“Oh, I would not dream of it.” She gestured him away with one elegant hand. “Now, be off with you. And if you are lucky, you may find a messenger pixie dallying in the kitchen. And do not be late this evening!”
Kazrian turned away with a huff.
This evening did not matter. He would sit beside Lady Albina Bridgemere, he would be charming, he would discuss whatever one discussed with accomplished young ladies, and none of it would come to anything, because in a week’s time, when the Bloom Season officially began, Kazrian would no longer be here.
Chapter Twelve
Lucie stepped backfrom the window display and tilted her head, surveying the arrangement she and Georgiana had spent the better part of the morning perfecting. Behind the wide glass of The Honeycomb’s front windows, three tiers of confections rose on stands of polished brass and etched crystal. Slabs of honeycomb brittle in shades of gold, cracked into glittering shards. Rows of petit fours glazed in delicate pastels. A cascade of crystallized orange peel, curling like ribbons. And sugar roses, two dozen of them, each one enchanted to bloom in slow, trembling cycles.
The effect was, if she said so herself, rather lovely.
With just under a week before the Bloom Season officially began, the displays needed to be perfect. The trickle of invited patrons was thickening into something closer to a current, and the window had to make people want to know what was inside.
She had come in at her usual hour that morning, before the light had fully found the lane, and found a note propped against the honey jar.
The upstairs storeroom door is resolved. That concludes the outstanding repairs. — K
She had read it several times, standing there in the quietkitchen with Balthazar watching her through barely open eyes. So. That was it, then. Kazrian would be leaving—had left already, perhaps—and that was exactly as it should be.
She had slipped the note into her apron pocket and continued with her list of morning tasks, and if her hand drifted to her pocket more than once throughout the morning, that was simply a matter of habit, nothing more.
“I think the brittle wants to come forward,” Georgiana said behind her. “The light’s catching the petit fours, but the brittle’s lost in the shadow of the stand.”
Lucie tilted her head. “You are right. It’s the best part. It ought not be hiding.”
Georgiana reached in and slid the dish a few inches toward the glass, angling it just so.
“Oh, how is your aunt?” Lucie asked. “You said you were on your way to visit her when you left yesterday.”
“Oh—she is … much the same as ever, I suppose.”
Lucie waited, but nothing more came. Georgiana was like that. Warm and capable and perfectly friendly, but she did not share much of her life outside The Honeycomb.
“The new elderflower champagne jellies,” Georgiana went on, smoothly returning to the conversation at hand. “Should we put a few in the window? Or hold them back for the launch?”
“Hold them back, but mention them to the patrons who visit.” Lucie smiled. “Lady Rivenna would tell us a thing nobody can have yet is worth twice a thing they can.”
Georgiana laughed softly. “She is rather magnificent at that, is she not?”
They worked on in companionable quiet, Georgiana adjusting the height of the stands, Lucie repositioning the blossoms so the breathing of them rippled down the display in sequence rather than all at once.
It was while Georgiana leaned in to nudge the topmost stand into place—stretching over the others, one arm extended—that her neat little capped sleeve shifted upward, revealing a bruise at the top of her arm.
“Oh, goodness—what happened there?”
Georgiana glanced down and laughed before delicately tugging the sleeve back into place. “That silly handle on the back kitchen door. I keepcatching my arm on it. I try to push the door open wider, but the gnome has so many flower pots lined up out there that I can never open it fully.”
“Oh.” Lucie frowned. “You are right, it is rather a tight squeeze. I shall have a word with him. I do not want anyone else catching themselves on that handle.”
“Oh, no—please.” Georgiana’s voice was quick. “Do not trouble yourself. It is only my own clumsiness. I ought to look where I am going. Please do not inconvenience the poor fellow on my account. He does such lovely work out there.”
“That he does,” Lucie agreed. “When he is not waging war with the florist next door over whose lavender is encroaching on whose territory.”
That got a real laugh out of Georgiana, the alarm dissolving into it, and the moment passed.
Lucie left her to the last of the window and went back through to the kitchen, turning her mind to the work of the day: orange and almond florentines. Lacework confections, more nut and peel than anything else, held together by the thinnest layer of crisp caramel biscuit and dipped along one edge in dark chocolate. And then, once they set, the honey light.Kindred.
This particular variety produced a brief sense of warmth toward whoever one was with. Not manufactured affection, but rather a gentle lowering of one’s guard, the moment when a stranger starts to feel like someone you could know. Lady Rivenna wanted them for the launch, and Lucie needed to ensure they were perfect.
