Some couples keep separate bedrooms, Alex joked once, others keep separate estates.
Though the wind had turned her clothes from sopping wet to damp, Rune still shivered as she rode Lady as far as she dared into the woods surrounding the property. Octavia kept a patrol, Rune knew, and she had no desire to run into it. Once she was inside the forest, shrouded by jack pines and balsam firs, her icy, trembling fingers unbuckled the saddlebag concealing her evening outfit.
Rune was happy to strip the damp clothes off her body. Standing naked in the breeze but for the sheathed knife strapped to her thigh, she tightly braided her wind-dried hair into an effortless style she’d watched Nan employ whenever they were running late to some function. It was still a little damp, but not obviously wet.
Next, she inspected the gash from Laila’s shot, which was still bleeding. Rune had been lucky. If Laila’s shot had been an inch closer, she’d have a bullet in her arm that would require digging out.
This was a flesh wound: bloody, but not deep. She withdrew one of the cotton strips she kept in Lady’s saddlebag for emergencies, bound it around the wound, and tucked the ends underneath. Thankful she’d had the foresight to bring gloves, Rune pulled them on, concealing the bandage, and donned her dress and shoes.
Last, she put on her mask for the evening: a white fox face with pointed ears.
Fully dressed, Rune opened one more saddlebag and pulled out four sheets of tracing paper and a fountain pen. After folding the sheets and rolling them tightly around the pen, she tucked them down the front of her bodice.
Taking her whistle out for the third time tonight, she blew two long notes into the thin metal cylinder, telling Lady to go straight home. The moment the horse trotted away, Rune followed the footpath through the trees, allowing the house lights in the distance to guide her.
Normally, it would be exactly Rune’s style to arrive fashionably late, waltzing in through the front doors and announcing herself to everyone. Tonight, though, she didn’t want people to notice her delayed arrival. She wanted people to think she’d been here the whole time.
Drawing nearer to the house, Rune contemplated going in through the kitchens, pretending to have gotten lost, but that would only make the servants talk. As she drew nearer still, she eyed the windows. They were close enough to the ground for her to open and climb through without soiling her dress. She’d decided on going in through the windows when voices nearby caught her attention.
“All that’s left to do is sell Thornwood Hall.”
Alex? Rune was so relieved by the sound of his familiar timbre, she almost missed the words he had spoken.
Sell Thornwood Hall?
She tucked her questions away for later. Adjusting her mask, she donned a more tedious costume, one that was second nature by now: the guise of a superficial girl who cared only for designer dresses, extravagant parties, and juicy gossip. Rune stepped out of the woods, heading toward the ring of young men circling a fire that blazed in an ornate iron fire pit.
Her eyes found Alex in an instant, despite their masked faces. Through his lion mask, he gazed into the fire. As if pondering a problem that was plaguing him and searching for the answer in the flames.
Unlike his brother, who was built like a soldier, Alex had a slender frame. As a devoted musician who spent his days practicing and composing, he often forgot to eat.
At her approach, Alex’s attention snapped toward her.
“Rune?”
Seeing him was like a drowning woman sighting a buoy. She wanted to throw herself in his direction, loop her arms around his neck, and hold on for dear life.
She did none of these things.
“The darkness sure turns you about!” Still shivering, she stepped toward the delicious warmth of the fire. “I came outside for some air, and the next thing I knew, I was lost in that jungle.” She motioned to the woods behind her.
The gentleman wearing a wolf mask said: “I didn’t realize you were here, Rune.” The voice belonged to Noah Creed. “Did you just arrive?”
Before she could spin the story that she’d prepared, Alex unbuttoned his coat and dropped it over her shoulders.
“Your teeth are chattering. Let’s go inside before you freeze.”
The warmth of his body was still in the fabric, and Rune soaked it up. Wanting to thaw herself out further—and give Noah an answer—she put her hands to the fire. “Oh, but—”
“I insist.” Alex pressed his palm to the small of her back, turning her away from the heat.
The tone of his words, which sounded friendly, had a sharpness beneath for Rune alone. She glanced up to find his golden-brown eyes sapped of warmth. From the way his lips thinned, he wasn’t only worried, but angry, too.