He absentmindedly wondered if he should build one on his own estate, envisioning afternoons he could spend with his sisters and their families. For some reason, when he tried to envision the face of his own spouse, his mind went blank, refusing to even allow him to imagine the face of a woman who would be his duchess.
There was a face that came to mind, but he shook it out of his head before it could fully materialize in place.
He had spent valuable minutes convincing his sister that there was nothing between him and Penelope. And he had not lied about that.
So, he refocused his attention on his book, hoping that he would be able to make some decent progress this time around.
Cecil had barely gotten through half a page when he saw them below.
Penelope and Matthias Hawthorne strolling over the lawn. She had her hand lightly on his arm in a way that obeyed the rules of social etiquette, and she was turned toward him, saying something. Viscount Lockwood seemed to be listening with his whole body, his whole being hanging off her every word.
Cecil looked down at his book, forcing himself to focus on what was important to him in that moment. After a few seconds, he turned a page. Moments later, he looked down at the lawn.
She was laughing at something; her voice being carried by the air in earnest. Lockwood looked pleased – as though being able to make her laugh was the greatest feat he could accomplish. His hand moved, briefly, to cover hers where it rested on his arm, before returning to his side, a simple pat, the swift, small gesture, neatly accomplished.
Cecil's jaw tightened for a moment as irritation and anger flashed through him.
Against his wishes, he was forced to acknowledge that Matthias Hawthorne was on all accounts a good man. He relaxed it, deliberately, and found that it had tightened again almost immediately.
Holt was, he acknowledged without pleasure, a perfectly agreeable specimen. Reasonable height. He had the looks and the confidence of a man who was easily accepted by his peers and onlookers. He was, by all external evidence, exactly the sort of man that a woman of Penelope's intelligence and character ought to find appealing.
Cecil hated that he had been able to arrive at this conclusion; even more so, he despised the way it made him feel.
Suddenly, Penelope went still, and then she looked up. He did not flinch when her gaze found him simply stared back at her intently. They looked at each other for one brief, unguarded moment, across the distance of grass and rose beds and the crisp late morning air.
Then she looked away.
He watched her turn back to Lockwood, then she said something to him, and received a warm smile in return.
Cecil rose to his feet, tucked his book under his arm, and went inside the house.
Penelope found a note waiting for her when she returned to her room before brunch.
It was placed on the writing table, folded with his particular neat precision, nearly out of place on her messy tabletop.
She stood in the middle of the room for a moment and looked at it from a safe distance, as though she were assessing the temperament of an animal.
Then slowly, she crossed the room, picked it up, and opened it.
Midnight. Come to my room.
Penelope stared at the last four words for a long time.
His room. Not the garden – which she had believed bore the greatest risk – not a sun room with a convenient settee, but his room. His actual private chambers, in a house full of peoplewho would be asleep and dreaming at midnight, and if she were caught in that corridor–
She put the note down and walked across to the other side of her room, frustration welling up within her. Moments later, she returned to the desk and picked up the note once more.
“He cannot be serious,” she mumbled aloud, to her empty room.
The room offered no counterargument, much to her chagrin, and she groaned.
She sat on the edge of her bed and pressed the note flat against her knee, smoothing it out unnecessarily. She stared off at a wall as she tried very hard to think about something other than the way he had looked at her from the terrace earlier. There had been a single unguarded moment before she had turned away, in which she had seen something in his expression that she was not prepared to name, because naming it would require her to decide what to do about it.
And she did not know if she could make such a decision.
Penelope had known, coming into this, that it was dangerous. She had calculated the risks and decided she could manage it. Clearly, she was wrong because she had only accounted for the obvious dangers, which could be managed with discretion, rules, and common sense. The other kind was considerably harder to manage.
The kind that crept in through his warm touch, whispered encouragement, and a secret that had taken her nearly ten years to share with anyone.
