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Miss Atwood straightened “Well, it was as if he was expecting ave me the key”

Lucius fired his logical brain into action, a task that soon da Miss Athile exploring critical aspects of the case “The inn sits on the busiest stretch of road heading north out of London Is it not odd that the room was available?”

It was odd that the blackguard’s chosen inn was so close to Bronygarth Worrying, when one considered few people knew Lucius owned the house So discreet, he had made a mistake

“The villain must have paid for the room in advance,” Miss Atwood said

“And so you left the letter on the bed,” he said, recapping what she had told him not two hours earlier “No one approached you or made contact, not even a maid”

“I was there but ten minutes Numerous people passed ood ”

“Only good ?”

She gave a half shrug “The lady in the roo She said if I was taking supper to avoid the stew and du, and we parted ways”

Lucius mulled over the snippets of useless infors was hardly a veiled threat “The innkeeper must be in contact with our quarry How else would the devil know to coate him, it will only arouse his suspicions”

“Unless our quarry is a resident When on his travels, my father often stayed at the same inn for a month or more”

A fond ht e near Wetherby I shouldn’t have left the dor through a difficult phase”

A disobedient and destructive phase was a better description

“Wetherby?” Miss Atwood frowned “You went to school in Yorkshire? One would think you’d have gone to Harrow orin Surrey”

“One would think so,” was all he could bear to say on the matter

Since the day Lucius’ mother disappeared, the duke had deliberately kept his distance He rarely ventured to Surrey, rarely left Bideford Park Perhaps he feared sorave