“He is good with them,” Sophia said.
“He is.”
“Are you all right?”
Lily wrapped her hands around the teacup. “Of course. Why would I not be?”
“Because you and the Duke have been addressing each other as though you are strangers at a diplomatic function, and two weeks ago you could barely look at each other without the air catching fire.”
“We are being appropriate. He is my fiancé, and we are in the company of family.”
Sophia sat beside her and lowered her voice. “Lily. I am your sister. I know you. You fell in love with Italy and with books and with the idea of a life beyond drawing rooms. I know what you look like when something has shifted inside you, and something has shifted.”
“Nothing has shifted.”
“Everything has shifted. You are holding your teacup so hard your knuckles are white.”
Lily loosened her grip. She stared at the amber surface of the tea and willed her expression into something neutral.
“It is complicated, Sophia.”
“It always is.” Sophia pressed her hand. “You do not have to tell me. But you have to stop pretending that nothing is happening because pretending is hurting you. I can see it.”
Before Lily could respond, Margaret lowered herself into the armchair opposite with the deliberate grace of a woman who had been eavesdropping and saw no reason to pretend otherwise.
“The Duke poured your wine tonight without letting his fingers touch yours,” Margaret said. “That required effort. A man does not avoid contact with a woman unless the contact means something he is trying not to feel.”
“Aunt Margaret.”
“I am stating an observation, not an opinion.” Margaret sipped her wine. “Although my opinion, since you have not asked, is that a man who plays dragons with children and pours wine with trembling restraint is a man who is in considerably deeper than he intended to be.” She paused. “As I suspect, are you.”
Lily set her tea down. She looked across the drawing room to where Hugo was lowering Leo from his shoulders and handing him to Edward, who carried both boys toward the stairs for bedtime.
Hugo straightened and brushed the crumbs from his waistcoat, and for one unguarded moment, his gaze found hers across the room.
What she saw in his eyes was not charm or calculation or the practiced warmth of a man playing a role. It was raw, open, and aching, and it lasted precisely one heartbeat before he looked away and reached for his brandy.
One heartbeat. It was enough.
“Everything is fine,” Lily told her sister and her aunt. “I have everything under control.”
Aunt Margaret and Sophia exchanged a look. Lily could tell that it communicated, with devastating efficiency, that neither of them believed a word of it.
Lily picked up her tea, drank it, and said nothing more, because the truth was lodged in her throat like a stone, and if she opened her mouth, she was not certain which words would come out first: the ones that protected her or the ones that would change everything.
She was not ready for either.
CHAPTER 24
“He all but said it, Hugo.” Lily sat in the chair nearest the fire with her hands folded in her lap and her gaze fixed on a point somewhere between the hearth rug and the future she had been building for weeks.
The drawing room had emptied of children and noise, and the evening had settled into the quiet intimacy of family, brandy, and conversations that mattered.
“He told me he wished he had spoken sooner. Before the engagement.” She lifted her chin. “If I were available again, I believe he would propose.”
Hugo’s fingers curled into his palm. The contraction was brief, a single pulse of tension that he released before anyone could notice. He raised his brandy and took a measured sip.
“Then the arrangement has served its purpose.”
