Page 36 of The Duchess’ Little Miracle

She slammed the mental door shut, pulling her gaze back down to the ink-stained paper before the feeling could take shape, before it could demand a name. She cleared her throat softly, her fingers tightening around the barrel of her quill.

“Moths,” Seraphina said. “Perhaps you’re right. I shall figure out something.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The knock at the door was soft and entirely unexpected for the hour of the evening.

Seraphina did not immediately rise from the armchair she had dragged into the corner of the bay window. The rain outside was beating softly against the tall diamond-leaded panes, misting the glass with a film of condensation that blurred the shapes of the gardens below. In her lap lay a dense treatise on agricultural drainage systems, the ink fading on pages she had reread twice without absorbing a single sentence.

Without turning her head from the glass, Seraphina turned a page of her book. “You may enter.”

A long beat of silence stretched through the doorway.

The door creaked open, admitting a slice of warm sconce-light from the corridor before clicking softly shut again. Then came the familiar click of boot heels against the rug, moving unhurriedly across the room.

“Before you ask, no, I have not torn apart any more of your rare editions, Your Grace. Your library is perfectly intact.”

William did not answer. He bypassed the center of the room entirely, drawing closer to the bay window where she sat.

He stopped just short of the window corner, resting his shoulder lightly against the tall carved molding of the wall. He kept his hands tucked casually into his coat pockets.

Seraphina glanced up sideways over the edge of her volume. The intimate setting of her bedchamber only underscored how different he looked tonight. He had discarded his formal neckcloth somewhere down the hallways of the estate; the collar of his white linen shirt sat open at his throat, exposing the line of his collarbone.

She hated how she always noticed his chest whenever it was exposed. Always, without fail. But she also noticed that he looked thoroughly worn down. Whatever business had taken him away from the estate and kept him brooding in his study had waned him.

He looked down at her, his eyes searching her face in the light of the single oil lamp she had lit on the side table. For a long moment, the only sound between them was the drum of rain against the windowpane.

“I have an update,” he said softly.

The teasing edge in Seraphina’s chest evaporated instantly. His tone was too flat, too careful, completely stripped of the cutting sarcasm he usually employed when sparring with her.

She closed the treatise, setting it aside on the small table beside her cup of cooling tea. She folded her hands in her lap, turning her body slightly in the chair to give him her complete, undivided attention.

“Is it about the letters?” she asked.

“In a sense,” William said. He did not elaborate further just yet. Instead, his gaze drifted away from her, turning toward the doorway. “You look tired. Did Alice wear you out?”

“I could say the same thing about you,” she answered. “She is doing better. Over the last few days, the improvement has been marked. She is far calmer in the mornings when she comes into the library to sit while I write. She sleeps through the night much more often now, and even when a nightmare does take hold, she settles again quickly once she hears the sound of a voice.”

William’s jaw tightened subtly. A faint, barely perceptible shift in his shoulders suggested a wave of profound relief washing through him, though he kept his back rigid against the wall. He stared at the crack of light in the doorway for several seconds before looking back down at Seraphina.

“I am glad to hear it,” he murmured, his voice rough. “I owe you a debt for that, Seraphina. A considerable one.”

“You owe me nothing,” she replied simply.

Seraphina held his gaze, waiting. There was a question that had been sitting at the back of her mind for days now, floating beneath every observation she made. She wasn’t entirely sure of the connection between Alice and William.

They looked too much alike, but he has never once called her his daughter, and she did not want to pry by asking the staff what they knew.

Now, surrounded by the intimacy of her private rooms, the pieces refused to fit into any logical ledger she knew how to keep.

“Your Grace,” she said. “Is Alice your daughter?”

The silence in the bedchamber stretched out instantly, taut and thick enough to weigh upon the air.

“I will understand if you do not want to say,” she continued. “I was merely curious.”

William did not startle. He did not blink. But the line between his brows deepened, and he shifted his weight off the molding, stepping away from the window alcove. He walked toward her bed behind her, and sat. Seraphina rose too, walked over and sat by his side, but not close enough that they were in each other’s space.