Page 27 of In Bed with the Earl

“Now,” he said coolly, “you’re not the one asking questions. Are we clear?”

Fighting still for a proper breath, Verity managed nothing more than a nod.

“Now.” He lowered her arms but still kept them wrapped in a manacle-like grip, one with a shocking amount of strength, and yet there was also a gentleness to it that belied any criminal intent. Or was that merely hope and wishful thought on her part? He turned her back so that Verity faced him. “Who are you?”

“V-Verity Lovelace.” Her voice emerged hoarse from fear and the useless fight she’d put up against him. She pressed her eyes briefly closed. All the while trying to put disorderly thoughts to rights. To plan her escape. To answer his questions.

The stranger released her. “Miss Verity Lovelace,” he murmured, bringing her eyes open.

Another gasp burst from her; he had his dagger in hand, casually angled at her chest.Flee.She arched forward, poised for flight.

“Uh-uh.” Her captor had perfected the cheerfully delivered threat. “I’d advise against that.”

He’d end her. She saw the promise of her death reflected in those gold eyes.

“Now, what were you searching for,MissVerity Lovelace?” Verity had been jeered and mocked the better part of her life for her birthright alone. This stranger before her, however, was the first who’d managed to gibe so perfectly with a single syllable. “Or ...” He did a sweep of the tunnels. “Is there a husband whom you are here on behalf of?”

“N-no. There’s no husband.”

“A client?”

A client? And then the meaning of his question hit her. “No.” The denial burst from her, that indignation preposterous to her own ears, given that he was a thug of the streets with a clear intent to kill, or at the very least harm, her. Even so ... “I’m here of my own volition.”

He slid closer; his stealthy steps barely stirred the water around them. “And what were you searching for?”

Not a “what,” but rather a “who.” And yet, less was more. She knew better than to reveal too much about her purpose here. Shivering, she huddled in her soaked cloak. “Sli-slippers,” she whispered.

He angled his head, setting the long knot of hair drawn at his nape to fall over his shoulder.

At the piercing, unasked question, Verity lifted first one foot and then the other. “I’ve lost them. They are my s-sister’s.” Her voice broke. For it was easier in this moment to focus on the idea of returning home with Livvie’s footwear missing than the fact of her current interrogation at the hands of a stranger who oozed lethality.

He was coldly implacable. “And yet, something drove you into the sewers to risk your sister’s slippers.”

It wasn’t a question but rather an observation doled out by a man who was as clever as he was well built. As such, Verity set her mouth. To hell with him. To hell with his questioning. And her patience—with him, and with every man who made it their mission to suck control from her—snapped. “Are you going to kill me?”

His mouth moved, but no words slipped forward, and knowing that she’d knocked him off guard strengthened her. “Cut me with your knife?” Lifting her heavy hem above the water, she marched forward. “Rape me and leave my body to rot?”

The stranger scraped a disdainful stare up and down her frame, clear in his gaze what he thought of her body. “I don’t rape women,” he said frostily, not disputing the former charges she’d leveled.

And every last bit of gooseflesh upon her body that hadn’t already been on end from the frigid water soaking her through stood.

Her courage flagged, and when she again spoke, she forced a strength she didn’t feel. “What is it to you if I’m in these tunnels?”

“Sewers,” he said flatly.

Yes, she knew where they were.

The stranger touched the tip of his knife to the clasp at her throat; she sucked in a breath, braced for the thrust of that dagger—that didn’t come.

“And it matters. The reason you are here matters very much, Miss Loveless.”

“Lovelace.” It was an inane correction to make, given that she was one wrong utterance away from being stabbed through the heart.

His gaze sharpened on her face, one that searched for insolence? Or was it her secrets he sought? Or mayhap both. And with an intuitiveness born of the need to survive, Verity knew she’d never leave these sewers unless he had the information he sought. “You were correct. I was ... I am searching. I’m desperate.”

“Your sister,” he ridiculed, as though Verity’s caring about anyone were foolhardy and a folly.

But if Verity drew her last breath alone in this pit of hell, she’d own that her every action, her every decision in life—including this very one now—had been with Livvie in mind. “My sister,” she said quietly, and for the first time since she’d let herself fall the six feet into these tunnels, a calm settled over her. “I’ve lost employment. My apartments will follow. And our survival depends on my being here amongst the toshers.”

---