x
The candles had flickered out, and the only dim lighting came from the shreds of sunlight filtered through heavy clouds, falling rain, and panes of glass. It was enough to illuminate the white rose that had adorned my hair, lying on the coffee table beside a pile of hairpins and empty dishes, and it was enough for Chevalier and me, cuddling on the sofa in silence. I had my legs tucked up beside me as I snuggled into his side, and he combed his fingers through my hair, working the waves left by the updo out with each stroke.
We hadn’t spoken for a while now. Not since I sobered up enough to realize how much I’d embarrassed myself. Chevalier had reassured me I’d done nothing wrong, and I’d been more tipsy than drunk, but I felt my cheeks warm all over again when I remembered the way I’d clung to him in front of everyone. At least I’d avoided a hangover thanks to his insistence that I drink water and eat - both before and after he kissed me senseless.
Drunk, tipsy, or sober, that had been fun.
But now, watching the rain falling steadily outside, following the rivulets tracing down the windows with my eyes, I felt a dull ache in my chest. I knew this familiar throbbing pain. It came whenever I thought of Mother, and I always thought of her when it rained.
She loved the rain.
Chevalier kissed the top of my head. “You’re thinking about her, aren’t you?”
I nodded. His hand found mine on his lap and squeezed it as the memories came trickling in, like the tiny streams that used to work their way under the door and walls of my old house and turn the dirt floor to mud. She used to sit on that muddy floor, holding me on her lap in the open doorway when I was just a young child stricken with terror by every roll of thunder. I’d clutch her dress and hide my face in her chest, and her gentle reassurances would wash over me, as soft and soothing as her humming, weaving in and out of the pitter-patter of raindrops and low grumbles of distant thunder as she stroked my hair. The fear couldn’t stay when she did that.
The fear couldn’t stay when I was with Chevalier, either. Not since the first time he held me after Jack’s assault and promised he’d never allow that man to touch me again.
Mother should be here. She wanted this for me. She wanted me to find love, she wanted me to be safe, and she wanted somebody to take care of me after she passed away. That was her biggest concern at the end. Taking care of me.
And she wasn’t here to see her dream for me come true.
I wished she were here.
Chevalier’s hand left mine to brush across my cheeks. His fingers came away wet.
“Sorry. I don’t mean to cry,” I said, raising my hand to wipe my cheeks dry, but he caught my wrist and leaned in to kiss the corner of my eye. I took a deep, shuddering breath and closed my eyes, and he kissed my cheek, once, twice, releasing my wrist on the third kiss to free his fingers to slide under my chin and tilt my face up. My hand went to the back of his neck, curling into the stiff white fabric of his jacket collar as he continued kissing my tears away. His lips tasted salty when they found mine at last.
The kiss was short, chaste, and everything I needed.
Our breaths mingled as our lips parted. He rested his forehead against mine, his pale blonde eyelashes and crystal blue eyes close and comforting, and his hand slid around to the side of my neck.
“Don’t apologize,” he murmured, stroking my cheek with his thumb. “It is only natural you would think of her today.”
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, and, when I opened them again, I gave him a small smile. “She used to tell people if it rained on their wedding day, that was a blessing from God, because rain brings new life. I guess…no, I know she’d be smiling if she were here.”
He returned my smile and pulled back enough to press a kiss to my forehead. I shifted to put my other arm around his neck, interlacing my fingers over one shoulder and resting my head on the other. Lightning flashed across the sky, and I waited for the inevitable thunderclap. It came, as it always did, far away this time. Another flash of lightning lit up the clouds, this time unable to break free and streak across the sky.
“After I got over my fear of thunderstorms, they became kind of fun,” I said quietly. “Mother would teach me a new song or tell me a story in her native tongue, and she’d laugh and correct my pronunciation when I tried to imitate her.”
I could almost hear an echo of her laughter in the faint grumblings of thunder. It made me smile.
“Sometimes, if she couldn’t find work on a rainy day, we’d go out and jump in puddles, just because we could. She always said we needed to do laundry, anyway, so why not get a little dirty? Even if we didn’t really need to do laundry. I knew she was making more work for herself, but…she enjoyed it as much as I did, and she liked to laugh, so I never said anything.”
Chevalier remained quiet, his fingers combing through my hair again as the memories came and went. There were too many to tell, but a recent memory from a summer thunderstorm last year crossed my mind, and it made me giggle.
“Once, it thundered really loudly in the middle of the night, loud enough to wake us up, and it startled me so much that I fell out of bed. She laughed about that for a long time.”
He chuckled. “I’m sure.”
I looked up at him and, unsurprisingly, found his eyes on me instead of the rain. The warmth in them was clear, even in the poor lighting.
“You don’t have any memories like that with your mother, do you?” I asked softly.
“No.”
My heart throbbed again. “And your grandfather isn’t much of a grandfather, either.”
“Not in the sense you’re familiar with. Family ties among royalty define political influence and the route of inheritance. Nothing more.”
“That’s not true,” I protested. “I’ve seen you with your brothers.”
He smiled. “There are always exceptions to the rule, and you once told me I make and break rules as I see fit.”
“I did say that, didn’t I?” I turned back to the window, watching the rain that had gentled to something akin to a spring shower. He broke a lot of rules when it came to me.
“Mother used to tease me about you,” I said after a while.
“Oh?”
