Without thinking, he lifted his hand and brushed the backs of his fingers lightly against her cheek.
She blinked in surprise. “What are you doing?”
“You have freckles,” he murmured, almost in awe. “I hadn’t noticed before.”
She let out a small, embarrassed grumble, turning her face partially into the pillow. “Yes, well… it’s all the sun in the countryside. They’ve gotten worse since we married. I’ve been outdoors more than I ever was before. Blasted things.”
He smiled. “I like them.”
She glanced at him through narrowed eyes. “You do?”
“They make you look very… cute,” he said, the last word coming out in a tone of slight disbelief, almost as if it had escaped him without warning.
She looked at him in a surprised manner and then laughed softly. “Well, in that case, I suppose I’ll keep them.”
He studied her, basking in the quiet comfort that settled between them. Her laughter always did something strange to his chest.
Then her eyes narrowed with curiosity. “You know, you have something too.”
“Oh?”
She reached out, brushing her knuckles just along his jaw. “A scar. Right here.” Her touch was light, barely there. “I hadn’t noticed it before.”
He shifted slightly under her gaze. “I was thrown from a horse as a boy. Landed on a fencepost. It split my cheek.”
“Does it hurt?” she asked, her voice quieter now.
“Not anymore.” He held her gaze. “Most things don’t once they scar.”
She nodded slowly and tucked herself a little deeper beneath the blanket. He mirrored her, their bodies close enough to feel the warmth radiating between them but not yet touching.
And somewhere in the hush, amidst the fading firelight and the gentle sound of rain tapping on the windows, their breaths slowed in unison. Neither of them could say exactly when it happened, but sleep found them like that… side by side, peaceful.
And just a little closer than before.
Chapter Twenty
“Surely, you do not mean to remain cloistered in that dreadful old townhouse all Season, Evelyn?” Her mother’s voice was lined with sweet lavender and reproach, her perfectly arched brow lifting like a well-aimed dart.
Evelyn speared a boiled potato with all the delicacy of a knife to the ribs.
“Dreadful old townhouse or not, Mama, it has character, and we cannot wait for the renovations to be brought to an end,” Evelyn smiled. “The upholsterers were simply scandalized by the dust. And you know how I detest sneezing in mixed company.”
“Since when do you care for mixed company?” her father asked dryly.
She offered him a radiant smile. “Since I married a man who finds them even more intolerable than I do.”
Robert lifted his glass in ironic toast. “Your wine is excellent, My Lord.”
Her father grunted but was pleased with the comment. “As it should be, Your Grace. I do not serve vinegar to my guests.”
“Oh, you do. Just not in a bottle,” Evelyn murmured into her drink.
Robert choked into his. If she had heard it, her mother would gasp. But Evelyn didn’t wish to accentuate the polite savagery of familial interaction but rather to dress it in silks and etiquette. After all, she had promisedhim. She promised she would help him find the truth. And Brimwood House, namely its immaculate study, its secret drawers, its heavy oak desk under which she’d once hidden with a stolen tart, might hold the key to it all.
She glanced at Robert then, catching the line of his jaw, the unreadable depth of his eyes. He looked as he always did: like a man who’d walked through fire and refused to be burned. She wondered if he felt the tremble in the air the way she did.
“Evelyn, darling,” her mother said with the piercing sweetness of a stiletto made of spun sugar, “I spoke with Matilda yesterday.”
