Page 90 of Lord Hartwell’s Refuge

Oh. Her eyebrows rose.

A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “But I find I do not mind.”

A soft laugh escaped her as her shoulders relaxed. “That is fortunate.”

Roman moved several papers from the chair on the nearer side of his desk. “Come, sit.”

Tamsin did, and for a moment simply looked over the collection spread on its surface: the petition, or at least one version of it; lists of names in several different hands; a copy of the York Herald folded near Roman’s elbow.

“What are you working on at present?” The answer would be the barbican, the bar, the gate. It always did.

Roman sighed. “An attempt to satisfy six reasonable men who all agree upon the substance of an argument and none of whom will agree upon how it ought to be expressed.”

Oh dear. “That sounds tedious.”

“It is excruciating.”

“It sounds rather like when I tried to appease my stepmother and all my sisters at once, when deciding upon dress patterns.” Tamsin smiled up at him, allowing the warmth in her heart to seep through into her expression.

“Would that I could fix this with the right sort of lace.” Roman reached for one of the papers, then paused when he noticed her still looking at the others. “Did you need something?”

There it was again—the same question he had asked that morning, only dressed in different clothes. Tamsin might have told him about Anne. She might have asked whether he intended to be at home the following afternoon, or mentioned some household matter that could reasonably require his opinion.

“No,” she said, with complete honesty.

Roman waited, to his credit, and did not appear the least put out, which gave her some confidence in telling the whole truth.

She swallowed. “I wanted to see you.”

His expression changed—only slightly, but she saw it. “Oh.”

Tamsin immediately wished she had found a more elegant way to say it. She folded her hands tightly in her lap. “You have been gone a great deal.”

“I know.” Roman’s brow furrowed. “I am sorry for it.”

“It was not a complaint.” She shifted in the chair, looking down at her lap a moment.

“It sounded rather like one.”

Bother. “Then I expressed myself poorly.”

Roman’s mouth twitched. “You? I was not aware you suffered from such things.”

That made Tamsin smile, despite herself. “Do not become accustomed to hearing me admit it.”

“Ah, then I shall treasure the moment as a rarity.”

Her gaze dropped to the map. “Why are you so worried about Micklegate?”

Roman leaned back. “What makes you think I’m worried?”

Tamsin shrugged. “You have spent the better part of a month thinking about it, even when you are supposedly thinking about other things.”

He grimaced.

“You also lost your coffee this morning while your hand was resting six inches from it.”

The grimace softened. “That proves nothing.”