“I’d tell her about my day when I got home from work - carefully selected bits of information so she wouldn’t worry - and I guess I was talking about you more and more, so…well, I’d told her about you taking me into town for Rhodolite Foundation Day, and you buying me a book and a funnel cake and then inviting me to read in the gardens with you, and she knew about you paying off her doctor’s bill, too. She probably guessed about…about Jack. I never could hide anything from her. But, anyway, she heard the carriage drop me off after…that first time you made me take a carriage home, and that’s when she started teasing me about you. And…that’s when she made me promise to show you Father’s journal. After she…” I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Anyway, that’s when I told you I didn’t want to continue taking a carriage.”
He didn’t answer immediately.
“I recall thinking I was doing a poor job concealing my attraction toward you if a dying woman I’d never met could tell,” he muttered.
I smiled despite the lump’s return to my throat. “That is pretty bad.”
Another low, distant rumble of thunder. I hadn’t seen the lightning this time. The storm was losing its strength. A question brewed in my chest, one that I’d wanted to ask for a while, but the timing was never right, or I couldn’t work up the courage. This was as good a time as any, though.
“Um, Chevalier…how…how long have you had feelings for me?”
The silence was deafening, even louder than my heart, thundering in my ears.
“How long do you think?” he asked after an eternity. Typical Chevalier, answering a question with a question.
“Well, I was trying very hard not to notice,” I replied, plucking at his lapel instead of meeting his eyes. “It took Mother’s pestering for me to even acknowledge that you liked me, and I still wouldn’t admit it to her. And that doesn’t mean you felt anything for me. You can like somebody without-”
It was so sudden. One moment, I was cuddled up next to him, my head on his shoulder and his arm around my waist; and the next, he’d shoved me against the backrest, his hands on my shoulders and his face inches from mine.
“Chevalier-” I protested weakly. His hand moved to my neck, and he traced a single finger up and down my skin. A thrill ran up my spine.
“The first time I did this was the first day we met,” he said, his voice low and quiet. “I wanted to test your limits. You were terrified of me, but you wouldn’t back down.”
I swallowed hard. The intensity in his eyes drew me in, and warmth blossomed in my skin, following his finger’s trail up to my chin, then to my cheek.
“I found myself watching you, intrigued by you. And I realized how frustratingly attractive you were.” His finger slid back down my neck to trace my collarbone. “I didn’t like anybody else touching you.”
He brought his face even closer to mine, brushing my nose with his, and I shivered with anticipation, but he maintained a fractional distance between us, his breath ghosting across my lips and reminding me to breathe. It was a difficult task, since I was drowning in the oceans of his eyes.
“You kept getting into trouble, and I wanted - needed - to protect you.”
My cheeks were blazing hot. Even my ears had to be red at this point. I swallowed again and licked my lips nervously. His eyes only left mine for a second to glance at them.
“When I killed the assassin, I thought of you and the danger I was putting you in by keeping you near me. I hated the thought of hurting you, but I hated the thought of losing you more. I didn’t sleep at all that night, knowing what I had to do.”
His lips brushed against mine, and my eyes fluttered closed, but he pulled back. I bit my tongue to stop a needy whimper from escaping.
“But you wouldn’t leave.” He slid his fingers up to my chin, tilting it up and running his thumb across my lips. They parted of their own accord. “My plans had never failed before. I wanted to drive you away, and I realized I’d fallen in love with you instead.”
I swallowed hard to bring saliva to my dry mouth. “That…that early, huh?” I asked in a hoarse voice.
His lips finally met mine in a kiss as insistent and wild as the storm had been an hour ago. I felt his heart pounding in his chest, hard and fast, or maybe that was my heart racing out of control, my blood rushing to my ears so I couldn’t even hear the quick gasps for air between kisses. I’d never felt his skin so hot before. His fingers burned my cheeks as he cupped my face in his hands, burned my neck as they slid down to my shoulders, burned through my dress as they roamed over my back. I clung to him, head spinning, unable to process anything beyond the here and now until he finished stealing my breath and trailed wet kisses down my neck. Roses invading my senses. Dripping water somewhere beyond panted breaths. His weight pinning me beneath him on the sofa.
His weight pinning me beneath him on the sofa.
I was pinned beneath him on the sofa.
He was still kissing me. His breath was fire on my collarbone. It felt good, and it also terrified me.
“U-um, Ch-chevalier…”
And suddenly, he was gone. His weight, his cologne, his kisses, his touch. I took a few deep, steadying breaths before I sat up.
“Chevalier?”
He was halfway across the library, his back to me as he strode toward the door. “We have to leave early in the morning if we’re to make it back by evening,” he said, his voice unnaturally tight.
“O-okay.” I found my shoes and slipped them on, standing on shaky legs. His abrupt departure told me what I’d felt was right. He had lost control for a moment, and he was in danger of doing so again if we stayed here - alone in the dark.
This was why I hadn’t asked before now. I hadn’t been sure I could handle the answer.
“Um…we don’t have to ride with your…uh, grandfather, do we?” I asked, keeping my eyes on the floor as I followed him to the exit.
“No. He has his own carriage.”
Was that a good thing, or a bad thing?
“Chevalier, I…”
He sighed and caught my chin when I reached his side, bringing my face up to look at him. “You’ll have to tell me your side later.”
I smiled shyly. “Maybe in broad daylight. With a chaperon.”
He chuckled and smoothed my hair. “Maybe."33Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGsVQh9NYk7
