Page 25 of Caught by the Forbidden Duke
“He’ll still say no.”
“He might.” She paused. “But it would be an honest no. Which is better than a reason that doesn’t quite fit.”
James held her gaze for a long moment. He had brown eyes, dark and very steady, and when he looked at her directly, it was with the full, unguarded attention he gave the piano keys.
It was the most honest face she had ever seen on anyone.
He nodded once and turned back to the keys.
He was playing through the second phrase when Annabelle heard the front door below and footsteps on the stairs a moment later. Quick, unhurried, the gait of a man who was not rushing, but was also not interested in taking his time.
James heard it, too. His hands stayed on the keys.
Dominic came through the door with his hat in hand and his eyes on James first, the same as always. He took in the bench, the keys, the cat in the chair, and James’s expression, which was readable to anyone who bothered to look.
“Ready?” he said.
“I want to play it for you first,” James said. “The melody. I learned the whole thing.”
“James—”
“It’s one minute.” He kept his voice flat and even. “You could stand at the door.”
Dominic held his hat. “The sound?—”
“You said it hurts your head,” James,” he paused. “But when you’re in the study, and the door is open, and I’m humming, you don’t put your hands over your ears.”
Dominic looked at the boy.
After a moment, he said, “It is not that I do not want to hear you play.”
James looked up from the keys. “Then why?”
“It is not a simple answer.”
“Why not?”
Dominic turned the hat once in his hands. “James?—”
“Is it the migraine or not?” James said it flat, both hands resting on the keys, looking at his uncle with the direct, unblinking attention he gave things he was working out.
Dominic had gone very still. He let out a breath, slow and even, and said nothing.
Annabelle said, quietly, “Your Grace… James has been working on this diligently. He learned the whole melody because he wanted you to hear it. Not because I asked him to.” She paused. “That is all he wants.”
Dominic looked at James, then at Annabelle. He knew that his face gave her nothing, but he was much more grateful for the fact that she did not press it.
He turned back to his nephew again. “One day,” he said, the words releasing with great difficulty, “I will hear it.”
James held his gaze in that guileless yet accountable way he did that reminded Dominic that he could not escape his words. “Promise?”
Dominic’s hand stilled on the hat. “Yes,” he said.
James nodded, as though this, too, was information he was filing away.
“Your coat,” Dominic reminded quietly.
James climbed off the bench and set Newton gently aside on the bench cushion. Newton opened one eye, registered the change in arrangement, and settled back into sleep without visible objection. James retrieved his coat from Miss Hartley, who had materialized in the corridor, and went through the door without looking back.
