Page 40 of A Duke Changes Everything
“Let’s have a look at the damage and get off this bloody roof.” He waved his arm to urge her over. His manner had gone as gruff and cool as the wild weather.
“There.” He pointed to a spot in the sloping roof tiles, a bit darker than its neighbors. “The depression runs down toward the wall.” He lowered himself, balancing on his haunches.
Mina approached but didn’t dare get near the wall’s edge.
He noticed her wobble and glanced up, all the earlier warmth in his gaze gone. “Go back inside. I can do this on my own.”
“I prefer to stay with you.”
He turned back slowly, then stood to face her, their bodies inches apart on the narrow walkway. “Are you worried I loathe this place so much I’ll fling myself off the side?” He stared down at the multistory drop between them and the ground. “Or are you hoping I will?”
“Of course not.” Mina risked a glance and immediately regretted it. A wave of nausea hit and she reached out, her fingers grabbing his coat lapel.
The duke gripped her arm. A comforting heat, sheltering her from the parapet’s edge. “You’re all right,” he said softly, as gently as she’d murmured to the shying stallion. “I’ll have a quick look and we can get back on solid ground.”
Mina nodded, and he let her go to examine the damaged tiles again.
If they ever got off the roof, she wanted to show him the gardens and the folly near the pond. Enderley’s groundskeeper had created topiaries that hadn’t existed when the duke was a child.
“I’m not sure what good we can do up here. Wouldn’t a mason have far better knowledge of the structural integrity of a centuries-old wall?”
He turned back to her, a smirk softening the sharp peaks of his upper lip. “You underestimate me, Miss Thorne. I do know a bit about old walls.”
Mina squinted skeptically. “Don’t tell me you’re a bricklayeranda gambling club owner.”
His chuckle was deep and appealing, and far too brief. “When I found the site of my club, it was a shambles. I learned more about masonry and plasterwork and the fine art of window glazing than you could ever imagine.”
“You did all the work yourself?”
“No.” He snorted and the left side of his mouth slashed upward. “I hired the best I could afford. But I insisted on knowing everything. Overseeing the work closely. Lyon’s is the only thing I’ve owned, and I wanted to understand every part.”
“You really don’t trust anyone, do you?”
“There are a few people I trust.” He narrowed an eye at her, and she was uncomfortably reminded that she’d already proven herself faithless in his eyes. More than once. “I can count them on three fingers.”
“They must be extraordinary.” It irked Mina that she’d never be counted among those Nicholas Lyon trusted. “Why did you choose a shambles as the site for your club?”
He shrugged. “Good location.”
Mina waited. There had to be more.
The duke let out a sigh. “I saw something others hadn’t. What it could become. I saw potential.”
Mina felt a strange fluttering inside, as if a cage of sparrows had been freed inside her. “So youarecapable of hope.”
Shock softened his features again. A bit of warmth lit his eyes. “Only very occasionally.” He pulled back the lapels of his overcoat and shrugged the garment from his shoulders. “Would you hold this? Or, better yet, put it on and keep yourself warm.”
Mina gathered the woolen coat in her arms, sinking her hands into the warmth he’d left behind. His scent wafted up, bergamot and something darker.
Down on one knee, he braced his hands on the sloping roof tiles to get a closer look, and the crisscross pattern of bricks beneath him shifted.
“Careful.” Mina hadn’t imagined the movement. The bricks beneath her feet shifted too. The slightest of movements.
“Speaking of hope, I suspect that’s all that’s holding these bricks together. The mortar’s gone,” he said tightly. The bricks beneath him began to bow out toward the parapet edge, and a piece of the limestone facade emitted a terrible scratching groan as it moved.
The duke got to his feet slowly, widening his stance for balance. Mina started forward and reached out a hand.
“Don’t come closer,” he hissed. “Back away. Quickly.”
