“Miss Weston.” He closed the door—careful, measured—and crossed toward the fire. Distance was prudent. Distance was necessary. Any nearer and he might forget entirely that it was the middle of the day.
“I understand you have been planning something for Thomas’s birthday.”
“I have.” She set aside her list. “I intended to speak with you this evening.”
This evening.
The words carried a weight wholly disproportionate to their surface meaning.
He steadied himself. “I should like to assist. Mrs Potter informs me a gift is required.” A pause. “I did not know his birthday, Lorraine. Seven months—and I did not know.”
She rose and crossed to him, stopping just within reach—close enough that he caught the faint, familiar scent of her.
“You know now,” she said softly. “That is what matters.”
“It is not enough.”
“It never feels like enough. But it gathers, Dominic. Every moment you show up, every small thing you learn.” She lifted her gaze to his, and what he saw there steadied him more than anything else could have done. “What were you considering?”
He told her.
Lorraine’s eyes widened. Then softened, brightening with emotion she quickly mastered.
“That is perfect.”
“You think he will understand?”
“He will understand everything.” She half-raised her hand, then checked the movement, letting it fall instead. The restraint struck him harder than any touch. “He will treasure it.”
He held her gaze a moment too long.
“Tonight,” he said quietly. “Tell me everything tonight.”
“The party arrangements?” she asked, with the faintest suggestion of mischief.
“All of them,” he replied, his voice lowering despite himself. “Every detail.”
Her breath caught—barely, but he heard it.
For one dangerous instant, the space between them threatened to collapse entirely.
Then footsteps sounded in the corridor—Graves, precise as ever in his timing—and they stepped apart at once, composure restored as though it had never wavered.
“I shall have the full report ready, Your Grace.” Her voice was admirably steady, though the pulse at her throat betrayed her. “This evening.”
He inclined his head—a bow of almost exaggerated formality, given the circumstances—and withdrew with measured steps and clenched hands.
***
The seventeenth of December dawned cold and bright.
Dominic had been awake since five—not from unrest, but from anticipation. The unfamiliar sensation sat uneasily beneath his ribs, impossible to ignore. It had been years since he had felt anything like it—this clear, forward-looking eagerness,unshadowed by dread or memory. It took him several moments, lying in the dim grey of early morning with Lorraine’s scent still lingering on his pillow, to recognise it.
He was eager. For a child’s birthday.
The realisation was followed by grief so sharp it stole his breath.
William should be here. William should be planning his son’s seventh birthday in whatever modest, happy home he and Anne might have made together.
