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His knotted emotions only made him warier of their surroundings. If this dogged Mr.Hogwood had struck once, who was to say he wouldn’t strike again? He could, Merritt was certain. Because if Merritt had shot somethingtrulyvital, there would have been a body. And he wasn’t sure how much the watchmen could do against a man like Silas Hogwood, or how long the constable would be willing to lend out his officers.
Maybe they should move back inland for a little while. He didn’t savor the idea of abandoning Owein for long, but...
Hulda leaned forward. “What are you thinking about?”
Blinking, Merritt steered the boat for a moment, ensuring they stayed on course. “He who shall not be named.”
Hulda nodded solemnly, then looked out across the bay.
They docked and took a tram into Boston, which let them off on Market Street. From here, their individual errands would take them different directions—Merritt to his editor to discuss the book hanging in a satchel off his shoulder, and Hulda to the Boston Institute for the Keeping of Enchanted Rooms to check in with her boss, Myra Haigh, and do whatever it was enchanted-house keepers did. Hopefully not get transferred.
They passed a group of rowdy men in the Union Oyster House. Once they’d distanced enough for easy conversation, Merritt drew himself up and swatted away the nerves that clung to him like flies. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been so nervous.
“Hulda.” He’d been calling her that more and more, and she never corrected him, which was one good sign of many. When she glanced up at him, he found it hard to meet her eyes.You’re thirty-one years old,he reminded himself.Act like it.
He cleared his throat. “After our errands today, I’d... like to speak with you privately.” Perhaps he should have done it on the boat, where the only thing that could overhear him was a dragonfly, but if it had gone wrong, well, he’d have been trapped in a small boat in a large bay with his rejection.
“Oh? About what?” They stepped apart to let a child and his dog slip through.
“Just to... talk.”Imbecile.He paused at the junction he knew she needed to take to head north.
“Oh.” Was that recognition dawning on her face? Since when had Merritt struggled to read people? “I would... like that. Before we head back to Blaugdone?”
He nodded. Peered up the street, where his eyes caught on a set of stone pillars. “Meet me at Quincy Market? Would six be enough time?”
She fidgeted with the hems of her sleeves. “I think so, yes.” She smiled. God, she was pretty when she smiled. Why had he not noticedhow pretty she was when she first knocked on his door? Hadn’t he likened her to, what, a schoolmarm?
She was a little older than he was, but not by much. The older people got, the less age mattered, in truth. Was it awkward that she was his housekeeper? But she wasn’thishousekeeper; she was BIKER’s. And if his confession that he direly wanted to court her was unsuitable, they could go their separate ways easily, no harm done.
Would she turn him down? But the way she’d held on to his arm for their entire walk yesterday—and it had been a long walk—whispered that she wouldn’t. The way she smiled more easily and chuckled at his attempts to be funny. The way she looked at him...
That was, hethoughtshe looked at him in a certain way...
He cleared his throat. “I’d best be going or I’ll be late.”
“Six, then,” she said.
He nodded. Hesitated. Awkwardly tipped a hat he wasn’t wearing and turned on his heel. His publisher wasn’t too far; the walk might do him good.
He glanced back when he reached the next street, catching just a flash of Hulda’s skirt as she boarded a cab.
“Excuse my lack of professionalism,” Myra said midpace, “but are you out of your bloody mind?”
Hulda would have taken a step back, were she not seated in a chair across from the director’s desk. It took her a few heartbeats to collect herself. “Should I excuse it?” In all the scenarios she’d concocted of how this conversation would go, none had contained such vitriol. “I’m hardly asking—”
She paused as Myra turned away and grumbled in Spanish, so quickly Hulda could not discern one word from the next. When she turned back, eyes ablaze, she said, “You wereattacked, Hulda! By awayward ruffian! Almostkilled, and you want tostay? You’re no longer needed! You said so yourself.” She scooped up Hulda’s report from her desk and threw it back down again.
“I did not say I wasn’tneeded, only that I’d confirmed a second source of magic... and it wasn’tsome ruffian, Myra. It wasSilas Hogwood.”
“So Miss Taylor said.” Myra paced, paused, and punched her hands into her hips. “Are you sure—”
Hulda stood, her bag toppling to the ground. “I could not possibly be more sure. I’ve already given his name to the authorities. I don’t know how he fooled everyone into thinking he was dead, but itwashim.”
The older woman pinched the bridge of her nose and collapsed into her chair. “I want you to move on, Hulda. I wanted you to move onbeforeyour life was in jeopardy, and now I want you off that island even more.”
Hulda frowned, relaxing a fraction, but refused to sit. Her employer was being relentless, and she didn’t understand why. Normally, Myra was much more amenable. Certainly, her attitude would make sense if she knew the truth, but Hulda knew Myra too well to fear her employer would invade her mind without permission. There was too much respect between them. Too much trust. So she couldn’t know that while Hulda wanted to stay for the coast and the air and little Owein, she also very much wanted to stay for the love of a man. A man who wanted tospeakwith her later in what sounded to be a very specific manner.
Her pulse quickened at the idea of it, and she swiftly banished the thoughts, fearful they’d be so strong Myra would hear them without trying. So she studied, very hard, the grain of the desk before her, picking out abstract pictures and shapes, and asked, “Are you lonely?”
