Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
“Do not be foolish,” Emmeline whispered to herself, though the ache in her chest did not listen.
Rowan’s side of the bed was empty.
She lay still beneath the heavy coverlet as pale morning light slipped through the curtains and touched the rumpled sheets, making last night return in pieces sharp enough to steal her breath. His mouth on her throat. His hands at her waist. The dark weight of his gaze as he had knelt before her.
Her skin warmed at the memory before she could stop it.
Then her gaze returned to the empty space beside her, and the warmth thinned.
Rowan knew how to leave without leaving.
He had made an art of it. Still, after the way he had held her, after the way he had settled beside her, she had permitted herself one foolish hope: that morning might find him there.
That he might wake beside her, look at her without the darkness of a ballroom or the excuse of desire between them, and say something that belonged to daylight.
Instead, there was only the impression of him in the sheets.
Emmeline sat up slowly, gathering the coverlet against her chemise. Her hair had fallen loose over one shoulder, her body still tender in secret places, and it made her feel both cherished and abandoned. She reached for her discarded gown and froze.
A folded note lay upon the bedside table. Her heart gave a small, humiliating leap as she took it quickly, then forced herself to slow before unfolding it.
Emmeline,
Urgent business called me away before you woke. Do not mistake my absence for regret.
I meant what I said last night.
You were beautiful.
-R.
Emmeline read it twice. The disappointment did not vanish entirely, but something softer, warmer, moved through it.
She pressed the note to her lap and looked toward the pale morning window, suppressing a smile.
Margaret arrived later that morning. Emmeline had managed to dress, pin her hair, and arrange her face into something close to composure by the time she knocked.
Margaret took one look at her face and her eyes widened. She understood immediately.
“I knew it,” she said, stopping just inside the drawing room.
Emmeline looked up from the tea tray. “Good morning to you as well.”
“No.” Margaret pointed at her. “Do not good morning me with that face.”
“What face?”
“That one.” Margaret came closer, eyes narrowing with wicked attention. “You left the ball without even saying goodnight, and now you are sitting here looking happier than I’ve ever seen you.”
Heat rushed up Emmeline’s throat. “Margaret.”
“Oh, excellent. That blush answered several questions before I asked them.” Margaret sank onto the sofa beside her, all concern now sharpened into delight. “I was worried half the night. I thought perhaps Lady Amanda had said something dreadful.”
“She did.”
Margaret’s smile faded. “Then I shall hate her properly in a moment. First, tell me why you look as though you’ve forgotten all about her.”
Emmeline lowered her gaze to her teacup, but her fingers betrayed her, tightening once around the porcelain.
Margaret gasped softly. “Emmeline.”
“Nothing happened,” Emmeline said quickly, then felt her own mouth betray her by curving.
Margaret leaned closer. “That is the least convincing lie you have ever told me.”
“It was not… not everything.”
“That sounds very much like something.”
Emmeline closed her eyes, and at once she felt Rowan’s mouth again, the slow heat of it, the way his voice had broken over the word beautiful. Her breath turned shallow before she could hide it.
When she opened her eyes, Margaret was staring at her with open triumph.
“You are going to tell me everything,” Margaret said.
Emmeline lifted her cup at last, though her hand was not entirely steady. “I am going to tell you very little.”
Margaret smiled. “Then I shall listen very carefully.”
“It seems you are having a delightful morning, Duchess.”
Rowan stopped at the threshold of the drawing room with his hat still in one hand and his gloves in the other.
Emmeline sat near the tea table with Margaret Godwin beside her, both of them looking up at him with expressions far too innocent to be trusted. Morning light fell across his wife in a pale spill, softening the sandy gold of her hair and catching on the faint freckles across her cheeks.
She wore a gown of light muslin, modestly cut, perfectly proper, and somehow more dangerous to him than last night’s dark blue silk had been, because now he knew what rested beneath all that propriety. He knew the taste of her on his tongue.
Emmeline’s mouth curved. “Am I?”
“Yes.”
“I thought I appeared perfectly ordinary,” Emmeline said, lowering her gaze to the teacup in her hand.
“You appear anything but ordinary,” Margaret replied.
Emmeline gave her a warning look, but Margaret only smiled as though she had said nothing improper at all.
Rowan’s gaze moved between them. “Am I interrupting?”
“Only tea,” Emmeline replied.
“And conversation,” Margaret added.
