My chest tightens. I know she’s not just talking about the late duke.
‘He wrote to me every week,’she continues.‘Even when we were in the same house. He’d leave letters on my pillow. Little notes in my coat pocket. Once he hid a love letter inside a book he knew I was reading, tucked between the pages so I’d find it at exactly the right moment.’
‘That’s—’I don’t have a sign for what that is. Romantic doesn’t cover it. Neither does sweet. It’s something deeper, something that makes me look at her helplessly, and Lady Hampton simply nods.
Words aren’t needed.
She gets it.
‘And you know what’s even better?’
I shake my head even as I feel a little wary by how her gaze has turned mischievous.
‘The love my husband gave me...is the same the kind of love my son is capable of. Whether he knows it yet or not.’
Before I can respond, before I can even process the weight of what she just said, she’s patting my arm and heading toward the door.
‘I need to check on the arrangements for tonight.’Lady Hampton is clearly in a hurry now, with her hands moving in a speedy blur, and it’s only thanks to the fact that I’ve been signing all my life that I’m able to keep up.‘The gala preparations are behind schedule. You stay. Look at the portraits. Learn the family.’
And then she’s gone, and I’m alone in a room full of dead Hamptons.
This is fine. I’ll just stand here and study the portraits and not think about the fact that Lady Hampton is very clearly, very deliberately matchmaking, and not think about the gala tonight, and definitely not think about the kiss in the library yesterday that I can still feel on my lips if I—
“She left you with the ancestors.”
I spin around.
Veil is leaning in the doorway with his arms crossed, looking like he’s been there long enough to have watched Lady Hampton leave. His hair is slightly damp, like he just showered, and he’s wearing a white shirt with the sleeves rolled to his forearms, and I am going to have to stop cataloguing what he’s wearing every time he enters a room because it’s becoming a problem.
“Your mother was showing me the family history,” I say, keeping my voice carefully neutral. “For the exhibition.”
“Mm.” He pushes off the doorframe and walks into the gallery, and the room feels smaller with him in it. Everything feels smaller with him in it. “Did she tell you about Great-Aunt Millicent?”
“The one who eloped with the stablehand?”
“The very one.” He stops beside me, and we’re both facing his father’s portrait now. Side by side. Close enough that I can feel the warmth of his arm near mine but not quite touching. “She got through Millicent but not my father?”
“She did tell me about your father.”
Veil is quiet for a moment, studying the portrait. “What did she say?”
“That he had beautiful handwriting. That he left letters in her coat pockets. That he hid a love letter inside a book she was reading.”
A sound escapes him. Almost a laugh. Almost something else. “She always tells that story.”
“It’s a good story.”
“It is.” He’s still looking at the portrait, and there’s something in his expression that I haven’t seen before. Not the mask. Not the teasing. Not even the raw intensity from the library. This is quieter. More private. Like he’s forgotten I’m here and is just looking at his father’s face the way you look at someone you miss.
“I write to him,” Veil says. “Every Sunday.”
I know.
Lady Hampton told me. But I don’t say that, because this feels like something he’s choosing to give me, and I don’t want to take that away from him by admitting I already know.
“With his favorite pen,” Veil continues. “A 1920 Montblanc. Safety pen. He carried it everywhere.” He pauses. “I tell him about the estate. The business. Whatever’s happening in the world. Stupid things, mostly. Things he’d have an opinion about.”
“I don’t think that’s stupid at all,” I say quietly.
