Page 19 of The Lady is Trouble

“A person with no purpose invites trouble. And you gain no loyalty without accountability.” Humphrey tightened the reins around his fist and urged the horse into a canter. “The waffle bit is your problem.”

Julian sprawled against the cart’s rough backing. The sun had bled into the horizon, layering Humphrey in silhouette, but Julian saw him smile. This from a man who did not smile often. “Waffle?”

Humphrey cleared his throat. “Minnie said you look at Scamp like something you’d pour over a waffle. And that, my friend, is your dilemma to overcome. Or not, should it come to it.”

Julian looked to the sky, the stars like diamonds peeking from a twist of black silk. He could just make out Canis Minor, the small dog, two bright winks he’d gazed upon often as a child. Celestial happenings had been of comfort to the boy living in a filthy warren, driven out by an atrocious excuse of a father and making his way from nothing. The universe was steadfast. Unaffected by a sound beating, hunger tearing through your gut, and fathers who loathed you because of strange abilities you couldn’t control.

The universe was faithful. Secure.

He was tempted to tell Humphrey this chatter was silly, inane, simply untrue. Instead, he dug a flask from his pocket and took a healthy drink. “The waffle can sod off,” was all he said.

Humphrey sobered, too honorable to beat a man when he was down. “Don’t take offense. Minnie was a good choice for added protection. The woman has skills. When we were practicing, she closed her eyes, and that knife hit dead center from ten paces. Just slipped out of her boot like a ghost and whack, no hands. It was damned amazing, though she put a decent tear in that painting of your father. Got him right above his ear. I guess her aim isn’t completely true.”

Julian took another drink, brandy burning a path to his belly. He wished it’d complete its mission and cloud his mind. “Rey, please don’t share that information”—he tapped the flask on his thigh—“if you have a care for me. The added protection part. If Piper knew Minnie was guarding her bedchamber after hours, she’d have my head.”

They fell silent amidst the clip of the horse’s hooves and the creak of the cart. Julian drew a breath laced with the earthy, dense aroma he always associated with Harbingdon, withhome. Wondering if he was going to regret this, he took another sip and agreed to Humphrey’s suggestion. “Start her with the footman. We don’t want more broken dishes or sleepless nights. I’ll handle proposing the garden project.” He also needed to help categorize her auras, as promised, but this involved exposing a part of himself he’d kept hidden when she’d gotten too close and was learning too much about him.

A decision based on survival, then and now.

“Are you sure?”

“My good man, where Lady Elizabeth Scott is concerned, I’m not sure of anything.”

Humphrey halted by the side of the house, a lantern in the morning room spilling light on the lawn. “The plan is, we pick apart everything in Finn’s dreams. Every piece of furniture, every tapestry, even the rings on that crazy bitch’s fingers. Something will lead us to her, Jule.”

But they both left this unsaid: if Finn’s dreams didn’t lead her to themfirst.

Julian braced his hands on the cart and vaulted to the ground. The wind blew his hair in his eyes, obscuring the apprehension he’d seen cross Humphrey’s face. A sharp crack of thunder shook the ground, and his heart stuttered as he imagined those he sought to protect. Those he’d come to love. The knife in his boot was a welcome presence pressed against his skin.

“We must prepare,” Humphrey whispered and circled the cart away from the house.

Julian stood transfixed under the kitchen eave, watching Humphrey fade into the night. The guard patrolling the back lawn nodded, their only communication. Something brushed his ankle, and he looked to find Henry sitting by his side. The dog had appeared one morning, and he, like many Harbingdon sheltered, now seemed a natural part of the household. A most mixed-up family. He dropped to his knee, searching the sky until he located Canis Minor. “Do you hear that fella? We must prepare.”

Sidonie trailed her finger over the lines of text, London’s incessant clamor oozing through the window of her hotel room—a modest dwelling in a mundane neighborhood where coin bought silence. And every room on the floor. Her condition required isolation. Should she be drawn to companionship, because loneliness was its own kind of madness, she only had to recall the blood on the steps of the theatre in Lyon. The look of scorn and revulsion on the faces of those she had once called friends.

Lovers.

Frenzied, she flipped pages of the geological survey, searching for the small stone edifice she’d seen in the boy’s mind. He’d been traversing a country lane, and an intense surge of longing had swept her when she gazed upon the edifice through his eyes. It was the same sensation she felt when she returned to her family’s estate after being away. Shelter, security.Belonging. There would be no sleep until she located the town.

Because, she’d felt the presence of another at his side.

A formidable presence, sedative. Healing. Jamming the heel of her hand into her eye until she saw stars, she kicked the discarded pile of books, sending them tumbling across the carpet.

Her father had taken her to Stonehenge years ago, and she would never forget pressing her palms against moist sandstone and imagining those who had come before her seeking divine intervention when none was forthcoming. Raising their faces to the heavens and demanding deliverance. For one breathtaking moment, standing there in a ring of towering rock, she’d felt invincible, powerful, healthy.

Normal.

When normalcy had never been hers—would neverbehers.

Unless the healer was able to cure her, as those towering stones had been unable to. She’d walked beside the boy on that country path, the two of them joined in protection and love. Sidonie was sure of it.

The edifice had also been made of sandstone. Filled with pock mocks and worn etchings. Prehistoric. Unusual, although she hadn’t been able to look long because the boy had shoved her out of his mind quite violently when he realized she’d taken hold of him. She would know it if she ever—

She turned a page, and the air ripped from her lungs.

Sarsen stone. King Alfred. Saxons. Danes. She traced the sketch with her ragged thumbnail. The Blowing Stone.

Kingston Lisle. Oxfordshire.