He barked out an unwilling laugh at that. “A glowing compliment, Duchess.”
“You are welcome, Your Grace.”
The carriage jolted again, and Victor’s smile faded briefly as tension crawled up his spine once more. Charlotte noticed immediately and gently redirected the conversation yet again.
“I believe Lady Elizabeth has more sense than all of us combined,” she declared.
Victor arched a brow. “That is a bold statement.”
Charlotte grinned faintly. “She met me once and instantly declared I was your fiancée.”
“Yes, and that caused absolute chaos.”
“Yet she was correct in the end.” Charlotte looked entirely too smug about this observation. “Perhaps she is secretly a genius.”
Victor shook his head slowly. “Or perhaps we are both fools.”
Charlotte’s cheeks pinkened slightly at that, and Victor realized with sudden clarity that he enjoyed flustering his wife almost as much as he enjoyed kissing her. Dangerous knowledge indeed.
“Do you regret it?” she asked softly after a moment.
Victor looked toward her properly then.
The question was quiet, almost hesitant, yet there was vulnerability beneath it that struck him unexpectedly hard. For a brief second, he saw not the composed Duchess of Mulford but the woman who had spent years sacrificing herself for everyone else. The woman who still seemed astonished that anyone might choose her willingly.
“No,” he answered honestly.
Charlotte blinked softly, clearly surprised by the immediacy of his answer. Victor reached over before fully thinking and brushed his thumb across her gloved knuckles.
“Do you?” he asked quietly.
Charlotte held his gaze for a long moment before shaking her head. “No,” she admitted.
Something warm settled low in his chest at her answer.
He hated that she looked sad for him. Worse, he hated how much he appreciated it.
“You are retreating into your thoughts again,” Charlotte said softly.
Victor loosened his jaw with effort and exhaled slowly. “You notice too much.”
“Someone must,” she replied gently. “Otherwise you shall simply sit there suffering in silence while pretending everything is perfectly fine.”
A faint smirk tugged at his mouth despite himself. “You make me sound dramatic.”
Charlotte folded her hands in her lap primly. “You are dramatic.”
Victor barked out a quiet laugh at that. “Careful, Duchess.”
“Or what?” she teased lightly. “You shall glare at me more intensely?”
He leaned back against the squabs and studied her thoughtfully for a moment.
“If you truly wish to distract me,” he drawled slowly, “you should give me something better to look at.”
Charlotte blinked once. “What precisely does that mean?”
Victor’s gaze lowered deliberately toward her legs beneath the folds of her gown before returning to her face again.
