She kissed him back, her hands coming up to rest against his chest, feeling his heartbeat racing to match hers. When they finally parted, both breathing unsteadily, she saw her own wonder reflected in his eyes.
"So what happens now?" she asked.
"Now?" He pressed his forehead against hers, his hands still cradling her face. "Now we stop pretending. We work together, as equals. We build something new, something that doesn't exist in your carefully drawn boundaries or society's narrow definitions. We write our own rules."
"And if we fail?"
"Then we fail honestly, rather than succeeding at a lie." He pulled back enough to meet her eyes. "I'd rather have one day of truth with you than a lifetime of careful pretence."
She thought of Harriet's words about unnecessary rigidity, of her mother's hard-won savings freely given, of Thornbury's enthusiasm for her work. She thought of the translation on her desk, Ovid's words about love transforming language itself. She thought of the future she'd mapped so carefully—a future that suddenly seemed less like freedom and more like another kind of cage.
"All right," she whispered. "No more pretending."
His smile was like sunrise after a long winter night. "No more pretending," he agreed, and kissed her again.
This time, when Morrison knocked tentatively at the door, they stepped apart without guilt or panic. They were still themselves; scholar and duke, employee and employer, two people navigating an impossible situation. But now they were also something more, something unnamed but no longer denied.
"I'm sorry to interrupt," Morrison said, hovering in the doorway with obvious uncertainty. "I came back because I just wanted to thank you again for your help today, Miss Whitcombe. And Your Grace, thank you for this opportunity."
"You're very welcome, Mr. Morrison," Adrian said, his voice warm with genuine feeling. "I trust you'll make the most of it."
After the young man left, Eveline began gathering her things, aware that something fundamental had shifted between them. The very air in the library felt different; still charged but no longer oppressive, like the atmosphere after a storm has finally broken.
"Same time tomorrow?" Adrian asked, helping her collect her scattered notes.
"Yes." She paused at the door, looking back at him. "Adrian? This changes everything, doesn't it?"
"Yes," he said simply. "Everything."
As she walked home through the gathering dusk, Eveline felt lighter than she had in weeks. The future was no clearer, the challenges no less daunting. But something had released in her chest, some tight knot of fear and denial finally loosening.
She loved Adrian Blackwood. He loved her. Everything else, the gossip, the professional complications, the social impossibilities, would have to be navigated around that central truth.
No more pretending, indeed.
Chapter 20
Two weeks into their new understanding, Eveline had developed a routine that would have scandalized proper society and delighted the romantics. Her days were spent in genuine scholarly work—cataloguing, translating, losing herself in the Byzantine manuscripts that continued to yield fascinating secrets. But threaded through the academic pursuits was something else, something that made every moment shimmer with possibility.
They no longer maintained careful distance. Adrian would lean over her shoulder to examine a translation, his breath warm against her neck, his hand resting lightly on the back of her chair. She would seek him out when puzzling over a difficult passage, perching on the edge of his desk while they debated interpretations, their knees occasionally brushing.
It was still professional. They still accomplished prodigious amounts of work. But now it was also warm, intimate, charged with acknowledged feeling rather than denied passion.
"You're humming," Adrian observed one morning, looking up from his correspondence with a smile that made her stomach flutter.
"Am I?" She hadn't realized, but now that he mentioned it, she could feel the melody still thrumming in her chest. "It must be the Sappho. Her rhythms tend to stay with one."
"Sappho makes you hum Handel?" His eyebrow rose in that way she'd come to adore. "That's either a very liberal translation or a fascinating psychological phenomenon."
She laughed, crossing to show him the passage she'd been working on. "It's the meter. See how the Sapphic stanzas create this rising and falling pattern? It reminded me of 'Where'er You Walk,' and now I can't get it out of my head."
He studied the text, then looked up at her with an expression that made her breath catch. "Sing it for me."
"What?"
"The Handel. Sing it." He leaned back in his chair, watching her with that intensity that still made her knees weak. "Unless you're shy? Though given how boldly you argue about Byzantine scribal practices, I can't imagine a little musicwould intimidate you."
"That's different," she protested, though she could feel heat rising in her cheeks. "Academic discourse is..."
