Page 26 of The Dueling Duchess

The raven seemed to be staring at him, although it was difficult to say since his eyes were so black one couldn’t distinguish pupil from iris. In fact, did birds even have an iris or pupil? Guy had never been in close enough proximity to one to know.

He shook the thought away and asked, “What kinds of things?”

“Have you misplaced or lost anything lately?”

Guy frowned. “As a matter of fact, I haven’t been able to find my fire—”

She yanked on the corner of something brightly colored, and several items clattered to the floor.

“Why, there it is,” Guy exclaimed. “My fire piston.”

He bent over and picked up the slender rod that he usually kept in his pocket.

“My cousin gave me this for my twentieth birthday and I thought I’d lost it,” he said, inspecting the simple tool for any damage before turning to glare at the bird. “How the devil did he get it out of my pocket?”

Angus was looking elsewhere in a way that appeared almost . . . studied.

“He is very skilled,” Blade muttered, staring at something in her palm before dropping the item into her pocket far too quickly for Guy to identify it.

“Aha,” she said, reaching under the settee to pull out something sparkly.

“Is that an earring?” Guy asked.

She ignored him yet again, instead turning to her bird and scowling. “What have I told you about taking valuable things, Angus?”

The huge beast made a soft quork quork that actually sounded apologetic and—Guy was mortified to admit—quite adorable.

“That won’t work,” she retorted, apparently not as charmed by Angus as Guy was.

The raven’s wings sagged at her words and Guy swore the beast looked guilty.

“Whose is that?” Guy asked as she pocketed the piece of jewelry.

“It’s Cordelia’s and apparently it is not paste. Why she wore such a valuable item to work I don’t understand,” she added under her breath.

Cordelia Black was the woman whose small theatrical troop performed a harlequinade for the circus. She was quite lovely and had made her interest in Guy quite clear. Only his promise to Sin had kept Guy from misbehaving with her.

Blade stood and brushed off her skirt, which had become dusty when she’d bent to collect the pilfered items.

When she was finished, she pointed to the newspapers that had slid to the floor as he’d reached for the fire piston. “You’d better not mess those up or Cecile will be most displeased with you.”

“Cecile?”

“Yes, they’re hers and she keeps them arranged in a particular order.”

“Order,” Angus repeated, his voice so much like Blade’s, it was unnerving.

Guy sat back hard in his chair at Blade’s words. “They belong to Miss Tremblay?”

The haughty Frenchwoman insisted that Guy call her that even though she allowed everyone else to use her Christian name.

“Yes, she collects them.”

“Well, isn’t that interesting,” Guy said.

Blade either didn’t hear him or didn’t think his comment worthy of acknowledging. Instead, she dug around in one of the dressing table drawers, slipped something else into her pocket and then nodded to her bird. “Come along, Angus.”

The massive raven gave an almost soundless flap of his wings and landed on her shoulder, where he immediately snuggled up to her neck.