Chapter 9
"Another ale, Rufus?" Paisley asked, flashing a smile at the wobbling drunk man in front of her.
At this time of day – barely one o' clock in the afternoon – customers in The Sinner were few and far between. Mostly, there were just old drunks, men with no work to go to and families all grown up and left home, with little else to do but loll around all day and drink themselves silly.
Paisley had been braced for unsavory comments, for fending off amorous drunkards, and many general humiliations.
She was pleasantly surprised.
The old drunks were chatty and friendly, acting like wobbly, smelly gentlemen. When Paisley ventured a slightly off-color joke – learned from Ava, of course – they all roared with appreciative laughter, and Paisley found herself blushing and grinning with pleasure.
It's not all bad working here.
Aside from the drunks, there was little else to do. There was no sign of Dominic, and she hadn't seen him all morning. In fact, Brodie had been the one to unlock the doors and let her in, mumbling something about cleaning and seeing to what few customers there were before darting away.
So, Paisley had made herself busy. She'd always prided herself on not being one of those dull ladies and gentlemen who needed to be told everything – the ones that would sit on a sofa patiently for hours and hours, waiting for their host to reappear and suggest that they do something more interesting.
No, she was entirely capable. So, Paisley had swept the pub floor as thoroughly as possible, ending up with a large pile of grime, dust, dead leaves, and assorted rubbish at the threshold, which she swept out into the courtyard.
She dusted where she could reach and wiped down the sticky tables and pub counter.
But there was really only so much she could do in the main pub to clean. Now, Paisley was reduced to hovering behind the bar counter, bored. The drunks in the corner seemed to be nursing their pints for now, so she had nothing really to do.
What if Dominic came back and found her idle?
Paisley couldn't help but shiver at the thought of him. It wasn't an unpleasant shiver, more like an anticipatory ache. Really, this whole business would be easier if he were unattractive. The man had no right to be so brooding and alluring.
Remember that he doesn't know the real you, Paisley reminded herself, a thought that never failed to quench her good mood, as effectively as a bucket of cold water dumped over her head. If he did, he'd despise you, I can guarantee it.
On that pleasant thought, she glanced around the pub, looking desperately for some chore to do to distract herself. Her gaze fell on the staircase, leading up to the mezzanine landing, and a dark passageway beyond. There'd be something up there to clean, she was sure of it.
But what about the customers? Brodie had told her to take care of them. Diving under the counter, Paisley rummaged through the boxes and untidy drawers kept underneath until she found what she was looking for.
She straightened up with a satisfied smile, clutching a bell in her hand. It was old and rusty, and the clapper was cracked, but when she gave it an experimental shake, it rang out nicely.
The drunks glanced over at her inquisitively.
"Gentlemen," Paisley said – they liked it when she called them gentlemen – holding up the bell. "I shall be going upstairs to clean. If you need anything, please ring this bell and I'll come down directly."
She received a chorus of affirmatives, and so left the bell in an obvious place on the bar counter.
Picking up her bucket of grubby water, along with the scrubbing brush, duster, broom, and handful of rags she'd cobbled together for cleaning, Paisley headed towards the stairs. She was very pleased with her own initiative.
Sure enough, the landing and stairs were thick with dust, needing a good clean. She placed the bucket and cleaning supplies in a corner, surveying the landing. It was natural that her gaze should be dragged towards the passageway in the corner, dark and intriguing as it was.
The passageway was long and thin, stretching to the very back of the building, as far as she could see. There was a round window, grimy with dirt, at the end – she would clean that first, Paisley decided – and there were closed doors branching off on either side of the passageway.
Resolutely ignoring her mother's warnings that curiosity killed the cat, or some such serious fable, Paisley tiptoed down the hallway, trying the door handles as she went.
They were guest rooms, mostly. Simply laid out, with a bed in the corner, a washstand, and sometimes a wardrobe. They were dusty and smelled stale, but aside from that, they were perfectly serviceable rooms.
She would clean them all. And then, when Dominic finally appeared, he would be impressed by her initiative and hard work, and then...
