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“What is it?” he asked.
“Look! Look at this!” She jumped to her feet and hurried toward him, passing the rock for him to see. Across the surface was not just one tiny ammonite fossil, but a whole bundle, about six or seven, some large and some small, all overlapping. It seemed Lady Hermione’s hard work had paid off.
“Damn,” he muttered. “I should have looked with you, then I could claim to keep this one.”
“That can’t happen now,” she said with glee, taking the stone from him and sitting on the rock beside him.
“I found one like this once,” he said, pointing down to it. “That was a day I like to forget. I needed to escape my thoughts, came here the whole day, and then right at the very end, I smashed a rock and found a whole bundle of ammonites. It cheered me more than I can say.”
“What was wrong that day?” Lady Hermione asked. Antony snapped his gaze up toward her, realizing how open he had been with her.
“It is not easy to explain,” he said, looking away from her and out to the ocean. He may have nearly told her about a secret from his past, but he would go no further.
“You look in pain,” she said softly. “May I presume it was some kind of heartbreak?”
“You could say that,” he said, looking down at the fossil in her hands. He took it gently from her, desperate to change the topic even though he could already feel the pain coursing through his body, just as it always did when he remembered that day.
That is why I can never let my guard down with you, Lady Hermione. What we share can never be more than this flirtation.
“Do you know, this is one of the finest fossils I have seen for some time,” he said, bringing a smile to his cheeks. “You have done well–”
“I am sorry.” Her words brought him up short.
“For what?” He looked up from the fossil.
“Whatever heartbreak that befell you,” she said, holding his gaze. “I am sorry to see you in pain, your Grace.” She genuinely meant her words; he could see it in her face.
“Thank you,” he said softly, wondering how to close down this conversation before he told her anymore. When his eyes slipped from her face to the locket around her neck, he thought of the perfect distraction. “What does this mean?” He lifted a hand to the locket and picked it up from her neck, caressing her open neck with the backs of his fingers.
They were close now, and he could feel her heartbeat quicken beneath his fingers. It made him thrum with the temptation to kiss her another time and indulge in what they had shared the first night they had met in the library.
“I told you before,” she said, holding his gaze. “It is a secret.”
“But it is some kind of symbol, am I right?” he asked, finding his curiosity getting the better of him. “Does it remind you of a past love, perhaps?”
“No!” she said quickly, so sharply that he dropped his hand from her. She looked disappointed the moment his hand left her. “Not a love, not quite,” she said, hanging her head and looking down at the fossil again.
“I see, a suitor but not a love. No lovers in your past then?” he teased her, seeking to lighten the mood.
“You are being forward again, Your Grace,” she smiled, looking up at him.
“I rather like being so, especially when it makes you smile like that.” He pointed to her face, laughing when she made a point of clamping a hand over her face to hide the smile. “Is there anything so wrong with a lover?”
“Very wrong, and you know it!” she said, dropping her hand. “A lady cannot take a lover; think of her reputation.”
“I wasn’t thinking of reputations,” he said, glancing over his shoulder in search of their chaperone. The maid was some distance away on the beach, still talking with the footman. He turned back to Lady Hermione. “I was thinking about stolen kisses and illicit meetings.”
“You have already stolen one kiss,” she warned him.
“I’m guessing that is your way of telling me I won’t be stealing anymore.”
“Precisely,” she said, straightening her spine and lifting her chin a little. The dignified look pulled another chuckle from him.
“If it is not a lover, what does it mean then?” he asked, pointing at the locket once more. Her expression turned somber. She didn’t answer him straight away, but instead lifted her hands to remove the locket from her neck completely and hold it up in her grasp.
“It was a gift, though in truth I do not associate it with the person,” she said, speaking to him though she kept her eyes on the jewelry. “I keep it to remind myself of a life that could have been mine. Perhaps a life that would have been easier, happier even.”
“Yet that life was denied to you?” he asked. She nodded in answer. He wanted to ask her more about it, but when he was keeping secrets from her, it hardly seemed right to pry, so he settled for something else instead. “Are you reminding yourself of this other life or torturing yourself with the idea of it?”
