Chapter Four
He really was the most disobliging man she had ever met.
Julia sniffed, then immediately wished she hadn’t. Though Almack’s was not the paragon of perfection, as so many of the ladies in Society pretended, it was at least clean.
The same could not be said for the Almonry Den.
But then, Donald would undoubtedly say that it was her own fault for coming. She hadn’t been able to stay away. Three days at the most, then Julia had stained and ruined a perfectly good cushion after losing track of her teacup only that afternoon.
“Oh, Julia, attend!” her mother had scolded, whipping the offending teacup from her hands. “I do not know what has got into you lately, you barely paid any attention to the Dowager Duchess of Chantmarle! Have you forgotten your deadline—you must find a husband by Easter or I—”
“Will find one for me, yes,” Julia had been forced to say. Then smile, apologize, and pretend her mind wasn’t two miles away, far from the respectable Mayfair, and instead…
Julia smiled nervously at a man sitting down the bench, gawping at her. “Good evening.”
The man continued to gawp.
She could not blame him. It was rare enough for a woman to be here, thought Julia as the growing crowd’s voices started to echo around the large hall. It was even less usual for a woman to be here on her own.
Which she wouldn’t be, if not for her disagreeable brother.
“Donald, where are you?” Julia muttered under her breath.
It really was too bad of him. Why, he had agreed only a few hours ago to meet her outside the Almonry Den, and she had waited for near twenty minutes.
At least, it had felt like twenty minutes.
Despite asking her mother for a pocket watch, or something that would help her tell the time while out and about, her mother’s outraged face had been sufficient a reply.
And so she had come inside.
Which had not felt rebellious at the time. After all, Julia told herself as the stands started to fill up with no sign of Donald, it was surely less ladylike than standing outside in the dark as though…
Well. As though she were a lady of the night.
But now she was seated here alone, she started to realize how delicate her situation was.
A woman. A lady, a lady of her social standing… alone. At a boxing ring.
Julia bit her lip. She would not admit her brother had been right, not even if she had to suffer the indignity of being gawped at by all around her.
Anything to have the chance to see—
“I thought you wouldn’t heed my advice,” said a dry, deep voice. “I don’t know why I thought you might.”
Julia’s stomach curled with delight. There, standing just along the row, with his hands in his coat pockets and a wry smile on his face, was—
“Lawrence,” she said, trying to keep the delight firmly from her tones. “Why, I did not think to see you here.”
It was a lie, of course.
Try as she might, Julia had not yet plucked up the courage to pay someone—a maid perhaps, or one of the footmen—to discover more about the mysterious Lawrence Madgwick.
Where he went. Where his rooms were, though the very thought of discovering such a thing made shivers rush along her bones. Where he frequented, other than the Almonry Den.
And so, Julia had been forced to return here. The only place she could be sure she would see the handsome young boxer.
Never mind he was entirely the wrong sort of person for her to be associating with. Never mind her mother would undoubtedly shriek if she saw the state of his nails.
Never mind she’d had a wild dream last night, filled with the scent of Lawrence, and heat, him saving her from a terrifying thing she could no longer remember now…
No, her memory was crowded only with sensations. Touches.
“Where else would I be?” Lawrence said heavily, sitting beside her on the bench.
Julia swallowed. He was close. Too close. Closer than any gentleman, even the few who had wished to gain her affections.
Mr. Lister had been the boldest. He had once sat on the same sofa as her, ignoring her chaperone. At the time, she had thought it outrageous! No man should be that brazen with a lady.
Now Julia wished Lawrence was closer. The fabric of his breeches was touching her gown. Something prickled her skin, making every inch heightened, as though…as though something was going to happen.
“Where’s that brother of yours?”
Julia swallowed. It was imperative she give no indication of how rattled she was.
“Donald?”
Lawrence nodded. Julia tried not to look at the way his stubble was starting to meet his sideburns along that sharp jawline.
Tried. It was difficult not to, seated as they were.
She took a deep breath with the intention to reply but was overcome by his scent. Dear God, she had never smelled a man like this. All others had been gentlemen, not men of the lower classes. Not men who earned a living with the sweat of their brow.
Lawrence was a man who worked with his hands.
