Page 39 of A Family Bargain with the Duke

“Thank you, Your Grace. I only stepped out a moment for more coal.”

“Of course.”

He left her to her charge and made his way back down the corridor, still mulling over everything he had just confessed aloud to a sleeping infant, the words sitting oddly in his chest now that he had given them proper shape, perhaps more true for having been spoken rather than merely thought.

He had just stepped into his chamber, his hand still on the door handle, when he heard footsteps in the corridor, unhurried, familiar in a way that made his pulse quicken before he had properly identified why.

He did not turn around immediately. Somewhat, he recognized without needing to look the cadence of them, lighter than a servant’s brisker pace, unhurried in the way Louisa moved through every room she occupied, entirely at ease with herself even at this quiet, unreasonable hour.

The footsteps drew nearer, and Julian found himself listening rather more intently than the moment warranted, tracking her progress down the corridor by sound alone, the soft fall of her slippers against the runner growing closer until they were unmistakably outside his door.

Then they stopped.

Julian stood very still, his hand still on the handle, listening to the silence that followed, a silence that somehow felt considerably more charged than any ordinary quiet. He could hear nothing beyond the door itself, no further movement, no immediate retreat.

Is it Louisa? Is she going to knock?

He felt his heart beating faster, some part of him already anticipating the sound before it came, absurdly hoping for it, turning over half a dozen questions of his own in the space of that single held breath.

What would I say if she knocked? What might she have come to ask at this hour, when the whole house is asleep?

He found he did not know, and found, more troublingly still, that he did not care what excuse either of them might offer for the conversation, only that he wanted it to happen.

He lifted his hand from the handle to rest it flat against the wood, though whether he meant to open the door or simply be ready when she did, he could not have said with any certainty.

Another moment passed. The silence held, stretched, and he remained exactly where he stood, every part of him attuned to the quiet on the other side of the door, waiting.

Then the footsteps moved away. Slowly at first, almost reluctantly, then with more purpose, retreating back down the corridor in the direction of her chamber.

Julian stood with his palm still flat against the wood, listening to them fade until the house had fallen silent again, nothing left but the low creak of settling timber and his own uneven breath, considerably louder in his ears than it had any right to be.

He remained there for a long moment, unmoving, staring at nothing, replaying the hesitation in those retreating footsteps, long enough that he was entirely certain, whatever had brought her to his door, that it had not been some trivial household matter easily raised at breakfast.

It is better this way.

He frowned, lowering his hand from the door, though the words carried rather less conviction now than they had when he’d first reasoned them out, weeks ago, alone in his study with a marriage proposal spread across his desk.

Whatever she meant to ask, whatever brought her to my door at this hour, it is better that she thought better of it. I have made promises. I intend to keep them, and keeping them means neither of us reaching for more than we agreed to.

He turned away from the door at last and crossed to his bed, the candle guttering low on the nightstand. As he slipped beneath the cold sheets, he found that the room felt considerably emptier than it had an hour before, the space beside him absurdly more noticeable for its emptiness than it had ever been.

He lay awake a long while after that and could not, for the whole of that sleepless night, quite bring himself to think why.

CHAPTER 19

Louisa had not meant to walk this corridor at all. She told herself she meant only to fetch the shawl she’d left in the blue morning room, and that her path taking her past Julian’s door was simply the most direct route, nothing more calculated than that.

She saw the light first, a thin line of candlelight beneath his door. Her feet slowed before she’d quite decided they ought to.

He is awake.

She stood there, candle held low, and found herself absurdly considering whether to knock.

What would I even say?

She might ask about the eastern thatching. She might ask whether he’d eaten anything since dinner, since she’d noticed he often took something sweet like a biscuit or a small slice of cake with his coffee after dinner. She might simply call his name through the door and see what came after.

The thought of standing there and saying Julian into the quiet with nothing else prepared made her chest go tight with something close to panic.