“Seriously, Miss Beaton. I don’t ever want you to be in a room alone with that man again,” Westbury said, glowering at her. “What if I hadn’t arrived? What then?”

She threw back her shoulders. “I would have defended myself.”

“With what?”

She was still holding the knitting needle. She waved it at him. “With this.” She set it down on a nearby table.

The duke snorted. “You can’t be serious.”

“I’m very serious. I learned how to use the sharp point of a knitting needle as a weapon from Mina, Duchess of Thorndon, who is an expert in improvised and modified weaponry.”

“While Thorndon’s wife might be an expert in weaponry, you’re not. And that man is dangerous. He could have harmed you. And then I would have had to kill him.”

The raw intensity of the anger etched across his face startled her. Did he care that much for her honor?

She laughed softly. “You’re making too much of it, Your Grace. He’s been making insinuations and advances since I was a girl and I’ve always managed to evade him.”

He curled his hands around hers. The heat and strength of his fingers caught her off guard. Suddenly there wasn’t enough air to breathe in the room. After the frightening experience with Lord Sprague, all she wanted to do was nestle against the duke’s chest, seek a safe haven in his arms.

“Viola,” he said, and his low, gruff voice speaking her name so intimately set something quivering inside her. “You’re very brave, but you can’t take that chance. That man is dangerous to you.”

This man was dangerous to her. It was the midnight encounter in the hallway all over again. The sonata she’d begun writing that night filled her head. A simple melody that swirled and overlayed and built into a crashing, passionate crescendo.

She mustn’t mistake his momentary concern for caring.

She mustn’t allow the music swelling in her heart to overwhelm her, the need for comfort, the longing for his warm, strong arms to enfold her.

“I can take care of myself,” she said firmly. “If a knitting needle to the jugular didn’t discourage him, I would have pretended compliance and brought him to the sofa and then given him a sharp jab with my knee to the . . .” She glanced at his breeches flap. Mistake.

Never look at Westbury’s tight buckskin breeches and the way they molded over his groin and thighs ever again.

“To the bollocks,” he finished her sentence. He chuckled and released her hands. “I’m impressed. That’s actually a very good plan. I’m glad to hear that you’re aware of the only foolproof method to incapacitate a man.”

“I’m no damsel in distress.” She straightened her spine. “Why are you here, Your Grace? Did you really think to commission a wedding march from my father?”