don’t particularly like.”
“Where?” Alex turned her head.
“Don’t look,” he hissed. “I’m hoping he didn’t notice me.”
She returned her gaze to what lay in front of her. “I’m hoping no one notices we’re staring at a blank wall.”
“Very well, have a look. But be casual about it. At the far end of the gallery. The shorter fellow compensating by means of an absurdly tall hat.”
Alex turned in place, trying her best to look aimless about it. Although she wasn’t certain it looked better to be aimlessly turning in circles than to be staring at a blank wall.
As she completed her circle, she caught sight of the man Chase had described. Her stomach churned.
“Tell me he’s not looking this way,” Chase mumbled.
“He’s looking this way.” Which meant Alex wanted to pick up her skirts and sprint in the opposite direction.
“Reynaud?” The voice carried from the other end of the gallery. “Chase Reynaud, is that you?”
Chase cursed under his breath. “No escaping it now.” He turned and raised his hand in a halfhearted greeting. “That’s Sir W—”
“Sir Winston Harvey.”
“You know him?”
“I set the clocks in his house for three years.”
“Then you know he’s insufferable.”
Her skin crawled. “Oh, yes.”
In the distance, Sir Winston began taking leave of his current conversational partner—the quicker, presumably, to make his way down the length of the gallery to them.
“I’ll go to the girls,” Alex said. “They’ve moved on to the Grecian marbles.”
“No, stay.” He tugged her to his side, drawing her hand through his arm. “If you’re here, he won’t regale me with tales of his sordid brothel adventures. He seems to think I’ll be impressed.”
“I’d rather go with the girls.”
“What did he do?” He must have caught the tense note in her voice. “Tell me.”
“It was mostly just leering,” she whispered. “A pinch or two. You know, the usual.”
“The usual?”
“The usual for him. Chase, it was years ago. He won’t even recognize me. Just let me go.”
But it was too late. The man was upon them now.
No escape.
Chase had never been one for committing acts of violence. He wasn’t opposed to a bit of vengeance, but somehow the opportunity had thus far eluded him. He always seemed to show up too late, after the damage was already done.
That was not the case today.
“Reynaud, you old cur. Haven’t seen you about the clubs much of late.” Sir Winston’s attention slid to Alex, and he raked her with a lecherous gaze. “Good to know you’re still in fine form. Who’s this?”
“I’m just the governess,” Alex quickly volunteered.
“You are not just the governess,” Chase corrected. “You are not ‘just’ anything.”
“Well, of course she’s not ‘just’ the governess.” Sir Winston gave him an unsubtle wink. “They never are, are they?”
Chase clapped the man on the shoulder, as if in appreciation of a good joke. And then, turning his back to the room, he drove his fist into the leering blackguard’s gut.
Sir Winston’s hat skittered across the floor.
The man himself was doubled over and groaning. “What the devil was that for, Reynaud?”
“You owe Miss Mountbatten an apology.”
“An apology for what?”
“For insulting her today, to begin. And for taking liberties with her in the past.”
“In the past? For God’s sake, man. What are you on about? I’ve never laid eyes on the chit in my life.”
Alex ducked her head, evading the gaze of the other museum-goers. She murmured, “I told you he wouldn’t remember.”
“But since you mention it,” Sir Winston said jovially, “I wouldn’t mind knowing her. When you’re done with her, send her my way.”
The man reached to pick up his hat.
Chase stomped on it. He held the man’s gaze as he slowly and meaningfully lowered his boot, crushing the tower of felted beaver to a fuzzy burnt pancake.
There, you bastard. Try compensating with that.
“Apologize to Miss Mountbatten.” He growled the words through clenched teeth. “Or by the gods of the Egyptians, I will pull your brain out through your nose and stuff you in that sarcophagus for the next three thousand years.”
Sir Winston knew when he was bested. He straightened and bowed. “My apologies, Miss Montbarren.”
“Mountbatten.”
“Miss Mountbatten.”
Once they’d watched that bit of human refuse depart the gallery, they collected the girls and left the museum. Rosamund and Daisy protested the hasty departure. While they waited on the carriage, Chase bribed them with oranges from a boy selling them on the street.
At home, the girls raced upstairs to mummify Millicent. Chase strode into his study. Alexandra followed him, closing the door after her and turning the key.
“The nerve of that blackguard.” He jerked off his gloves and slapped them against the edge of the desk. “I’m sorry if he upset you.”
“Perhaps Sir Winston Harvey upset me, but what you did was more humiliating by far. You made me a spectacle.”
“Hold a moment. I’m not the villain here. That bastard deserved everything I gave him, and more. My only regret is that he had but one hat to crush.”
“It’s all about your pride, isn’t it? Did you pause to consider my feelings at all?”
“Your feelings were my foremost concern. How dare he speak to you in such a manner. As if you were my—”
“Mistress?” she supplied.
That
