Page 33 of Three Weeks with a Princess
Drat. Shehadbeen avoiding him, and not simply because she didn’t want to reprise their argument. Their disastrous kiss in the library at Stonefell had been the most mortifying moment of her life. How could they ever get back on the old footing with something like that hanging between them?
“I’ve been very busy,” she explained. “The theater will open with a new program in only two days. It’s been a madhouse.”
“So I see,” he said, casting a dark look around the room.
Some of the plasterwork was a little worse for wear and the paint was a bit faded, but it was in better shape than some of the shuttered rooms at Stonefell. Her stepfather had plans to renovate the entire backstage area, but that would have to wait until they were making a profit. So far, all his efforts had gone into refreshing the galleries, boxes, and public areas of the theater. The Pan was now almost as elegant as the big theaters in Drury Lane.
“Now that I’ve finally got a moment of your time,” Jack said with gentle sarcasm as his gaze returned to her, “may I comment that your behavior has been nothing short of reckless? First you lied to me by feigning illness, then you ran off to London on the mail coach, of all things. What in God’s name prompted such foolishness, especially after I told you that I would take care of you?”
Lia carefully folded the costume and placed it in her workbasket. Then she crossed her arms over her chest and stared at him. “You can’t think of one thing that would make me bolt?”
He flushed a bit. “You were the one who kissed me, not the other way around. It wasn’t as if I had designs on your virtue, pet—quite the opposite, in fact.”
“Yes, you made that abundantly clear,” she said coolly.
He slapped a hand to the back of his neck, rubbing it as if it pained him. In the process, he knocked off his hat.
“Dammit,” he muttered as he stooped to retrieve it. “All right, let’s leave aside the issue that you apparently resent the fact that I refuse to take advantage of you. And let’s also defer for now any discussion of your precipitous, nay, insane departure from Stonefell.”
“Thank you, my lord,” she said with sugary sweetness. “I’m ever so grateful.”
Jack looked as if he might have to pry his jaw open to continue. “I understand that you might wish to visit your mother, but working in a theater? Did I not already point out the risks of such a venture to a girl in your position? You might as well send out invitations to every rakehell in Town.” He swept another disdainful glance around the room. “This place is barely one step up from a brothel.”
She scoffed at the exaggeration. “The Pan is nothing of the sort. My stepfather is a well-regarded theater manager and this is a legitimate, respectable establishment.”
“So respectable that the females in the company apparently scamper about in an advanced state of undress.”
“Not at all. I was simply fitting Amy’s costume. It is a common occurrence in a theatrical troupe and no one thinks twice about it. Goodness, Jack, when did you turn into such an old miss?”
He shook his head. “I’m the furthest thing from an old miss one can imagine. But I know very well how men think about actresses.”
“You have no cause to worry. For one thing, I’m the theater manager’s stepdaughter and the leading lady’s daughter. And I’ve found the men in the company to be very protective of the women. A theatrical troupe is much like a family, especially when they have an excellent manager like Stephen Lester. I couldn’t be safer than if I was in my own bedroom in Bluebell Cottage.”
As Jack set his hat down on the large worktable beside the bits and pieces of costumes and a stack of programs for opening night, Lia let her gaze slide quickly over his body. He had always been a handsome man, but now he was something more—he was a marquess, and he carried himself with an understated but formidable masculine power. Although never a dandy, his clothes were beautifully tailored and had an air of elegance that befitted his new status. As Marquess of Lendale, Jack might have his financial challenges, but no one could doubt for a second that he belonged in the rarified atmosphere of the beau monde.
Suddenly, she was painfully aware of her plain round gown, now several years out of fashion. It was good enough to work in but certainly not good enough to attract the notice of a man like him. What a fool she’d been to think she could.
“I do worry because you are far from safe,” he said. “This building is a maze of poorly lit corridors and grimy little rooms, as far as I can tell. Anything could happen to a young woman wandering around so ramshackle an establishment. Especially at night.”
“Did you tour the building on the way to see me?” she asked sarcastically.
“Because the front door was locked, I was forced to come around to the back through that exceedingly dank alley. Which, by the way, I forbid you ever to go into by yourself.”
Despite her irritation, Jack’s concern warmed Lia enough to smile. “Surely you must have seen that we have a man at all times at the stage door. He doesn’t let just anyone in, you know. My stepfather is very strict about that.”
“He let me in,” he replied.
“No doubt because you obviously told him that we know each other.”
“Yes, and he thought I was your lover,” he said with disapproval. “When I disabused him of that notion, he then made the assumption that I was ‘sniffing around Miss Lia’s skirts.’ He made a feeble attempt to prevent my passage, but I was able to bribe my way in.”
Lia felt her shoulders go up around her ears. “I’ll have to speak to my stepfather about that.” She’d had her doubts about the fellow who manned the stage door during the day. He was a rather disreputable-looking character who tended to leer at the dancers and actresses.
“And while you’re at it, why don’t you also tell your stepfather that you’re going to give up this mad scheme and return to Stonefell, where you belong?”
Lia pulled out one of the chairs from the worktable and wearily subsided into it, ignoring the alarming creak of the old spindles. “And what has changed that would make such a thing possible? Have you discovered some previously overlooked annuity or a forgotten inheritance? Perhaps one fell out of a secret drawer in your desk or a priest’s hole in the wall?”
“Even though we’re in a theater, we’re not living in the pages of a melodrama, Lia,” he said quietly.
