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Chapter Thirteen
How many songs she’d played, Chastity wasn’t certain. She’d been lost to playing music for the first time in far too long. However, she knew as soon as he moved close. It didn’t even take a glance sideways for her to feel him there. She twisted her head marginally, allowing her fingers to continue dancing over the keys whilst the patrons sang along—some well, some less so.
Her heart stuttered when she met his gaze.
Valentine.
What was he doing here? How had he found her?
Chastity’s cheeks warmed, then cooled quickly when she noticed how deep his scowl was. Fury radiated off him. No doubt a scolding would be coming for her attempt at meeting with the Harpers. Well, he might technically be her employer but no man owned her movements, and no man ever would again.
Lifting her chin a little higher, she turned back to the piano and signed off with a final song—the most rowdy and crass one she could think of about a sailor and his lover. She only knew it because Aunt Sarah had been singing it under her breath many, many years ago and Chastity had begged to hear it. It was not the sort of a song a young lady should know.
And precisely the sort of song to infuriate an already incensed earl.
When the song was finished, she stood and curtsied with a mocking flourish while everyone clapped.
Valentine stomped immediately over. “Enough of this nonsense. Come with me.” His voice growled right above her ear, so low it made her stomach twist in the oddest of manners.
She should be furious too. He shouldn’t speak to her in such a way.
A broad, artificial smile in place, she walked away from her adoring fans and followed his broad shoulders out toward the bottom of the stairs that led to the lodgings. His hair looked more mussed than usual if that was possible, as though he had been shoving his hands through it. His jacket was crumpled too.
Once they were away from prying ears, Valentine whirled on her, his dark gaze digging deep into hers. “I suppose you think you’re clever, traveling here when I expressly forbade you to do so.”
“And I suppose you think you have a say in my movements when you do not,” she responded through clenched teeth.
“You are under my roof.” He jabbed a finger at her.
“Not right now.” She glanced at the rickety beams above.
His gaze narrowed. “Of course you would be so glib. Do you not understand what I thought? You could have been set upon—robbed, taken or even damn well killed. What kind of fool woman—”
“I am a grown woman,” she interrupted. “Not a child and certainly not a fool.” She gestured toward the taproom where a new song emanated through the thick brick walls, the tune a little more clunky than her own. “I can look after myself.”
“You are the daughter of a duke. You have no business—”
“The daughter of a duke who has been entertaining everyone at this inn for a good hour or so.” She would not admit that the first half an hour of her arrival here had been uncomfortable indeed. Despite her simple clothing, she’d drawn the attention of many patrons. Playing on the piano seemed a good way to occupy herself until the promised arrival of a man who could aid her with the broken wheel.
“I thought you dead.” His jaw ticked, his nostrils flared. “You should never have come here.”
“Well, I am quite well, as you can see.” She gestured down herself.
“I can see.” His gaze grew darker, but the lines in his brow didn’t soften and the tension running across his rigid shoulders remained. “I can see all too well.”
Her throat threatened to close over. Her fists were still tense balls, her breaths came hard. How dare he speak to her in such a manner? She was not some naïve little child in need of a telling off.
But when he looked at her so…
They stood so close together that she felt the body heat roiling off him. He stared down that patrician nose at her. Something stirred deep inside her, and she had to resist the urge to press her palm against his chest, to trace her fingers along his scruffy jaw and into the silky, graying curls at the nape of his neck.
“Um.” A serving girl slid between them. “Excuse me,” she murmured before slipping through into the tap room.
Chastity jerked back. What was wrong with her? Any longer alone and she might well have jumped upon him and begged him to take her here and now. Loneliness had been the last thing on her mind since John’s death but for the first time ever, she missed the touch of a man.
Not just any man, though. For some reason, she longed for Valentine’s touch.
She clenched her teeth. She was not supposed to be attracted to this man. They didn’t even get along. He thought her spoiled or silly or something. She wasn’t going to correct him. Let him think what he wanted—she knew the truth.
