The pallets made sense now, Zaria realized, watching Fletcher push them up against the instrument. It was admittedly beautiful: ivory keys unchipped, wood finish gleaming. “But you already have one of these.”
“Yes,” Kane agreed.
“Why do you need another?”
“I don’t, technically speaking.” He strode past Zaria to assist Fletcher, not deigning to provide any more of an explanation. When she didn’t follow, he pivoted to quirk a brow at her. “Are you going to help?”
This was utterly ridiculous. She’d figured Kane wanted her assistance with something dark market related or perhaps within the realm of alchemology. She had not, however, foreseen his wanting her manpower. All at once, Kane’s disappointment over Jules’s not joining them made sense.
I’d have preferred a fourth set of hands, he’d said.
Preposterous.
“We’re not going to be able to lift that,” Zaria said, staring dubiously at the pianoforte. “Even with the three of us, it’ll be far too heavy.”
“Ah.” Kane tapped his temple with a finger. “But that’s why we have Fletcher.”
Fletcher winked, beginning to unbutton his coat. A moment later, he stood before them in nothing but a white shirt on top, and Zaria felt her cheeks heat. She’d never seen so many muscles on a person. The steep taper of his neck to shoulders alone was ridiculous, and frankly, she was surprised that his shirt was enough to contain his biceps. Everything about this was astonishingly improper, even to someone like Zaria, who had seen more than enough partially clothed men in the slum.
“I don’t want to ruin my coat,” Fletcher said, perhaps misinterpreting her stare as horror. “Sorry.”
She set her jaw, mouth a firm line as Kane came up beside her.
“Ready?”
He had rolled the sleeves of his shirt up to the elbow. He was muscular in his own way but leaner, more sinewy. Even in the relative darkness, she could see dark markings along his forearms. More arrow tattoos? She tilted her head slightly, trying to make them out.
Kane caught her looking and shoved his sleeves back down, scowling.
“What are those?” she couldn’t help asking. “On your arms.”
“Nothing,” he snapped back. “How strong would you say you are?”
Zaria only continued to stare at him. She’d obviously knocked Kane off-kilter, though she couldn’t figure out why. What was he hiding? Had he worked for someone else prior to Ward? Someone with a different way of marking their most trusted men?
But no, that didn’t make sense: Kane said he’d been with Ward for years. He was too young to have had a previous employer.
So Zaria let it go. What difference did it make?
“I’m strong enough,” she said defensively, though it wasn’t like she had much idea either way; women didn’t often do this kind of labor. “That said, I don’t think I’m the lift-a-pianoforte kind of strong.”
“Do your best,” Fletcher said from around the other side. “I’ll be doing most of the work anyway.”
And that was how Zaria ended up shoving the world’s most unwieldy instrument up a makeshift ramp and onto the wheeled pallets Fletcher had supplied. He hadn’t lied—he was definitely doing most of the work—but sweat beaded on Zaria’s upper lip as she braced a shoulder against the wood. The pianoforte had three legs—two in the front, one in the back—and at Kane’s direction, they managed to get the front two onto the first pallet, the back one onto the second. The pedals, Zaria saw, were attached by a harp-shaped bit of wood attached to the underside of the instrument. Had she known anything at all about music, she might have thought it was beautiful. It certainly had to be expensive.
When they had finished, Zaria slumped against the wall, a dawning horror washing over her.
“Wait. How the hell are we going to get it down the front steps?”
Kane shoved back a handful of sweaty hair. His shirtsleeves had ridden up again, and this time Zaria could see the shape of a tiny blackxagainst the skin of his wrist. She stared at it a moment but didn’t dare wonder aloud what it meant.
“You think we didn’t plan for that?” Kane said. “We’re going to back slang it. There are double doors leading out into the garden. It’ll fit,” he added before Zaria could ask.
Well then.“You’ve been here before.”
“Of course we’ve been here before,” Fletcher cut in, shrugging his coat back on. “We plan ahead. Surely you know that by now.”
Zaria watched them wheel the pianoforte through the entryway and past the staircase, to the rear of the house. Kane didn’t ask for her help, and she didn’t offer it. She wished Jules was here. He’d roll his eyes at these two, equal parts horrified and amused by what they were doing.
