Robert dropped his hands, momentarily winded not from the fight but from the weight in his chest. “It’s like I’ve lost control of myself,” he murmured. “My body… my thoughts… they aren’t obeying me.”
Mason lowered his fists too, watching him carefully. “Because your heart’s too loud to hear anything else.”
Robert stared at the floorboards, jaw working. A fine sheen of sweat dampened the back of his neck. His cravat felt too tight. His gloves suffocating.
He missed her.
Mason turned sharply. With a low growl of frustration, he stormed forward, fist raised, and in one clean motion, aimed a punch directly at Robert’s face.
But he stopped.
The blow hovered just inches from Robert’s jaw, his knuckles trembling with contained force. Robert didn’t even flinch.
Mason arched a brow, smirking slightly. “See?” he said, calm and unflinching. “You’re good for nothing. All dramatics and wounded sighs.”
Robert scowled. “You’re insufferable.”
“And you’re an idiot,” Mason snapped, pulling off his gloves with sharp, annoyed jerks. “Now stop whining, and go speak to her. Get your blasted life in order.”
“I told you,” Robert said, jaw tight, “I’m following my wife’s wishes.”
Mason stepped forward, dropping the gloves onto the bench with a thump. “And how, precisely, do you know what her wishes are?”
Robert blinked, caught off guard. “She wrote me a letter.”
“Ah yes,” Mason said with biting sarcasm, “a letter penned in a rush, filled with apologies and assumptions. Did she say, explicitly so, that she did not love you? That she did not wish for a life with you?”
Robert faltered. “No, but?—”
“People change, Robert. Their hearts shift. Circumstances shift. And feelings,” Mason jabbed a finger into his shoulder, “can deepen. But no one can make a choice if they aren’t given the chance to do so.”
Robert stood very still, breath caught in his throat. Evelyn’s laughter, her fierce eyes, her trembling voice when she said she would follow whatever path he chose—it all rushed through him like a gust of wind breaking open a shuttered window.
“You’re right,” he whispered, the beginnings of a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Damn it, Mason. You’re right!”
Mason stepped back with a smug shrug. “Of course, I am.”
Without another word, Robert ripped the gloves from his hands, tossed them at Mason, who caught them with a grunt of surprise, and bolted for the door.
“Where are you going?” Mason called after him.
“To find her,” Robert shouted over his shoulder, already halfway down the corridor. “To give her the choice she never got.”
Mason shook his head, chuckling as he watched his friend disappear. “Finally,” he muttered to the empty room. “About bloody time.”
The scent of lavender and old wood hung gently in the air as Evelyn stepped through the threshold of her new townhouse. It was modest by London standards but fashionable with delicate molding, tall windows, and just enough character in the creaking floors to make it charming. The walls were still bare, the fireplace cold, and only a handful of her belongings had arrived, but it was hers. Her own space.
Matilda hovered nearby, draping a shawl over the back of a chair, while Hazel and Cordelia busied themselves with unpacking trunks and fussing over curtain colors.
“It’s rather cozy,” Cordelia said gently, smoothing her hand over the mantle. “I quite like it.”
“It will be perfect once you’ve put your touch to it,” Hazel added. “A few paintings, perhaps a new rug… yes, this could very well be a lovely little escape.”
Evelyn smiled faintly though the expression didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Yes. I think so too.”
She knelt beside a half-opened trunk, withdrawing a familiar silk dressing gown and folding it with care. It still smelled faintly of lavender water and something else, something that reminded her of her dressing room at the ducal estate. Her throat tightened.
Matilda watched her with silent concern while Cordelia perched on the arm of a chair.
