His Lordship's Blood (His Lordship’s Mysteries Book 4) by Samantha SoRelle

Author:Samantha SoRelle [SoRelle, Samantha]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Balcarres Books LLC
Published: 2023-06-12T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 16

Dominick stared helplessly at himself in the mirror. When he was in Spitalfields, his life had been simple. Cold, miserable, and frequently painful, but simple. Coming to live with Alfie had complicated his life, mostly for the better. But now? He looked down at the long strip of fabric on the dresser before him. He was supposed to twist the linen into some sort of cravat knot, but right now it was one more complication than his mind could handle.

After Monsieur Henri had called him that, things had happened very quickly.

Monsieur Henri spouted a lot of political nonsense Dominick didn’t understand while his father had tried to get him to stop making a fuss. Fortunately, they began to argue and slipped into French at that point, so Dominick hadn’t had to listen anymore. Not that he could before that anyway. All he could hear through their argument and the ride back to the Stocktons’ home with Alfie afterwards was the word King… King… King… King… King repeating in an endless loop until the word lost all meaning and just became another sound he couldn’t understand.

He shook himself, trying to get the word out of his mind and realised there was another repetitive sound, although this one was real. After another round of knocking on his door, it creaked open and he watched in the mirror as Alfie slipped inside.

“Are you all right?”

Dominick looked back down at the cloth. “When I’m crowned, the first thing I’m going to do is outlaw cravats.”

Alfie’s voice was alarmed. “Nick?”

“No, I am not all right. Christ, I can’t even think.”

“I don’t know what to say. It might still all just be a horrible misunderstanding.”

A bubble of tentative hope formed in Dominick’s chest. “You really think so?”

Alfie’s hesitation said it all. The bubble burst.

“It might be?” Alfie said tentatively. “We still haven’t been to every pawnbroker in Bath yet. One of them may know of another bird ring? Or there was that Italian cook we heard about who might turn out to be French. We could expand the search to the surrounding villages. The maid back in London might not have known Batheaston and Bath were different places. Or she was mad and this has been a wild-goose chase all along. The rings and the story of the lost heir and the dates all matching up could just be—”

“A coincidence?” Dominick finished.

He was desperately hoping Alfie would say something along the lines of, “Of course! Isn’t it obvious?”

But instead, Alfie just opened and closed his mouth a few times with no sound coming out. He sat down heavily on the edge of Dominick’s bed. “I don’t see how it could be. If it was just one coincidence, perhaps, but all of them together? We can keep searching if you want but…”

“But it’s the same ring.”

It was. There was no use fighting it. Their search for Dominick’s family had come to an end in the most unexpected way.

“My God, Dominick,” whispered Alfie. “You’re a king.”

“Worse than that, I’m French.

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