Then he went into the bedroom with its bare floor, simple furnishings, and the shade pulled low on the window with the sound of icy rain upon the glass.
He took off his boots, laid his trousers over the back of the chair beside the bed, turned the flame down on the lantern, then slipped into bed and pulled her to him.
Her warmth drove back that cold, empty feeling deep inside that had been a part of him for so long, and was there tonight as if he couldn’t escape it.
“Aye,” he whispered against her hair.
Now, everything was all right.
Nineteen
#204 ON THE STRAND
Brodieand I had returned to the office after taking breakfast at the Public House.
I had updated my notes on the chalkboard the night before, after returning to find that he had been to the office, and had then left again. Mr. Cavendish had been present, minus the hound that had been sent along with Brodie.
I had now added what he had learned from his meeting with a man by the name of Brown.
Brodie knew a great many people from his time with the MET and before. Mr. Brown apparently operated a very lucrative business in smuggling, extortion, and everyday street crime, with a network of associates, as Brodie put it.
Just your everyday successful businessman. And exceedingly dangerous, according to what the Mudger had shared with me.
“Yet, you went to meet with him,” I pointed out, and left that open for a response. That dark gaze met mine.
“Old business,” he replied. As if that was an explanation.
“Did you consider that it might be dangerous?” Even as I said it, I thought that I might have sounded a bit like a nagging wife.
“What I mean is…” I started to explain. There was an amused smile behind that dark gaze.
“I know wot ye mean. The most dangerous part of it might have been the hound mistaking me afterward for one of Brown’s men.”
He then asked, “Wot time are ye to meet with Sir Laughton regarding the information he was able to obtain?”
“Ten o’clock.”
He nodded. “I’ll just go with ye. I may have some questions for him.” He had grabbed a towel from the bedroom and went to the door with soap and towel in hand.
“I have a need to wash off the street,” he explained as he left the office and went down the landing to the accommodation that had been added some time before and included a boiler for hot water, wash stand, and marvel upon marvels, a flush commode!
When he returned, he shook water from his hair, and smelled delightfully of soap.
“Can ye be ready by quarter past?” he inquired as he towel-dried his hair. It fell into waves about his neck. “That should leave enough time to reach his office.”
“I am quite ready now,” I replied.
I had already dressed for the day and my notebook was in my bag, while he stood there in trousers, bare of foot, without a shirt in spite of the cold and the rain—he was after all a Scot and they were quite used to such things. However, I was still not used to the sight of a half-dressed Scot with that light dusting of dark hair across his belly and…
I quickly went to the bedroom and retrieved a clean shirt and tie, then returned.
He handed me the dark-blue muslin shirt he’d worn the night before, then slipped his arms through the white shirt, which was far more presentable, and buttoned it.
When he would have tied the tie himself—always a frustrating endeavor that usually brought on several curses—I brushed his hands aside.
I felt that dark gaze on me.
“I never had anything that was truly my own.”
