“What? Why not?”
She shrugged. “I like it there. Besides, it’s my dress, I can do with it what I wish.”
“That is not,” Christopher could feel it building inside of him, that nervous tick, that desire to fix that which needed to be fixed. His leg began to tremble, and his hand began to shake. “I can do it for you.”
“I am sure that you can.” She folded her arms and cocked an eyebrow at him. “But I am not going to let you. So, you will have to live with it, I am afraid.”
The side of his lip twitched again. The urge to assert himself, to use anger if needed, rose in his belly. But Christopher neededto be careful, especially where Rose was concerned. Too often of late, he had let his emotions slip around her, and he couldn’t afford for it to become a habit.
Calm and collected. Reasonable and in control. That is what I need to be. That is who I am, as far as she is concerned. Behave yourself, Christopher!
“Fine.” Christopher tore his eyes from the loose thread and bent his head to look back at his work. “If that is how you wish to be.”
He could feel her eyes on the top of his head. Just as he could sense the amusement. “That’s it then? You’re not going to…”
“To what?” he said sharply.
“Nothing…” She laughed softly, shook her head, and bent herself over the desk; back to work. “Just curious, is all.”
Christopher clenched his jaw and breathed deeply, his attention saved fully for what was in front of him. This was where he felt most comfortable, this was how he had built his reputation, and it was time he proved why. The Duke of Thornwall, composed, astute, the type who would walk over his own parents if he thought there was money to be made.
That’s who he was, and any emotions he felt or wanted to show— it really was as simple as saying that he couldn’t afford such things. For his own safety, as much as anything.
In hindsight, maybe this wasn’t the best of ideas.
Christopher and Rose were locked away in his office, a mode of operation that had been Christopher’s suggestion because, as he had told her, he wanted to keep his eye on her.
“That is an odd thing to say,” Rose had said when Christopher raised the topic.
“My meaning is,” He exhaled sharply out of his nose. “It will be easier this way. You won’t have to find me to ask permission to make any changes to my work. And knowing you, were I not immediately available, you would do so without asking.”
To that, she had laughed. “Am I so predictable?”
Christopher was not so stubborn that he couldn’t admit that Rose had saved him when she’d looked at the taxation policy he was working on, fixing a few small errors that were likely to save him a small fortune. Nor was he so arrogant that he wasn’t about to ask for her help again.
Therefore, he approached her the day after the Ball and suggested that she might help him if she was willing.
There was a part of Christopher that knew this was going to be a bad idea. But there was a greater part that tried to justify the logic. He struggled to maintain composure around his wife, and he feared that if he did not learn how to, then a time might comewhen he would lose it completely. Worse, it might happen in public.
This way, he could train himself to keep his cool and not let his emotions get the better of him. It was an idea that sounded good at the time.
But now that they were alone, the door closed, sitting just across the desk from each other…I wonder if my reasoning wasn’t nearly as clever as I like to imagine it.
“May I ask you something?” Rose said suddenly.
Christopher grimaced but did not look up. He pretended to scratch something out on the parchment in front of him, determined to stay cool. “That’s why you are here.”
“No, not about this,” she said. “I wanted to ask…” He wasn’t looking at her, but he could sense her reservations. “About the Ball last night.”
“What about it?”
“You looked like you were enjoying yourself,” she started carefully. “Just as it looked like everyone else was enjoying your presence there.”
“Your point?”
“Why do you act that way?” she said.
Christopher paused. He balked. He felt her looking at him, just as he understood thetruemeaning of her question. “Act what way?”
