“Devil.”
That was what the man had to say. The curt, nonsensical insistence she refer to him as his awful sobriquet. She most certainly would not.
Evie spun on her heel and commenced pacing.
“Nineteen.”
She turned back to him. “You are counting the number of times I have paced the floor?”
He stared at her with those insolent blue eyes that saw too much and made her tingle in places she had not previously known existed. He said nothing.
Somehow, his silence was a greater rebuke than his words.
“You refuse to answer me until I refer to you as you wish” she guessed next, irritated. “I do not want to play games with you, sir.”
He grunted.
She gritted her teeth, commencing her pacing.
“Twenty.”
That was it.
She pivoted and stalked toward him. Evie did not halt until she was near enough to thrust out her forefinger and poke him in his big, hard chest. “Stop. Counting.”
Two pokes, one for each word. Emphasizing her point.
He raised a brow and said nothing, mocking her without uttering a syllable.
Her finger lingered against his chest, and it occurred to her belatedly that he had somehow shucked his coat. He stood before her in shirtsleeves and a waistcoat only, the cravat at his neck scarcely knotted. In a word, he looked disreputable.
And delicious.
No! Decidedly not that.
She banished the unworthy thought immediately. The warmth emanating from him seared her fingertip. She cleared her throat. Forgot why she was still touching him. His scent was richer at this proximity, tiny flecks of green visible in his bright eyes. Her gaze dipped to his mouth, which was full.
Fuller than Lord Denton’s. She did not think she could recall her betrothed’s lips just now. Oh, bother.
“Like what you see, milady?”
His mocking query filled her with mortification. Her cheeks were scalding. She withdrew her finger. “No. I am horrified by it. You are a dreadful, uncouth beast, sir.”
One corner of his lips quirked. “Didn’t seem horrified.”
She was staring at his dratted mouth again. And being insolent. He had cleaned her wound when she had been injured. His balm had appeared to stave off infection and was aiding in her healing. She had not required stitching after all, much to her relief.
But Evie was still in a dreadful mood. Her life had been disrupted. Upended. Her reputation was in every bit as much danger as her life. If word of her sojourn in this Grosvenor Square townhome ever reached anyone, she would never survive the storm of scandal. Diamonds of the first water did not disappear for a fortnight with the sole accompaniment of a lady’s maid and one of the East End’s most feared criminals.
“Milady?” he prompted, his voice still mocking.
What was it about him? Why could she not seem to look away, to walk away?
She sniffed. “As a lady, one must hide one’s true feelings. Undoubtedly, that is why I do not seem horrified by you. However, rest assured that I am.”
The other corner of his mouth lifted. “If you say so, milady.”
His scent was coiling around her now. Much as she imagined a serpent would. She had to put some distance between them. “No more counting, Mr. Nothing.”
Once more, he declined to respond, simply watching her with that mocking smile on his sensual lips.
On a huff, Evie turned and resumed her pacing.
“One-and-twenty.”
She whirled back to him. “I did not finish my twentieth pace. How can we now be at one-and-twenty?”
He cocked his head. “Devil.”
“What is your true Christian name? No mother would name her child Devil.”
“You do not know the woman who birthed me.”
That was a decidedly strange manner to refer to one’s mother, she thought. His jaw had tightened. A sensitive subject, she sensed. Hmm. Interesting. His intellect and his mother. Twin weaknesses from the monster of a man who was to haunt her every day. She would save the knowledge, lest she needed it.
“I wish to read,” she announced, deciding a change of subject was in order. “There is no need for you to remain here.”
“I stay where you are.”
She glared. “You cannot be where I am at every hour of the day.”
“When I was not, you were shot.”
“No one knows I am here.”
He shrugged. “We hope.”
Her stomach felt as if it dropped to the floor. “What was the meaning of the five carriages, if not to confuse anyone who could be watching?”
“It is early to tell if we were followed. I saw no sign of it, but nothing in life is certain.”
Evie frowned. “That is a grim view of the world, sir.”
“A truthful view.” Another shrug of those impossibly broad shoulders.
Her gaze dipped to his chest. To his throat. To his jaw, shadowed with a fine layer of whiskers. Back to his lips. She wondered for the first time why he was so quiet, so solemn, so jaded. What had happened to Devil Winter in his past to make him the man he was?
Then she wondered why she cared.
Most certainly, she should not. Thinking of him at all was dangerous. As was lingering near to him. And yet she did.
They stared at each other, at an impasse.
“I do not wish to be here,” she said.
He raised an inky brow, saying nothing.
Fair enough. He had made his opinion on the matter clear as well. Some of her irritation with him faded. He was not the source of her ire. Indeed, mayhap he was every bit as trapped as she was.
“You have more of a choice than I do,” she countered, as if he had spoken aloud.
Sky-blue eyes burned into hers, unwavering. “You do not know my brother.”
“Nonsense. Gentlemen possess all the power. A man can be anything he wishes, go anywhere as he pleases. A lady, meanwhile, is held to the strictest of standards.”
“Not in the rookeries.”
His world was different from hers. The reminder nettled more than it should. She was suddenly acutely aware of her own life as the daughter of a duke. She had been raised without thought of anyone who had less.
“What is it like there?” she ventured, curious in spite of herself.
He grunted.
Apparently, she had reached the limit of his goodwill. Either that, or Devil Winter did not like to speak of his past.
“I am going to read,” she announced. “You may as well. Take your pick. There is no end of books here.”
He said nothing, merely watched her.
On an irritated sigh, she turned away from him once more.
“Twenty.”
This time, she carried on, stalking to the wall of books opposite her. The man was maddening. Vexing. Infuriating. She was not sure if she ought to be amused at his return to twenty in his counting of her pacing or incensed. Evie settled for somewhere in between the two as she searched the endless spines before her, looking for a book to suitably distract and entertain. He had not joined her, of course.
But she felt his eyes upon her back, burning into her, watching.
Her finger drifted over a volume of Shakespeare just as an unsettling conclusion occurred to her. Two subjects had pierced Devil Winter’s armor. His intellect and his mother. He could count, but was it possible he could not read? She had no notion of what the education of a young man in the rookeries would be. Her sister’s husband could read, but that did not necessarily mean Devil could. They had not shared the same mother, after all.