"Yes."
Simon sipped his brandy, his tone unusually thoughtful. "You’re in love with her."
Magnus didn’t answer. He swirled the contents of his glass slowly, the amber liquid catching firelight as tension coiled in his shoulders.
"She’s going to refuse you," Simon said, not unkindly, but with the bluntness only a brother could manage.
"Probably."
"So what are you going to do about it?"
Magnus turned toward the window, where the rain still fell against the glass in steady rhythm.
"I’m going to find a way to make her say yes."
"Ah," Simon said, settling back. "This should be entertaining."
* * *
In her bedroom, Alexandra sat before the fire while Mrs. Greaves tried to coax her hair into some semblance of order.
"You realize," her maid said, "that you’ve created quite the storm."
"It was already raining."
"Not that kind of storm.” Mrs. Greaves shook her head. “And you well know it.”
Alexandra sighed, rubbing at her temples as if she could press the memory from her mind. "I didn’t mean for it to happen."
"But it did."
"And now I have to live with it."
"Or," Mrs. Greaves said gently, "you could embrace it."
Alexandra stared at her reflection. Her breath fogged the glass for a heartbeat, blurring her features until all she could see was the outline of uncertainty. She looked pale, her hair damp and curling at the ends—a woman caught between the storm and its aftermath.
Rain had a way of revealing things.
And for one brief moment beneath that ancient oak—the same place where she'd laughed like a girl in the rain and kissed like a woman unafraid—she had felt something terrifyingly real.
What if she was wrong about him? What if accepting that kiss meant surrendering more than just her heart—what if it meant trusting someone not to break it? And what if—just this once—it was worth the risk?
Now she had to decide what to do with it. Outside her window, the rain continued to fall, soft now—gentler, like the memory of a kiss. Somewhere in the garden, the old oak still stood, branches dripping, roots deep and enduring. Alexandra imagined the bark damp against her palm, the grounding solidity of it beneath her fingertips. There was comfort in its constancy, clarity in its quiet presence. It had stood through storms and still reached for the sky—perhaps she could, too. And she wondered: could something as wild and unexpected as love take root in her, too?
Chapter 5
By the time Alexandra awoke the next morning, the storm had moved on.
Outside her window, the sky stretched clear and blue as if the heavens themselves meant to erase all traces of the previous day’s chaos. But the gossiping tongues of the ton were not so easily stilled. Alexandra could feel their whispers like invisible fingertips on the back of her neck—prickling, invasive. The imagined heat of their judgment made her spine straighten as if steeling herself against a storm more insidious than rain.
Alexandra had barely finished her morning tea, her fingers tightening slightly around the delicate porcelain cup when Louisa burst through the front door of the Peregrine townhouse, cheeks flushed and bonnet askew.
“It’s everywhere,” Louisa announced, skidding into the drawing room like a harried footman.
Alexandra flinched, nearly spilling what remained of her tea. Her pulse quickened with the certainty that whatever “it” was, it would not bode well for her.
“What is?” Alexandra asked, though she already knew. Dread pooled low in her stomach.