Despite everything she knew a lady should be, Julia glanced at his hands, brought together and resting between his knees.
She swallowed. Hands she had most definitely dreamed about. It was all rushing about to her now, the way he had held her—
“Jules?”
Julia smiled weakly. “I like it when you call me Jules.”
A sharpness returned to her eyes as she realized what she had just said. Goodness, if she was not careful, she would start to have a reputation.
Not that there was a single person at the Almonry Den who would find themselves at Almack’s.
Stifling a smile at the thought, she spoke more firmly. “Donald. Yes, I thought he would be here to meet me. He did promise, but I have a terrible feeling his gaming hell has distracted him.”
Julia thought, on the whole, she should be congratulated for speaking of her brother’s disreputable habits so calmly. Their mother always hushed her voice whenever debts appeared in crisp white envelopes.
But Lawrence did not seem concerned. “You still should not be alone, though. You should return home, back to civilization.”
There was a dry wit to his words that made Julia smile. “I’m not alone though, am I? I am with you.”
She had not intended to speak so companionably to a man she knew nothing about, a man she had only met above a week ago.
But there was something about this Lawrence Madgwick. Something that settled her spirits yet drove them to distraction at the same time. Something that made her feel safe and right on the edge of adventure.
“Yes, I suppose you are,” said Lawrence quietly, the crowd around them roaring as the first two combatants stepped into the boxing ring. “But how do you know you are safe with me?”
Julia shivered. Whether it was the excitement of the crowd, the heady presence of the man beside her, or the remnants of her dream slipping into her mind, she did not know.
Whatever it was, she knew she was absolutely not safe with Lawrence Madgwick.
“I don’t,” she breathed, her gaze catching his own. “That is what makes it so exciting.”
Lawrence said nothing, merely looked at her, as the referee bellowed the names of the two men who had stepped into the ring.
At least, Julia thought that was what he said. She could not tell.
Lawrence. A man she would never have met in the polite drawing rooms she spent her days frequenting, a man who knew what it was to fight and strive and work hard.
Julia swallowed. She had to be careful.
A slow smile crept across his handsome features. “You are rebellious, Jules, if you do not mind me saying so.”
“And you are bold to say so, which suggests you are just as rebellious as I,” Julia said, hardly daring to take another breath.
He laughed. “Bold?”
Julia nodded. She never would have dared to speak in such a way to one of the servants, and she supposed they were the same class as Lawrence.
But then, no one was the same class as Lawrence. He was in a class all of his own.
“I think you are,” she said, trying to hold onto her nerves as the fight began and those around them cheered.
Lawrence nodded slowly. “Yes, I suppose I am, though not why you think.”
“You take your life into your own hands every time you step into that ring,” Julia pointed out.
This was madness. She should not be having a calm conversation with a boxer, in the Almonry Den! She should go home, berate Donald later for refusing to make their rendezvous, and never think of doing something so unruly again.
So why was she almost glued to the bench?
Lawrence laughed dryly. “My life?”
“You’re certainly putting it on the line. I heard Donald once talking to our butler about a boxer who lost all his senses after a particularly dangerous fight.”
It was the wrong thing to say.
Lawrence raised an eyebrow. “Your butler?”
Julia cursed her lack of thought, but it was too late to take back now. Besides, it was clear as day to anyone by the silk of her gown and her impeccable taste that she came from money, and not just good money, but old money, too.
“My butler,” she said, refusing to back down from her position. She forced herself to meet his eyes, though her heart skipped a beat as he smiled. “I am not ashamed of who I am.”
“And nor should you be,” came his quiet reply. “Still, you must admit you and I come from very different worlds.”
There was a teasing smile playing on his lips. Julia found it rather difficult to look away once she had noticed. They were full, kissable—
Now where had that thought come from?
“Different worlds, perhaps,” she said quietly. “But I imagine we have far more in common than may appear on the surface. Looks can be deceiving.”
A cheer went up around them. Julia turned hastily to see that one of the men in the boxing ring had fallen to the ground. There were excited exclamations from a man behind them, who had evidently won a great deal of money.
When she turned back to Lawrence, he was smiling—and this time he did not appear to be teasing.