His hand flexed. A flicker of instinct. To reach. To touch. To feel. He curled his fingers into a fist against the absurd urge instead. To feel he’d have to remove his gloves, and he never removed them in front of anyone.
“I will hold you to that, Miss Turner. Let’s not meet again, then.”
Her eyes blazed at him. “Agreed.”
He strode from the shop, pausing with his hand on the door, casting her one last glance at her before stepping out completely. He didn’t go far, however, leaning against the cool stone wall of a nearby building across the street, his eyes trained on the woman’s shop. Every nerve in his body felt pulled tight, sharpening his senses as he turned over what he had learned from their brief encounter.
Calliope Turner.
A vision of sunlight.
Could she truly be the same woman who had slipped through his grasp last night? Had he chased her through the dark alleys, her shadow just a whisper against the cobblestones as she evaded him with skill?
Bloody troublesome.
He didn’t do loose ends. Didn’t do sweet scents. Didn’t do women like her. Polished edges. She practically gleamed with them. A finish the Lanes could never scuff away. That spine. That poise. She was not from his world, hadn’t scraped her way from the gutters. And he hadn’t crawled his way to his position now to end back there because he lost focus. For that reason, he needed to determine his new tenant’s true intentions in Brighton. Young women didn’t just open candle shops and run them by themselves without a guardian.
Ones with secrets might.
He should never have left Brighton. Should have sent one of his brothers. Perhaps then he wouldn’t have a merchant bleeding in thebloody dungeon beneath his tavern. And her.
Drake, his right-hand brother and second oldest of the Fury brood, appeared beside him, sliding his hands into his pockets. “Is it her?” he asked in a murmur so low it barely rose above the clatter of the growing streetway. “Your little spy?”
Maxen didn’t respond immediately, his gaze remaining fixed on the shop’s window where Miss Turner once more arranged her candles. Was she? He wasn’t entirely certain. And he wanted to be certain. If it was her, she might just be an expert at hiding.
Or she might just be a normal, polished young woman.
Still, a nagging suspicion burrowed into him.
“I’m not sure,” he finally said. She was hiding something. But he didn’t know what. Yet.
“You have a suspicion.”
“Of course. Why else would I be keeping an eye here?”
“Lurking.”
Maxen merely shrugged. “Call it what you will.”
Drake crossed his arms over his chest. “We can’t afford any wild loose ends running around Brighton.”
The slipper burned against his chest. It was not a decision he wanted to make, but for now, “We do nothing.”
“That’s not like you.”
Maxen shrugged. If it was indeed her, which he was about ten percent unsure about, this innocent-looking Miss Turner with her golden spun hair and bright, piercing eyes would have to be watched closely. Something Maxen wanted to do even less than he wanted to deal with her in the first place.
“If you want me to handle the chit—”
“No.” He turned to his brother, gaze hardening. “She’s on my territory. I will handle her.”
His brother’s brows furrowed. “She seems to have caught your interest.”
“Interest?” Maxen turned the word over in his mind. That couldn’t be. He’d only just met her. And she was everything he avoided. Everything delicate and soft andlight. She barely reached his damn shoulders, for Christ’s sake.
“Is she pretty?” Drake asked, his voice laced with amusement.
“No.”
