Heart Burn (29 page)
Heat flared from her throat to her hairline. “Your eyes were pointed at
me
, sir,” she said, trying hard to sweeten her tone. “And since
my
eyes are in perfect working order, I do not think I was mistaken.”
He sighed and looked briefly heavenward as if seeking a sign. “I wasn’t watching
you
, I was watching your companion.”
The sound of her vanity bursting momentarily filled her ears. Her heart dipped. It really was her own silly fault to have assumed he had been staring at
her
. She was hardly the sort of woman to inspire a man like him to spend his afternoon looking at a stranger.
She tucked a stray lock of hair back into her hood. “Style? But why?”
He hesitated, just a little, then said, “I want to join his company.”
“Lord Hawkesbury’s Players? As what?”
He shrugged. “In any capacity. And it seems, madam, that you have helped my plight.”
She didn’t believe him. He didn’t even know Style was the manager of Lord Hawkesbury’s Players until she’d told him and now he wanted to work for Style’s company? She wasn’t a fool.
But why lie? What did this man have to hide?
And what had she got herself into by using him?
Whatever it was, it seemed only fair that he now use her. That would teach her not to think her schemes through properly before opening her mouth.
The stranger rubbed his stubbly chin, lost in thought. “Are you going to see Style again about your play?”
“Yes.”
“When and where?”
“Why?” A sense of foreboding congealed in her stomach.
“Just answer the question.”
“What if I don’t want to?”
“Then I will follow you and tell your father or husband or whoever is head of your household that you have been consorting with theatrical types.”
Her jaw hurt. She forced it to move so she could say: “Consorting?”
“They can put their own interpretation on the word.” He blinked lazily.
Min wanted to scratch those too-blue eyes out, wanted to punch him on the chin like an insulted man would. But she wasn’t a man, and he wasn’t like any man she’d encountered. “Is your name Lucifer by any chance?”
His cheek twitched. “No.”
She spun round and strode off, hating God, the devil, and whatever witchcraft had sent this man to her.
Walk away. Walk far away from him now.
Yet she couldn’t. Not entirely. If he was to go to Style and tell the manager he did not write the play, her last hope would be dashed and it would be Ned Taylor for her.
“I’m meeting Style here tomorrow at this time,” she shot back over her shoulder. By then she would be fully recovered from this girlish folly.
Her dramatic exit was ruined when he fell into step alongside her. “To make our ruse seem authentic,” he said, “we’d best exchange names. I’m Blake.”
A fat drop of rain exploded on her nose and she swiped it with her sleeve. “Is that a first name or last?” she said, flipping up the hood of her cloak.
“It’s what you can call me. And you?”
More drops fell. She picked up her pace and headed for shelter. The overhanging upper stories of the houses and shops lining the narrow street provided perfect cover for London’s fickle weather. The paved surface quickly became slippery and little rivulets began to trickle between the stones, bringing with it mud, horse dung, and refuse from nearby Leadenhall Market. Min kept her gaze down and dodged the worst in her haste to reach dryness.
Suddenly a solid arm circled her waist and jerked her back into an equally solid body. “Watch it,” Blake murmured in her ear. A barrel-sized man stumbled past, too intent on his wineskin to notice anyone or anything in his path.
Min looked once again into the eyes of her savior. No, not her savior. She really must stop thinking of him as that.
But he
had
just saved her from being knocked over and landing on her rear in the muck. And he was staring at her again, this time with an odd expression that she couldn’t decipher.
She smiled tentatively and placed a hand on the arm that still held her snugly against his body. Beneath the leather doublet, she could feel thick muscle. Or was it padding? It was hard to tell so she squeezed. Definitely not padding.
He let go of her waist and smoothed a wrinkle out of her coat at the shoulder. His thumb brushed against her throat in a movement so exquisitely gentle it made everything inside Min stop. Her heart, her breath, her thoughts. Every part of her focused on that thumb and the way it caressed her, moving from her throat to her jaw to her lower lip. It tickled but there was no way she would pull back, no way she would break the touch. She couldn’t. She was in his thrall.
A strange hush surrounded them. She could hear nothing except his light breathing, see nothing except his face, so intent on his task. It was as if they were floating inside a bubble; the outside world became irrelevant. It was quite simply magical.
Then Blake did something unexpected. He smiled. Not a full, beaming smile but more a twitch of one corner of his mouth. It was accompanied by a derisive curl of his lip and a soft grunt. He was sneering. He removed his hand and the bubble burst.
She swallowed and pressed her fingertips to her mouth but it didn’t feel the same. Didn’t have nearly the same effect.
He cleared his throat and lifted an eyebrow. She let her hand fall and tried to concentrate on not looking like a silly female who’d never been touched in quite the way he’d just touched her. Even though she hadn’t. Nor would she again, a small insidious voice inside her said. Not if Ned got his way.
Raindrops splashed off Blake’s shoulders and plastered his hair to his face. “You should watch where you’re going,” he said.
She huddled into her cloak but it was too thin and had too many holes to be effective against the damp. “Min.”
His gaze shifted to her. Water dripped from the ends of his hair and lashes. “Pardon?”
“You can call me Min.”
“Min.” She thought he would ask her about her name but he didn’t. He bowed slightly. “I’ll see you here tomorrow, Min.” He turned back the way they’d come, his stride leisurely compared to the few remaining people who scurried like ants to get out of the rain.
Min raced off in the opposite direction, resisting the urge to look back at him. She wouldn’t give into temptation. She still had enough self-control to resist the blue-eyed Lucifer.
Her resistance lasted all the way to the corner where she weakened and snuck a peek.
Blake was gone.
***
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