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“You’re welcome to try.” He took a step forward, putting distance between the oncoming fight and her. The man with the club swung first on Jamie’s right. Daphne swallowed her scream and the fight was engaged.
    It lasted only a minute or two. The men were bullies and had not been expecting a fight. Jamie had been. Jamie had disarmed the man with the club with a slash of the dagger and his fists. Then he turned his attentions on the other with a sharp, disabling jab to his stomach and another to his nose, resulting in a flow of crimson. It was enough to send the pair scurrying down the nearest alley clutching their wounds.
    Daphne gripped the carriage wheel for balance. She wasn’t squeamish by nature, but neither had she ever experienced that kind of bloody violence up close. Laughing, teasing, mischievous, handsome Jamie with his endless repository of knowledge of Egyptian sex practices had done that. Jamie faced her, triumphant.
    “You made them bleed,” she managed to get out.
    He gave a cocky half grin and strode toward her, bracketing her against the carriage with his hands. “Have I shocked you?”
    Daphne steadied herself, the initial surprise of the violence starting to pass. “As a wise man once said, ‘Only in the best possible way.’”
    Jamie laughed. “Good, because I am about to shock you again.” She hardly had time to breathe before he pulled her to him in a fierce kiss, the warrior inside him still very much alive in the aftermath of the fight. He pressed against her, his arousal hard and insistent against the apex of her thighs as his hands bunched her skirts.
    “Do you mean to ‘oblige me’ in the middle of the street?” She whispered, well aware her own legs were wrapped about him, encouraging just such a thing.
    “I mean to put the dagger in its sheath.” Jamie’s voice was full of unmistakable innuendo as his hands slid the little blade home with metaphoric intent.
    Daphne trembled at the wickedness of his gesture. Her instincts had not been wrong. She was safe with him. He’d proven that to her in the most literal way possible. With her dagger and his fists he’d defended her, saved her. The footpads might have been asking for Jamie’s money, but they wouldn’t have stopped there. He’d been fighting for her as much as himself. A man fighting for his woman was a potent aphrodisiac indeed, one that sent her pulse racing and her better judgment to the hinterlands of her conscience.
    She was safe with him. Was she safe from him? Did she want to be safe from him?
    What a glorious madness this was turning out to be. If only this night could last forever.

Chapter Five
    The Strand, 11:00 p.m.
    Hell’s teeth! He’d nearly taken her in the middle of Piccadilly! One could not call what he’d been about to do “making love’ by any extent of the definition. There was enough of the gentleman left in him to know the difference, which is why he was now driving them onward trying to ignore the extremely painful state of arousal that had taken up residence in his trousers. What he needed was food and activity to take his mind off his charming companion and he knew just where to find it; the Coal Hole on the Strand.
    Jamie turned the horses west onto New Street toward the Strand and tried for conversation. The most obvious question being, “Are you going to tell me why you brought a concealed weapon to a ball?”
    Apparently the obvious question didn’t have an obvious answer, from the way Daphne fussed with her skirts, taking overly long to settle them, searching for an answer. Apparently, this wasn’t a subject she wanted to pursue, which made it all the more interesting. “You make it sound like I was plotting murder.”
    Jamie steered the team out onto a narrow street. “You have to admit it seems an odd accessory compared to a fan and a beaded reticule.”
    “A girl can’t defend herself as well with those.”
    Jamie shot her a knowing glance. “Does a girl have a need