24. The Lonely Gentleman
Twenty Four
The Lonely Gentleman
T he Green Swan sat on a corner near the large warehouses, its windows glowing warm in the afternoon sunlight.
Mr. Moore pushed through the door into a wall of sound—voices raised in conversation, laughter, the clink of glasses and scrape of chairs.
The smell of ale and pipe smoke and unwashed bodies were intoxicating, but that didn’t stop him.
He made his way to the bar, ignoring the curious glances from other patrons. A gentleman of his obvious quality didn’t often frequent such establishments. Or so he thought.
“Whiskey,” he said to the barkeep. “Leave the bottle.”
The man’s eyebrows rose but he complied, setting down a glass and a bottle of amber liquid that had probably never seen the inside of a proper distillery.
Mr. Moore was beyond caring any of that. He poured himself a drink, downed it in one gulp, and poured again.
The liquor burned his throat as he swallowed, sinking hot and heavy into his empty stomach. But he welcomed the sensation; anything that distracted him from the crushing weight in his chest was better than doing nothing. He wanted to erase the memory of Kate’s face when she’d fled that last time.
Disgusted. Revolted. Unable to even look at me.
He poured another glass.
Time dissolved sip by sip, measured only by the level of liquid in the bottle.
The tavern’s bustle enveloped him, though he couldn’t really make anything out, conversations he wasn’t following, laughter that sounded distant and hollow.
He kept his gaze fixed on his glass, on the fingers that circled it, trying not to see, instead, Kate’s hands gripping the armrest with white knuckles, trying not to remember how those same hands had touched his face so tenderly just a week before.
His own hands overlapped with Kate’s in his memory, his eyes blurred now by the alcohol coursing through his veins.
A woman’s hands. Gina’s hands. Hands that had made Kate feel violated, outraged.
Another glass down.
The burn was dulling now, becoming almost pleasant. His thoughts were starting to blur at the edges, as was his vision, as the weight on his chest began to lift, sip by sip.
The tavern’s afternoon crowd thinned and thickened again as workers came and went. Shadows shifted across the floor as the sun moved.
And he kept pouring, unaware of anything else around him.
Across the tavern, tucked into a corner booth shadowed by the poor lighting, Lord Ramsay sat with two acquaintances whose names he could barely remember.
The conversation had long since grown tiresome—complaints about investments, gossip about people he didn’t care about, the usual tedious drivel that filled these establishments.
He lifted his glass, swirling the amber liquid without drinking, his mind elsewhere.
The afternoon wore on. His companions ordered another round. Then another. Ramsay barely touched his drink, content to let them talk at him while he observed the tavern’s comings and goings with detached boredom.
At some point, movement near the bar caught his eye. Ramsay’s attention sharpened instantly, his glass freezing halfway to his lips.
Moore.
Alone.
Hunched over the bar like a man trying to drink himself into oblivion.
Something sparked in Ramsay’s chest, hot and eager and vindictive.
The great Mr. Moore-Sullivan, who’d stolen Kate from under his nose, who’d married her before Ramsay could make his own intentions clear, looked absolutely wretched.
Even from this distance, Ramsay could see the slump in his shoulders, the way his hand trembled slightly as he poured another glass.
Trouble in paradise, Ramsay thought, his lips curving into a slow smile.
“—don’t you agree, Ramsay?” One of his companions was speaking, waiting for a response.
Ramsay made a noncommittal sound, not taking his eyes off Moore. The man poured another drink. He watched him swallowed it. Then another.
Minutes passed. Maybe longer than that.
Ramsay watched Moore’s posture deteriorate with each glass, shoulders slumping further, head dropping lower. One of his companions droned on about something. Ramsay nodded at appropriate intervals without hearing a word.
Moore signaled for a second bottle.
The light through the tavern windows shifted from bright afternoon to the amber of early evening. Moore was still at it, methodical in his self-destruction, but his movements were becoming less controlled now.
Perfect.
“Ramsay? Are you even listening?”
“Hmm?” Ramsay finally glanced at the speaker, not bothering to hide his disinterest. “Apologies, gentlemen, but I’ve just spotted an old acquaintance. If you’ll excuse me.”
He stood before they could respond, smoothing his waistcoat and adjusting his cuffs. Timing was everything in situations like these. Too soon, and Moore might still have his wits about him. Too late, and he’d be too drunk to properly understand the barbs Ramsay intended to deliver.
