He suspected that on the nights he wasn’t there she received swats on her backside. He saw one fellow reaching for her with the flat of his hand. His mate slapped his wrist and jerked his head toward Beast. The would-be offender’s eyes widened before he gave a little nod of acknowledgment. Most people in the area were aware of the sort of behavior directed toward women that Trewloves didn’t tolerate.

She offered the prettiest smile to her customers. But for him, no curling up of her lips, no sparkle in her eyes. Serving him was a chore, a duty, and an unpleasant one at that. He wished he didn’t long to have her smile directed his way, wasn’t certain why he did. He didn’t know why she’d snagged his attention the night before and continued to hold it. Why she called to the loneliness in him.

When she finally made her way over to him and set the full glass of scotch down, he said, “You misunderstood regarding my proposition.”

“I very much doubt it.”

Her nose had gone up ever so slightly and in spite of her diminutive height, she’d managed to give the appearance of looking down on him from Mount Olympus.

When she immediately walked away, he didn’t try to stop her. He’d had too many of those haughty gazes cast his way over the past couple of years, whenever he’d attended one of his siblings’ blasted weddings. Each of them had married a noble and that had meant churches filled with the toffs. A couple of the ladies had even approached him, signaling their interest in experiencing a bit of the rough. Seemed they’d believed fucking—a word they’d used much to his astonishment as he’d thought proper ladies didn’t even know, much less speak, the term—a commoner, especially a bastard one, would be distinctively different than fucking a noble.

Taking one against a wall, another bent over a vicar’s desk, he’d probably proven them right, confirmed he was no better than the name they called him.

He’d felt tainted, sullied, and used afterward, had no desire to ever again be intimate with a blueblood.

If he’d had any doubts before regarding the new barmaid, he had none now. He didn’t know why she was in Whitechapel but knew her blood was as blue as it came. And he’d be damned before he’d beg her to help him.

Staring at the two sovereigns, Althea gingerly picked up one.

“They’re both for you,” Rob said as he dropped the damp rag on the table and began scrubbing the surface.

“Why would he leave me two sovereigns?” To demonstrate the generosity he would bestow upon her if she accepted his proposition?

“Why would he give us any?” Rob asked.

“How many did he give you tonight?”

“Two.”