Page 51 of Duke of Bronze
With gratitude,
Nurse Adams
Anna reread the letter. An anonymous donation? It was not her.
CHAPTER 20
"Iwas beginning to think you wouldn't be on time."
The voice came from behind Colin, halting him mid-step. Instinct tightened his spine, his hand twitching slightly at his side as he cast a swift glance around him. This was no place for carelessness.
The fading sunlight cast long shadows across the uneven cobblestones, but it was enough. A figure emerged from the alley he was passing by. Roderick.
Colin looked him over. The man had a new bruise on his right jaw. Unsurprising. "And I did not think you would be lurking like a specter in the night," Colin returned.
Roderick's face remained unreadable, his shoulders shifting in an almost imperceptible shrug. "I need to ensure you arrive intact to Lydia. We cannot have you losing yourself in our world."
Colin let out a short huff, stepping into stride beside him. "I am quite capable of finding my way, I assure you."
Roderick merely inclined his head. "I do not question your abilities. I merely fulfill my duty."
Colin said nothing, merely casting his companion a sidelong glance. Roderick was a man of few words, his every action calculated and his tone consistently devoid of unnecessary embellishments. Colin had yet to decide if he found the man's demeanor amusing or intolerable.
They reached the residence soon enough, and as they stepped inside, the scent of burning wood and faint traces of lavender met Colin's senses. The lavender reminded him of Anna, and it also brought back the question of her relationship with this family.
"She has been expecting you," Roderick's wife said. The woman's posture was rigid as she stood in the middle of the apartment, her dark eyes unreadable as they shifted between her husband and Colin.
For the briefest moment, Colin wondered if her words had been meant for him at all. Whatever grievance this woman held against him, he could not fathom. Her courtesy was faultless, yet colder than the winter breeze.
"We tried not to be late." Roderick touched his wife's shoulder as he passed her. Colin nearly asked what he had meant by that—after all, he had arrived on time—but something in the man's tone kept him silent.
Instead, he watched as Roderick tousled the hair of two of his children on his way across the room. The older of the two, a girl of perhaps nine with tangled dark curls, sent a wary look in Colin's direction before quickly looking away. The younger, a boy, leaned into the affection but clung to his sister's side, his small fingers grasping at her sleeve.
In the farthest corner of the room, a third child lay asleep atop a thin mattress, his breathing deep and even. Colin noted the hollowness of their cheeks, the way their clothes hung a touch too loose on their small frames, and something in his chest tightened.
But it was Lydia's room itself that struck him the hardest when he entered.
It was dismal. Stifling. A single, narrow bed occupied the far corner, the threadbare blankets pulled up to the chin of a woman whose presence seemed swallowed by the room's oppressive dimness. Against the opposite wall stood a small chest of drawers, its edges worn and splintered with age. A lone wooden stool sat beside the bed, its surface scarred from years of use.
"This way."
Roderick gestured toward the stool as he crouched beside the frail figure in the bed. Colin hesitated, his gaze moving betweenRoderick and the motionless form buried beneath layers of blankets.
"We're here," Roderick murmured, his voice gentler than Colin had ever heard it. At the sound, the woman beneath the blankets stirred.
A skeletal hand—thin, pale, and trembling—emerged, and Roderick caught it in his own and helped the woman shift into a slightly more upright position.
Colin fought to keep his expression neutral, but it was a battle he was not certain he was winning. Lydia was ravaged, and hehad more questions than he ought to have.
There was no other way to describe the sight of her. The disease had stripped her down to skin and bone, yet, when her gaze met his, he saw the sharp intelligence that still burned behind the sickness. Her bright blue eyes, despite the wreckage of her body, belonged to a woman no more than in her fifties.
She studied him for a long moment, and Colin—who had stood in front of kings and councils, who had commanded rooms filled with the most powerful men in England—found himself resisting the urge to shift under the intensity of her stare.
"You would do best to sit," Roderick murmured again, this time without looking at him.
Something about the way he said it sent an uneasy ripple down Colin's spine. His jaw tightening, he lowered himself onto the small wooden stool. It creaked under his weight, its legs uneven against the floor. It was as uncomfortable as he had suspected.
But the discomfort of the seat was nothing compared to the constriction of his chest. Whatever Lydia had to say, he had the distinct feeling it would change everything.
