Page 30 of A Touch of Charm (Miracles on Harley Street #3)

T hey talked for hours. Andre told Anna about his studies in Vienna, his apprenticeship in India, and how he started the practice at 87 Harley Street with his friends. In turn, Anna told him about her marriage, that her father had been appointed professor emeritus in Edinburgh and lived there with her mother. She even told him how she fell from the horse and broke her leg.

They’d exhausted every possible way to search for each other in secret, out of fear, yet Thea finally brought them together.

“Where is she?” Andre asked.

“She left us alone to speak, I suppose.”

Or perhaps she left because she realized I could ruin her beyond ruination . The Habsburg bastard was even lower in rank than the orthopedist without any links to the aristocracy.

“I’m going home to plan the ball. There’s still much to be done.”

“Are you quite certain that you feel ready to return home?” Andre asked when his sister gripped his arm tightly in a shaky effort to rise from her chair. He handed her one of the crutches, leaning against the wall.

She winced. “This hurts my arms,” she said, reluctantly taking the crutch.

“You’re not ready to go home alone,” Andre said.

“I won’t be alone at home; we have a staff of fourteen people. I’m never alone.” She sighed as if it were a bad thing to have so much help. “There’s always something to do, someone to receive or call on, and readying to leave or upon my return—but my husband put me here to isolate me.”

“The life of a lady sounds like a chore to you.”

Anna gave him the look she used to have when Mama sent them to the nursery if they ate pudding in the kitchen before dinner.

“I did everything I was supposed to,” Anna said.

“And it doesn’t make you happy.” Andre didn’t need to ask; it was plain to see.

“Nobody ever asked me what would make me happy, Andre. Everyone assumed that following the aristocratic path was right for me, and now”—she stroked her belly—“if I bear him a son, I will have accomplished everything I ought at two-and-twenty.”

“And then?”

She raised her brows. “You’re the first to ask.”

“You seem to have an answer. Do you care to share it?”

She gave a half smile. He had her. “Well, I’ll be a mother. And Mother said she’d come to help. But I don’t intend to remain at Paul’s disposal.”

“Mother is coming to London? When?”

Andre’s heart quickened.

“I don’t know exactly. The last letter came from Father. She’d left Edinburgh and was going to Italy to visit Lorenzo. Papa won’t join us till Christmas.”

His parents were coming to London. He thought he should feel whole again, relieved they were alive and restored, but all he could think of was Thea. How would she react?

And where had she gone?

“I won’t remain in London when the baby arrives.”

“I beg your pardon? You’re leaving London?” How could he already lose the family he’d barely reunited with?

“As part of my marriage settlement, Papa ensured I’d have a castle in my name.”

“Where is it?”

“Not too far, only about a day’s ride by carriage. You could probably ride there in half a day when you wish to visit. And you shall. It has eight bedrooms and more than enough room for all of us when Lorenzo comes for Christmas.”

*

“Has she left Cloverdale House?” Andre asked every servant who passed. He feared Thea had run away and could be in danger, so he searched for her everywhere.

When the scent of citrus and damp earth wrapped around Andre as he stepped into the orangery, he heard her—soft, muffled weeping.

His gaze caught her instantly. Thea. She was folded into herself on a stone bench beneath a potted myrtle tree, the fragile lace of her handkerchief pressed tight against her face. Her shoulders shook with the force of her sobs, and the sight twisted something deep in his chest. He’d seen despair before, countless faces contorted with pain, yet her tears struck him with unrelenting force.

Andre approached her cautiously, boots nearly soundless against the tiled floor. “Thea,” he murmured, his tone low, meant only for her.

She stiffened, startled, and quickly pressed the back of her hand to her cheeks as if to erase the evidence of her distress.

“Oh,” she whispered hoarsely, her voice breaking. “Andre… I didn’t hear—”

“I’m sorry,” he interrupted softly, easing down onto the bench beside her. He made no movement to touch her, giving her space, though every nerve in his body urged him closer.

Her lips parted, but no protest came. Instead, she lowered her gaze to the crumpled handkerchief she twisted between her fingers, as though even looking at him might undo her. They sat in breathless silence for a moment, broken only by the faint rustle of leaves and her uneven breaths.

“You don’t have to hold this alone,” he said finally, his voice gentle but firm. Her response was a sharp shake of the head, her knuckles white around the damasked fabric.

