Chapter 23
Your Grace,
I write to inform you that my daughter has developed a mild fever following her journey yesterday and is currently resting under supervision here at Rosemere House.
There is no immediate cause for concern, though I have insisted she remain here until the fever subsides fully.
She is weak but stable and being attended to properly.
In truth, I must admit that I am grateful for the opportunity to see my daughter, and she told me enough to know that she would not have come in the first place if it were not for you, so I must thank you for that.
It might not seem like it, but I do love my daughter, and I must also thank you for caring for her the way you do.
Sincerely,
Mrs. Holloway
Dorian stopped reading for a moment, simply staring at the words as though they might shift into something less alarming if he gave them enough time. When they did not, he forced himself to read it again, though the calm phrasing did nothing to ease what had already begun to take hold.
The letter had arrived the evening Anne had left, and was delivered with the kind of unhurried politeness that suggested the messenger had no idea that what he was carrying mattered at all.
Dorian did not think much of it at first, since he had been expecting to hear from Anne, but the handwriting was not hers, and that alone made something in his chest tighten before he had even read a full sentence.
He read it again, then again. By the time he reached the end, he was once again forced to think of Lily. He lowered the letter slightly as the study around him fell too quiet, the stillness pressing in where distraction had been only moments ago.
He remembered this pattern too well. A small illness first, dismissed as fatigue or nothing serious, followed by reassurances that rest would be enough, followed by days where everyone insisted there was no need to worry while he convinced himself that other matters demanded his attention more urgently.
He had believed them then. Everyone had.
He had been told that Lily was simply tired, that she needed rest, that it was nothing to concern himself with, and he had accepted those explanations because he had wanted to believe them, because life had been full of obligations that always seemed louder than quiet unease.
There had been meetings that felt important at the time, social obligations he had not wanted to break, conversations that felt meaningless in hindsight.
He could still remember laughing at something someone said about racing odds while Lily had been upstairs, unwell enough that she had not come down for dinner.
He could still remember someone telling him not to fuss because it would pass soon enough.
He had listened. He had believed it.
His grip tightened slightly on the edge of the desk as the memory settled more heavily than he wanted it to, the past pressing itself into the present in a way he could not easily dismiss.
“No,” he muttered under his breath, though there was no one in the room to hear him.
The word was not directed at anything in particular, only at the increasing certainty that had begun to form where calm should have been. He forced himself to read the letter again, focusing on the phrasing rather than what it reminded him of.
None of it should have been enough to cause alarm on its own, and yet every line felt dangerously familiar in a way that made his pulse sound too loud in his ears. He pushed back his chair abruptly, the legs scraping across the floor as he stood too quickly for composure to remain intact.
Anne was ill, but she was at Rosemere. She was resting, supervised, and safe. That was what the letter said, but what he saw beneath every line was something far less stable, shaped entirely by memory and fear he had never fully learned how to set down.
This time, he did not remain seated long enough for doubt to settle into anything resembling calm.
Before anyone could stop him, he had already given the order for Tempest to be saddled. The stablehands hesitated only long enough to register the urgency in his voice, before moving. But by then, he was already pulling on his riding coat and allowing no space for discussion.
The weather outside had worsened since dusk, rain sweeping across the grounds in heavy sheets, the wind driving against the windows.
Tristan appeared in the doorway just as Dorian crossed the corridor.
“You are not seriously riding out in this weather,” he said sharply.
Dorian did not slow down. “Move.”
“Dorian,” Tristan tried, stepping into his path. “It is pouring. The roads will be—”
“I said move.” His tone made further argument pointless.
Tristan’s expression darkened. Dorian stopped only long enough to look at him.
“You want me to do what feels right as a husband?” he bit out. “That is what I am going to do.”
Then he was gone.
The stables were already in motion by the time he arrived, Tempest being led out with more urgency than caution, tack being tightened in hurried movements as rain lashed against the open doors.
Dorian swung himself up into the saddle without waiting for final adjustments, taking the reins before anyone could question him again.
The moment Tempest moved, he urged him forward hard. He did not entirely trust the safety of it, but Tempest was the fastest horse he owned, and he did not want to risk being too late.
The gates passed behind him almost immediately, swallowed by rain and darkness as they broke into the countryside at reckless speed.
Wind whipped at his face, cold and relentless, but it barely registered compared to the tight, rising pressure in his chest that had not eased since he read the letter.
Images of Lily flashed through his mind again, and he forced them away, only for them to return more vivid each time Tempest’s hooves struck the ground.
By the time Rosemere House emerged through the rain, the world had narrowed to breath, reins, and the single certainty that he had not been fast enough.
He dismounted before Tempest fully stopped. The ground was slick beneath his boots as he crossed the drive and reached the front door, rain soaking through his coat and shirt until he felt entirely drowned in it.
He did not pause long enough to be announced or recognized, his fist striking the door with a force that echoed through the entrance hall.
“Open the door,” he demanded, his voice rough with exertion and something closer to fear than anger.
