Sonata for a Scoundrel by Anthea Lawson Read Free Book Online

Scotland itself seemed very foreign and far away.
    Soon enough, Master Reynard would join them. That was the most unsettling thought of all. She twisted her bonnet ribbons between her fingers, keeping time to the rough rhythm of the coach wheels. Mr. Dubois seemed well asleep as the vehicle jolted through the streets of London, conveying them to wherever the maestro was waiting.
    She tilted toward her brother, keeping her voice low. “How soon until we arrive, do you think?”
    “Let’s see where we are.” Nicholas pulled the curtain on his side of the coach and secured it open with the gold-tasseled cord. He was more familiar than she with the genteel areas where his former students dwelt.
    The neighborhood they were passing through was very different from their own. The streets were cleaner, the buildings more imposing and well kept, the colors brighter. Clara blinked at the violet and scarlet-striped skirts of a passing lady, the colors echoed in her frilled parasol. It was noisier too, the air filled with the clatter of metal-bound wheels over cobblestones, the calls of vendors echoing over the bustle.
    “Darien Reynard will be at Mivart’s Hotel,” her brother said. “Unless he’s staying with an earl or some such. In any case, we’re heading into Mayfair.”
    Mayfair. She pulled back her curtain and peered out the window.
    They turned a corner, past ornate lamp posts and a swath of green park. Fashionably dressed gentlemen strolled with ladies turned out in stylish perfection from the toes of their shining buttoned boots to the ostrich plumes adorning their high-brimmed bonnets. Clara glanced down at the simple wool of her best gown, the toes of her boots scuffed despite extra coats of polish. They had done the best they could, but it was laughably pathetic—she could see that now.
    The graceful terrace houses outside the window began to pass more and more slowly, until finally the coach came to a swaying halt.
    “Ah.” Mr. Dubois’s eyes snapped open. “We have arrived.” He brushed invisible lint from the front of his coat. “Remain here. I will inform Monsieur Reynard.”
    The footman opened the door with a flourish, and Mr. Dubois stepped out. Clara could see him looking archly to either side before entering the gracious building before them.
    “Mivart’s,” Nicholas said. “The best hotel in all of London. Just think, Clara, we’ll be staying in places like this as we travel. Can you imagine it?”
    “Well, I don’t suppose Darien Reynard is planning to house us in the stables. A fine thing that would be, you performing with straw in your hair.” She had to smile at the notion; a welcome distraction from the flutter in her stomach.
    Though she wasn’t so certain the master would be displeased to see her bedded down in the straw.
    Her brother shook his head at her, the ghost of laughter in his eyes.
    “Make way!”
    It was Mr. Dubois again, at the head of a cavalcade of uniformed servants bearing trunks and boxes. He led them straight to the coach. The vehicle tipped and tilted as the men began loading the boot and roof.
    She was beginning to understand Mr. Dubois’s shock, if this was the quantity of luggage he considered normal.
    “It’s… rather a lot, isn’t it?” she asked.
    “Darien Reynard tours for months at a time,” Nicholas said, as if he were a well-traveled fellow in his own right. “He must bring everything he needs.”
    She refrained from pointing out that everything they needed fit into two small cases.
    The activity drew curious glances. When Master Reynard himself appeared at the top of the steps, a crowd immediately gathered.
    He was dressed in elegant black, his violin case in one hand. Dark hair framed a face that even without the patina of fame would have been captivating. His strong jaw and sensuous mouth, the faint line between his brows, and his eyes, a particular shadowy green… Would her breath always catch at the sight of him?
    With the lift of a hand