Darling Beast (Maiden Lane 7)

gave her a look. “You’re right clever, hinney, but you’re no Shakespeare.”

“Hmm.” Lily bent back to her play. Wantonish sounded like a perfectly lovely word to her—quite sly and suggestive, rather like the heroine of her play. Just because no one had thought of the word before now didn’t seem like a good enough reason not to use it.

She dipped her quill in the inkpot and wrote another line: “A Wastrel might indeed be wantonish but he’d surely not be wastefulish as well.”

Lily cocked her head, eyeing the drying ink. Hmmm. Two imaginary words in one line. Best not tell Maude.

Someone knocked on the theater door.

Both Lily and Maude paused and stared at the door, because that had never happened before. Granted, they’d lived at the theater for less than a sennight, but still. It wasn’t the sort of place most people happened by.

Lily frowned. “Where’s Indio?”

Maude shrugged. “Went out to play right after luncheon.”

“I told him to stay close,” Lily muttered, feeling a faint twinge of apprehension. She’d walked around to Mr. Harte’s rooms the day after she’d met Indio’s “monster,” but the man had been ridiculously adamant that the hulking brute couldn’t be moved from the garden. None of Lily’s well-reasoned arguments had persuaded the stubborn man and in the end she’d been forced to come away again, quite unsatisfied. Fortunately the mute hadn’t ventured near the ruined theater since. Unfortunately Indio had acquired a strange fascination with him. Several times the boy had disappeared with Daffodil into the garden, despite Lily’s dire threats regarding pudding and little boys who didn’t mind their mothers.

She sighed as she rose to get the door. She was going to have to speak to Indio again about his “monster”—always assuming her son emerged from the garden.

Lily pulled open the door to find a man dressed in a violet suit standing without, his back to her as he surveyed the garden.

He turned and she was dazzled by his alarming prettiness. He had bright-blue eyes, long chocolate lashes, cheekbones sharp enough to cut glass, and a soft, curving mouth that she really wasn’t envious of. And to top it all off—as if to prove Providence really, truly wasn’t fair—he had guinea-gold hair, smooth and curling perfectly.

When Lily had been a very small girl she’d prayed every night for golden hair.

She blinked now. “Erm… yes?”

He smiled. Lethally. “Have I the pleasure to address the illustrious Robin Goodfellow?”

Lily straightened and raised her chin, employing her own smile—which, she had on good authority, could be quite devastating. Lily Stump might occasionally have bad posture, might have hair that wasn’t gold and sometimes wasn’t perfectly arranged, might in the dark of night have fears and self-doubts, but Robin Goodfellow had none of those things. Robin Goodfellow was a very popular actress who was beloved by all of London.

And she knew it.

So Robin Goodfellow smiled with just the right amount of impishness at the very pretty man—and by God made him blink.

“You do indeed,” she said throatily.

A spark of admiration lit within his gorgeous blue eyes. “Ah. Then may I introduce myself? I am Valentine Napier, Duke of Montgomery. I was informed by Mr. Harte that you resided here and I thought to make your acquaintance.”

He swept the lace-trimmed black tricorn from his head and bowed low, holding his stick in the other hand.

Behind her, something clattered.

Lily didn’t turn to see what Maude had dropped. Instead she inclined her head coquettishly and dipped into a curtsy. “I’m most pleased to meet you, Your Grace. Won’t you take a dish of tea with me?”

“I’d be honored, ma’am.”

Lily pivoted and exchanged a significant look with Maude. They hadn’t planned for such a contingency, but Maude was an old hand in the theater and knew well the art of a false facade. “It’s such a lovely day. We’ll take our tea in the garden, Maude.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Maude said, immediately assuming the mask of a perfect servant.

When Lily looked back, the duke was eyeing her speculatively. “Isn’t it a bit cold for tea outside?”

She didn’t so much as narrow her eyes. He knew damned well why she wouldn’t let him in the wretched theater—she wasn’t about to parade her lowered state of affairs before him.

“La, Your Grace, but I like the fresh air. Of course should you prefer a stuffy indoor setting—”

“No, no,” he demurred, a gleam in his eye.