Page 37 of Earl of St. Seville

How did the pair know anything about her plans? She’d only discovered the fight and set her course an hour prior.

“I am certain Father would delight in knowing where—and with whom—you will be spending your evening. However…” Valor’s words trailed off as he tapped at his chin in thought.

“However, if you were to allow us to escort you to the match, then it would benefit all three of us,” Merit finished triumphantly.

The devils were planning to blackmail her.

The scoundrels.

“How so?” Patience took a step back from her brothers.

“Well, you shall have chaperones”—He gestured between himself and Valor—“and we will make a pretty shilling if we hedge our coin on the right fighter. Father cannot reprimand you for your choice of evening entertainment if we accompany you.”

Her muscles tensed with uncertainty and more than likely a healthy bit of disuse from her earlier activities. If she allowed the pair to accompany her, they would note her connection to Sin; however, if she denied them, her brothers would more than likely follow her anyway and possibly tattle on her to their father.

How could she arrive to collect Sin with Merit and Valor in tow?

The alternative was missing the pugilist match altogether, but she’d promised St. Seville she’d be there. And though she’d seen firsthand how much he’d improved after only one lesson, Patience shuddered to think of the fighter Sin would face with a prize as grand as fifteen thousand pounds.

Reluctantly, Patience nodded. “Very well, I will permit you to accompany me to the fight; however, what I do and whom I speak with is my business only. Neither of you”—She pinned both men with her hardest stare—“will even so much as utter a word about my activities to Father.”

Merit slapped his thigh before clasping Valor on the back, both whooping with excitement.

“The pair of you are incorrigible,” Patience huffed. “The fight is five days hence. Be ready at eight o’clock that evening to depart. Not a moment later.”

The pair was free to join her during the ride to Seven Dials, but her other daily activities—and her time at Southlund’s House—were hers alone…hers and Sin’s. If things did not go as planned and Sin was again defeated, they would need find other means for gaining the funds to save his estate.

Though it had never interested her before, Patience wondered how substantial her dowry was and if her father would speak of it when asked. Certainly, matters would not become so dire; however, having the information would still her nerves. The next several days of training would be crucial.

With a reserved smile, she spun around, her skirts flaring around her ankles, and headed up the stairs, her step far more hesitant than a moment before.

Chapter 12

Sin exited Southlund’s House not long after noon to see that the early morning sun—a rarity in London or so he’d been told—had been overtaken by a layer of clouds that would no doubt bring with it evening drizzle that would likely turn to a downpour during the late-night hours. Thankfully, Sin had no plans for his evening except to find his bed—and perhaps write a letter to Juliette and his mother.

Rotating his shoulders brought a fresh wave of pain to his back. The endless hours of training were taking a hefty toll on him. How so many prizefighters managed to sustain a decade-long career in the ring was a mystery to Sin. He’d only been in London a short two weeks, and already, he was looking forward to returning home. Though he also longed for the day when there would be a reason to have Patience close without the need for sparring as a motive.

“The breeze carries the scent of rain, my lord,” the lady of his thoughts mused, tucking a sack under her arm before glancing up at him. Her eyes matched the tumultuous clouds above—grey without a hint of their actual color, blue. She’d taken to arriving with the sack, hurriedly changing into her sparring gear before they entered the practice area at Southlund’s. And at the end of her sessions, she’d transform herself once more from the daughter of Ivory Bess into a proper London lady.

Could it be that Patience struggled as he did? A war between who he was, who he wanted to be, and what necessity demanded of him? Did all those wage war within her, as well?

He had never found anything lacking in his life at Brownsea until the crushing weight of his empty coffers pushed him from the safety of the island. It was only then that he realized he’d need to discover who he was and what he wanted his life to hold. Had their recent association done the same for Patience, casting doubt on who she was and what fulfilled her?

Her brow furrowed in that way that Sin was becoming accustomed to of late. “Nightfall will come early, as well, I presume.”

Such a mundane topic did nothing to cool Sin’s heated skin from their hours of training; neither did the wind that rushed down the street, billowing her skirts around her ankles and pulling free his hastily tied cravat. He’d learned quickly that if he took overlong donning his own proper attire after Patience’s lessons, she would slip from Southlund’s House without him.

Not this day. He craved a few more moments with her, even if only to discuss the commonplace seasonal weather. Sin would be damned if he allowed her to escape into the early afternoon, only to hear from the footman at the door that Lady Patience “looked forward to another training session the following day” with little more than a nod as he departed.

The Desmond carriage waited at the curb as it had since the first time she’d bid him meet her at Ivory Bess’s famed pugilist training house. Not far down the walk, in the other direction, waited the hackney driver who’d come to recognize Sin’s patterns of late and waited outside the Albany as faithfully as his driver in Brownsea Island did.

Neither of them said their goodbyes or moved toward their waiting conveyances.

Could it be that Patience stalled, too?

“I find I have become rather inured to the gloomy weather in town,” Sin offered.

“One must acclimate to survive, I fear,” she replied with hesitation as if something weighed on her. They both fell silent and still. Sin was perfectly content allowing the world around them to keep moving: people scurrying to and fro, carriages pulled by overworked horses, a farmer pulling a cart loaded with winter fruit to the market, and men on horseback navigating the perilous thoroughfare.