His chest tightened.Hard.“And I,” he whispered, “am absolutely ruined for anyone else.”
She gave him a tender smile.“I feel exactly the same.”
The mayhem continued.The chancellor bellowed.Winston sputtered.Hargrave looked ready to faint.Sir Edmund looked as if he’d swallowed a bee, while Lord Hillary looked as if he could barely contain his pleasure.
But Nicholas?—
Nicholas had never felt so steady in his life.
He wrapped his fingers around Bea’s and said, loud enough for the entire chamber to hear, “If she stands accused, then so do I.”
Gasps rippled through the air.
Bea looked up at him, tears shining in her eyes.
“Nicholas…”
He turned to the room.“I am culpable.I am complicit.Because I let ambiguity serve me when conviction was required.The caricatures she drew of me were not entirely wrong.”
Shouts, outrage, and calls to order echoed across the chamber.
Nicholas ignored them all.He lowered his forehead to hers.“They cannot arrest you simply for drawing things they dislike.Hell.Half the country’s artists would be in gaol.But let them rage.You’re not alone,” he whispered.“And you never will be again.”
