Page 69 of The Forsaken
Chapter 13
God, she had missed him this last week, so damned much. And she would miss him forever.
Amidst slivers of broken mirror, colored glass, and nautical treasures her cousin, Cassia, brought back to adorn Myrtle’s grotto, Andromena and Edgar stood at an impasse. His white gloves lay a symbolic divide between her and the only man she wanted to spend forever with.
Andromena’s throat closed up. She did not doubt his strength, nor his ability to defeat Satan himself if the fight came to his door, yet she would never put her selfish longing for him above his safety. She would have traded the stars, the sky, and her own breath to protect him.
Since reading that awful note on her pillow, she did as her blackmailer demanded—Andromena avoided Edgar at all costs. Yet, when they crossed paths in the hall, her heart still yearned for him. She lingered near the door during his interviews with the staff, captivated by his gentle questions. Inevitably, he coaxed a nervous laugh from every single candidate.
She sighed with them, then remembered those interviews happened because of her thefts and scurried away in shame.
He narrowed his eyes.
“You dropped your gloves, Edgar.”
Her soft voice rippled across the grotto’s dark pool and hit the cavern walls.
“Better than throwing them at you,” he snapped. He pulled something from his jacket. “Here. After your tantrum, I returned and fetched them.”
He held her slippers out like, a pink, sparkling satin olive branch.
Wordlessly, on her damp stockinged feet, Andromena picked her way over the slick stones.
When she did not take them, he gave them a wag.
Andromena plucked them from his fingers, snatched them close, and retreated a step. “It wasn’t a tantrum.”
“I don’t care what it was.” His tone said otherwise.
Andromena drew her slippers against her chest. “What do you want, Edgar?”
“That didn’t sound like a thank you.”
“Is that truly your desire? Did you chase after me merely to receive my thanks?”
His nostrils flared. “You test me. I do not chase women. I don’t interrupt dances, and I certainly do not call on public spectacles.”
“Truly?” She lifted a brow. “How do you define your recent conduct with Lord Kilmartin?”
“I have noticed your absence from the cataloging. You have been derelict in your duties to the Earl of Abington.”
An ache settled in her breast.
That is what he cared about? This is why he’d publicly dispensed with Lord Kilmartin in the middle of London’s biggest event?
It was for the best. Indifferent was better, for both of them.
“I don’t answer to you, Edgar.”
His hard mouth mocked her lie.
He moved fast.
Andromena gasped.
Her slippers fell with a soft thwack to the stone earth. Edgar caught her to him. “You’ve been hiding from me, darling. I want to know why.”
The toes of Edgar’s heavy Wellington riding boots brushed her hems. He was the only nobleman in the kingdom who refused polite court shoes for gear meant for the saddle.
