Chapter Seventeen #2
“My dear, I have eyes and ears everywhere. If you wish to survive in London, assume nothing is secret.”
“Perhaps we are simply… complex,” the Duke said dryly.
Lady Jersey’s gaze moved between them—lingering, assessing, something thin and calculating tightening at the corners of her eyes.
“Complexity,” she said at last, “is not in itself a crime. But London dislikes puzzles it cannot neatly categorise. The charged looks, the whispered counting, the… intensity between you—none of it has escaped notice.”
Her tone softened, almost imperceptibly.
“I have no intention of repeating what I know. I am not in the business of ruining marriages. But I will tell you this plainly: whatever is unfolding between you is beginning to show. And if you are not careful, the ton will seize upon it and make a spectacle of you both—perhaps a damaging one.”
The Duke’s jaw tightened. Celine’s hands folded in her lap.
Lady Jersey inclined her head slightly, acknowledging the weight of her own words.
“You must take care how you appear. Not only for propriety’s sake, but for survival. There is… feeling between you. Strong feeling. Anyone with half an eye can see it. And feeling, when it escapes its boundaries, can either charm or destroy, depending on how it is revealed.”
She reached into her reticule and withdrew a single, elegant card.
“Which is why I am here. The patronesses of Almack’s extend an invitation to you both to attend next Wednesday’s assembly.”
He blinked—an expression that in any other man might have been called surprise.
“I have not attended Almack’s in years,” he said.
“Precisely why your attendance now will steady the waters. It will demonstrate unity, intention, a willingness to engage with society on respectable terms.”
“And if we decline?” Celine asked quietly.
“Then the stories will grow teeth,” Lady Jersey said simply. “Better to shape the narrative than to let the narrative shape you.”
She smoothed her gloves with purposeful grace.
“Come to the assembly. Look content, not ravenous. Dance—twice, perhaps thrice—but no more. And if you must look at each other like that”—her eyes flickered between them again—“save it for when doors, locked or otherwise, put you out of sight.”
She offered a small, wry smile—almost kind.
“Good day, Your Grace. “See you at the assembly.”
And with that, she swept out, leaving the room humming with everything she had not said.
For a long moment, neither spoke.
“At Almack’s,” Celine said at last, exhaling. “The marriage mart. Where hopeful maidens hunt husbands, and established couples reassure the world of their respectability.”
“We are not respectable,” Elias replied.
“No. But we are remarkably adept at appearing so.”
“Are we?” He glanced toward her, one brow lifting. “Last night argues otherwise.”
“Last night we were not pretending.” Her voice softened. “Last night we were… what were we?”
“Honest, perhaps,” he said quietly. “For the first time since our wedding.”
“And look where honesty delivered us—the scandal of the season.”
“There are less amusing things to be.”
Before Celine could answer, Morrison appeared once more, looking positively beleaguered.
“Your Grace—additional callers. Several.” He paused, as if bracing himself. “The entrance hall is… rather congested.”
Elias sighed. “Who has arrived?”
“Lord and Lady Ashford, Miss Weatherby and her mother, Lord Ashworth, Mr and Mrs Faxtone, the Vanceleys—”
“Mercy,” he muttered. “A siege.”
“—your solicitor, the Duke of Haverford, and a young lady who claims to be Lady Rothwest’s sister.”
“Lucy?” Celine rose at once. “Show her in immediately. The others may wait.”
“Or depart,” Elias added. “Preferably depart.”
Moments later, Lucy swept in, cheeks flushed with triumph. “You two are infamous! Five dances! Mother nearly fainted at breakfast. Father poured himself a heroic brandy and declared that at least you look happy. And Anne wishes to know whether it was frightfully romantic.”
“Lucy,” Celine attempted sternness, but achieved only affection. “What brings you here?”
“Delivering these.” She produced a stack of letters from her reticule. “Invitations, mostly. A few pointed omissions. And this—” she held up one envelope between two fingers “—from Aunt Prudence. She says she is either immensely proud of you or deeply appalled; she has not yet determined which.”
Elias accepted the letters, leafing through them with mounting amusement. “Invitation. Invitation. Thinly veiled insult masquerading as invitation. Actual insult. Invitation. Threat of social ruin.” He paused. “Invitation to a christening—why on earth are we invited to a christening?”
“Because they wish to see if we shall again dance four times,” Celine offered.
“At a christening?”
“We have proven ourselves capable of anything.”
Lucy’s eyes sparkled as she looked between them. “You’re enjoying this. Both of you. You are positively revelling in your own notoriety.”
“We are making the best of an… interesting circumstance,” Elias said carefully.
“No,” Lucy corrected cheerfully. “You are flirting your way through social disaster. Quite charming, really. Also, the drawing room is bursting with people desperate for details. What shall I tell them?”
“Tell them we are indisposed,” Elias said at once.
“Tell them we shall be down presently,” Celine countered.
They faced one another.
“We cannot hide,” she said gently. “That will only worsen the gossip.”
“If I face them all, I may hurl someone out a window.”
“Then we face them strategically. Together.”
His expression softened. “Together.”
Lucy watched with unabashed delight. “The servants are correct. The pair of you are one exchanged glance away from either murdering each other or—”
“Lucy,” Celine warned.