“You don’t understand,” she rasped. “What I’ve done…” She bit her lips to stop their trembling. “What I’ve set into motion. It isn’t something you—or anyone—can fix.”

“Tell me anyway,” he urged, leaning forward, his elbows on his knees. “Test me.”

She huffed a laugh, light and humorless, only for it to dissolve into another wave of tears. At last, as though some internal dam had collapsed, she began to speak, her words spilling out in fervent, broken bursts.

“I’ve ruined everything, Andre,” she confessed, her voice shaking with anguish. “Refusing Prince Ralph wasn’t just about myself. It was a blow—a public affront to the Habsburgs. The Transylvanian branches, they don’t forgive. They conquer.” She choked on air as her lashes fluttered, heavy with tears. “And I—I’ve given Baron von List exactly what he wanted. I’ve done it. I’ve played into his hand.”

The silence was deafening after her words fell. Andre sat back, his mind unfurling the implications she hadn’t said but that hung heavy between them. She was right—he understood just enough of alliances, power struggles, and ambition to know what she feared wasn’t far-fetched. Thea wasn’t caught in the web; she was the web. Every thread circled back to her, every knot tightening with her despair.

“This could mean war,” she whispered, her voice raw. “A war I caused and that would implicate my brothers. All for… for…”

“For me?” he asked, though he had no need to. The answer hung between them like a fragile grape ripening too soon and rotting on the vine.

She raised her eyes then, amber and glassy, and met his gaze with searing honesty. “For someone I have no right to choose.” Her words cracked as they escaped her, raw and vulnerable.

Andre’s chest burned with the need to speak but fear that anything he might say could make it worse. He reached for her hand instead, slid his palm over hers. Her skin was cold and unsteady—such a contradiction to the fire that burned within her.

“Thea,” he said at last, his voice steady but low. “I know what it is to feel the consequences of my very existence. But this…? This war you fear? It is not your doing—at least, not yours alone.”

“You don’t understand!” she cried, her hands trembling under his. “I can’t undo this, Andre. Don’t you see? There’s no going back.”

“And who says going back is the solution?” His voice came suddenly, sharp and impassioned. “For years, I blamed myself for things that weren’t my fault. Do you want to know what that granted me? Nothing.” He paused, his hand tightening its hold on hers. “When I was eighteen, I fled—a decision that shaped my life. Napoleon’s army…” His words faltered for a moment before he found strength again. “They would not have spared my family if they learned of me—a bastard. The timing of my birth stained us all.”

She blinked at him, speechless for the first time since he entered.

“So I left,” he continued, his words laden with memory. “I removed myself as if that would cleanse their name. I stopped using my full name. I clung to medicine like a drowning man to driftwood because in medicine, science mattered. Skill mattered. Not parentage—never blood.” He leaned closer, his thumb brushing her knuckles. “It was society that cast the shadow, Thea. Not me. Not my family. Just misplaced judgment.”

Her voice softened, tentative, as she asked, “You ran away to protect them?”

“I did,” he admitted, the confession raw in his throat. “And while I ache for what I abandoned, I know it was my only choice. But now that Anna told me about her awful husband, I wonder if I should have stayed. And I’m not running away from you. Not now, not ever—for as long as you want me by your side.”

“And yet I risk everything now,” she said faintly. “My family’s lives. My home…”

“No, you don’t.” His voice caused her gaze to snap to his. “If alliances crumble or conquest is plotted, that is far bigger than you, Thea. They might wield you as an excuse, but it’s not your doing. And you have me now,” he added, his voice softening. “You have my family at your back.”

Tears shimmered in her eyes anew, though something unspoken passed between them—a flicker of hope in the midst of despair. Her free hand sought his, trembling and light. “I’m dragging you into this,” she murmured. “Into me.”

Andre shook his head at once, his thumb brushing the edge of her hand. “You’re not dragging me anywhere. I choose this, Thea. I choose you . Whatever comes next—we’ll face it together. Do you want that?”

For a long moment, her dark gaze searched his, words beyond her grasp. Then, as sunlight dappled the leaves around them, she gave the faintest of nods, her lips tilting into something fragile but real.

Andre allowed himself to forget, just for a moment, the weight of his past. Timing, his mother had once said, mattered little. And now, with Thea’s hand in his, he dared to believe she’d been right all along.