Chapter Twenty-Three #2
She recognized the warm spice of his cologne before she saw him.
“Cora?” Jack whispered.
He slipped into the space beside her and pulled the door closed until there was nothing but a sliver of light between them. The orchestra music dimmed and grew distant. She could hear the sound of her own breathing.
“Hello,” he said.
“Hi,” she whispered back.
He slipped off his wig and ran his hand through his hair.
She had found him attractive before, a girl of fourteen with a crush. Now, at twenty-eight, she found him almost devastatingly handsome.
But he was a means to an end. Someone she had long held responsible for ruining her entire life. It was ludicrous to think of him even as an ally tonight, much less a friend.
And yet she realized that part of her did.
“So the plan,” he said. “I’ll get Truman here tonight.”
“On my signal,” she reminded him.
“And you’ll be set up here. Will this work for a photograph, then?” he asked, turning toward the small shaft of light.
She nodded. “It should. But only if they’re distracted. They have to be good and hot. Or I’ll get caught when I slip open the door.”
“I won’t let that happen,” he said. He met her eyes and held them. There were faint echoes of tipsy laughter from the party far away, the tinkling of heels on marble.
Cora’s heart skipped a beat when he didn’t look away.
“Did you find Florence?” she asked.
Jack nodded.
“Is she coming?”
Jack’s eyes traced down her face, and he hesitated. He nodded again. Then he reached up to brush something from her cheek. At the gentle stroke of his fingers against her skin, hope for something that should not be sparked inside her. Her whole body quickened. It felt like a betrayal.
Her eyes fell to his frilled neckpiece. “This costume is absurd,” she murmured.
He laughed low in her ear, and every part of her smoked and caught fire.
She closed her eyes. “I had a thought,” she said. Her heart was racing.
“Mm?”
Jack took a step closer to her. Their hands brushed in the darkness.
This time she didn’t pull away.
She reached out and gently stroked her thumb once along the ridge of his knuckle.
He went very still.
“A thought?” he asked. His voice was low and strained.
“About the letter, signed with a bird,” she said.
He played with the end of a feather on her uniform, skimming her wrist, and a white-hot heat shot across her skin, down past her belly. Then he brought his hand up, grazing along the curve of her waist. His touch practically melted into the satin.
Cora closed her eyes. “It made me think of all the other birds in the house,” she whispered. She could feel his breath on her neck.
And then she heard the soft whine of hinges. The door to the bedroom opened, and Liam stepped inside.
Jack swore under his breath, his hand tightening on her waist. He pulled her away from the door, and they moved to the opposite side of the closet, pressing into the wall as they tried to stay out of the light.
She felt his breath catch the moment her body fit into his, and he instinctively drew her even closer. He tilted his face down, as if breathing her in, and made a low sound in the back of his throat.
She pressed into him, feeling the delicious way his body met every part of hers as she searched for the door handle behind him. Her hand clasped around the knob, and she turned it.
They spilled out into the second bedroom, and Cora shut the closet door behind them just in time.
What was that? Jack asked himself.
Cora smoothed her dress, turning away from him. He suddenly wanted to draw her close again, to fit his hands around the arc of her waist like it was the most natural thing in the world; for the scent of her hair to flood his nostrils again and to feel the gorgeous curve of her body beneath satin.
You do not have the luxury of distractions, he admonished himself.
When she turned toward him again, her face was flushed.
“Cora—” he started to say, but she interrupted him.
“What I noticed,” she said quietly, as if nothing had happened between them. She pointed toward the door they had just come through. It fit perfectly into the wall, almost disappearing. He tried to ignore the unexpected disappointment that was settling into his belly.
“The nightingales,” she whispered to him, moving to skim her fingertips over the patterned wallpaper. “There are birds on the other end, as well. I think it must be some sort of code.”
“A code?” he asked.
“Like the letter. A code, or some sort of clue, maybe. There was a dove to show the way to the freight elevator in the basement.”
“And the missing heron beside the grand fireplace,” Jack said. He was still clutching the wig in his hand. He forced his racing heart, his breathing, to return to normal.
“Mm,” Cora said. She still didn’t meet his eyes. “There are always birds leading somewhere.” She examined the door, and he saw how full her lips were, the delicate slice of her collarbone. “I wonder, if we pay attention, if they will lead us somewhere we need to go.”
He dragged his gaze away from her, running his hands through his hair. He gave it an extra tug, hard enough to hurt. “Good thinking. I need to go meet Florence.” He placed the wig back on his head. “But I’ll be back in time to help with Truman.”
Finally she looked at him. Her eyes were bright and luminous. “On my signal,” she said.
He nodded. “On your signal,” he confirmed.
She smiled. “I hope you get what you want tonight,” she said, brushing past him. He caught another whiff of her hair.
“Me too,” he said under his breath.
The problem was, he was no longer entirely sure what that was.