Well, Paisley wasn't entirely sure what would happen then. It didn't seem very in character for Dominic to give her a big smile and a tight hug and tell everyone who was listening that she was the best hireling he'd ever taken on.
She cleared her throat, not wanting to dwell too long on their fantasy, or on Dominic hugging her.
She approached the final door in the corridor, and found that this one was unlocked, too.
Rather than opening into another guest room or even a storeroom, this door opened onto a small, crowded office.
Bookshelves lined the walls. Paisley had never seen so many books together at once, except of course at that moldy old bookshop in the main street that smelled of something other than paper and seemed to have no filing system or type of organization at all.
They had a library at home, of course, but Paisley didn't count that. Hundreds of glossy book spines filled their shelves, immaculately organized, regularly dusted, carefully indexed, and never read.
It was only once she'd left home that Paisley understood what a treasure trove they'd had, all to themselves, and she had never appreciated it. None of them had. Every single family of her acquaintance kept a remarkable library, which was shut away and kept only for their own use.
And then they never did use it, did they? It was a terrible waste.
These bookshelves were not carefully organized at all, and there were no glossy, untouched leather covers.
The books were all well-read, pages yellowed and curled, dog-eared at the edges.
They were jammed into the bookshelves at strange angles, books fitted in between the shelves, piled up on their sides, and tucked into the corners.
There were piles of books sitting on the floor, and there wasn't a single empty spot on the shelves themselves.
Mesmerized by the active chaos, Paisley took a nervous step into the room.
There were floorboards here like everywhere else in the pub, worn smooth in places where the inhabitant of the room had walked to and from.
Mostly, the worn-out places led to a desk, laden with papers, pens, pencils, and more books, and to. ..
There was a bed, tucked against the same wall as the door. Paisley flinched back at the sight of it. She hadn't noticed the bed at first, since it was a narrow pallet-bed, and almost hidden behind the opened door.
What was worse, there was a man in it.
It was Dominic, of course. Paisley recognized him at once by his prematurely gray-streaked brown hair, sticking up every which way from the whiteness of his pillow.
He seemed younger, somehow. She knew, of course, that she ought to leave the room at once and close the door, and never again be so bold as to waltz right into his office and personal quarters.
Paisley did not take this very sensible course of action. She stayed where she was, staring at him.
In sleep, Dominic's face was smooth, only the groove between his eyebrows hinting at his habitual scowl.
There was a prickle of dark stubble on his cheeks and under his chin, highlighting his sharp jaw, and his body seemed smaller under the thick patchwork quilt.
He was curled up on his side, and that seemed almost amusing to Paisley, that a man like Dominic Sutherland would curl up into a ball when he slept.
It was fairly obvious that this situation could only end one of two ways. One, Paisley could creep out of the room and softly close the door behind her, and revel in secret shame over watching the poor gentleman while he slept.
Or two, Dominic could wake up.
Paisley couldn't have said at what point she realized that Dominic's eyes were open. A pang of embarrassment ran through her, and yet she didn't do the sensible thing of gathering the last of her dignity and making a run for it.
Dominic's eyelashes – longer, thicker, and darker than Paisley had imagined – fluttered, thin slits of iron-gray peeping out between the lids. He was watching her, but he said nothing.
"I'm sorry to disturb you," Paisley said lamely. "But I didn't realize you were sleeping in here."
He said nothing, and Paisley wondered if he was still asleep – her brother used to sleep with his eyes half-open, and it was very disconcerting – and simply didn't see her there at all.
That crease was still there between his brows, as if he were having annoying dreams. Something that made him angry. Or sad, she considered. On impulse, she reached forward, intending to press at the groove between his brows, to smooth it away.
Her father had always done that when Paisley was sad or angry. He'd gently rubbed at the line between her eyebrows as if he could erase it altogether, and she'd always ended up smiling, her bad mood gone and forgotten. She'd missed that gesture more times than she could count since she left home.
Her fingertip was almost grazing his skin when Dominic's hand shot up, so fast that Paisley didn't have time to flinch.
Long, cool fingers closed around her wrist, and for a heartbeat of time, Paisley froze, staring down into wide-open, wide-awake iron-gray eyes.