A Lady by Midnight (Spindle Cove #3)(43)

“Just wait, Badger darling. Just hold it one minute more . . .”

Scooping up the dog in one arm and taking a candlestick with the other, Kate shouldered open the door of her bedchamber and padded softly down the corridor. The hour was well past midnight, and she didn’t want to wake anyone.

After descending the stairs, she opened the front door of the rooming house a crack. Cool night air rushed over her exposed throat. She set Badger on the ground and pulled her dressing gown closed at the neck.

“Go on.” She shooed him with a hand. “Do your business and come back. I’ll just wait here.”

As Badger scampered across the front garden to have his choice of the hitching posts, a light caught Kate’s eye.

There was a lamp burning in the Bull and Blossom.

Odd.

To be sure, the Bull and Blossom was a tavern, but this was the country—Fosbury always closed up shop by nine or ten at the latest. Village life began with the crack of dawn. What man would be up drinking at this hour?

Perhaps a man occupied by the same thoughts that kept her awake, when all the other ladies were asleep.

It had to be Thorne.

And she simply had to see him.

Kate rewrapped her dressing gown, tying it as modestly as possible. Anyway, it was dark. No one could see much. She blew out her candle, leaving it on the small entry table. Then she shut the door behind her and moved into the garden, summoning Badger to her side with a little chirping noise.

“Come along,” she told him. “We’re going to have an adventure.”

A chill crawled down her spine as she crossed the dark, shadowy village green, but having the dog at her heel was some comfort. Badger might not be fully grown, but he could tickle an attacker into submission, if nothing else.

When she reached the red-painted front door of the Bull and Blossom, she put a hand to the door latch and tested it. It was unlocked.

And vibrating.

She held her breath and opened her ears. From inside the tavern, she detected soft strains of pianoforte music. But they sounded as if they were coming from a long distance away.

The faint chords threw her back to those first hazy memories. She was in that long dark corridor again. Pianoforte music played from somewhere. From below? In her memory, she felt the distant strains of music shivering up through her heels. The arches of her feet tingled.

“See the garden of blossoms so fair . . .”

The corridor was cramped and dark. Endless. But in the darkness, there was something blue.

Be brave, my Katie.

Kate awoke from her trance with a gasp, sucking breath into air-deprived lungs. Her white-knuckled hand remained clasped on the door latch.

She gathered Badger with her other arm, then opened the door and entered.

What she found inside surprised her.

Lord Drewe.

He was seated at the pianoforte, and he had not noticed her entrance.

Light from a small lamp revealed him to be dressed in an open shirt with rolled cuffs and a dark pair of trousers. His feet were hard to see through the shadows, but Kate thought they were bare—just long, pale wedges against the dark floorboards.

He was playing the pianoforte, but with the top closed and the damper pedal pressed to the floor. The result was that no matter how vigorously he attacked the keys—and he was going at them with true fervor—only a faint, music-box sound escaped the instrument.

She could have laughed, if she weren’t so afraid of being caught. Watching a powerful marquess play the pianoforte in this fashion . . . Well, it was a little like watching a side of beef being butchered with a penknife.

Badger wriggled free of her grip.

Kate held her breath, mortified, as he hit the floor with a clatter of tiny claws.

Lord Drewe’s hands froze on the keys and he looked up sharply. He peered hard toward the shadows that concealed her.

“Who’s there?” His voice had a rough, end-of-day quality to it, and his jaw had a dark sprinkling of whiskers. For the first time, he seemed less of an elegant marquess and more of a . . . man.

“It’s only me,” she managed to whisper. “Kate.”

“Oh.” In an instant he’d mastered his shock. He rose from the bench and waved her forward. “Please come in. What a surprise.”

She hated for him to see her in her dressing gown, but it seemed a greater sin to remain hidden. “I’m so sorry. I just took Badger out for a minute, and then I saw the light burning. I was curious. I didn’t mean to interrupt your . . .” She bit her lip. “Your seething.”

He smiled and laughed a little.

Kate released her breath, relieved. “I’m so glad you laughed.”

“Were you thinking I wouldn’t?”

“I wasn’t sure. To tease you felt like a risk, but I couldn’t resist.” She approached the pianoforte. “I didn’t know you played.”

“Oh, yes. My brother Bennett does as well—or at least, he used to. Oddly enough, none of my sisters show much inclination for it. It seems to be a trait confined to the Gramercy men.” A half smile tugged at his mouth. “That is, on our side of the family.”

“Do you know if my—if Simon Gramercy played?”

“I believe he did.” Lord Drewe slid down the bench and gestured for her to sit. “Shall we try a duet?”

“I’d like nothing more.”