Horace growled.

“This time, I am going to kill that damned dog,” the fiend promised, an icy relish contained within that sent dread tripping along her spine. “If you don’t cooperate. Now, let him out back, and get yarself back in here,” he ordered, his voice moving between proper King’s English and a street-roughened Cockney.

“Go,” Myrtle whispered, yanking the door open, and Horace took flight. His legs slid periodically as he hit icy patches of earth, though he all but flew, his strides still graceful despite his periodic slip.

She eyed his retreat a moment, considering escape of her own, knowing if she did, she’d be no match for them, that Val’s dog would return for her and pay the price with his life.

Drawing the door shut, Myrtle shifted course and took off running for the servants’ stairs.

Chapter 15

Chapter 15

Val was lonely.

Only, this was a different loneliness.

This wasn’t the familiar state he’d found himself dwelling in these past years.

This was a new kind.

The likes of which he’d never expected to know or feel again.

Loneliness for another person—a living person, that was.

He’d been aware of her in that room she’d made her chambers.

He’d felt her there, even before she’d shown herself at the windows, waving at him.

And he’d wanted to go to Myrtle.

He’d wanted to be with her.

Every day of his life since his wife’s passing had been difficult; this particular time of year, the anniversary of when she’d died, however, was especially hard. The memories stronger. The grief starker. The pain harsher.

Yet these past days, that hadn’t been the case.

These past days, he’d smiled and laughed, and perhaps he was just growing melancholy. Perhaps in being around Myrtle with her zest for life and her always sunny optimism, he’d found himself remembering how life used to be. She brought to mind feelings other than grief and loss, and that was a powerful aphrodisiac.

With a curse, he grabbed the book he’d been gifted and turned the well-read volume over in his hands.

When was the last time he’d read . . . anything?

Absently, he fanned the pages, taking note of those that were bent.

A wistful smile danced on his lips. She folded the corners of her books.

It fit with the lady, impatient and not bothering with the proper marking for the book.

As he flipped through the pages, his gaze snagged upon a note in the passages. It flew by so fast, and he stopped upon another she’d made in the book. Quickly reversing course, he licked the tip of his finger and turned back, searching for that earlier spot.

He found it.

“A lady’s imagination is very rapid, it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony in a moment.”