He gave a small nod, and for a moment, the silence between them was almost companionable. As if by mutual agreement, they sat at the breakfast nook opposite one another. They both spoke at once, then stopped. Rune tilted her head. "You first."
He hesitated, then: "Why did you never use the safe word, if something we did made you feel... It has been bothering me since you said it." He trailed off. It wasn't what she'd expected. She blinked, then exhaled. "I guess I loved you so much back then that sometimes I told myself, stop being a wuss. And eventually... I came to enjoy the things we did. I understood your need for control. I began to like it."
His eyes darkened. "You did?"
"Yes." She gave a faint, bitter smile. "I guess I have a bit of a masochist in me."
Dorian looked down. His voice was rough. "Did I... hurt you?"
Her gaze trailed over his bent head of curly hair, at the set of his tense shoulders. She blinked fast because tears wanted to come. "At first, I thought we had something special. That you'd come to-" she faltered, searching. "I thought my love would be enough for both of us. But that last month... when your friend Crispin lost his mind, as you put it, you changed. It was as if all those scraps of affection I had collected over the years were just gone. That last time, in the office..."Her voice dropped. "I felt sick afterwards. Why? I don't understand why you did that."
Slowly, he reached forward, taking her hands. They were fragile against his, and he noticed a small callus beginning to form on her thumb. He rubbed it absently as she tried to pull back.
"I..." His jaw worked. "Crispin, you didn't see the state he was in. I had this fear you'd go the same way... Leave me, I mean. Subconsciously... maybe I wanted to drive you away. To make it safe. Like if I drove you away first before you left me..." His voice turned a little husky. "I'm sorry. I’m sorry I did that to you. Made you feel small."
She looked down. Her voice was quiet, trembling. "Do you want this child?"
He swallowed hard. "I never wanted children."
Her hands jerked in his grip, but he tightened gently. "Wait. I didn't want them because I was afraid. Afraid I'd turn out like my father. That they'd suffer, like I did. But with you-" his eyes lifted, black as onyx in the shadows of the evening "With you as their mother, they'd be safe. I know it. Rune, come back with me. I am lost without you."
Her lips trembled. For a moment, she looked ready to break. But then she pulled her hands free. "I don't think I can."
His shoulders seemed to slump.
"I've been thinking," she said steadily. "I'm not going to be happy being your dirty little secret. All is not forgotten just because you finally decided that you could lower yourself to apologise to me for being an awful human being. Remember all the times I've had to say sorry when it wasn't my fault? What about my pride, Mr. Albury? " She looked away, staring at nothing in particular. Her soft voice wasfilled with tears when she spoke again. "I want a man who'd be proud to call me his wife. And I won't be satisfied with just one child. I want two or three. And two dogs. And a cat. And a nice house in the suburbs. Somehow, I don't think that's your vision of the future, Dorian." Her eyes met his, fierce and clear. "We're different people. I have finally come to realise that we're like two puzzle pieces from different boxes. We'll never fit."
With that, she slid her hands away completely and walked out, leaving him sitting in the kitchen, her words like a rock crushing his chest.
Chapter twenty-four
Chapter 24
Her Nana had come back from town with an enormous carrot cake dripping with cream cheese icing and dotted with walnuts. She set it down on the counter with a flourish, chattering about neighbours and who'd been caught out in the rain without a coat, who'd bought a new tractor, who was surely wasting their money.
Rune perched at the table, obediently accepting a large slice cut onto her plate. The warmth of the kitchen, the steady drone of Nana's voice, and the sweetness of the cake made her sink deeper into her chair, oblivious to everything else for once. The sound of footsteps in the doorway drew both their gazes. Dorian stood there, framed by the archway. He was so tall his head nearly brushed the lintel, his presence filling the room without a word.
Nana's shrewd eyes flicked from him to Rune, who was doing her best to pretend she saw nothing but the cake in front of her. Rune could almost feel the fraying control slipping away from her grandmother, a force of will that rarely remained quiet. But clearly Gramps had had a word, because she pressed her lips together for a moment, then sighed. She cut another generous wedge and thunked it onto a plate.
"Sit. Eat," she grumbled at Dorian. "Hope you're not one of those gluten-free, sugar-free, dairy-free vegan nuts. Don't think we've got much food of that type here."
Dorian inclined his head. "I'm not."
"Good," Nana said, inclining her chin towards the living room. "Your driver dropped off a bag."
He nodded once more and moved to the table, sliding into a chair. Rune could feel his gaze on her, almost like a hand moving over her face and neck, while she kept her eyes stubbornly on her fork. Nana studied him a long moment, then harrumphed. "Such a handsome face... so few brain cells," she muttered. She turned to Rune. "I've got the green room upstairs ready. Get him some bedding, alright? And don't be sneaking off into his room, not under my roof."
Rune nearly choked on her cake. Dorian's expression didn't flicker, though his fingers tightened around the fork. Nana sighed, slicing another piece for herself. "Well, at least you're already pregnant."
The silence that followed was thick enough to chew on, broken only by the crackle of the wood stove and Rune's mortified cough as she reached for her glass of water. Rune managed to avoid him for the rest of the day.
The farmhouse was sprawling enough that she could slip from room to room, out to the paddock, back into the barns, without ever crossing his path. But she knew he was there. She could feel him following her around, always at a respectful distance, his eyes, his presence, the way he seemed to stalk her without meaning to.
By late afternoon, she was in the stables with Barry, the farmhand she'd grown up alongside. Barry was broad-shouldered, his hair peppered with early grey, and he hummed as he cleared the muck with easy rhythm. Rune worked alongside him, as she brushed down the great black stallion in its stall .
They slipped naturally into Welsh. They had done all their schooling in Welsh. Rune's voice lifted with laughter at something he said, and the sound seemed to belong here in a way that cut Dorian to the quick. He stood just outside the doorway, half-hidden, listening. The rolling cadence of the language washed over him withoutmeaning, the rise and fall of familiar intimacy. The ease of it made the green demon do a ditty in his chest.
Rune's smile was unguarded, her body relaxed, her words tumbling in a flow that made her sound younger... freer. With every exchange she had with Barry, every glance, every shared joke, Dorian felt her edging further and further from him.
