It should not have hurt as much as it did.
***
The library encounter was the last.
Lillian had arrived at Wynthorpe Hall to find Rosanne occupied with her dressmaker, final adjustments to the gown she would wear to Lady Smith's gathering, and had been directed to wait in the library.
The library at Wynthorpe was magnificent. Two stories of books, accessible by a spiraling staircase and a gallery that ran along the upper level. Lillian had wandered its shelves on previous visits, selecting volumes on agriculture and estate management that Rosanne found extremely dull.
Today, she had chosen a treatise on soil composition and was curled in a window seat, entirely absorbed in a chapter on the benefits of marl, when the door opened.
She looked up.
The duke stood frozen in the doorway, clearly not expecting to find anyone in residence. He was dressed for work rather than receiving visitors, his coat slightly rumpled, his cravat loosened, and there was an ink stain on his right hand that suggested he had been dealing with correspondence.
"Miss Whitcombe."
"Your Grace." She did not rise from the window seat, though propriety suggested she should. "Forgive me. I did not mean to intrude on your sanctuary."
"My sanctuary?"
"The library. Is it not where you retreat when you wish to escape company?"
He was silent for a moment, and Lillian wondered if she had overstepped. But then the corner of his mouth twitched, almost, almost a smile, and he stepped into the room, closing the door behind him.
"It is. Though I find I am not as eager to escape as I once was."
He moved toward her, stopping at a respectful distance but close enough that Lillian could see the detail of his features; the dark eyes that watched her so intently, the strong line of his jaw, the faint furrow between his brows that seemed to be his permanent expression.
"What are you reading?" he asked.
She held up the book, showing him the spine. "Soil composition. The chapter on marl is particularly interesting."
"You are reading about marl."
"I told you I was boringly practical."
"And I told you that you were not boring." He moved closer, glancing at the page she had been reading. "This is rather technical material."
"I find I enjoy technical material. It gives me the sense that problems can be solved. That there are answers, if one is willing to look for them."
"Not all problems have answers."
"No. But more, than most people assume, do."
He looked at her then and Lillian felt the weight of his attention like a physical thing. There was something in his expression that she had not seen before, something that went beyond casual interest or polite curiosity.
"You are unlike anyone I have ever met," he said quietly.
"Is that a compliment?"
"It is an observation. Whether it is a compliment depends on one's perspective."
"And what is your perspective, Your Grace?"
The question hung between them, laden with implications neither of them was quite ready to acknowledge. Lillian's heart was beating faster than it should, faster than a simple conversation about books and soil composition could justify.
"My perspective," he said slowly, "is still forming."
