Page 109

It was not the warmth of the fire, though its embers still glowed softly within the grate.

She woke to Arthur's chest beneath her. His arm remained securely around her waist, exactly where it had rested when sleep had finally claimed her the previous evening, but now his broad chest was rising and falling in the slow, steady rhythm of deep sleep.

She tried to remain perfectly still as she studied the man before her. His lips were parted ever so slightly, his brow at last free from the perpetual crease that so often accompanied him, and although the morning light softened the sharp angles of his face, it could not conceal the shadows beneath his eyes nor the unmistakable exhaustion etched into his features. He could not have been asleep for long.

The events of yesterday came flooding back, bringing with them a dull ache that settled somewhere deep within her chest. Her husband had held her throughout the night without once asking anything of her, without once allowing his own comfort to outweigh hers. Cecily's letters had told her plenty about what it was to lie with a man, but nothing she had ever read had prepared her for the quiet tenderness of being held by one who asked for nothing in return.

She smiled faintly to herself. Arthur cared for her. She had known it before even though he denied it. He had never spoken the words, but the flowers that appeared in recent weeks without fail. The questions he asked her each evening—the bedtime routine they established. Arthur remained stubbornly convinced he was incapable of love, but his actions betrayed him at every opportunity. And last night, he had come closer to admitting he cared than either of them had ever dared to acknowledge before. The thought made her throat feel unusually dry. Almost absent-mindedly, she lifted her hand to the familiar chain resting about her neck, but her fingertips met bare skin.

She frowned.

Again her fingers searched.

Nothing.

Her eyes widened at the absence of her locket, and she sat upright so suddenly that the mattress shifted beneath them. Arthur stirred immediately. One moment he had been asleep; the next he was sitting upright beside her, every trace of weariness replaced by alertness.

"Is all well?" His voice was rough with sleep.

She looked towards him apologetically.

"I did not mean to wake you, Husband."

Over the past weeks she had begun to notice a curious habit between them, one neither of them had ever acknowledged aloud. Whenever Arthur's guard slipped, in those rare moments when sincerity overtook duty, she ceased to be simply the Duchess. Instead, she became my wife or my Duchess.

Never before others.

Only when he forgot himself.

Without ever deciding to do so, she had begun answering in kind. Husband.

It had become their own quiet language. Though he had still yet to use her Christian name.

"I..." She swallowed. "My locket, it's gone."

Her fingers rested helplessly against her collarbone. For a fraction of a second Arthur did not move.

His eyes dropped immediately to the bare skin of her neck. Then something changed in his expression, a shadow passing across his eyes as the events of yesterday seemed to replay behind them. Eliza knew, without Arthur saying a word, that he understood what had transpired. The locket had not simply been misplaced; it had been torn away in the struggle. Without uttering a word, Arthur swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood, running a hand through his already untidy hair before disappearing behind the privacy screen to change his linen shirt.

"You are not to worry yourself." His voice was deceptively calm from behind the screen.

He turned back towards her, his expression softening the instant his eyes met hers again.

"I shall have every room in Winworth searched, and the gardens too; if your locket remains anywhere upon this estate, then we shall have it back before the day is out."

Once dressed, he crossed back towards the bed and crouched before her so that they were once again at eye level. His gaze searched hers carefully.

"You have lost enough for one evening."

His hand hovered for only the briefest moment before gently enclosing hers.

"You shall not lose this as well."

He offered the smallest smile.

"But first, I think my Duchess ought to have some breakfast."

He looked at her with such extraordinary care that she found herself wondering, not for the first time, how a man could look at another person as though they were something infinitely precious, and yet remain so entirely convinced he knew nothing at all about love.