He stopped her, “Overly plump?You?”
“Who else?” She responded while angling her head. “When I debuted in my season, I overheard a lord say these words,adverbatim,‘she is pretty enough, but her rolls are not the ones I desire.”
Cedric stared at his wife long enough that she began to frown. “Is there—is there something in my teeth?”
“Those men are not men, they were boys. I have never heard such insanity in my life,” he said.
Her cheeks pinked, and her lips parted once, then closed only to open and close once more. Tenderness flooded his chest at how flustered she looked.
“You’re perfect exactly as you are,” he said.
She finished her food, “Thank you. That’s very kind of you.”
He got the impression that she did not get many compliments. Maybe he should start to correct that.
“Did you have any suitors?” He asked.
“No,” she said quietly. “Not one in three years. The lords would look right past me. Sometimes, it feels that they were looking right through me.”
As Cedric listened to his wife speak, he began to recognize the roots of her quiet demeanor.
It became clear to him that her gentle nature and humorous self-deprecation masked a deep-seated insecurity. This insight stirred something powerful within him— a fierce desire to shield her from the pain she carried and to offer her comfort and reassurance.
Do you really think this person will hurt you?
“Did you enjoy your meal?” she asked. “It looks like you did.”
He looked down at his empty plate. “I did. Did you make this menu or was it Mrs. Tully?”
“I did,” she said. “I remembered a meal my father used to have, and I thought you might enjoy it. I had hoped I’d be able to sway you into changing into a better habit.”
He nodded, “You can create any menu you’d like, but bear in mind that I do not like ham, tongue, mackerel, smelt, plover's, or sweetbreads. Everything else is fine.”
“Noted,” she said. “What do you have to do this morning?”
He sagged into the back of his chair as the long list of letters, Crown mementos, budgets, and petitions from parishioners danced in front of his mind’s eye.
“I have a mountain of work to finish. You should, too, as I assume many ladies have sent out invitations for balls, soirees, luncheons, and whatnot.” He rubbed his cheek and winced at thefeel of the abrasive five o’clock stubble coming through. “I need a shave too.”
“I will leave you to your day,” she said. “And tomorrow, I would like to know about your childhood, too. From the snippets you told me, it didn’t sound like you had an easy one either.”
Cedric laughed dryly. “To say the least.”
Two maids came and cleared the table before Ariadne stood. “May I?—”
He cocked his head. “May you what?”
She leaned in to brush her lips across his cheek, his scarred cheek. It made him jolt. “Have a good day.”
As she left the room, his hand drifted to his cheek, and wonder twisted his chest in knots. She had kissed his ruined flesh, a sight that made women and children flinch. More than that, Ariadne had not looked at him as something to be shied away from. She looked at him as he dreamed of being looked at, as a normal man with a handsome face.
She just said men looked right through her. If anyone knows how that feels, it is her. She would not do that to anyone.
He dropped his hand as Hunt came inside, “Should I remove the table, Your Grace?”
“No,” Cedric replied. “Let it stay. I have a feeling that we’ll be using it more.”
A footman came to the door with a silver tray and a letter in hand. Bowing, he said, “This was received for you, Your Grace.”
