Page 66 of The Duke's Mysterious Lover
“Spy creeping? Cat burglarying? Nay, that’s not the word.” Bull pursed his lips in thought. “Burglularing? Cat barglaring?”
“Cat burgling,” Kit offered, without pausing in her soft playing.
Bull nodded in satisfaction. “Aye, that’s it. I was tired of Titsworth’s snooty attitude—”
“Your Grace!”The door swung open, smacking Bull in the back, causing him to stumble forward as a stone-faced Titsworth stepped through. “Danger! Danger! We appear to have an intruder. A miscreant has made it into my domain!”
“Egads!” Bull blurted, glancing about theatrically as if looking for the interloper. “Fetch the constatablary. The constabulary? Damnation, English is hard.”
Kit snorted.
Thorne fought a smile. “Dinnae worry the law, Titsworth, let us skip straight to the mob.”
“Verra good, Your Grace,” the not-yet-middle-aged man intoned, managing to stand even straighter. “Standard pitchforks and torches, yelling anarchist slogans? I have them waiting without.”
“Without what?” Bull quipped.
“Without their torches, I hope,” Thorne shot right back. “We only just got the curtains hung the way I like.”
“Curtains arehangedsir,” Titsworth informed him blandly.
Bull nodded graciously to the butler. “I’mhung, curtains are hanged.”
This time Kit’s snort was more of a snicker.
Thorne cleared his throat, deciding he didn’t need to hear anything else about Bull’s cock. “Och, I’ve changed my mind, Titsworth. I’ll deal with the little shite, disband the mob.”
Did the butler look almostdisappointed? “Very well, Your Grace. But I’ll have to give them severance.”
He didn’t really have a mob standing by to tear intruders limb from limb, did he? Thorne shifted in the chair and cleared his throat. “Verra good. Then go have a sit-down, aye? It isnae good for a man of yer age to be running hither and yon after rabble like this arsehole.”
Bull beamed at the insult, and Titsworth…well, his eyes lit up when Thorne called hima man of yer age, and inclined his head a fraction of an inch.
“My sciaticahasbeen acting up, Your Grace.”
“Ye’re a credit to yer profession, Titsworth, soldiering through the difficulties,” Thorne intoned seriously as the man bowed and fake-hobbled out of the room. “Remind me to grant ye one extra half-farthing and a pudding at Yuletide to show my appreciation.”
As the door closed behind him, Kit’s fingers skipped across the strings in a little combination that managed to sound like laughter, and Bull swaggered across the room.
“Perhaps my ninjaing needs some improvement.” He threw himself into the chair opposite Thorne, a gold coin appearing in one hand, rolling across his knuckles. “What are we doing?”
“Mulling,” barked Thorne with a scowl.
“Mulling?” Bull repeated.
Kit surprised them both by pulling the violin away from her chin and answering for Thorne while still playing softly. “It’s a good plan, laddie, and you’re the only one who can pull it off, but he hates the thought of you in danger, and wonders if a reallyreallygood disguise might be enough to keep you safe from Blackrose.”
Bull nodded right along, as if it was normal to include a violin-playing valet in planning sessions. “And what areyedoing, Kit my lad?”
“Eavesdropping, you little shite,” she shot right back with a cheeky grin. “You’d know that if you were a better spy-ninja-cat-burglar.”
Bull burst into laughter and even Thorne felt his shoulders relax. He finally allowed himself to sip from the whisky he’d poured.
Kit might not be a princess, but her American half meant she didn’t bow to anyone.
A traitorous little voice in his mind whisperedA good quality in a duchess.
Nay. She’d made her preference known. He owed her the respect of listening. If Kit didn’t want to marry him, he wouldn’t push her.