A moment later, the door opened. Anne stood there, wrapped in a thick blanket, her hair slightly disheveled, her expression shifting instantly from confusion to shock as she took in the sight of him drenched, breathless, and clearly unsteady.
“Dorian?” She blinked as rainwater dripped onto the threshold. “What on earth are you doing here?”
He tried to answer, but the first attempt failed entirely, his breathing still uneven from the ride and the fear that had driven it. He swallowed hard, forcing himself to be steady enough to speak.
“I was told you were ill,” he managed.
Anne stared at him for a moment longer before softening, understanding dawning almost immediately.
“Oh,” she murmured, stepping aside as though the urgency itself had startled her into movement. “No, it is only a mild fever. I am fine. My mother insisted I remain here for a few days, but it is nothing serious.”
The words came calmly, practiced in the way reassurance often was when repeated more than once.
Dorian did not move at first. The tension in his shoulders did not release immediately, but the worst of the panic began to ebb away, as though his body was only now catching up to the fact that what he had feared most had not occurred.
His hands still shook slightly as he gripped the doorframe, rain dripping from his sleeves onto the polished floor. Anne noticed. Her expression softened again, concern replacing confusion.
“You rode here in this weather?”
He released a short, unsteady breath that was almost a laugh but not quite. “Yes. I rode like hell.”
A pause followed, heavier now that the urgency had begun to settle.
Anne stepped closer, lowering the blanket slightly as if preparing to properly assess whether he was injured or simply frozen through with cold.
“You are soaked,” she noted.
“I noticed.”
“That cannot be good for your health.”
“I am relieved,” he said after a moment, though the words came out rougher than he had intended. “That shall help with any ailment that may arise.”
Anne held his gaze. For the first time since he had arrived, he relaxed, though his breathing still had not fully steadied. Relief washed over him in slow stages rather than all at once, as if his body was only just allowing itself to believe what his mind had already been told.
She was here, she was safe, and despite everything he had thought as he rode through the storm, he was not too late.
He stood there for a moment longer than he needed to, rain still dripping from his coat onto the floor, his breathing slowly settling.
Anne watched him carefully, as though still trying to decide whether she should be concerned or amused, her expression caught somewhere between confusion and softened understanding.
“This is all because of a letter?” she sighed.
“Yes.”
The simplicity of his answer seemed to unsettle her more than reassure her. She shifted slightly beneath the blanket, as if preparing to insist again that nothing about this warranted such urgency.
“I am not severely ill,” she reassured.
“I know,” he said.
Anne hesitated. “Then why—”
Dorian did not let her finish. He looked at her properly, looked at her slightly pale face, at the way she stood there wrapped in warmth while he was still shaking from the cold and fear and everything he had refused to admit on the ride over.
The relief that had begun to settle in him did not fade, but something deeper rose beneath it, something far less controlled and far more dangerous.
Because it was not only fear that had driven him through the storm. It was the thought of losing her. The same hollow, corrosive dread he had buried once before and sworn never to feel again. Only this time, it had not stayed buried. It had grown roots.
Anne blinked as he stepped closer.
“Dorian?” she asked, quieter now.
He did not answer. Not because he had nothing to say, but because anything he might have said would have been a lie compared to what he was feeling too sharply to contain.
The space between them closed in a single breath. His hands came up first, not hesitating, not asking, simply reaching for her as though the decision had been made long before he consciously allowed it.
Anne barely had time to register the movement before he drew her fully into his arms. The blanket slipped slightly between them, forgotten.
“Dorian,” she gasped, her voice muffled against his chest.
But he did not loosen his hold. He could still feel the tremors in his hands, still feel the echo of the ride, of the rain, of every memory that had driven him there in the first place, and yet none of it mattered anymore because she was alive and well, breathing softly against him.
“I thought—” He broke off, his throat closing up.
Anne pulled back just enough to look at him, her eyes wide in confusion. “What did you think?”
He should have answered. He should have said something rational, or perhaps laughed it all off and said that it was nothing and that he would rather take her back home to recover.
Instead, his control shattered.
Before she could speak again, he pulled her back in and kissed her.
There was nothing careful about it, no restraint or distance. He kissed her with the full force of everything he had spent months refusing to name, everything he had buried under duty and avoidance and grief he had never properly learned how to set down.
Fear still lingered in him, but it collided with something else, something that had been building quietly in every shared look, every argument, every moment he had told himself meant nothing when it had begun to mean everything.
Anne froze for only a heartbeat. Then her hands curled into his coat, not pushing him away.
Dorian exhaled sharply against her mouth, as if something inside him had finally stopped holding back. When he finally broke the kiss, it was not because he wanted to. It was because he had to breathe.
He did not move far, not enough to create distance or to pretend it had not happened. His forehead hovered near hers, the rain still cold against his skin.
“I should not have done that,” he said, his voice low, rough in a way that had nothing to do with the weather.
Anne’s breath was unsteady, her eyes searching his as though trying to understand what had shifted between them in the span of a single moment.
“No,” she countered softly, shaking her head, “you should have.”
Dorian already knew that something in him had broken and would never go back to how it had been before.