Page 34 of My Lord Rogue
“Why are you telling me this?” she whispered.
He hesitated, then closed the gap between them, so they were shoulder to shoulder at the water’s edge.
“Because you should know exactly who you’re pretending to love,” he said.
He let the words stand, then looked away, as if ashamed of their weight.
Theo stared out over the water, her breath ragged. She tried to picture herself back at the house, among the women who had already written the rest of her story in ink. But the image wouldn’t hold. It slipped away, replaced by the knowledge that she was here, alive, and that the next choice would belong to her alone.
“I have spent the last year trying not to feel anything at all,” she said, not looking at him. “I thought it would keep me safe. But I don’t think it works that way.”
He smiled, slow and rueful. “It doesn’t.”
They stood there, the world stilled around them, every possibility alive and waiting.
Theo turned, studying his face. She saw the shadow of violence there, the promise of heartbreak, but also the hope of something brighter—something wild, and ugly, and true.
She stepped closer, until there was nothing between them but air. He didn’t move, didn’t reach for her, just waited.
“I don’t believe you could ruin me,” she said, voice steady. “I think you’d have to care, first.”
He exhaled, the sound half-laughter, half-prayer.
“Perhaps,” he said. “But you’d be surprised how quickly that can change.”
She touched his hand—briefly, lightly—and felt the pulse beneath his skin.
For the first time all day, she let herself smile.
They lingered, neither willing to break the spell, and the world around them fell away.
The game was far from over. But for now, in the hush between the next lie and the next confession, there was peace.
They walked back together, slower this time, the path curving ahead like a promise. Behind them, the lake was a perfect, empty mirror, waiting to reflect whatever the chose to do next.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The walk back from the lake was nothing like the walk away. The sky, so benign a half-hour ago, had sealed itself shut with slate. A wind picked up, urgent and indecent, flattening the reeds along the bank and thrashing at the necks of the lilies. Theo felt it first as a shift in pressure—a dense, expectant stillness—followed by the distant sound of thunder, a noise so subterranean it seemed to rise through the soles of her shoes before it ever reached her ears.
Teddy turned his face upward, watching the clouds. “That is not a gentle storm. If we run, we may beat it. If not—” He left the rest unsaid, but his hand tightened fractionally on her arm.
She let him guide her back toward the house, their pace a brittle half-jog along the shrinking path. The wind rose with every step. Within minutes, the first drops spattered against her shoulders, fat and cold as tears. Then, as if some god had lost patience, the rain broke in a single, drenching curtain—nothing gradual or polite, only the violent assertion of the elements.
The rest of the picnic scattered in a panicked blur. Distantly, she saw Verity and Lady Amelia lift their skirts and sprint for the shelter of the terrace, voices lifted in shrieks that dissolved inthe storm. The men shouted instructions, half-drunk and wholly ineffectual, as baskets and bottles went tumbling in the grass. No one even tried to salvage the food.
Within moments, Theo’s gown was soaked. The silk turned transparent, a second skin clinging to every curve and hollow, the wet fabric latching on to her like the grasp of an eager lover. Her hair, so carefully arranged that morning, uncoiled from its pins and hung in sodden ropes against her cheeks. Water ran down her back, over the dip of her spine, and down behind her knees. She gasped, choking on a mouthful of rain and laughter, and turned to see Teddy at her side, equally destroyed.
His coat was off, his shirt plastered to his chest. The linen, when wet, offered nothing in the way of discretion. The fabric revealed every plane of muscle, every rise and fall of bone beneath the skin. His hair dripped in his eyes, his expression was wild and exhilarated, a boy’s delight and a man’s hunger stitched together in a face made for neither. He draped his coat over her shoulders, allowing her some modesty.
She tried to speak, but the wind drove the breath from her. Teddy reached for her hand, his fingers locking around hers, and together they sprinted up the last stretch of path.
They reached the conservatory and Teddy yanked open the door and propelled her through, then followed, slamming it shut against the howl of the wind. The impact echoed in the domed chamber, startling a flock of finches into flight among the trailing vines. Inside, the air was a different world—thick, sweet, and almost tropically hot. Every pane of glass was fogged with condensation, rivulets of water raced each other down the sloped roof, tracing patterns that vanished and re-formed with every flash of lightning.
Theo stood gasping, her lungs burning from the run. She was soaked through, the blue of her gown gone indigo, her skin showing pale and iridescent beneath. She pressed her palmsto her cheeks, then down to her thighs, as if touch could confirm the fact of her own body. She was acutely aware of the wetness everywhere—on her eyelashes, between her fingers, at the hollows of her knees and elbows, at the small of her back.
Teddy stood a few paces away, hands braced on his knees, catching his breath. He looked up at her and laughed—an honest, animal sound, the sort she had not heard from any man since childhood. “Well,” he said, voice rough, “I suppose it was only a matter of time before the weather turned.”
She tried to muster a reply, but the words were lost to the air. Instead, she stood, and water sluiced from her hem onto the mosaic tile, pooling in shapes like fallen leaves. She shivered, though the air was close and thick as velvet.