Revealed by Kate Noble Page A

“but I can well imagine what you were doing on top of it a few minutes ago.”
    That earned him a look. A deeply outraged one.
    “A gentleman would not mention such a thing to a lady,” she sniffed.
    “True.” He grinned, having too much fun watching her turn red. “But a lady would not have engaged in such an activity in the first place. Perhaps we’ve both been mislabeled.”
    The light was dim, but he would swear she had gone from red to purple. “You . . . you did hear!” she spoke in strangled tones, her face mottled with horror. “You . . . knew I was coming here! Did you lie in the coffin to wait for us? To overhear ? That . . . that’s disgusting!”
    Marcus stared at her, bewildered. “What on earth are you talking about?”
    “Reggie Fieldstone!”
    “What has that child to do with anything? Good God, he’s not here, too, is he? Where would he hide?”
    “No, you . . . you overheard him telling me how to get to the library, and . . . and you followed me!”
    Marcus took a deep breath. “First of all. I technically could not have followed you, since I was here before you, as evidenced by the fact you landed on me. But”—he said, cutting her off before she could speak—“I take your meaning. However, I can assure you that I did not overhear anything Reggie said beyond what I told you before, and I am here for my own purposes and certainly did not expect anyone to choose such a dusty, crowded space for a tryst. I promise, I am more surprised by you than you are by me.”
    She bore herself up to regal height, her color returning to normal from its mottled, enraged shade. “Phillippa Benning does not engage in trysts.”
    Well, what could a man do but shrug? “As you say.”
    Her chin went up. If it weren’t so imperious, it would be charming in a girlish sort of way.
    “I find no need to explain myself to you, Mr. Worth. No, indeed. You may or may not derive pleasure from lying in coffins, listening to other people’s romantic assignations. I assure you, it’s of little interest to me.”
    She then swept to the door, certain in every step, and placed her hand on the doorknob.
    “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” he said, taking a moment to wipe the smudges from his spectacles.
    “But you are not me, Mr. Worth. Thank the heavens.”
    “No, but we do share a common trait at the moment.”
    “And what is that?” She sighed.
    “We are both covered in dust.”
    Phillippa pulled her hand off the knob and looked down at herself. Even in the darkness, she had to see she’d become distinctly gray. Her skin, her dress—
    “Even my hair!” she cried, as she patted the now-gray stands, only to engulf herself in a cloud. “Oh goodness! Imagine if someone saw me this way!”
    “Yes, yes, imagine if someone saw me this way!”
    “Mocking is only good for eliciting humor, Mr. Worth, and right now, no one is laughing,” she snapped at him.
    “I’m quite serious, you know,” he took off his coat and began to shake it out. “Imagine if someone saw you covered in dust, and then me covered in dust. What would they think?”
    “Oh!” her hands shot to cover her dropped jaw. “Oh, they would think—Oh, how appalling!”
    “Thank you ever so,” he said drily. “Turn round, I’ll see what I can do about your skirt.”
    He knelt beside her and began beating the folds of fabric of her skirt as if he were beating out a rug.
    “Do be careful! This is imported lace; the design is one of a kind,” she said as she took off her left glove and shook it out as much as possible. “If you didn’t come to spy on me, why were you in that sarcophagus?”
    “I thought you didn’t care,” he grunted as he continued thwacking the skirt free of the dust, albeit a little more gently.
    “I . . . I don’t,” she said primly. “I asked for the sake of conversation.”
    “Well, for the sake of conversation, and to assuage your apparently nonexistent curiosity, I will say that you are not the only