Page 122 of Duke of Sapphire

She shifted, ready to retreat.

“Charlotte,” Henry said.

He rose.

She stilled.

“I wish to speak with you,” he said.

Her stomach knotted.

You kissed me by a stream and then began eating in other rooms. Now you wish to speak. This cannot be good.

She stepped in and closed the door behind her. “Very well.”

They took the chairs by the fire. Not too close. Not too far. The distance felt wrong no matter what she did with it.

Henry rested his forearms on his knees. “Ian has gone,” he said, as if she might have forgotten.

“Yes,” she replied. “I was present.”

He winced faintly. “Of course.”

She looked at the flames because glancing at his face felt like too much.

Say what you came to say. If it is going to hurt, better quickly than slowly.

“Now that Ian has left,” Henry said, “we should discuss what comes next.”

Her heart dropped. It was almost a physical sensation. “What comes next,” she repeated.

“Yes.”

She forced herself to look at him. His expression was guarded. Too guarded.

He is going to unravel it. The marriage. The arrangement. He has realized that his duty has ended and that he has no further need for a duchess who climbs trees.

“What do you wish to do?” she asked.

His jaw tightened. “I do not know.”

She stared. “If you do not know what you wish to do, why are we having this conversation?”

He looked momentarily cornered. “It seemed…necessary.”

“For whom?” she asked.

He did not answer.

Charlotte sat back, her fingers digging into the arm of the chair.

He wants me to go, and he does not know how to say it. So he invites me to invent the future myself. How very tidy. How very Henry.

She took a slow breath. She would do it for him and leave before he asked. She had done harder things; had run from an Earl with her hair pinned beneath a cap. Now, she could leave the Duke’s house with her head held high instead of waiting to be dismissed.

But Charlotte did not say any of that aloud.

Not yet.