But now—now Moore looked just vulnerable enough. Drunk enough to have lost his usual control, but still conscious enough to feel every word.
Ramsay’s smile widened as he began making his way across the tavern floor, his eyes never leaving the solitary figure at the bar.
* * *
Lunch had come and gone without Mr. Moore appearing. No one had mentioned it at the time, though Mary had left his covered plate on the table longer than usual before quietly removing it. Kate and Vikram had eaten alone, as had become their habit since returning from Yorkshire.
Mr. Moore had a meeting, Kate had told the boy. A simple explanation that required no further discussion.
But she knew better. And so did Mary.
Since Yorkshire, they had fallen into a careful routine of avoidance. Separate mealtimes, separate schedules, each of them orbiting the house without ever occupying the same room. Kate had been the one to establish it. It had felt necessary at the time.
However, that was before this morning. Before the drawing room.
Something had shifted in that encounter, or perhaps, broken, was the better word, and Kate had spent the hours since trying to decide whether that was a good thing or a terrible one.
She hadn’t reached a conclusion. What she had reached, somewhere between the drawing room and the dinner table, was the startling desire to see him again.
Her. To sit across from her at this table and simply… continue. Whatever that meant.
She had said as much to Mary in the only way she knew how.
“Set a place for Mr. Moore-Sullivan tonight,” she had told her that afternoon. “Let him know dinner will be at the usual hour.”
Mary had not said anything. She had simply nodded and gone to do it, which Kate had appreciated more than she could express.
Now the candles were lit, the plates were full, and the chair across from her was empty.
“Has Mr. Moore-Sullivan come in yet?” Kate asked, keeping her voice even.
Mary shook her head. “Not when I went to check, ma’am.”
Kate nodded and picked up her fork.
Vikram glanced at the empty chair and then back at his plate, saying nothing, though she could tell he had noticed. He was perceptive that way.
A few minutes passed. Kate moved food around her plate without eating none of it.
“I can go ask the butler,” Vikram offered eventually. “He would know if Mr. Moore-Sullivan has come in.”
Kate looked at him. Then at the empty chair. Then back at Vikram.
She sighed. “Go ahead,” she said.
The boy stood up and left the dining room without waiting any longer, his footsteps quickening in the hallway.
Vikram returned moments later, his brows slightly furrowed. “The butler says Mr. Moore-Sullivan left the house just before midday, ma’am. On foot. The footman at the door told him—” Vikram hesitated. “He said Mr. Moore-Sullivan looked distressed when he left, and hasn’t come back since.”
The dining room went quiet. Mary set down the serving spoon she had been holding.
Kate set down her fork with the utmost care. Nine hours. He had been out for nine hours after their encounter in the drawing room.
Before she could say anything about it, Henderson, the butler himself, appeared in the doorway, his face, usually imperturbable, now reflected an unusual urgency.
“I beg your pardon, ma’am.” He stepped into the room, and Kate could sense that he was restraining himself with the composure of someone who must deliver bad news. “A boy has just arrived at the door with an urgent message from Viscount Perry.”
Kate stood immediately. “What message?”
Henderson glanced at Vikram, then at Mary, then back at Kate.
“The boy says Viscount Perry is at the Green Swan tavern in the dock district. Mr. Moore-Sullivan is there as well. And…” He paused, inhaling deeply.
“Lord Ramsay is there too. The boy says Mr. Moore-Sullivan has been drinking heavily—that he’s in a very bad state.
Viscount Perry says to come quickly—he believes there will be trouble. ”
The silence that followed was of a different quality entirely.
Vikram looked at Kate with wide eyes. Mary’s face went pale. Kate felt the blood drain from her own.
The Green Swan and Lord Ramsay.
“I’m going after him,” Kate said, already moving toward the door.
“Ma’am, you can’t—” Mary started.
“I can and I will.” Kate turned to Henderson, who was still standing in the doorway. “Have the carriage brought around immediately.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Henderson left at once.
“Please!” Vikram grabbed Kate’s sleeve, his eyes desperate and pleading. “Please let me come with you. He’s my—I have to go—please, Mrs. Moore-Sullivan!”
Kate looked down at the boy’s frightened face and saw her own fear reflected there. Every instinct screamed that she should send Vikram to his room, that a lady and a child had no business venturing into the dock district after dark.
But the thought of… Gina… alone and drunk, vulnerable to Ramsay’s cruelty, a woman facing down a man who already hated her, hated him , with no way to defend herself without exposing everything—