Page 31

Chapter Twenty

“ S o to recap,” Katherine began, looking at Spencer, then at his wife, and then at Charlotte. Dinner was laid out before them, the small dining room in the cottage feeling even smaller with the four of them in it. “You ladies became friends when…”

“Well, when I was twenty,” Eleanor answered. “Charlotte was seven-and-ten—recently debuted, I believe.”

“That is right,” Charlotte sighed, shaking her head as she smiled wistfully. “Oh, sometimes I miss those early balls. Suitors would clamber over one another to get to the most eligible lady.”

She let out a laugh, and Eleanor followed. But Spencer noticed that it did not reach her eyes. He filed that observation away for later, wanting to ask her about it.

“Charlotte, do you recall Lord Grimsby?” Eleanor suddenly asked, covering her mouth as she laughed.

“Lord…” Charlotte’s brow creased until recognition struck her. “Heavens, Lord Grimsby!”

A loud, raucous laugh burst from her lips as she bent over the table. Spencer merely looked aghast at her reaction. He glanced at his aunt, who looked impatient to know the reason behind such mirth.

“Do get a hold of yourself, niece, and tell us the story,” Katherine chastised lightly.

“Oh, I cannot,” Charlotte answered, her voice strained. “He was an absolutely horrid man! He must have been at least sixty-five, and he approached every lady in the ballroom, asking for a dance.”

“At first, Charlotte felt rather sorry for him,” Eleanor pitched in, “so she accepted his offer when everybody else turned him away.”

“I did!” Charlotte nodded earnestly. “I truly felt sorry for him. It must be hard, and we cannot understand such things. He was old, with no heir, possibly no surviving family, and knew that no lady would accept his suit.”

“Yes, but he was awful. He was… greasy.” Eleanor shuddered.

Spencer found himself relaxing as he started picturing the younger versions of his sister and his wife. What the two of them had shared before Eleanor was sent to St. Euphemia’s.

How could he have ever denied her claims of their friendship?

He watched her as she recounted watching Charlotte dance with the old lord and how his hand had brazenly traveled too far, resulting in him being escorted out of the ballroom.

“I believe he settled down in the end,” Charlotte murmured. “About a year ago. An old widow took a liking to him.”

“Ah, well, it seems that more happy endings are to be found than sad ones.” Eleanor smiled at her. “And then there was the other man whose hair was…”

Charlotte mimicked a very long ponytail with her hand, and the two of them burst into more giggles.

“Where were you during these dances, nephew?” Katherine asked, drawing Spencer’s attention.

He tore his gaze away from Eleanor and cleared his throat.

“Well, Spencer was not present for my first debut,” Charlotte hurriedly said, giving him a tight smile. “However, there was no shortage of other strange suitors when I reentered Society.”

“I never knew what truly happened to make you disappear, Charlotte,” Eleanor noted.

But Charlotte only lifted her wine glass and murmured, “Likewise, Eleanor.”

For a moment, they only laughed, and then Charlotte shrugged off the whole inquisition before reminding Eleanor of a hopeless gossip who had been shamed out of the ton for a most uncouth pregnancy rumor.

“You must have been there for these stories at least, Spencer,” Katherine pushed, trying to get involved.

She always had, always afraid to miss out on her nephew’s life when he had distanced himself.

Spencer stiffened. “I am certain I was… there, watching. Perhaps I was distracted for a moment.”

Eleanor tried to make eye contact, but he purposefully averted his gaze, not wanting to cloud his mind with darker thoughts.

He dug his fork into the meat on his plate, pushing it all away. He deserved that. He deserved to simply sit with his family, watch them, and know that they were safe.

He had done well by them. His sister was smiling, his wife was laughing, and his aunt watched on fondly even as she attemptedto tell the women off for their unladylike snorts.

An unexpected warmth bloomed in his chest. For a second, he did not recognize it.

He chewed slowly, thoughtfully, digging his focus into that warmth.

“Spencer?”

Charlotte’s voice sounded distant, and he found himself smiling, a disbelieving laugh spilling past his lips.

“Are you all right, Spencer?”

Katherine’s voice broke through his haze, but it was Eleanor he sought out first. Her soft gaze, that smile she had fought hard to win back, the shadows of her past tucked away at least for the night.

And he was doing the same.

Home .

That was what the feeling was.

The warmth filled him. It filled the hole that had been dug in his chest, punched through when he was only a boy, forever carved into him, making him feel incomplete. He had tried to fill that gap with too many things that had never worked, greedily hunting for something to make himself whole.

