Then she looked at Marcus. Uncertain. Hopeful. Afraid. Trusting. All at once.
“Tomorrow?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said.
She slipped inside. The door closed softly.
Marcus remained inthe street, studying the quiet façade as though committing it to memory.
Henry tugged his hand. “Papa, was that man dangerous?”
“Yes,” Marcus said. “And he will not come near her again.”
Marcus was done observing. Done retreating. Done waiting.
Fenwick had made a mistake. He had stepped into Marcus Wolfton’s world.
And Marcus intended to answer him on his own ground.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Wolfton Hall househad begun its quiet descent into evening.
Lamps dimmed along the corridor. Servants’ voices softened. The distant pulse of the city slipped beneath the floorboards and became something almost like breath.
Marcus stood outside Henry’s door, one hand resting against the frame, listening.
Henry played with the crooked concentration of a child who wanted very much to please. His fingers were uneven. His rhythm precarious. Yet every note landed with earnest intention. It was not music so much as devotion, an offering from a boy who believed the world stayed whole as long as he kept the melody.
Something drew tight in Marcus’s chest.
Henry’s shoulders were hunched with effort, tongue caught between his teeth as he searched for the next correct note. There was trust in every sound. Trust that Marcus would hear him. Trust that Miss Edgewood would be proud. Trust that the world was still safe enough for music to exist inside it.
The image of Fenwick in the street earlier that day returned without warning, watching, measuring, dismissive. Heat struck sharp and controlled behind Marcus’s ribs.
He knocked lightly on the doorframe.
Henry looked over his shoulder at once. “Papa. Did I keep the notes?”
“You did,” Marcus said. “You kept them beautifully.”
Henry’s smile was immediate. Unfiltered. The kind Marcus wanted him to keep for as long as the world allowed.
“Will you listen again tomorrow?”
“I will.”
Satisfied, Henry turned back to the keys.
Marcus lingered, letting the uneven strains wrap around him. They steadied him even as they stirred something else, an older instinct he had allowed to sleep for too long.
Fenwick had looked at Henry.
Not with interest. With indifference. As if the boy were nothing more than another object in the street.
Marcus stepped away from the door. With each pace, Henry’s playing softened, thinning along the corridor until it sounded almost like memory. The house seemed to hold its breath with him.
He reached his study and closed the door.
