A Duchess a Day (Awakened by a Kiss #1) - Charis Michaels Page 0,41

someone like Lusk for themselves . . . then I will abandon the conversation.”

A line of schoolboys snaked their way down the walk, and Helena stepped to the side. “It’s a lot of ‘ifs,’ I know. But this is why I meant to approach so many young women.”

They reached the end of New Bond with no sign of anyone remotely fitting the description of Lady Genevieve. Helena cursed their limited timing and crossed to the other side of the street.

“I’ve seen four blonde women,” Shaw reported. “But the age is wrong. Or the dress.”

Helena stared at the row of shingles hanging beneath the awnings of shop after shop after shop. “She could appear at any time.”

“Look in windows,” he instructed. “And inside passing carriages. There’s no guarantee she’ll march down the street.”

Helena nodded, stepping up to a window. The display beyond the glass dripped with ribbons and lace, a blizzard of accoutrements styled in white-and-pink drifts. Her sisters had been mistaken when they said she didn’t enjoy shopping. In fact, fashion was a hobby, and she rather enjoyed dresses and hats and ribbons—not the latest styles, not the ostentation of London, but playing with color and texture and looking distinctive in pretty things. Her grandmother had patronized a dressmaker in Winscombe, and the two of them had worked together on dresses that suited Helena’s skin and figure, that drew inspiration from summer greens and winter whites. Helena’s mother had insisted upon a few London-made pieces, her trousseau among them, but when Helena and her lady’s maid pulled together her wardrobe, they reached for her gowns from the village dressmaker.

Now she squinted through the glass, trying to make out the customers inside. In a sudden whoosh, the door of another shop flew open, emitting an upright gentleman with stomping boots and swinging cane. Helena gasped and bumped into him.

“I beg your pardon, sir,” she said, jumping back.

The man whirled around. “Mind yourself!” His snarl bared a wet glob of tobacco and a gold tooth.

Helena shrank back, and Shaw was there suddenly, inserting his large body between them.

“Careful, my lady,” he sang in a low, almost playful sort of whistle.

Helena hopped back just as Shaw affected a half pivot, half stumble. The unsteadiness caused him to appear clumsy, although his control and balance was obvious to her. Moreover, she saw the look in his eyes: cool, shrewd, intentional.

“I’ve never seen the likes of this,” the man bellowed. “Drunken revelers in New Bond Street.” He raised his cane as if to strike, but Shaw’s hand shot out and clasped the polished wood, stopping it midarc.

“Careful, governor,” Shaw said, spinning neatly away. He gave the cane a little twist, and the man yelped in pain. In one fluid movement, the cane flicked from the man’s grasp and pitched into the air.

“Let me get that for you, gov,” Shaw said, snatching it from above his head as if the man himself had tossed it. He caught it with one hand, spun it like a baton, and pressed it to the man’s chest.

It happened so quickly his deft movements were barely perceptible, even to Helena. It looked almost like a dance, and he’d done it one-handed, with her cloak flapping gently across his left arm.

Who is he? she marveled.

Stepping back, she nearly collided again, this time with a small figure in a dark cloak.

“I beg your pardon,” she said again, craning around. The person’s face was obscured by a flowing velvet hood. Helena saw only the tip of a nose. She stepped closer, trying to make out a face, but the figure hurried away, disappearing into the crowd.

She looked back to Shaw. He was bowing with exaggerated humility as the gentleman glared and shook his wrist.

Shaw ignored the outrage, tipped his hat, and backed away. The gentleman spun and strode in the opposite direction, grumbling some indecipherable complaint.

Shaw stepped to her. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m perfectly well,” she said, gaping at him. He’d moved like an acrobat and fought like a fencing master. It was unlike anything she’d ever seen.

“If you’re certain,” he said, “let’s walk.”

Helena walked. “Shaw? How did you manage that?”

Shaw was silent. He adjusted his hat.

“Declan?” she asked again.

“What?”

“Tell me what you’ve just—”

“My lady,” he warned, “you are meant to be looking—”

“I’m perfectly capable of walking and talking and looking. If I simply stride down the street, gaping at everyone, I’ll look mad.”

“This endeavor is mad,” he mumbled.

She whirled on him. “This was your idea and, foolish me, I believed it to be rather