“—or reconciling your differences,” she amended, though her mischievous grin betrayed the truer sentiment.
“Fine,” he said. “We shall receive callers. But only for an hour.”
“Agreed,” Celine said. “Though we should probably change first.”
“You look perfect,” he murmured—and this time the compliment trembled with meaning.
“I look like someone who spent the night thinking of you,” she blurted, then flushed scarlet.
His eyes darkened. “Did you?”
“You know I did.”
“Thinking of what, precisely?”
“Elias—”
“I shall… remove myself,” Lucy announced hastily. “You clearly require privacy. Or—something.”
With a rustle of skirts, she vanished.
Silence stretched between them.
“We should change,” Celine said again, though neither moved.
“We should,” Elias agreed, stepping closer. His familiar scent—clean linen, winter air, and something darker beneath—wrapped around her. “But first, tell me what occupied your thoughts.”
“The same as yours, I think.”
“You cannot know what I was thinking.”
“Can I not?” She met his gaze steadily. “You were thinking of the dance. Of how I felt in your arms. Of what happens now that the countdown has ended.”
“Has it? Because from where I stand—”
“What?”
Then he kissed her.
The motion was swift, overpowering—nothing performative, nothing measured. His hands framed her face, and she clutched his waistcoat, pulling him closer as if that might steady her.
When they parted, breathless:
“That was—”
“Necessary,” he said simply. “To endure the vultures below, I required something to fortify me.”
“Only that?”
“No. But it is all we may have for—”
“For now, I know.” She leaned her forehead against his chest. “We’re never going to make it.”
“We must.”
“Why?”
“Because I need to know—”
“That I choose freely,” she finished gently. “Elias, I chose you the day I signed that contract. Everything since has merely proved I was correct.”
His arms tightened around her. “Has it?”
“You know it has.”
“Then why are we waiting?”
“Because you need the control. The structure.”
“And you?”
“I need to know that this is not just proximity and circumstance but something real.”
“Nothing about this feels real. It feels like fever, like madness, like dying and being reborn every time you say my name.”
“Elias—”
“Don’t. Not unless you want me to lock that door and tell everyone we’re not receiving callers after all.”
“That would be—”
“Perfect. It would be perfect. And completely inappropriate.”
“Like dancing four times?”
“More.”
They stood there for a moment, caught between propriety and desire, before Morrison’s discreet cough from the doorway broke the spell.
“Your Grace, the Duke of Haverford says he will wait… as long as necessary.”
“Of course he will,” Elias muttered. He stepped back, composure sliding back into place like a well-fitted coat. “We shall receive him first. Alone. The others may wait—or go.”
“Very good, Your Grace.”
When Morrison left, Celine touched Elias’s arm lightly. “Be gracious with the Duke. He seemed kind.”
“He is kind. And likely here to remind me of propriety and restraint.”
“Or,” she said, smiling faintly, “to congratulate you on finally behaving like a man with a heart.”
“That seems optimistic.”
“I am an optimist.”
“Since when?”
“Since marrying a beast and discovering he was simply a man.”
***
The Duke’s visit passed in a genial haze of counsel and amused reproach, his manner so warm it was impossible to take offence at the gentle scolding he delivered.
When he left, the true onslaught began—a steady stream of callers who brought gossip thinly veiled as concern, congratulations sharpened with envy, and questions crafted to pry into every corner of the previous night’s spectacle.
Elias met them with polished reserve; Celine, with unflappable grace.
And though neither remarked upon it aloud, they moved in perfect concert—trading glances that signalled retreat or advance, answering challenges as a unit, presenting a united front that only invited more speculation.
By the time the last name was crossed from Morrison’s list, they had weathered the siege not as two people forced together, but unmistakably as a pair.
At luncheon, they sat inconveniently close and spoke of the morning’s callers—Ashworth’s pettiness, Lady Weatherby’s insinuations, Lady Jersey’s warning.
Every topic circled back to last night, to them, to everything neither dared say aloud.
Their words were about callers; their eyes were about desire.
The afternoon brought yet more callers, yet more speculation, yet more deliberately restrained touches that carried far more heat than propriety allowed.
By evening, they were both exhausted. Yet beneath that fatigue ran something steady and quiet: a new closeness, a shared understanding that had not existed the day before.
The air between them felt settled now, not frantic; weighted, but not heavy.
As though their united front throughout the day—their shared glances, their shared patience, their shared defiance—had shifted something fundamental.
Even the footmen moved more softly around them, as if sensing it.
After dinner, Celine set down her napkin. “I believe I shall retire early.”
“It is scarcely nine,” Elias said, though his voice held no reproach—only understanding.
“I find myself fatigued,” she replied.
His gaze held hers. “You are avoiding me.”
She hesitated, then answered with disarming honesty. “I am avoiding the temptation to do something we will not be able to take back.”
“That sounds… oddly like me,” he said, almost teasing.
“It does.”
A quiet settled between them—not tense, merely true.
He rose when she did, as though compelled by an invisible thread neither wished to sever.
“Goodnight, Celine.”
“Goodnight, Elias.”
She left him standing in the soft candlelight of the dining room, and felt his gaze follow her until the door closed behind her.
And though they parted for the night, neither felt alone.
The waiting was almost over.
Almost.
But not yet.
Not quite yet.