Waited.
Forme.
When my gaze hit his once more, it was almost like I couldfeelhim loaning me some of his calm. I inhaled a deep breath, only just managing to find my center. Then I managed to convince my feet to move.
Neither of us said anything, just exchanging tight but not unfriendly smiles as I passed him. He let me walk half a step ahead, but his silent companionship down the hall was strangely grounding all the same.
When we walked into the formal dining room though, my eyebrows twitched and my focus stopped being entirely aimed at the meeting ahead. The room had been prepared as if we were hosting visiting royalty, a veritable feast laid out in Jesse’s honor. There were silver platters, polished glassware, and candles flickering along the length of the enormous table.
Everything was traditional, from the arrangement of the place settings to the precise placement of the wine glasses. I’d grown up with dinners like this, but we could hardly ever afford them anymore.
It felt oddly theatrical to be sitting down to one tonight, knowing Dad had splurged because of a Westwood and what they would mean for our family. It really drove home the weight that was resting on my shoulders right now.
Dad and the lawyer were waiting for us behind their seats, both only resuming motion once we were in the room.
“Eliza,” Dad said, waving me into the chair on his left while Jesse was gestured to the one on the right.
As such, we ended up across from each other, the long stretch of table between us filled with dishes I barely registered.Servants moved quietly in and out of the room, pouring wine and setting down courses with practiced precision.
For a while, the conversation flowed seamlessly around me. Jesse’s lawyer launched into the nitty-gritty details of the contract and my father interrupted only when he had a very serious question. At least, I thought it was serious, but honestly, my ears were ringing a bit now that I was trying to process that all this was real and I was having trouble following the conversation.
All these supremely important things that apparently needed to be discussed before two people could even think about getting married, yet Jesse and I seemed entirely unnecessary to this discussion. Like mere witnesses instead of the two people who would be entering into said nuptials.
Across the table, Jesse was as quiet as I was, but every now and then, our eyes met, and every single time it happened, that strange nervous energy twisted through my chest all over again. I had just convinced myself I could survive the rest of the dinner in polite silence when his foot suddenly slid against mine under the table.
The contact shocked me so completely that my muscles froze with my fork halfway to my mouth. For a moment, I even forgot how to complete the movement of bringing food to my mouth. How to move at all, really.
My first thought was that it had to have been an accident, but the pressure lingered just enough that my heart jumped. I slowly managed to lift my eyes from my plate, finding him already looking at me. His expression didn’t change much, but he tilted his head slightly toward the lawyer, who was still deep in conversation with my father about timelines, clauses, and various other things that sounded far too official for my liking.
The small gesture felt deliberate. Like encouragement, perhaps. Possibly even encouragement to speak up about why Ihad made Jesse fly all this way. My throat suddenly felt so dry that I cleared it on instinct, but that brief moment of connection had snapped me out of my shocked trance.
“Excuse me,” I said, quietly interrupting them.
Three sets of eyes immediately turned toward me, my father’s eyebrows lifting slightly in surprise. Jesse, however, leaned back in his chair with a slight hint of a smile on the corners of his lips.
“I’m listening,” he said, entirely calm.
I folded my hands in my lap so no one would notice that they’d started trembling. “I wonder if I might clarify a few things I’ve been uncertain about.”
The lawyer nodded politely, obviously ready to take mental notes, but I did my best to ignore him. I didn’t mean to cause trouble or be difficult. The man could relax. Seeing as my father was the Earl, the practical side of this arrangement had simply been weighing on my mind since the moment the contract had been mentioned, and before I signed anything, there were certain stipulations I wanted to make.
“If this goes forward, I would have to relocate to Chicago,” I started slowly, speaking mostly to Jesse now.
He gave me a small nod, still calm and with that hint of a smile on his lips. Some of my nerves eased at the open expression on his handsome features. Clearly, unlike his lawyer, he wasn’t bracing for a fight to the death over unexpected, possibly unreasonable demands, so I kept my focus on him.
“I’m willing to agree to that, but I would like permission to return to the castle every summer,” I said. “I would also want to bring whatever children we may have in the future with me when I do visit.”
The moment the sentence had left my mouth, my father cut in. “Of course, the children would need to spend time here.”
He leaned forward, launching into explanation mode.Man-splaining, Winnie called it when he got all animated like this over things we already knew.
“My heir would need to be here quite often. It’s important he understands the family history, the traditions, and the responsibilities that come with the title. This estate has existed for centuries. It’s not something one simply learns from a book?—”
Jesse’s foot tapped against mine. When I looked up, I found him once again already looking at me. He cocked his head, inclining it slightly toward my father like this was meant to be a quiet reminder.
Although I didn’t know him very well, it was almost like I could hear his voice in my head.This is your show.Run it.
I straightened slightly in my chair. “My reasoning goes beyond ensuring that my future, theoretical son is a well-trained Earl by the time he’s five.”
