Perhaps break all contact with her.
He strode toward Heath Grenville, drawing him aside. “I have a job for you.”
“Name it,” Grenville replied without hesitation.
The future baron was known throughout the ton as a solver of problems. He could not be taxed with the conundrum of Julian’s suddenly wavering self-control, but he could investigate another matter for him.
Julian kept his voice low. “Find out who she is.”
“Don’t you know?” Grenville answered in obvious surprise.
“I know her name,” Julian said. “The night butler will give it to you when you are out of range from eager ears.”
Grenville nodded. “Understood. What do you want me to find out?”
Julian pushed away all thoughts of the softness of her body, the heat of her kiss. He almost hadn’t recognized her tonight. Not because she was wearing an Elizabethan costume, but because she wasn’t wearing herusualdisguise. Something was not right.
He found it difficult to trust others under the best of circumstances. He would not allow himself to be gammoned because of a pretty face.
“Start with whether that’s her real name,” he said. “And then find out everything you can. If she has an ulterior motive, I need to know it. If she has a secret, uncover it. I want to know everything.”
“I’ll need a little time.”
“You’ll be compensated handsomely for speed.”
“Very well.” Grenville inclined his head and disappeared into the night butler’s vestibule to speak to Fairfax.
Only then did Julian allow his gaze to travel back to the marble staircase.
She was gone.
Chapter 9
The warm spring sun fell on the back of Unity’s bare neck as she stepped off of the pavement and into a bustling outdoor market. Vendors surrounded her, some shouting in front of fruit or vegetable stands, and others threading through the crowd, hawking posies or oysters from baskets like the one Unity carried.
Hers was empty, just like her larder. Between the long days at the theatre and the long night at the duke’s masquerades, she’d been too busy to think of much else. This morning when she broke her fast with her last egg and the final hunk of stale bread, she knew she could escape the real world no longer.
But, oh, how she yearned to! She wished she were shopping not for her small shelf in her apartment’s shared pantry, but for the future masquerade-themed assembly rooms she would one day open.
She was tired of being frugal and conservative and quiet. Everyone complimented her on being so resourceful, on finding a way when there was none, on turning scraps into something more. But who wanted to live like that?
“Soon,” she murmured as she threaded her way through the crowd.
Was that true? She hoped so. The dream of not just being financially secure, but the owner of a thriving establishment she could be proud of had filled her every thought for so long, and had given her much-needed hope on countless bleak days. It was her favorite fantasy to dream about, the picture she painted in her mind at every opportunity—
Or, at least, ithadbeen.
It still was! It definitely still was. It was just... A certain duke had begun to creep into her thoughts more and more. Pah. He was nothing more than a temporary distraction. A distraction who hadkissedher. There could be nothing more distracting than that!
And their embrace was just theatre. He’d walked away from their kiss—walked away fromher—like an actor hanging up his wig after a performance.
Unity should know. She’d seen it thousands of times. Ordinary people became Hamlet or Joan of Arc for three hours but returned to their true selves as soon as the curtains closed.
Lambley played two roles: Magnanimous Host and Irresistible Rake. She’d merely been caught at the intersection last night on the stairs. An accident of proximity. The audience demanded a kiss, and so he had kissed her.
No—he had kissed Lady X, not Unity. A nameless, faceless figment of the crowd’s collective imagination. They hadn’t wanted him to kissher. They didn’t know or care who the person was beneath the mask. They just wanted a show. It wasn’t personal.
And she was a professional, too, was she not?
