He’d returned to the house at eight o’clock, slipping in via the rear alleyway and the shadows of the back garden. Entering through the kitchen, he’d noted that the builders had left only a few tools gathered in a corner. The side door had been as he’d left it, the key in the lock but not turned, the teeth not engaged. The scene set, he’d retreated to the porter’s alcove, leaving the door at the top of the kitchen stairs propped open with a brick.
The porter’s alcove commanded an uninterrupted view of the ground floor hall, the stairs leading upward, and the door to the kitchen stairs. No one could enter from the ground or the upper floors and get access to the basement level without him seeing them.
Not that he expected anyone to come that way, but he’d wanted to leave the way clear for the burglar belowstairs. He was willing to wager the “burglar” would head for some area of the basement; he wanted to let the man settle to his task before he intervened. He wanted evidence to confirm his suspicions. And then he intended to interrogate the “burglar.”
It was difficult to imagine what a real burglar would expect to steal from a vacant house.
His ears caught the soft slap of a leather sole on stone. Abruptly, he turned and faced the front door.
Against all the odds, someone was coming in that way.
A wavering outline appeared on the etched-glass panels of the door. He slipped noiselessly out of the porter’s booth and merged with the shadows.
Leonora slid the heavy key into the lock and glanced down at her companion.
She’d retired to her bedchamber supposedly to sleep. The servants had locked up and retired. She’d waited until the clock had struck eleven, reasoning that by then the street would be deserted, then she’d slipped downstairs, avoiding the library where Humphrey and Jeremy were still poring over their tomes. Collecting her cloak, she’d let herself out of the front door.
There was, however, one being she couldn’t so easily avoid.
Henrietta blinked up at her, long jaws agape, ready to follow her wherever she went. If she’d tried to leave her in the front hall and go out alone at this hour, Henrietta would have howled.
Leonora narrowed her eyes at her. “Blackmailer.” Her whisper was lost in the strafing wind. “Just remember,” she continued, more by way of bolstering her own courage than instructing Henrietta, “we’re only here to watch what he does. You have to be absolutely quiet.”
Henrietta looked at the door, then nudged it with her nose.
Leonora turned the key, pleased when it slid smoothly around. Removing it, she pocketed it, then drew her cloak close. Curling one hand about Henrietta’s collar, she grasped the doorknob and turned it.
The bolt slid back. She opened the door just wide enough for her and Henrietta to squeeze through, then swung around to shut it. The wind gusted; she had to release Henrietta and use both hands to force the door closed—silently.
She managed it. Heaving an inward sigh of relief, she turned.
The front hall was shrouded in stygian gloom. She stood still as her eyes began to adjust, as the sense of emptiness—the strangeness of a remembered place stripped of all its furnishings—sank into her.
She heard a faint click.
Beside her, Henrietta abruptly sat, posture erect, a suppressed whimper, not of pain but excitement escaping her.
Leonora stared at her.
The air around her stirred.
The hair on her nape lifted; her nerves leapt. Instinctively, she dragged in a breath—
A hard palm clamped over her lips.
A steely arm locked about her waist.
Hauled her back against a body like sculpted rock.
Strength engulfed her, trapping her, subduing her.
Effortlessly.
A dark head bent close.
A voice in which fury was barely leashed hissed in her ear, “What the devil are you doing here?”
* * *