His Fire Maiden

Chapter 25

Maurus Robert Lea, Seventh Earl of Leland, rarely slept anymore. If he were lucky, four or perhaps five hours of sweet oblivion would claim him. Lately, however, the god Hypnos rarely granted him a visit. He began to wonder if such sleeplessness was the work of his mind striving to keep itself useful until the day that final sleep would claim him. Surely it would arrive sooner than later.

Thus he was very much awake, sitting before his coal fire hearth, listening to the storm that was brewing up and taking stock of his overlong life, when the clock struck three in the morning and blows began to rain down upon his front door.

"Leland!"

Startled, he tripped over his dressing robe as he scrambled to his feet. Wilkinson met him in the hall looking alarmed yet impeccably groomed, his snow-white hair neatly combed, his collar points high as Dover cliffs. Leland doubted he looked as well.

"My lord?" the butler inquired with a hasty glance at the door. The blasted pounding had not abated.

"Open up, Leland!"

"All is well, Wilkinson. Go to bed, will you. I'm far too old to be mollycoddled."

"Yes, my lord."

Leland knew the man would stay in his butler's closet until his master went to bed. He pushed the thought out of his mind and wrenched open the door to face the wily bastard whose voice he knew so well.

Reginald did not appear wily just then. Only lost. Rain bounced on his shoulders as he stood drenched in the doorway. He wore only the half mask tonight. It stuck to him like sealskin, outlining the weariness and utter defeat carved on his face.

His massive chest lifted as he pulled in a deep breath. The plea came out a rasp, as though he wished to pull it back in with every word. "I need your help, Lilly."

For one angry moment, Reginald thought Leland might slam the door in his face. The man stood frozen before him, his ridiculous peacock-printed dressing robe hanging askew over his nightgown, his thin legs like birch sticks trembling above worn velvet house slippers. He might have been EDamienezer Scrooge standing there with such a sour scowl upon his face. But then he moved, stepping aside to bid Reginald entrance.

"Come," he said, keeping his eyes on Reginald.

Reginald brushed past him, feeling very much the specimen pinned to a dissector's board. But the time for humility had come. He'd made sure Vivi was in bed and then slipped out. Even though it struck terror in him to do so, plans had to be made.

He followed the old man into a library nearly identical to his own. A coal fire glowed in the hearth—warmer than wood but foul smelling.

"Drink?" Leland was already pouring himself one.

"Have you bourbon?"

A thin smile lifted the man's mustache. "No. Can't say I've developed a taste for that Yank swill."

"Snob. Scotch, then."

Leland handed Reginald a glass, and he took a grateful swallow, then moved closer to the hearth. Little hisses and black smoke puffed out of the grate as water dripped from Reginald's back and shoulders.

"You'll put my fire out," Leland admonished.

"I didn't know where else to stand." Or to go.

"Why on earth didn't you put on a cloak, or hat, for that matter?"

"I was distracted."

The man was beginning to sound like his mother. Then again, Leland always chastised. Leland, the pinnacle of common sense and order—until West Moon Club.