Wykeham faltered for the first time. “I—I am not sure, but I know—”
Robert held up his hand. “Before you say anything more, remember that you are about to slander men of your own ilk. Men who might very well take issue with such.”
Wykeham looked around at the rough dress of the other gamblers and shook his head. “I do not think any—”
“Careful, Wykeham,” Michael said. “Not every noble traipses into Covent Garden looking like a peacock. But they do know where the dueling field in Hyde Park lays.”
Wykeham paused then and grew quite still. He looked more closely at each face, all of whom met his examination with a stern expression. The duke’s eyes widened with recognition of two of them. He swallowed and straightened his topcoat.
“Mr. Gilley,” Robert said.
Gilley held out his hand in the direction of the front door, and Wykeham silently made his way there. They watched him leave, and the cluster of folks around the table slowly dispersed. Robert nodded to the remaining players. “Thank you, gentlemen, for your patience. Jimmy, please add a twenty-pound credit to each of their accounts.”
“Yes, sir.”
Robert finally released Michael’s forearm and urged him toward the office. The normal waxing and waning of the noise on the floor washed over them, and Michael found it almost a relief from the silent tension of the previous encounter.
“Does this happen a great deal?” he asked as Robert closed the office door.
Robert dropped into his chair behind the desk, his body sagging in relief. “Thankfully, no. Most evenings I never even go down there.” He shrugged. “Not since Bill died and I had to stop being Robbie Green. But now you see what I meant about being bullied by a title. Wykeham is a fool but hardly the first one to attempt pulling rank.” He gave Michael a grin. “I thought you were going to launch across the table at him. You were in a high color.”
“I did want to.”
“Do you believe him?”
“That Lady Clara’s father has made the choice permanent?” The thought felt too much to bear. “I hope not.”
“Well, if your heart is entangled enough for you to maul a man, you had best find out.” Robert straightened in his chair. “Now may we finish this discussion?”
They did, and the next two hours slipped by rapidly. Near midnight, Michael took a hackney back to Ashton House. Robert would follow later, and the next morning they would leave together, taking one of the Kennet carriages to Kent.
Although the hackney dropped him in front of his home, Michael walked to the edge of the property and slipped down the alley to the mews. He had no treats, but his desire to check on the horses, especially Copper, would keep him awake if he did not take the time. The solace and silence of the stables this time of night soothed him in a way hard to explain, even to the others who loved and worked the horses as much as he did.
Michael eased the stable door closed, pausing to inhale the familiar scents of hay, leather, and horse. As his eyes adjusted to the change from streetlamps to shadow, he looked toward a table near the door, where several lanterns waited. Before he could light one, however, he realized a lantern already cast a dim yellow glow down the aisle between the stalls. His eyes narrowed as he spotted the light near Copper’s stall, hanging on a wall hook.
What the devil—?He moved slowly in that direction, careful that his boots did not clomp loudly on the stone floor.
That’s when he heard the sobs.
Soft, low, almost controlled... but not quite. And murmured words, muffled, as if spoken into a thick cloth.
Or fur.
Which is what he saw as he peered cautiously over the top of Copper’s stall door. In the far corner, barely illuminated by the one lantern, Lady Clara Durham sat on a pile of hay that had clumped into the corner, her face buried into the fur of Rufus, the big orange stable cat. Rufus, who allowed no one to touch him, was placidly wrapped in Clara’s arms. He did not squirm, spit, or buck as he always had in Michael’s experience, especially in such proximity to a horse. Like all cats, he diligently avoided the possibility of being stepped on. But Rufus curled against her shoulder, his head against hers, as peaceful as a morning dew. In the voluminous skirts gathered around her legs and in her lap, the white head and wide blue eyes of her kitten peeked out, looking around in apparent confusion.
“I cannot, I cannot, I cannot.” Clara repeated the words between gasped sobs. “I will not. They cannot.”
While Michael was certain the thoughts were completed in her head, they never made it from her lips before a sob swamped them, her tears streaking the orange cat’s fur.
He looked at Copper, who was awake and had moved to the far side of the stall. Lady Clara had taken up refuge in one of the most dangerous spots she could possibly have chosen—behind the hooves of a stallion—but Copper seemed to be as calm about her presence as the big barn cat. Still—
“Clara?” He kept his voice soft, but she still jerked, her head popping up, her eyes wide.
She stared at him, then released the two cats. Rufus seemed to regain all his energy then, leaping from her arms, snagging the white kitten in his jaws, and disappearing over the stall door.
“Pockets!” Clara’s voice rasped through her tears as she made a vain reach for the cats.
“Let them go,” Michael whispered. “We’ll find them later.”
