This wasn’t easy to hear.
“And, son, that was where I failed you a second time.”
Rhys had difficulty drawing breath.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Aye.”
“Now that you’ve recovered this”—Papa held up his hand, the emerald glowing with flickering firelight—“are you returning to your old ways?”
“Never,” Rhys nearly growled. He might’ve been wretched and bereft, but he wouldn’t return to the life of wastrel lord and rake.
Papa considered him for another long moment. “I see a change in you, son.”
Son.
Lingering unworthiness crept through Rhys.
“Any change in me,” he said, “is down to Tilly.”
“Then why do you sound like that?”
“Like what?”
“Abject.”
“My acquaintance with Tilly is at an end.” Each word followed the one preceding it mechanically, as one spoke when delivering hard facts.
“Because you earned the ring back?”
Rhys nodded.
“You’re in love with her, aren’t you?”
“I…”
Rhys blinked.
This feeling of wretchedness…of abjectness…of pure, utter desolation… It had a source, didn’t it?
And wasn’t that source obvious?
Love.
Love for Tilly.
He was wretchedly, hopelessly in love with Tilly.
“Aye,” he said, “I love her.”
“And she inspired you to be a good person?”
“She did. She does.”
That inspiration wasn’t in the past.
It sparked through him in this very moment—and every moment he drew in a breath and exhaled.
