Chapter 31
Phaedra woke in a room that was not hers. The canopy hung above her in a shade of dark navy trimmed in gold, feeble light filtering in from the wrong direction. She turned her head, and the slam of a splitting headache crashed into her. She groaned, her hand heavy as it met her forehead.
What had happened to her?
She waited for the pain to subside, then squinted into the semi-darkness. There was a thin shaft of morning light breaking through a split in the navy curtains, the pale color of the walls muted to a dull gray. This was most certainly not her room. But then where was she?
Then her eyes landed on the large wingback chair pushed up to the side of the bed, and the man sleeping in it. Nathaniel.
His head had fallen to the side, his smooth expression almost angelic in the half-light, with his lips slightly open, golden hair falling over his eyes. His clothes looked ruffled, and Phaedra realized they were the same he had worn the evening before when she had gone to see him.
The evening before.
The memories rushed her all at once, the images flashing over and over until they made sure she remembered every detail. The reading, the sketching, and the revelation that finally set her stomach turning. Even now she could feel it tighten, and her teeth clenched against the hollow sensation.
She could have been wrong. She could have misunderstood. Misheard. Misinterpreted. Imagined it to be what it was not. It could have been the case. Yet she feared it was not. But she needed to know more to be absolutely certain.
She shot Nathaniel a weary glance. He looked so peaceful, so serene, that a pang of guilt twisted through her heart. Had he truly stayed with her throughout the night?
She shifted in the bed, trying to push herself up, but the ache hammered through her head with renewed force, her vision flashing with the splitting pain.
She must have made a sound, because even before her eyes could clear, before her own hands could leave her face, she felt his on her arm and back, supporting her.
“Miss Mercer? Are you alright?” His voice was groggy from sleep, yet there was an urgency there that felt oddly reassuring, as if proving that he was there for her. That he still cared. “Tell me what you need.”
“Water,” she choked out, then winced at the bite in her throat.
His hands released her, the absence hitting her like frigid air. But it was merely a moment before he returned with a filled glass, his palm warm against her back as she drank.
“Thank you,” she said as he took the empty glass and placed it on the nightstand.
“Of course.” He looked her over with worried eyes. “Would you like to lie back down?”
She took a slow breath, then nodded. “Yes.”
His hands shifted around her carefully, his fingers gentle at the back of her head as he lowered her onto the pillows.
Then he hovered for a moment, his eyes searching her face as if he could not part with the image of it just yet, and Phaedra could not help but think of her fantasy, of how easily it could be brought to life.
She would only need reach out and pull his face down to hers. His mouth against hers.
And just as he would be reading her mind, his gaze dropped to her parted lips, eyes flaring, his fingers tightening almost imperceptibly in her hair.
For a terrible moment she believed he might do it, seal their fate before she could even conjure the thought of objecting. But then he pulled back, shifting to sit on the edge of the bed.
He cleared his throat before asking, “How are you feeling?”
Phaedra watched him a moment, knowing that it was no longer his hasty awakening that had made his voice hoarse.
She could see the strain in his face, the clash of emotions just under the surface of his skin, wondering, guessing, second-guessing everything that had led up to this point.
He was lost in it. Lost to it. And Phaedra no longer knew if she should be the voice of reason leading him out of the haze, or that of a siren, luring him deeper.
“Miss Mercer?” he asked, a crease forming between his brows, and Phaedra suddenly understood that she had been staring for longer than she had realized.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to shun the images that threatened to reemerge. “I feel a bit… dazed. I don’t really know how I got here. Or where I am, exactly.”
Her eyes moved over the room, or rather the part she could see without turning her head, but when Nathaniel did not answer immediately, she looked back at him. There was a definite hesitation in his expression before he finally said, “This is my bedroom.”
Phaedra’s eyes widened, horrified. She shot up from the cushions, then groaned as a white flash of pain seared through her head. Nausea swayed her even as she sat, and she was grateful for Nathaniel’s warm hands on her arms, steadying her.
“Please, do not exert yourself,” he said. She could feel the beat of his quickened pulse through the palms of his hands, but she could only shake her head slowly, her words caught in the pain throbbing through her whole body.
“Truly,” he whispered. “It is not a problem.”
The earnestness in his voice made her look up, a fear she could not name spreading within her like wildfire.
And when he lifted his hand to tuck a stray strand of hair behind her ear, his fingers lingering on her cheek, she found that the pounding no longer came from her head but her ribs, her heart stuttering at his touch. And then she realized what it was.
It was not fear. It was a wish.
A desire that it would be easier to accept this gentleness. To believe in it. To have a heart that would not look for intention behind the act, but to take it for what it was. Caring. Kindness.
Love.
She wondered what it would have been like if it had been someone like him to take her away all those years ago.
If the hell she had been rescued from had been replaced not by one of a different hue, but something else entirely.
Something she would not want to escape from. Something she would not yearn to bury.
She wondered if it would have killed the darkness spreading within her. Or perhaps simply transformed it into something more. Something that could grow. That could live. Maybe even hope.
“Stay as long as you need,” he said.
She nodded before dropping her gaze, afraid of what might happen should she not.
The prick of tears was sharp in her throat, the warmth of his hand seeping into her skin.
But before she could even offer herself the choice of leaning into his touch, he asked, “You’ve figured something out, haven’t you? ”
She froze, dread pooling at the base of her spine as she dragged her stinging eyes back to his.
There was a change in his face that could have been invisible to anyone but her, a difference in the angles of his body, in the very pattern of his breathing.
And when she did not answer, he pulled back, his hand falling away from her face.
“Will you tell me?”
She did not know which was worse, the hope or the fear waging war in his eyes, and she suddenly wished she had never come here. Never agreed to meet him, never taken this contract. Even if it would have damned her.
His fingers tightened on her arm, his voice almost breaking with the plea. “Miss Mercer!”
She opened her mouth, but it was dry, the words like gravel scratching against her tongue. But her time was up, and she could no longer hide behind the mask of ignorance. She had to speak.
“Yes. I think I understood something. But I am not at all certain, and I hope I am wrong, but I fear that I am not.” She pulled in a ragged breath, her eyes brimming with tears she did not wish to shed. “But I need to be sure before I tell you. Please. Allow me to be sure.”
He stared a moment, stunned by the vehemence of her words, and she could see for certain that fear had won the war. She swallowed against the aching knot in her throat, then whispered, “Please know that I am sorry for the distress I am causing you. I wish I could take it away.”
He blinked, as if finally awakened, his nod but a jerk of his head. “Thank you.”
He pried his fingers from her, then pushed to his feet.
He looked about the room, as if unsure where he was or where he should be instead.
Then he spotted the empty glass on the nightstand, and took it to the sideboard to refill it.
When he placed it back beside her, his face was blank, washed clean of all emotion.
An empty canvas for whatever the future would deign to paint.
“Sleep,” he said without looking at her. “We shall continue once you are better.”
With that he left the room.