Page 54 of The Boxing Baroness

With each day that passed, he was more impressed by her intelligence, tenacity, and fire. He now knew that her fights were as real as any of the dozens of mills he’d seen over the years.

Although Sin despised Farnham more than ever for earning money off his niece’s pain, his admiration for Marianne was rapidly beginning to threaten his objectivity.

Hell. Who was he trying to fool—what objectivity? He’d been impressed by the woman since the first morning he met her. First, he’d been taken by her directness and—he couldn’t lie—her incredible rudeness.

But in the almost three weeks that he’d spent with her, he’d come to admire her more and more. She was smart, loyal, witty, kind, and honest. Any suspicions he’d had about her being Strickland’s partner in crime had slowly dissipated.

Sin now wondered—as he looked at her angrily pacing the tiny dressing room and glaring at him—how he ever could have suspected her of such duplicity.

“Are you mad?” she demanded.

“You like to ask me that question, don’t you?”

She shoved her hands at him, wrists up.

Sin plucked at the double knot that held the thick cowhide gloves on her hands, standing close enough that he was surrounded by her now-familiar scent. No other woman smelled like her: an intoxicating blend of clean sweat, leather, and lavender. He couldn’t remember why he’d ever found expensive perfumes appealing on a woman.

“You cannot serve as my knee man on Tuesday.”

Sin glanced up. “Why not?” he asked as he removed the glove, marveling—as always—at the delicacy of her wrist.

She yanked her gloveless hand away. “Why not?” she repeated, pulling a haughty face and aping his accent in a way that almost made him smile. But he caught the expression in time, compressing his lips in a stern frown.

“What an excellent imitation of me, Marianne. I’m flattered you’ve taken the time and effort to study my voice and mannerisms so carefully.”

She scowled. “I’m not in a jesting sort of mood.”

He picked at the tight double-knot on her second glove. “Why are you suddenly fighting this after forcing me to spend almost every minute of my days either chasing behind you on Dobbin, cleaning up after you here at the theater, or serving as your general dogsbody?” Sin now knew more than he ever wanted to know about laundry and looked at his own snowy-white linens with newfound respect.

“May I remind you, Your Grace, that if you get on that stage Tuesday, you’ll be in front of hundreds of your closest chums. Men you’ve gone to school with, caroused in your clubs with, and whored at brothels—”

Sin’s head whipped up, and he was no longer amused.

Her tirade stuttered to a halt when their eyes locked.

“You think you know everything about me, don’t you, Marianne?”

She flinched at the quiet menace in his tone.

Sin pulled off her glove and tossed it to the floor. And then he lowered a hand onto the wall on either side of her shoulders, effectively caging her in.

“Or perhaps it just amuses you to insult me by accusing me of being a hypocrite? Lord Flawless—a stuffy, overly righteous, self-important twit who rails against public immorality in Parliament and denies other men and women sensual pleasures but does not hesitate to sate his own base appetites?”

She swallowed and his gaze was drawn to the taut musculature of her throat. Moisture flooded his mouth at the sight of her slick, pearly skin. And the scent of her . . .

God. She smelled so damned good.

She licked her plush lower lip, the simple gesture making him hard in a heartbeat.

“I, er, don’t—”

Her broken babbling yanked his attention away from her tantalizing mouth and the wicked thoughts that he had almost put into action.

“Yes, Marianne?”

She shook her head, the short, sweat-damp brown curls that framed her face dancing. “Er—”

Sin leaned closer to her, the sudden movement startling her. He inhaled her scent, filling his lungs to bursting and holding it.