Emmeline looked down at her lap, but not quickly enough to hide the deepening color in her cheeks.
Rowan’s body remembered the same flush creeping down her throat last night while she lay beneath him, trembling, trying to hold back the sounds he had coaxed from her with his mouth.
“I shall leave you to it,” he said, before the memory possessed him entirely.
“A wise retreat,” Margaret murmured.
Rowan gave her a look. “Miss Godwin.”
“Your Grace.”
Emmeline pressed her lips together as though to contain another laugh.
He turned away before the sight could unmake what little order the day still possessed.
The corridor beyond the drawing room was cooler, quieter, and blessedly empty. Rowan drew in one controlled breath and released it slowly. He had work to do. Letters waited. Accounts required signatures.
Then he passed the library, and stopped.
A small voice came from within, barely above a murmur.
Rowan stood just beyond the open door, his hand tightening once around the gloves.
Aaron sat on the rug near the low shelves by the window, a book open across his knees, Biscuit curled heavily against his side with one paw resting on the boy’s leg. The puppy’s eyes were shut. His ears twitched now and then as if even in sleep he considered himself part of the story.
Aaron’s lips moved as he read.
“Th-the ship… struck the r-rocks at d-dawn, and C-Captain M-Morley…” He stopped, swallowed, then tried again in a whisper. “Captain M-Morley ordered the m-men to lower the boats.”
Rowan did not move.
He had heard Aaron recite prayers and answer tutors in clipped, fearful fragments. But this was different. The boy was reading because he wished to, despite the stumbling.
Biscuit shifted, pressing closer, and Aaron’s free hand dropped automatically into the puppy’s fur.
“Captain Morley,” Aaron whispered again, more steadily this time, “ordered the men to lower the boats.”
Rowan stepped into the room.
Aaron looked up at once.
The color left his face so quickly that Rowan felt it like a blow. The book dipped in his lap. His fingers tightened in Biscuit’s fur, waking the puppy just enough for him to open one eye, decide no emergency required his intervention, and close it again.
“I d-did not know you were there,” Aaron said.
“No,” Rowan replied. His own voice sounded too formal for the room, so he forced it lower. “I did not mean to startle you.”
Aaron looked down at the book as though he might hide inside it if he stared hard enough.
Rowan stood there a moment longer, held between instinct and effort. The instinct was to ask what he was reading or whether Miss Harrow had assigned it. Small. Practical questions that would make the moment orderly.
But then, he thought of Emmeline at dinner. He thought of what she would say if she saw him now, standing before his son with all this silence between them. She would tell him to soften. To listen first. To offer warmth before correction.
He crossed the library and sat on the rug beside his son.
Aaron stared at him, eyes widening.
Rowan had not sat on a rug in years. The movement was inelegant, and his knee protested at once, which he chose to ignore. Biscuit opened both eyes this time, lifted his head, and gave Rowan a suspicious look.
Rowan looked at the dog. “Settle yourself.”
Biscuit put his head back down.
Aaron’s mouth twitched.
Rowan gestured to the book. “Continue.”
Aaron’s eyes widened. “Aloud?”
“If you like.”
“I was only p-practicing.”
“Then continue.”
Aaron looked at him for several long seconds, searching his face. Rowan held himself still, no matter how much he wished to fill the silence with something stern that did not terrify him as much as his son’s eyes on him.
At last, Aaron looked back at the page.
“Th-the sea was… was…” His stammer thickened immediately, the words catching under the pressure of being heard. His shoulders rose. “The s-sea was b-black as ink, and the w-wind…” He stopped.
Rowan felt the old impulse rise.
Tell him to start again.
He crushed it.
Aaron glanced at him from beneath his lashes, and Rowan made himself smile. It was small and awkward, likely more of a grimace, but Aaron saw it, and his shoulders lowered by a fraction.
“The wind t-tore through the sails,” Aaron continued, still halting, still careful. “B-but Captain Morley did not tremble.”
“Brave man,” Rowan said quietly.
Aaron’s eyes brightened. “Very.”
He continued. The first paragraph came rough, uneven, filled with pauses and repetitions that made Rowan’s chest tighten each time the boy’s face flushed.
But Rowan did not move. He kept his hands folded loosely over one knee, kept his expression calm, and listened as though there were nothing in the world more important than whether Captain Morley survived the fictional storm.
Slowly, Aaron changed.