Page 37 of Reclaimed By Her Scottish Duke

She had left the door ajar, Magnus noted, and stood well within sight of it, which was sensible and disappointing in equal measure.

“I only wanted a word.” He kept his voice low and stayed at the balustrade, hands hanging loose at his sides. “To tell ye that ye did well. That’s all. Ye earned it.”

“Oh.” Some of the wariness left her shoulders. “Well, thank you, Your Grace.”

He let himself look at her then, the way he had spent the whole dinner not allowing himself to, from the dark coil of her hair to the deep neckline she kept resisting the urge to cover and back again. He did not hurry it, even as the color rose in her throat.

“The gown was a good choice,” he praised. “A very good choice. Ye look like a woman who has decided to be seen, and it suits ye a great deal better than the wall did.”

“You are staring, Your Grace.”

“I am. It’s a fine thing, watchin’ the pupil outstrip the master.” His mouth curved. “Though ye wasted the whole of it on Denby, a man who cannae find his own opinion with both hands and a lantern.”

“Don’t.” Rosaline’s chin lifted. “You have no right. You made a fool of the poor man twice over in front of the entire table, when he had done nothing but be a little dull and a little vain, which describes half the peerage. It was cruel and reckless. If I had not stepped in, he would have known exactly who had done it to him.” Her eyes flashed. “I am trying to build something, and you were kicking at the foundations for sport.”

“He was lookin’ at ye like a sweet he meant to buy.”

“That was the entire point of the exercise. You taught it to me.”

That landed because it was true, and Magnus had no answer he was willing to say aloud on a balcony.

“Ye can do better than Denby,” he said instead. “That’s all I’ll grant ye. A great deal better than that.”

“Can I?” She turned to face him fully, and there was something in it that was not quite the argument anymore. “Then tell me who, Your Grace. Who is it I ought to be doing so much better with?”

The question hung in the cool air between them.

He had a dozen deflections, and any one of them would have served. Instead, he looked at her, color high, eyes on his. The answer sat so plainly on his tongue that he had to press his lips together to keep it there. He was distantly aware of dragging his tongue across them as he did.

Her gaze dropped to his mouth and came back up.

For a moment, the balcony seemed a great deal smaller than it had, and the ajar door and the sensible distance and every good reason counted for nothing whatsoever.

Rosaline broke the silence first. He saw her reach for solid ground the way she reached for a clue in a maze—deliberate and a little desperate.

“Your meeting.” Her voice came out a little shaky. “With the lord you were seeking. How did it go?”

His jaw tightened before he could stop it. He did not want to talk about Ulverton, did not want to talk at all. But she had thrown him a rope and needed him to take it, so he took it.

“It went well,” he answered. “Better than well. I did everything ye taught me, and the old man never saw the join. I bowed too low and asked after his trees and let him think himself the cleverest soul in England. At the end of it, he offered to open a door I’ve been banging my head against for a year.” He inclined his head, and meant the next part more than he’d meant anything all evening. “That was yer doing, Rosaline. Thank ye for that.”

“I am glad.” And she was; he could see it. “I am glad it worked, Your Grace.”

“Magnus. My name is Magnus.”

“I couldn’t. It’s not proper.”

“Just this once, Rosaline. ‘Tis only ye and I here.”

She paused. “I… Very well, Magnus.”

Damn it.

She’d only spoken his name, and the entire world had shattered. Faded. Vanished. She’d become the world. She, and his name on her lips.

Then she drew a breath and stepped back toward the door. “I should go back in. Beatrice can only mend an imaginary hem for so long before⁠—”

He moved without deciding to, a single step that put him between her and the glass, not touching her.