Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
The Nightingale was bustling with activity and voices. The air stank of lamp oil and damp wool, thick with the bitter tang of smoke.
Hudson stepped out of his carriage into the midnight hush, his boots striking the stones with a confidence that brooked no resistance.
A footman had braved the drizzle to lower the step, but Hudson ignored the offer and landed lightly, surveying the entrance with the wary precision of a soldier entering a contested garrison.
He lingered for a moment under the overhang, flicked a raindrop from his sleeve, and with a single brisk gesture, smoothed a rogue lock of golden-brown hair back into order. His hand rested for a heartbeat on the head of his cane before he pushed inside.
Heat and sound hit him as he crossed the threshold.
He scanned the room. He saw everything—every tic and tell, every feigned yawn and exchanged glance. It was the old habit, that ability to size up a crowd and spot the danger before the danger even recognized itself.
The tension in the room recalibrated itself around him.
Even here, where secrets were supposed to ferment undisturbed, his presence was a distillery of rumor and dread. The barman nodded and hastily poured a whiskey neat, then slid it down the polished wood with the reverence one afforded an idol.
Hudson ignored the drink and made for the private alcoves at the far end, weaving past a pair of footmen in the Nightingale’s dark livery. He took the high-backed chair at his usual table, the leather creaking in familiar protest as he sat down.
The table was set for three, though he rarely needed the company. It was a signal—an old trick—to leave the additional chairs empty, a promise of negotiation or threat depending on who filled the seat.
He planted his elbows on the table and folded his hands, the posture of a man about to give orders.
Chin lifted, back arrow-straight, he began the inventory: patrons, employees, potential liabilities.
He caught snippets of conversation, dissected the meanings in the cadence of laughter and the wary glances tossed his way.
Most people gave him a wide berth, instinctively steering clear of the eye of the storm.
With a flash of irritation, he thought of the scene at Oakhart House earlier: Cassie and her governess sneaking into the manor, stained with mud.
He’d intended to be furious, to deliver a dressing-down that would restore the proper order of things.
Instead, he’d found himself… what? Disarmed, certainly. Unsettled, yes.
The memory of Augusta’s face—luminous, impudent, and utterly unrepentant—rose unbidden.
His knuckles whitened around the edge of the table. He was not used to this. Being challenged in the way she challenged him, or being affected by anyone this much.
He had no idea what to make of it.
Thoughts of Augusta’s face so close to his own taunted him all night, even as he made his way back home and attempted sleep. When dawn broke, he was still wide awake, though unable to keep from dreaming of the things he may have done had Cassie not interrupted the charged moment.
He avoided breakfast, avoided her, and made his way to the stables with pursed lips.
James was already waiting for him, his breath visible where he stood.
“Hudson,” he called, his grin wide enough to crack the cold. “I had wagered a shilling that you’d call off today’s ride. Happy to lose it. What is it that brings you out in this weather?”
“Habit,” Hudson replied, swinging himself up into the saddle with a practiced grace. “And the fact that if I remain indoors one minute longer, I’ll implode.”
“And here I thought you’d be up to the elbows in your Nightingale accounts,” James said, nudging his horse alongside.
Hudson set off at a brisk trot, savoring the brief peace before James inevitably talked it away. With each stride, the gelding’s muscles bunched and released, a rhythm that bled tension from his shoulders.
“I hear,” James said, as soon as they hit the main path, “that you’ve acquired a new weapon in the household wars. Miss Norton. It’s all over the kitchens that she’s uncommonly clever, and that Cassie hasn’t yet managed to make her run weeping into the night.”
“Indeed. We shall see whether she lasts or not.”
“Is she beautiful, at least?” James asked, the curiosity in his voice far from innocent. “Or did you forgo the usual qualifications in favor of brute necessity?”
“I paid little mind to her appearance,” Hudson lied, though even as he said it, his mind supplied the color of Augusta’s eyes and the way her hair gleamed in the morning light. “My primary concern is Cassie’s education and safety.”
James hooted. “And here I thought you’d gone soft. Cassie’s the most willful child in England. It would take a dragon to keep her in line. Or an angel. Which is she?”
“I am not quite sure,” Hudson admitted with a sigh. “She is… something. She vexes me. She does not listen.”
“You sound… frustrated,” James noted with a grin. “Or perhaps enamored.”
Hudson scoffed, though his heart skipped a beat at the thought. “That is a preposterous thing to say.”
James chuckled, but relented, and together they rode the remaining mile in silence, broken only by the snort and crunch of hooves through crusted mud.
Hudson didn’t speak much, but the idea of his friend calling him enamored with the frustrating woman in his home stuck in his mind.
Hudson and James shed their boots and cloaks in the entrance hall, the warmth inside an immediate relief.
Hudson led the way toward the drawing room, expecting to find Cassie hunched over Latin verbs, but instead he heard music.
An actual, honest melody, the notes stumbling but unmistakably deliberate.
He followed the sound to the music room. There, in the filtered sunlight, sat Augusta at the pianoforte, with Cassie beside her on the bench. The men hovered in the doorway, unnoticed for a moment.
“Try it again, from the start,” Augusta said gently.
Cassie did, her tongue caught between her teeth in concentration.
Hudson waited until the lesson had ended, then cleared his throat.
James strolled in, executing a bow so deep it nearly swept the carpet. “You must be the celebrated Miss Norton,” he said, all charm. “James Collins, the Marquess of Ridgewell, at your service. I come as a friend of the house, and as an occasional source of mischief for Lady Cassandra.”
Augusta inclined her head, the corners of her mouth quirking upward. “A pleasure, My Lord.”
“Did you play as a girl?” James asked, settling into a chair and gesturing to the pianoforte.
Augusta’s fingers smoothed over the keys. “A little. My mother insisted. She said it built character.”
“Did it?” James asked.
“I suppose so,” Augusta replied, her hand drifting to the necklace at her throat, a delicate silver chain, the locket barely visible above her bodice.
“It is a beautiful chain,” James noted, gesturing to it. “Something quite special.”
“My mother gave it to me,” she said. “Before she died.”
Hudson found himself unable to look away.
“She said it would bring luck,” Augusta added, her voice soft.
Their eyes met, and Hudson shifted almost uncomfortably at the blood that rushed through his body, the warmth that settled in the pit of his stomach.
“Will you play something for us? On the pianoforte?” James requested, breaking the moment.
Hudson could see the no forming on Augusta’s lips.
“Of course, My Lord,” she said, seemingly having changed her mind.
As he watched her, Hudson could not help but be enchanted by the sounds coming from the pianoforte as well as her nimble and slender fingers. He could not help but wonder what her hands would feel like on his skin.
He shifted irritably at the thought. The woman was driving him mad.
He turned to walk away, but the look in Cassie’s eyes stopped him. Never before had he seen her look at anyone in that manner, and his frustration melted away like snow on a sunny morning.
“Is she a good enough governess now, my friend?” James murmured next to him.
“Stop this at once,” Hudson practically growled, keeping his eyes on the woman.
When her fingers stilled, James clapped excitedly. “I must say, Miss Norton, you are quite the talent indeed. I admit I shall enjoy seeing more of your talents.”
A blush rose to Augusta’s cheeks, and the radiant smile she flashed at him tore through Hudson.
His cheeks warmed with a heat he could not explain.
Or rather, a heat he had to forget.