“James.” Dominic’s voice came out even.
All three women turned at once, and James looked up from the keys, his head turning like instinct to find his uncle.
“Your Grace.” Mrs. Greer moved toward him, hands still clasped. “We were only airing the room, as you requested last week. I had the maids in to dust. Lord James came past in the corridor and slipped in before?—”
“Why was the door unlocked?”
“We were inside the room, Your Grace. We were working.”
“A locked room requires a key to open. Which means it was lockable while you were inside it.”
Mrs. Greer closed her mouth.
“It is of no matter now.” He walked toward the boy, keeping his eyes off the instrument. “Come away from the piano.”
“I want to play,” James said and pressed C again with one finger, as though that would settle the argument.
“This piano is not for playing,” Dominic said. “Step away from it.”
“I want to play,” James said again.
“I am aware of what you want.” He glanced at Miss Hartley, who immediately stepped forward.
James ducked sideways on the bench and put both hands flat on the keys.
The resulting sound was not musical. A full crash of discordance rang off the ceiling, and Dominic’s jaw locked.
He breathed in through his nose. “James. That is enough.”
“It’s not for playing,” James said. “You said. But why do you have it, then?”
Dominic looked at him.
The boy’s dark eyes were level and entirely serious. He genuinely wanted to know. He was six years old, and he genuinely wanted to know why a man would keep a piano in a room and declare it unplayable.
There was no answer Dominic could give him here. Not in this room. Not standing over his mother’s piano while the echo of those discordant keys was still moving through the walls.
“Step off the bench,” he said, instead.
“Why do you have it?” The boy was insistent, and now was not the time to be so hardheaded.
At least, not to Dominic, it wasn’t.
“That is not a conversation for now. Off the bench,” he gritted out.
But James shook his head, obviously not satisfied with that non-answer. “I want to play.”
Dominic stepped forward and lifted the boy from the bench in one movement, tucking him against his side.
James went rigid and immediately began to thrash. “Let me down, let me— I want to play?—”
“Mrs. Greer.” He kept his voice flat. “Lock the room. Now.”
He carried the boy into the corridor, James’s heels connecting with his shin with what felt like deliberate persistence, and held him until he heard the lock click behind them. Then he set James down.
The boy turned and went directly to the door, both hands flat against the wood.
He pushed. It held. He pushed again, harder, and made a low sound in his throat.
