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“I see a wooden box inside the room,” she said gently. “We must open it.”
“Must we?” he asked, his face a study in conflicted emotions, none of them his customary arrogance.
He hunched his shoulders, staring at her instead of at the room. “Very well then.” He took a deep breath. “Let’s go explore.”
“Wait.” She wedged a book under the door. “That’s usually the first mistake people make with hidden chambers. Now we won’t be trapped inside.”
“Excellent,” he said shakily. “Though a secret chamber behind a bookshelf might make a perfect location to steal a kiss.”
“Or the perfect location for your brother to hide information about his clandestine activities.”
Though another kiss would be equally thrilling.
Although the duke didn’t look amorous at the moment. He stood so still that he could have been a statue. The hand that held the lamp trembled.
She moved closer to him and placed her palm on his chest. “Your heart is beating so fast.”
“I’m excited to see what the room will reveal.”
“So am I.”
He was obviously fighting for control over his emotions. He clasped her hand where it lay against his heart and threaded his fingers between hers until they were holding hands. “Are you ready for an adventure, Miss Penny?”
“Always, Your Grace.”
They walked into the room hand in hand. He set the lantern on the desk, never letting go of her hand. The light from the lantern and the dim light from the study showed all sides of the room.
Thorndon appeared even larger in the tiny space, his head nearly reaching the low ceiling. The enticing scent of his cologne teased her senses.
Perhaps they would have time for just one stolen kiss in the dark. Or she could reach her arms as far around him as possible and give him a hug. It might help calm him.
It would have the opposite effect on her. Her body thrummed with the awareness of how near he stood. How their hands were linked.
She slid her thumb along his knuckles in a soothing rhythm.
“It’s very Spartan and spare, like a monk’s cell,” he observed. “Not very Rafe-like.”
She led him to the far wall and rapped upon it with her knuckles. “Walls intact. Nowhere else to hide anything.” She bounced up and down on the floorboards, one by one, the duke following at her side. “No loose floorboards.”
“Then it’s just the box,” he said.
That’s where Rafe would keep his coded messages. They would be coded because agents were extremely cautious about what they entrusted to paper.
The duke’s face was ashen and his breathing was ragged. He clutched her fingers so tightly it almost hurt.
“Let’s take the box into the study and examine it there, Your Grace.”
He relinquished her hand and passed her the lamp. He pounced on the box and carried it out of the room and over to a table near a window. He stared out the window for a few moments, his back to her, shoulders rigid.
“Your Grace?” She touched the back of his shoulder. He flinched. She sensed that he was fighting for control over his breathing, unwilling to betray any weakness.
He turned. His brow was beaded with sweat. She longed to ask him about his reaction but she could see from the closed, forbidding expression in his eyes that he wouldn’t appreciate any prying.
“Are you going to open the box?” he asked, his voice harsh.
He watched intently as she opened the box and lifted out a leather-bound book. There was no lock. She spread it open. It was a coded diary. Each day had a date in English, but the entries were written in a cipher consisting of numbers and letters.
“That’s Rafe’s handwriting but what does it mean? It looks like gibberish,” Thorndon said.
