Chapter Thirty-Seven
London had never been so loud.Nicholas could still hear the echoing pandemonium of Parliament behind him, voices shouting, the chancellor pounding his gavel, half the chamber in hysterics and the other half in scandalized outrage.He had barely managed to get Bea out before Winston or Hargrave could drag her into some back room for questioning or threats.
The corridor outside the chamber had been blessedly empty.Nicholas had wrapped her cloak around her trembling shoulders, taken her hand, and ushered her through a side exit where his coach waited.
The chancellor had declared the state of affairs within the chambers far too turbulent to conduct the vote today.They would all have to return in the morning.
Now Nicholas and Bea rode in his carriage, just the two of them, sunlight slipping through the curtains in bright, fluttering ribbons.
Bea was still flushed—cheeks pink, eyes bright.She sat angled toward him, cloak loosened, one glove half-off as if she’d forgotten she was wearing it.Nicholas watched her mouth as her smile faded.
She stared down at her hands.“I didn’t plan it.I didn’t go there intending to…to make a spectacle of myself.I just wanted to watch the vote.But when I saw you standing there—alone, defending your conscience—after I’d spent so long mocking you and misjudging you and hurting you… I couldn’t hide anymore.”Her voice trembled.
Nicholas went still.He moved to sit next to her.His hand stayed at her waist—not possessive, but grounding—his thumb brushing once, a silentI’m here.
“Bea,” he said quietly.
She drew a shaky breath, still looking at her hands as if they were safer than his eyes.
“Nicholas, when you spoke this morning, when you didn’t flinch… I knew I couldn’t be a coward for one more minute.Even if I made a spectacle of myself.”
Nicholas’s throat tightened.He lifted his free hand and, with careful tenderness, turned her chin toward him.“You’ve never been a coward, Bea.You taught me to be brave.”
She shook her head, tears filling her eyes.
“Look at me,” he murmured, tipping her chin with his thumb.
Bea did—reluctant at first, then fully, as if she’d decided she would not half-step into courage anymore.
Nicholas held her gaze, expression open, voice low.“You weren’t a spectacle,” he said.“You were…you.”A pause.“And I have never—” He stopped, the words catching, then tried again with quieter certainty.“I have never been prouder to stand beside anyone.”
Bea’s eyes shone again, but this time she didn’t look as though she might shatter.She looked as though she might finally stop running.
She clung to him with a desperate little breath.“I had to tell them,” she whispered.“All of them.I had to tellyou.”
“You did.”His throat tightened painfully.“With this…” He gestured to the paper that laid on the seat next to them.
“Do you like it?”she asked tentatively, biting her lip.
He allowed the hint of a smile to touch his lips.“It’s extraordinary.”
She glanced down at the drawing.
The caricature was unmistakable…bold lines, fierce motion.A phoenix burst upward from a scatter of inked ashes, wings flared wide, each feather edged with purpose rather than ornament.The fire that surrounded it was not destructive but cleansing, the kind that burned away rot and left something stronger behind.
And there, at the heart of it, was Nicholas.
Not softened.Not idealized.His profile was sharp, intent, eyes fixed forward as though he were already in motion, already answering some call only he could hear.The phoenix wore his face without disguise, without apology, powerful, swift, and unyielding.
Below him, the ashes resolved into figures: bent backs straightening, empty hands lifting, shadows retreating.Coins fell not into the pockets of the powerful, but into the open palms of the poor.Scales tipped.Chains snapped.Justice—clear-eyed and unsentimental—was delivered not with cruelty, but with resolve.
She had drawn him not as a hero crowned by praise, but as a man remade by fire.A man who chose the harder path and rose because of it.
Nicholas stared at the page for a long moment, utterly still.
“This is how you see me,” he said quietly.It was not a question.
“This is who you are,” Bea replied, her voice trembling.
