He smiled at her, just half a smile, something gentle and familiar and so very much worse than that wide, toothy grin he flashed ateveryone all the time. He looked … he lookedhappyto see her there, the bastard.
“Don’t run away,” he said by way of greeting. “Please.”
“I wasn’t going to,” she said haughtily, while still very much considering doing just that.
He kicked off of the carriage and walked toward her, holding his hands up in front of him like he was approaching a spooked farm animal.
She narrowed her eyes, thinking how very satisfying it would be to smack those hands as hard as she could until they fell back to a neutral place at his sides, where they could not provide demeaning commentary upon her temperament.
“We haven’t even said hello to each other,” he said, perhaps in kindness ignoring that he had very much said hello to her that day in the master suite. She had simply refused to accept it. “Claire, please. Let us at least speak to one another as allies, if not friends, if not … if not …”
“Lovers?” she guessed sharply.
“Man and wife,” he completed, raising his eyebrows with surprise at the wordshehad chosen. “I was going to say man and wife.”
“Of course you were,” she snapped, coloring.Lovers?!Why had she said that?! “Fine. What have you to say to me?”
“I …” He trailed off, running a hand through his hair and giving a short little laugh of surprise. “I don’t actually know, to tell you the truth. A thousand things, obviously. Obviously.”
“Obviously,” she mocked, crossing her arms over her chest. “Verbosity was never one of your weaknesses, Freddy.”
She had meant to wound him, but instead he paused and turned that smile back onto her, his eyes softening with familiarity, with warmth.
“And yet …” he said with a little shrug that made her heart hiccup.
Again, she imagined slapping him. Quite hard.
“You have done such wonders with Oliver,” he said, his voice lowering to an octave of sincerity. He dropped his hands in front of him. If he’d had a hat, she imagined he’d be twisting it around in some pantomimed approximation of an honest everyman. “He is remarkable. He is a gift, Claire. He is perfect.”
“I …” She cleared her throat, furrowing her brow. “Of course he is. And I … he …” She stopped, holding up a hand and shaking her head, desperate to just turn Freddy into one of the stones until she could remember how to use words again.
He didn’t rush her. He just stood there politely.
She found that very cruel.
She sucked in some air and forced herself to say something. Anything. “Yes, good. You are both very taken with one another. I am pleased to see it.”
“Are you?”
“Yes, of course I am,” she hissed, perhaps a bit too harshly. “And I expect you to write him every bloody day once you’ve left him alone again. You chose to embrace him, Freddy, so now you have to commit to it.”
He held those hands up again, like she was some errant bovine trying to kick him.
She fumed. She raged. She stood completely and silently still.
“You look beautiful today,” he told her, tilting his head to observe her in the afternoon light. “The earrings … they still suit you.”
“The … what?!” She balked, her hands flying up to touch the little spheres that dangled from golden hooks at her earlobes.
“Enjoy the afternoon, Claire,” he said, and leaned forward to kiss her cheek. It was too sudden to stop, too unexpected to receive the appropriate violent backlash. It was soft. It was gentle. It was very bloody chaste.
And it awoke every nerve in her body.
By the time she was ready to claw the flesh from his face, he was already walking away, whistling to himself, like a man who had just won a great victory.
And she stood there like the damned idiot Stone King, petrified forever, because she’d underestimated her opponent.
CHAPTER 10
