Page 119 of Duke of Sapphire

She had not meant to say it like that. It came out lower than she intended. She was already closer to him than she’d realized, one step toward the door, toward the sound of Henry’s voice in the quiet.

In the dim light, his face was not hiding anything. He looked simply like himself—stripped of the careful architecture, the controlled expression, the practiced authority. He looked tired, fond, and sad, and she had to direct her attention back to the door because looking at him like that was not safe.

“I’ll miss him,” she said. “I know I shouldn’t say it. I know our arrangement was never meant to be permanent. I know he belongs with Nathan and Eleanor, and I am glad for that, I am entirely glad, but I will miss him until it⁠—”

She stopped.

She pressed her mouth closed and shook her head once.

Until it what? She did not know how to finish that. Until it stops? It would not stop. Until I find somewhere else to put it? She had nowhere else.

She did not know why she had said it at all. That was not entirely true. She knew exactly why. She had said it because she was standing in the dark two feet from Henry and she was still turning over his toast and some small, reckless part of her had hoped that if she said something open and unguarded, he would answer with something equally unguarded in return. That he would ask her to stay. Not because Ian needed her. Not because the marriage required managing. Simply because he wanted her there.

She wanted the kiss to mean something. She wanted to know that he had felt it too, that soft, terrifying collision by the stream, that he thought about it at odd moments the way she did. She wanted to be seen.

He was looking at her.

Really looking. The way he had at the dinner table, that still, intent attention that felt like being read. She stood inside it and did not move and let him look, because she had nothing left to hide and little dignity to lose.

Ask me to stay.

She did not say it.

Say it means something. Say it was not duty. Say the toast was for me.

The silence stretched.

“I will miss him, too,” Henry said. The words were barely audible. Just breath, almost, the faintest edge of voice.

From inside the nursery, Ian murmured. Something about the fish, probably.

Henry turned his head toward the door. Then he looked back at Charlotte. His expression was unreadable now—locked again with all the stripped-back honesty folded away somewhere she could not reach.

“Good night, Charlotte,” he said and walked past her.

His shoulder nearly grazed hers. Nearly. Charlotte stood and did not move. She closed her eyes. Her fingers curled tight, the nails biting against her palms.

Don’t. She told herself. Don’t care. Not now. She breathed as evenly as she could.

Not ever.

CHAPTER 32

“Ye’ve given us back our boy,” Nathan said. “I daenae ken how to thank ye for that.”

Henry stood at the foot of the steps, watching the carriage being readied. “You might begin by getting in the carriage on time,” he said.

Nathan laughed. “Aye, that too. But truly, Henry. Ye can have yer old life back now.”

Henry’s fingers tightened behind his back.

My old life. Ledgers. Silence. No dragons in the nursery. No wooden swords in the corridors. Do I want it?

Ian bounded across the gravel. Charlotte had crouched in front of him, her skirts pooling, bonnet ribbons loose. Her arms were already open.

“I daenae want to go,” Ian said. He threw himself on her neck. “I like it here.”

Charlotte wrapped him close. “You are going home,” she said. “Home is worth liking too.”