly choked on his cigar. That was a stretch. Jesus Christ, he was embarrassed for her. He had been too generous. Theodora Fields was every bit as deluded as he had initially feared.

“Miss Fields,” he interrupted apologetically as soon as he had stopped spluttering. “Standing around in a pair of silk breeches does not a male impersonator make.”

Theodora drew herself up at that. “If you would do me the courtesy of hearing me out, Mr. Dabney?” she suggested freezingly.

Very well if she was determined to make an absolute fool of herself, who was he to stop her? “Go ahead,” he said with a shrug. “Be my guest.”

“I am aware that I work better in a duo.” Well, that was putting it mildly. “And I have a new partner picked out—Mrs. Lillian Longdon. We have known each other for years so we have a good rapport between us. I think we will work together very well indeed.”

Lillian Longdon? Clem nearly spat out his cigar. She was replacing her sister’s beauty with an over-the-hill actress who was fifty-five if she was a day? He shook his head slightly. She was more than deluded. She was ready for Bedlam. “You have … er … been practicing this new act?” he heard himself say aloud. After all, what else could he say?

She lifted her chin. “We start on the morrow. I have some music picked out already and we will be easily worthy of mid-billing on your list of entertainers.”

“Mid-bill is out of the question,” he heard himself reply swiftly.

Some of the wind seemed to go out of her sails. “I … well, I suppose that was a bit much,” she conceded. “But uncle always said to aim high, so I thought …” She bit her lip. “Very well, Mr. Dabney, I would settle for bottom of the bill, so long as you give us our start.”

Clem took a deep breath. “Have you ever been to a music hall performance, Miss Fields?” he asked skeptically.

She drew herself up in her seat. “I am not so naïve as you assume, sir,” she insisted.

“That’s a ‘no’ then,” he observed.

“As a matter of fact, I have, once! My uncle took me,” she said defensively. “Though we left before the last act as he did not deem that one appropriate.” She gave a small cough. “But in any case, I have met several music hall performers over the years for my uncle’s theatrical background was quite checkered before he settled down to respectability. I have met Miss Abigail Thewston herself and she gave me many pointers and tips of her trade.”

He gazed back at her levelly. It had taken guts to come here and beard him in his den, but did she not realize that every word she spoke revealed how unsuited she was to this life? “I’m being blunt with you to be kind,” he said abruptly. “At least it’s kinder in the long run.” This seemed to give her pause and she gazed at him, her eyes very bright. He wondered if tears were threatening, and he softened his voice for her.

“I started out as a prizefighter, Miss Fields, as I told you before.” Likely, she knew even less about organized fighting than she did music halls, but he had a point to make. “When I started out, I thought I had the makings of a champion, a true great,” he confessed. “I truly thought I had it in me, but I got to a certain point in my career and looked about and realized that it just was not going to happen for me. That was when I started planning for a different future and sought out other opportunities in life. That is what you need to do now.” And that was putting it generously.

“At least you had your shot,” she said in a choked voice. “At least you came by that decision yourself, not by someone looking you over and telling you that you were not good enough to even climb in the ring. I tell you; I love the theatre. It is in my blood!”

Clem shrugged. “And my mathematics teacher loved boxing ten times more than I ever will, yet he never climbed into the ring, not even once.”

She gazed back at him. “Did he train for the ring or was he a mere follower of the sport?”

Clem removed his cigar from his mouth. She had him there. “He was a dedicated follower,” he admitted. “But you seem to forget, I have seen your act, Miss Fields.”

“No, you have not, Mr. Dabney! You saw The Faithful Shepherdess. I readily admit that I was nothing more than a prop in that role. I was not—” She grew choked. “I have not been given my chance in life to shine.”

Jesus, she was stubborn. He lit a match. “You want to learn the hard way, is that it? Ever appeared before a hostile crowd?”

“You saw my sister, what do you think?” she shot back at him.

“Honestly?” The gloves were off now. “I think you had an easy ride in life, Miss Fields, and that free ride is now over.”

She swallowed and stood up, the light dying out of her eyes. “I appreciate your taking the time to speak to me, Mr. Dabney, and your … candor.” She looked as though the words half-choked her, but she managed to get them out and thrust her hand across the table with an almost defiant look.

Clem glanced at her navy-blue glove a moment. The middle of three buttons was missing. Suppressing a sigh, he reached across and was surprised to feel her firmly grip his fingers. “Good day to you, sir,” she said with freezing politeness. “I hope you remember this moment and look back on it with the bitterest regret.”

His startled eyes met hers. “Regret?”

“For letting me slip through your fingers,” she said, so boldly it almost took his breath away. He liked them bold. If she wasn’t so respectable, he might have been tempted to pull her into his lap and kiss her, for all her plainness. Instead, he laughed and saw the ire spark in her eyes before she bolted from the room.

FIVE

He had laughedat her. Theo blinked back hot, angry tears. Laughed. And the worst kind of laughter too. At her and not with her. She hated him, loathed him. He was a smug, rotten bastard who thought he knew it all after running his tawdry dinner and show outfit for eighteen months! How dare he? she raged inwardly as she plunged down another cobbled passageway.

Her chest burned with indignation and something worse than that. Humiliation. She had offered herself to him on a platter, and he had turned his nose up. That really smarted. She knew she was no matrimonial prize, but he hadn’t needed to be so rude about it! Now what was she going to do? Lil would be out on the street with her dependents and so would poor Mrs. Cherwell and her Herbert.