Marcus allowed the faintest smile. “I think it can manage.”
Henry grinned and disappeared into the corridor.
Marcus followed more slowly, casting one last look at the open instrument. Sunlight lay across the keys where Henry’s fingers had been.
He left the door ajar, the way Henry preferred and joined his son in the hall. Mrs. Pritchard waited a discreet distance away, her relief evident without a word.
Henry fell into step beside Marcus, matching his stride with ease. The folded staff paper rustled softly beneath his arm.
A small sound.
A promise.
Chapter Ten
The lamps alongCleveland Row burned with a dull golden glow, their light catching in the damp air like breath. Marcus stepped from his carriage without waiting for the footman, the familiar pressure settling beneath his ribs as he faced the polished lion’s-head knocker.
He had not come here at night since before everything changed.
The last time, the room had blurred around him, cards, brandy, a circle of men content to let dissipation soften the edges of the world. He had left with nothing but the knowledge that running from shadows only lengthened them.
Tonight, he was here because of Henry.
Because of Lila Edgewood.
Because Bessie Dove-Lyon never summoned without reason.
He lifted the knocker and let it fall once. The door opened almost at once.
Theseus stood tall and quiet, surprise flickering before it settled into the steady understanding that nothing in the Lyon’s Den happened without purpose.
“Good evening, my lord. Mrs. Dove-Lyon is expecting you.”
Of course she was.
Marcus followed him past the gentlemen’s and ladies’ gaming rooms. A low hum of voices drifted through the walls. Men murmured over cards. Women laughed behind fans. Beeswax polish lingered in the air, threaded with something faintly floral he could not place.
He did not glance toward the main tables. His gaze stayed forward.
Theseus stopped at a quiet anteroom and knocked once before opening the door.
Bessie Dove-Lyon sat at a small round table near the hearth, her cane resting across her knees. Firelight picked out the silver in her hair and the sharp intelligence in her eyes.
“Lord Wolfton,” she said. Her tone held no welcome and no threat. Only truth. “Sit.”
Marcus took the chair opposite her.
She studied him the way a general studied a battlefield, not to admire it, but to decide where to place her forces.
“You read my note,” she said.
“I did.”
“And you understood it.”
“Yes.”
“Good. We may proceed.”
