The shadow lifted. She nodded, her fingers tightening around his.
“Yes.” She rose on her toes and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “I rather think it is.”
They walked down to breakfast together, her hand tucked in the crook of his arm.
And for the first time since he could remember, Edward felt like he was exactly where he was meant to be.
CHAPTER 33
“You are glowing.” Alice settled onto the settee beside Sophia, her eyes bright with curiosity.
The drawing room at Heatherwell House bustled with afternoon callers, ladies who came to pay their respects to the new duchess, but Alice had claimed the seat closest to Sophia with the determination of a woman on a mission.
“I am not glowing.” Sophia smoothed her skirts. “I am simply well rested.”
“Well rested.” Alice’s lips twitched. “Is that what we are calling it now?”
Heat crept up Sophia’s neck. She busied herself with her tea, avoiding her friend’s knowing gaze.
“The visit to your father’s house seems to have done wonders.” Alice sipped her own tea with exaggerated innocence. “Thomasmentioned the duke has been in remarkably good spirits since your return. Smiling, even. Thomas nearly fell out of his chair.”
“Edward smiles.”
“Edward.” Alice’s eyebrows rose. “Not ‘His Grace’ or ‘the duke.’ Edward.” She set down her cup. “Something has definitely changed.”
Sophia could not deny it. Something had changed. Everything had changed. The man who had once seemed so distant, so cold, so determined to keep her at arm’s length, now reached for her hand across the breakfast table. Now appeared in her sitting room in the afternoons simply to see how her day was progressing. Now looked at her as though she were the answer to a question he had spent his entire life asking.
“We are finding our footing.” Sophia chose her words with care. “Learning to be married.”
“Learning to be married,” Alice repeated the phrase with a smile. “I am happy for you, Sophia. Truly. You deserve this.”
Before Sophia could respond, the door opened, and Edward appeared. He crossed the room, nodding politely to the assembled ladies, and stopped beside Sophia’s chair.
“Forgive the interruption.” His eyes found hers. “I wondered if you might spare a moment. There is something I wish to show you.”
The request was perfectly innocent. His tone was perfectly proper. But something in his gaze made Sophia’s pulse quicken.
“Of course.” She rose, setting aside her tea. “If you will excuse me, ladies.”
She caught Alice’s grin as she followed Edward from the room. Her friend would have questions later. Many questions.
Sophia found she did not mind.
The days that followed blurred together in a haze of discovery.
They took breakfast together each morning, lingering over coffee and toast while Oliver regaled them with his dreams from the night before. They walked in the garden when the weather permitted, Edward’s hand warm at the small of her back. They dined together each evening, and their conversation flowed more easily now, and their laughter came more freely.
And at night, in the privacy of their chambers, they learned each other in different ways.
Sophia discovered Edward was ticklish along his ribs, a fact he vehemently denied. She learned he preferred to sleep on his left side, his arm draped across her waist. She found out that he read poetry when he could not sleep, dog-eared volumes hidden in his bedside table.
He discovered her in turn. That she hummed while brushing her hair. That she could not resist a freshly baked scone. That she talked in her sleep, fragments of conversations and half-formed thoughts that made him smile in the darkness.
They were building something. Brick by brick, moment by moment. Something that felt dangerously like a life.
The Ashworth ball was the first event they attended as a properly united couple.
Sophia descended the staircase in a gown of midnight blue, Edward waiting at the bottom in evening dress. His eyes swept over her, and heat flickered in their depths.
