“I’m very fortunate,” she said, simply stating a fact that she’d only recently realized.
Andrew raised one eyebrow, as if in suspicion. He crossed one leg over the other, resting his left ankle over his right knee. He rearranged his jacket. It drew her attention to his hands, and she looked away so sharply her neck creaked.
“You consider yourself fortunate, then? Living here?” His tone had smoothed some. Before today, if she’d closed her eyes and tried to imagine what his voice might sound like, it would have been this. Gentle. Slow. That feeling of safety washed over her again, and some part of her wanted to rebel against it.
He was a man she was alone with in her private chambers. She was not supposed to feel safe right now.
“I do,” Della said. She stood up, taking slow, deliberate steps in an effort to regain control of her aching limbs. “I have many wonderful people here with me, and I am content. I have far more than many others, especially those in my condition without any support.”
Della couldn’t see his face from this angle, still walking slowly on her path to nowhere. He was silent again for long moments, and as she ran a hand over her still aching hip, she wondered if they’d truly lost the ability to talk to each other. Maybe she’d write him a letter and hand it to him instead of sending it through the post. That seemed easier.
There was a knock on the door. She was close enough to open it herself, so she did.
“Time for dinner,” Clara said, her fist still raised to the now-open door. Her smile was that of an excited child. Della half thought Clara was more thrilled about Andrew’s visit than she was herself. “Mrs.Goldsmith sent me to see about you and Mr. Lockhart. Will you want a tray in your room, or will you be joining us in the dining room?”
Della turned around to ask the same question of Andrew, but he was suddenly much closer than he’d been before. He stepped up right next to her, in fact. Their bodies took up the entirety of the doorway. She looked up at him. He looked down at her. They were stuck in silence again, but this quiet wasn’t heavy with awkwardness. This was alight with possibility.
“I should like to go to dinner, but I might require some assistance,” Della told Clara. Her pain today was becoming such that movement hurt less than stillness, but the staircase was an entirely different beast. She’d never make it down and back up without help.
“Please,” Andrew said, extending his arm in her direction. “Allow me.”
Della froze. Clara let out a pleased little giggle that made her seem girlish.
“I’ll tell Mrs. Goldsmith to prepare for two more,” Clara said, promptly leaving them alone once again.
Della tried to communicate by blinking again. Once, twice, three times. His eyes weren’t responding to hers. They were such deep pools of amber. She forgot what she was trying to say in the first place.
Slowly, so slowly, Della wrapped her fevered fingers around Andrew’s elbow. At the first touch of her ungloved hand against his greatcoat, she sucked in a heaving breath. Or maybe that was him. Perhaps it was them both. She dared to squeeze his arm, even though the action made her knuckles twinge.
“Shall we go?” he asked in that same quiet voice she’d already become so fond of. She nodded and grabbed her trusty walking stick from its ever-present place by the door.
They took tentative steps toward the grand staircase, lost again in an absence of conversation that was starting to feel comfortable. Della could smell him, musk and leather and rain. She could feel the fabric ofhis coat against her fingers, the warmth of his skin beneath. Della realized she’d never been on a man’s arm before. She wondered if what she enjoyed so much was being on someone’s arm or being on Andrew’s.
They took the first step gently, but even so, a low hiss slipped out from between Della’s teeth. Andrew did not respond. Not verbally, anyway. Instead, he shifted their stances until her nagging hip was resting against his. They took the next step in tandem, him bearing some of her weight.
“Is that better?” he asked, that low voice becoming a near whisper.
“Yes,” she told him honestly. Even if he hadn’t helped her pain, she would always assume things were automatically better being this close to him.
The remainder of the stairs were easier, but they took them at a snail’s pace. She wasn’t in any rush to be parted from him, and he didn’t seem to be in a hurry, either. They made it to the ground floor, and the grand hall was suspiciously empty, but Della could hear that the revelry had already begun in the dining room.
“Thank you,” she whispered, squeezing Andrew’s arm once more for good measure, and just because she felt as if she could.
She’d been trained in the art of the marriage mart. Had dances with all manner of tutors. She’d worn gowns straight from the best designers in Paris. Despite all that, Della couldn’t recall experiencing anything as lovely as this simple trip down the stairs.
“My pleasure,” Andrew said.
He smiled, a genuine, charming grin wide enough to make those fathomless eyes crinkle and both of his dimples appear.
It was almost boyish, and in it, Della saw the only man she’d ever loved.
Chapter Nine
Andrew thought hemight’ve stepped into another world. A beautiful realm in which he had the privilege of walking about with Della on his arm. Where he couldn’t so much as breathe without the hair around her shoulders ruffling in waves. Where they stepped into a room and everyone smiled.
If he’d left his home and everything he knew for this unknown place, he just might be grateful.
He hadn’t expected so many people, though. Not at the dinner table. He’d never been permitted to join them in the dining room at the Harrises’ London townhouse. At first, he was too young, as they all were. He and Della and David. Then it was a matter of their noble birth and his working-class upbringing. When he’d so abruptly decided to come to Westfield Manor, he hadn’t thought about this bit. The little things. This small raucous crowd that greeted them—greeted her—was appropriate, though. This was the kind of joy he wanted for her, and the kind of joy he ached to be a part of.
