Chapter 40
By the time the carriage turned into the familiar drive of the Voss estate, the night had deepened into that soft, settled quiet that came only after a full evening well spent.
The heart of Ambervale lay behind them in lanternlight and fading conversation, its streets gradually emptying into private homes, late suppers, and the last murmurs of gossip that would, Dara suspected, become something far more elaborate by morning.
She did not mind. In fact—
No.
She was not going to think too hard about how useful that might be just now.
The carriage rolled to a smooth stop before the front entrance, and for a moment, neither of them moved. The evening had been… pleasant. Suspiciously so. The play, infuriating. Dinner, excellent. Conversation, far too easy.
That in itself was becoming a problem.
The footman opened the carriage door. Valerius stepped down first, as he always did, then turned and offered his hand up to her. Dara placed her gloved fingers in his and let him help her descend. Gravel gave softly beneath her slippers as she stepped down.
And then—
He did not let go.
It was not improper. Not yet. Only a second longer than necessary.
Long enough to be noticed.
Dara looked up at him.
The lanterns at the entrance cast warm light across the sharp lines of his face, catching at the dark fall of his hair and the quiet steadiness of his expression.
He had been composed all evening, as ever, but there was something gentler in him now—a loosened edge, perhaps.
Something quieter after the intimacy of shared stories and candlelight.
Without a word, he kept her hand in his and began walking her toward the entrance.
Dara went with him.
The front steps of the estate rose ahead, lit by the soft glow of the lanterns set at either side of the doors.
Somewhere behind them, she could sense Grace descending from the rear carriage, and no doubt Leon and Edric as well, all with the tact to remain just distant enough to preserve the shape of the moment without pretending not to see it.
The night air was cool against her skin.
The gifted hairpiece still rested in her hair, the faint weight of it now familiar enough to forget until she remembered, all over again, who had given it to her.
At the top of the steps, Valerius stopped. Only then did he turn fully toward her, and Dara realized he still had not let go of her hand. She had been perfectly calm up until that exact moment. Then she became very aware of it.
Valerius lifted her hand slowly, deliberately, and pressed a kiss to the back of her glove. Not hurried. Not careless. A proper gesture.
And yet—not only proper.
His gaze lifted to hers as he lowered her hand again. “I hope you had a pleasant evening.”
Dara held his gaze. She could have given him something elegant, polite, and reserved. Instead, because there seemed little point in dishonesty now, she said, “I did.”
The answer pleased him. She saw it in the slight shift at the corner of his mouth before his expression faded back into something quieter.
Good.
That, too, was dangerous.
Valerius’s fingers remained around hers for a moment longer. Then, instead of stepping back, he leaned in. It was subtle enough that, for the briefest second, her mind did not catch up.
Then his lips touched her cheek.
A soft, deliberate kiss. Not careless, not stolen, not testing.
Intentional.
Dara went still. Not frozen. Not startled enough to embarrass herself. Only still enough to feel the exact warmth of the gesture before it was gone. When he drew back, she realized—with immediate annoyance—that heat had risen faintly in her face.
Really.
How inconvenient.
She did not step away. That would have looked too much like retreat. Instead, she lifted her chin the slightest degree and looked at him with as much composure as she could gather in the span of one heartbeat.
“That,” she said, her voice even, “was bold.”
Valerius’s expression shifted. Not quite a smile. Very nearly.
“I thought so.”
Dara stared at him for one long second. Then, despite herself, despite the heat still lingering in her cheeks and the entirely unreasonable awareness that he had now kissed her twice and remained offensively calm about it, she smiled.
Small. Real. Gone almost as quickly as it appeared.
Valerius saw it.
Of course he did.
The silence between them was not awkward. It would have been easier if it were. Behind her, Grace shifted softly into place near the door. Somewhere farther back, Leon and Edric remained wisely distant. No one interrupted.
The estate stood quiet around them, all lamplit windows and stone dignity, as though it too had decided to witness this in respectful silence.
Valerius released her hand at last. Slowly. Not enough to be theatrical, but enough to matter.
The loss of contact was immediate.
Dara disliked noticing that.
“My lady,” he said.
There was something different in the way he said it now. Still formal. Still proper. But warmer than before.
Valerius gave her a slight bow.
Dara answered with a small curtsey. “Your Highness.”
She turned then, because lingering any longer would begin to feel like something else entirely, and she was not yet prepared to define what that something else might be. With her pace measured, her posture steady, and her expression restored, she crossed the last step toward the door.
Grace opened it for her without comment.
Naturally.
Dara stepped inside, then paused only long enough to glance back over her shoulder.
Valerius was still there, standing near the lanternlight at the top of the steps, composed as ever. Watching her with that same unreadable steadiness that had become entirely too familiar over the past months.
Their eyes met.
For one suspended second, the whole evening seemed to gather there—the theater, the story, the dinner, the candlelight, the lingering warmth of his kiss against her cheek.
Then Dara inclined her head, just slightly, and went inside.
The door closed softly behind her.
The silence that followed in the entry hall lasted only a breath before Grace, who had shown truly admirable discipline all evening, said in a tone of perfect neutrality, “My lady had a pleasant evening, I hope.”
Dara did not look at her. “Yes.”
Grace’s pause was brief. “That is good.”
Dara handed off her gloves with exact composure. “Yes,” she said again.
Then, because no one in this house deserved the satisfaction of watching her stand in the entry like a woman who had just been kissed goodnight by the Crown Prince and was thinking far too much about it, she turned and ascended the stairs without another word.
Only once she reached the upper corridor—well out of sight, well beyond Grace’s excellent manners and the reach of anyone’s polite curiosity—did she lift two fingers lightly to her cheek.
The warmth there had already faded.
That, perhaps, was the worst part.
No.
The worst part was that she wanted to remember it anyway.
Dara lowered her hand at once.
Ridiculous.
Entirely ridiculous.
And yet, as she continued down the corridor toward her room, one thought followed her with quiet, persistent clarity. This courtship was becoming much more difficult to treat as merely useful.