Page 133 of Duke of Sapphire

“You do not have to do anything with it tonight.” Henry set the letter on her lap and covered her hand with his. “You may simply let it sit there being strange.”

“He says he thinks of my mother,” Charlotte said. “Often. He has never said that to me before.”

“Grandchildren have a way of loosening tongues that daughters could not manage alone.” Henry considered this. “Also mortality. Men of your father’s generation tend to discover sentiment around the same time they discover their knees.”

“That is a terrible thing to say.”

“It is also accurate.” He tucked a curl behind her ear, unhurried about it. “For what it is worth, I do not think it is only the child. I think he has had a great deal of time to sit in that house alone and consider what he lost when he lost you.”

Charlotte looked at the letter again. “I am not ready to forgive him. Not entirely.”

“No one is asking you to. Not tonight, and not because he wrote one warm paragraph after so many cold years.” Henry’s hand found hers properly now, fingers threading through. “You may take as long as you like deciding what he has earned.”

“You are remarkably reasonable about my father, for a man who once threw him out of a sitting room.”

“I did not throw him. I asked him to leave a study.” Henry’s mouth curved. “There is a difference.”

“A very small one.”

“An important one.” He glanced at the letter once more, then at her. “For what it is worth, Charlotte, I understand him rather better than I once did. Regret arrives late for men like your father. Men like me too if we are being honest about it.” He paused. “I sat in a house for six days once, convincing myself I preferred an empty one to admitting what I actually wanted.”

“I remember,” Charlotte said, quietly.

“I am simply saying belated wisdom is still wisdom.” He tapped the letter. “Even from an Earl who thought marriage settlements were poetry.”

She smiled at that, properly this time, and folded the letter along its worn crease. “We have come rather a long way from a coaching yard in the rain.”

“We have.” Henry looked at her, at the firelight moving over her face, at the small, undeniable curve beneath her hand where it rested on her middle. “I did not expect any of this, you know. When I opened that carriage door.”

“I recall you being furious.”

“I was furious for approximately four minutes. After that I believe I felt a sensation that was considerably more complicated, and it took me the better part of a year to admit what it was.” He leaned in and kissed her temple. “Come to breakfast. Ian has been awake since five, apparently, interrogating Mrs. Wick about whether Father Christmas prefers the east or west chimney.”

“There is only one chimney in this house large enough for a grown man.”

“Ian is aware of that. He simply does not accept it as an obstacle.” Henry stood and offered his hand. “He learned that from you, incidentally.”

“I have never once climbed down a chimney.”

“No,” Henry agreed, drawing her up. “But you have climbed a great many other things you were told not to.”

* * *

“He’s comin’ down the east chimney,” Ian announced, before anyone had finished sitting down. “I’ve decided.”

“Have ye,” Nathan said, reaching for the teapot. “And what convinced ye of that, exactly?”

“It’s closer to the stables. He’ll want to check on the reindeer first.”

“A sound strategy,” Henry said, taking his seat. “Logistically.”

Ian beamed at him, delighted to be taken seriously.

The dining room had been dressed for the season with more holly than strictly necessary, most of it, Henry suspected, arranged by Ian personally and adjusted only slightly by Mrs. Wick before it became a genuine hazard. A fire roared in the grate. Frost patterned the windows in sharp white lines, and beyond them the moor sat white and silent under the sky the color of old pewter.

“Mrs. Wick,” Ian said, “did ye tell him about the biscuits? He willnae come if there’s nae biscuits.”

“I left him shortbread and a wee dram for the cold,” Mrs. Wick said, setting down a platter. “As I do every year.”