"Perhaps we should stop for today," he suggested, setting aside his unread book. "First days are always exhausting, and you'll want to be fresh for your museum visit Thursday."
"I've barely started the Plutarch section," she protested, though her eyes ached from maintaining focus through the haze of awareness. "And there are still the manuscripts to review..."
"Which will still be here tomorrow." He rose, moving to the window where late afternoon light painted golden squares on the carpet. "Unless you plan to catalogue the entire library in a week, in which case I'll need to increase your salary again."
"Again?" She looked up from her notes. "The salary is already more than generous."
"Is it?" He turned from the window, and the light was behind him in a way that made him look like something out of a painting. "I've been reviewing comparable positions..."
"There are no comparable positions. You invented this one specifically for..." She caught herself before finishing the sentence, but the words hung in the air anyway. Specifically for me.
"Specifically for a scholar of rare ability who deserved recognition," he completed smoothly, though something heated flashed in his eyes. "The fact that said scholar happens to be you is... fortuitous."
She began gathering her materials, needing the activity to mask her reaction. "I should go. Harriet will be wondering how my first day went."
"Of course." He moved to help her, maintaining that careful distance even as he handed her the portfolio of notes. Their fingers brushed in the exchange, and she saw his jaw tighten. "Same time tomorrow?"
"Yes." She clutched the portfolio like armor. "Thank you for... that is, today was..."
"Productive?" he suggested with a smile that didn't quite hide the strain around his eyes.
"Very productive."
She left quickly, not trusting herself to maintain composure if she lingered. The walk home felt like emerging from deep water, her lungs filling with air that wasn't charged with his presence, her skin cooling from the constant flush of awareness.
Harriet was waiting in her lodgings, tea already prepared and an expectant expression on her face.
"Well?" she demanded before Eveline had even removed her cloak. "How was it? Did you maintain professional distance? Did he?"
Eveline sank into a chair, accepting the tea gratefully. "We were perfectly professional. Collegial. Scholarly."
"How disappointing."
"Harriet!"
"What? I was hoping for at least one moment of passion over the Plutarch. A stolen kiss between the stacks. Something to justify all this careful boundary-setting."
"There was no kissing." Eveline took a large gulp of tea to hide her expression. "Though there was... awareness."
"Awareness." Harriet settled back with the satisfied air of a cat with cream. "Do tell."
"Every accidental touch felt like lightning. He watched me work with an intensity that made my hands shake. We maintained perfect propriety while the air between us practically crackled with everything we weren't saying or doing." She set down her teacup with a clatter. "How am I supposed to do this every day? How am I supposed to sit across from him at meals and discuss Byzantine manuscripts when all I can think about is how his mouth felt on mine?"
"Practice," Harriet said pragmatically. "And possibly some very cold baths."
The week progressed in much the same fashion. Tuesday brought a new level of torture as they worked side by side on a particularly challenging text, their heads bent close together as they debated translation choices. Wednesday saw them taking luncheon in the garden, the spring air doing nothing to cool the heat that built every time their eyes met.
By Thursday morning, Eveline was almost grateful for the respite of her museum day. She arrived at the British Museum feeling like she'd spent three days holding her breath, her nerves strung tight as violin strings.
Thornbury greeted her with enthusiasm that bordered on the manic, immediately whisking her away to the manuscript room where he'd arranged several Byzantine texts for her examination.
"Your observations about the scribal variations have kept me up at night," he confessed, pulling on white cotton gloves with the reverence of a priest preparing for sacrament. "If you're correct, and I believe you are, it revolutionizes our understanding of Byzantine scholarly networks."
She lost herself in the work, grateful for the pure intellectual challenge without the distraction of Adrian's presence. The manuscripts yielded their secrets slowly, each notation and variation adding evidence to her theory. By the time Thornbury called a halt for tea, she had filled a notebook with observations and felt more like herself than she had all week.
"Remarkable," Thornbury said, reviewing her notes while she enjoyed what the museum considered tea; a brew so strong it could strip paint, accompanied bybiscuits that had clearly been purchased sometime during the previous century. "Your analysis of the marginal notations alone would make a significant journal article."
"Do you really think so?" She tried not to sound too eager, but the prospect of publication under her own name still felt like an impossible dream.