Yet the answer was right there: his family. Laughter.

No, home wasn’t a wall and endless hallways, or even a maple tree forest behind a grand estate. Home was the candlelight catching his sister’s blue eyes—so very different from his own—and the curve of Eleanor’s grin as she tipped her head back, her hair tumbling down her back.

Home wasn’t something he was familiar with, but as that warmth anchored him, he wanted to welcome it back into himself.

It had been too long.

Do you know that you undo me entirely?

He looked at Eleanor.

Do you know that you are turning me into a man I do not recognize—perhaps the man I might have once been? A man worthy of you.

Spencer smiled, tuning back into the conversation as Eleanor recounted a ball where she had tripped on her way to the dance floor.

“Of course, you tripped; you are ever so clumsy,” he muttered almost absentmindedly. And just that simple familiarity between them softened the atmosphere.

“Charlotte,” Katherine spoke up a few moments later. “I do believe you have had quite enough wine.”

“Oh, nonsense! I am celebrating my friend’s return to my life.”

“It is lovely to know that I am included too,” Spencer drawled.

“Of course I am celebrating you, too, Brother. But Eleanor and I are very close. Closer than you and her, perhaps.” Her words grew more slurred as she held up a scolding finger.

“She is my very best friend, and nothing— nothing —in this world will pull us apart again.” She jabbed that scolding finger at Eleanor. “You must promise me this.”

“I promise,” Eleanor swore, and the two linked fingers.

“I can hardly believe Charlotte drank so much wine that she passed out,” Eleanor sighed as they closed the door to their room later that evening.

“It is not an unfamiliar sight,” Spencer confessed, grimacing. “After I returned to London, there were evenings when she was so cross with me that she would break into my stash of brandy. She would very much take a tumble into a deep slumber, inebriated.”

Eleanor’s face twisted in sympathy. “Why did you leave London? And Charlotte.”

Spencer tensed up, a lie coming to the tip of his tongue before he could rethink it.

He could offer a thousand excuses, reasons that were not as honest as he wanted to be, but Eleanor deserved better than that.

“The answer to that does not make a nice tale,” he sighed. “Let me tell you another night.”

Eleanor nodded, sitting down at the vanity to start loosening her hair. Having styled it back for dinner, part of it was still wet.

Spencer had moved over to her chair before he realized was he was doing, and then he was combing his fingers through the thick strands. Her eyes met his in the mirror.

“Here,” he said quietly, nodding toward the fireplace. He had ordered a maid to light it before dinner. “Come, warm up.”

As he guided Eleanor over to the fire, he snagged a towel on his way. She delicately lowered herself to the floor, sighing when he put a mound of cushions and blankets around her to soften the hardness of the wood.

She smiled up at him, tilting her head back. He wrapped her hair in the towel and gently squeezed it. Then, he kneeled behind her, and she turned her face toward the fire, warming herself.

His fingers were deft on the towel, drying her hair with care. He loved her hair, finding it soft and thick— beautiful .

“You think it is beautiful?” Eleanor asked, making him realize he had spoken aloud.

Spencer continued working the towel through her damp strands. “I think you are beautiful, Eleanor. Everything about you is beautiful.”

He sat back on his heels, and before he could reconsider, he brushed her hair over her shoulder, baring the back of her neck. His eyes closed, his mouth pressed to her skin.

“You still smell like the rain,” he murmured, nosing along her upper back until he brushed the neckline of her dress.

His mouth grazed the fabric. The towel slipped from his hands, which rose to the laces of her dress.

“And you still smell like firewood,” she whispered. “Like the woods behind Everdawn Hall. I have always thought so. It is as if the scent follows you. As if it calls you back home every time.”

“Perhaps it does,” he relented. “Especially now that it has become my home with you.”

The words were placating, masking the things he wasn’t yet ready to say. He swallowed, his hands dancing down the back of her dress until it loosened. He slid a finger into the gap between the fastenings, exhaling when he met her bare skin.

“Spencer,” she whispered.

He paused. “I can stop?—”

“Do not.” Her head turned to him, her shoulders slumping. “I… I am inexperienced.”

“I will guide you.” Spencer couldn’t help but press a kiss to the top of her spine.

“I will be terribly imperfect.”

“You will be most perfect,” he declared against her skin as his fingers slid over her shoulders, pushing down the sleeves of her dress.