They stayed like that, the three of them, in a suspension so delicate it felt almost sacramental. The only movement was the steady, determined crawl of Lizzie, who, after sampling theleather of Felix’s shoe, fixed her gaze on the glass in his hand. She made a grab for it, and Rose stood, anticipating disaster.
But Felix was quicker. He set the glass aside and swooped the child into his arms, lifting her until she squealed. “Not for you, my little falcon,” he said, settling her in the crook of his arm.
Lizzie, thus detained, patted his face with both hands, her tiny fingers searching out the contours of his jaw, the line of his nose. She seized a fistful of his hair and tugged, delighted by the victory.
“Careful,” Felix said, but he was smiling. The real kind, without malice or shield.
Rose watched them, and for a moment the sight made her throat tighten. She had not known this was possible: that the man who could split a room with a look was the same who now jiggled a baby on his knee, making faces with abandon. He caught her staring, and the effect was immediate as his mask slipped back into place, not unkindly, but with a sort of practiced distance.
She returned to her desk, pressing her palm against the letter to dry the ink. She heard Felix lower Lizzie to the floor, then the whisper of his footsteps as he crossed behind her.
“What do you tell her?” he asked, voice low. “Your sister.”
Rose capped her pen, steadying herself before she answered. “That I am well. That you are…” She hesitated, then looked up. “That you are generous. And that Lizzie is safe.”
His expression was unreadable in the lamplight. “Is that what you believe?”
“I want to,” Rose said. She did not look away.
Felix nodded, as if satisfied, then picked up his glass and returned to the window. He stood with his back to her, the line of his shoulders sharp as the edge of a coin.
“Will you take Lizzie to the nursery?” she asked, after a minute. “I’ll be along in a moment.”
Felix didn’t turn. “I think I’ll stay down here. There’s a letter I need to write.”
She gathered the baby and carried her upstairs, pausing at the landing to glance back at the parlor. Through the open door, she could see Felix silhouetted against the pane, still as a figure in a painting. For an instant, she wanted to call out, to ask him to follow, to insist that he not spend the evening alone.
But something stopped her. Perhaps it was the weight of the last few months—the knowledge that their happiness, hard-won though it was, stayed fragile and might shatter at the first careless touch.
She carried Lizzie to her cot, settling her with a lullaby half-remembered from the convent. When the baby’s eyes drooped closed, Rose lingered by the window, listening to the city. A carriage rattled by with its lamps glowing. Somewhere down the block, a woman laughed, and then the street fell silent again.
Rose did not know how long she stood there, holding to the quiet, afraid that if she moved, she would lose her grasp on the life they had managed, by some miracle, to assemble.
When she finally crept back downstairs, she found the parlor empty. Felix’s glass was gone, as was the man himself. Only the faint scent of whiskey and orange peel lingered.
She thought about the letter to her sister, about the things she had not said. She closed her eyes, then went looking for him. Not because she needed to, but because she wanted to. The hallways were dark, and in the master suite, she found Felix standing by the window, staring out at the city as if he could memorize every lamp and brick.
She entered quietly, and he did not turn.
“Is it the city?” she asked. “Does it make you restless?”
He answered without looking at her. “It’s not the city. It’s…” He let the words trail off, as if they were too delicate to survive the air.
She crossed to him, careful not to startle. “You’re allowed to be happy, you know.”
Felix laughed, soft and humorless. “I’m not sure I believe that.”
She touched his sleeve, just at the elbow. “We could try, together.”
For a long moment, he did not move. Then he reached for her, his arm encircling her waist, pulling her close. “Promise me,” he said. “That you’ll never run. No matter how many times I get this wrong.”
“I promise,” Rose whispered. She felt him breathe out, a tremor that shivered through his whole body.
They stood at the window, two figures framed by lamplight, neither daring to move. But the moment held.
Their bedroom was always cold at night, no matter how many embers Felix stoked in the hearth. The windows were old, the glass thin, and the wind seemed to test every inch of the frame for weakness. Rose lay on her side beneath a siege of quilts, listening to the hush of the house settle around them. Felix was behind her, one arm draped heavy and protective across her waist, his body an anchor of warmth.
She had not imagined she would ever sleep in a man’s bed, least of all his. Not after the convent, not after all the vows she had broken, first in word and then in spirit. But here she was, his shirt draped over her like a flag of surrender, her own nightdress bunched at her knees, Lizzie sleeping two doors down. She felt a wild, unlikely contentment.
