Free Romancing Lady Stone (A School of Gallantry Novella) by Delilah Marvelle Page A

helping me.” She stared. “Who are you really, Mr. Levin? Why do you carry a blade?”
    He said nothing.
    “You had best tell me.”
    “It is best you do not know.”
    “ Tell me .” Her voice quaked. “Before I walk to Saint Petersburg on my own. Don’t think I won’t. After what I just witnessed, I deserve an explanation.”
    He momentarily closed his eyes, knowing he had no choice but to explain. Before she did walk to Saint Petersburg. Damn it. Damn it, damn it, damn it. It was every woman all over again. He re-opened his eyes. “Like my father before me, I used to protect influential criminals from being killed by the government. I have been doing it since I was eighteen.”
    Her lips parted.
    “It paid well,” he argued. “And the community of men involved were dependable and decent. We were like brothers. It only ever got rough when we were on assignment and had to travel with whoever we were commissioned to protect. But I am no longer doing it. I grew tired of people always thinking the worst of me. Especially women. Do you think good, respectable women want to marry into a life where the husband gets shot at? Far from it.” He adjusted his shirt. “Which is why I am going to London. I am being given a chance to be what I should have always been: a better man. I am trying to be a better man.”
    “You call putting a knife to a man’s throat trying ?” she echoed.
    He swiped his face. “I have never killed anyone. I have bruised and bloodied people beyond recognition, as my job required, but I have never killed anyone.”
    Her expression stilled. “Why didn’t you tell me any of this earlier?”
    “Because if I told you, you would have never allowed me to help you. And you needed help. I needed you to trust me and given who I am, women never do. ’Tis always a dilemma.”
    She remained quiet.
    God only knows what she thought of him now. “I am not going to hurt you. It is not who I am. Now please. Close the door and allow us both to get some sleep. It is late. You can yell at me in the morning.”
    She puffed out a breath. “I am not going to yell at you.” Closing the door, she locked it with the turn of the key and wandered over to the chair where his coat and waistcoat were. “In truth, I feel partly to blame. I was looking at your watch earlier and left it out on the chair.” She paused. Quickly leaning behind the chair, she lowered herself to the floor and swept something up with a clatter. Rising again, she turned toward him and held up his watch by its silver chain. “It must have fallen.”
    He swallowed in disbelief and collapsed onto the bed beside him, pasting his hands against his face. Not only had he threatened an idiot at knifepoint, he had also confessed to being a criminal and now he looked stupid.
    He heard her bare feet pad over to him.
    Keeping his hands against his face, he refused to look at her.
    A soft breath escaped her. “We all do things we regret, Mr. Levin. And it is fairly obvious you wish to move away from your past. I cannot and will not hold that against you.” Her tone was genuine and yielding.
    It was not a tone he expected from her after what she had just witnessed and what he had shared.
    Konstantin lowered his hands and glanced up at her.
    Her long wet hair clung in lopsided sections to the sides of her concerned face.
    It was like meeting who she truly was.
    His throat tightened. “I vow unto you that I have never killed anyone. It is not who I am.”
    She leaned in and whispered, “I believe you. And your confession is enough for me to understand the sort of man you really are. Most men try to paint themselves as being more. Not less.” Taking his hand, she gently clasped the cool metal of the watch against the palm of his hand. “Know that despite your past, you have a friend in me after everything you have done for me . You didn’t have to help me but you did. It says a lot about you.”
    The chain slipped through his fingers and dangled,