She recovered quickly, as he’d expected. “You look like a street urchin,” she muttered. “Half-starved, bruised up—what have you been about, then?”
“That’s a rather long story.”
“Hmm.” Mrs. Tanner folded her arms. “Long story or not, should I send for the authorities?”
This woman was no fool, and she, of course, would suspect that some kind of foul play was at hand. Servants always knew more than their employers gave them credit for.
“Refrain for now,” he said. Because Daisy had said the men who’d left him for dead had been police, and Alastair had no way of knowing which bobbies were in his enemy’s pocket.
“Is my uncle awake yet?”
Mrs. Tanner’s mouth tightened as she wiped her hands on her apron. “Of course. You know he rises with the sun.” Then, after a pause, she sniffed and added, “He’s in the study.Your study, as we speak.”
The tone in her voice, as much as the words themselves, shifted something in Alastair’s gut.
His study.
He’d been clinging to the belief that his uncle—his father’s own brother—couldn’t possibly pose any real threat to him.
But standing here now, in his own home, hearingsomething…off in Mrs. Tanner’s voice—something she wasn’t quite saying aloud—he felt the first real stirrings of doubt.
Alastair gave the astute woman a meaningful stare before nodding and then forcing his features into a neutral mask.
“My thanks, Mrs. Tanner.” He pivoted toward the door that led to the small stairway normally reserved for servants.
“Your Grace?” Her voice halted him mid-step.
He turned back.
She hesitated, then squared her shoulders. “It’s good to have you home again.”
There—just for a moment—her normally sharp gaze softened, and if he wasn’t mistaken, there was the faintest shimmer of moisture in her eyes.
A strange warmth spread through his chest.Home. He hadn’t realized until this moment how much the idea of it mattered.
By God, how long had he been gone?
“Good to be back,” he said, swallowing around the lump in his throat before disappearing through the narrow passage. He turned toward the steps leading to the main floor with quiet precision. The house would have felt peaceful if not for the sound of his pulse beating loudly in his ears.
When he reached the landing, he paused, pressing his back against the wall and peering down the corridor. No sign of any footmen.
The house was waking. Soon, his presence would be impossible to hide.
He knew exactly where to go, as if he’d never left, every room and hallway as familiar to him as the back of his hand.
He did not knock before stepping into the study that would always remind him of his father.
Everything about the room welcomed him, from the rich walnut molding to the deep leather armchairs and the warm coals glowing in the massive hearth.
And yet, seeing his last living relative so comfortable nearly made him feel like an intruder.
The man sitting behind Alastair’s desk, in Alastair’s chair, with the windows at his back, should have been a familiar sight—should have stirred a sense of security, of kinship.
Instead, Alastair felt something else entirely.
Foreboding.
A warning.
