“It doesn’t have to be forever. I mean, I’m not waiting for you or some creepyMadding Crowdshit like that.” I managed a vague impression of a laugh. “Maybe when you’re a smug married and I’m over you, we can be friends or something. Just…not right now.”
His hold on me had loosened, so I was able to pull back. It was only a couple of steps but it felt like a long, long journey. Caspian straightened, repositioned the knot of his tie, the cool grey light from the floor-to-ceiling windows turning him into his own shadow.
“Then go,” he said. “Before I can’t let you.”
I’m sure, once upon a time, walking away from Caspian Hart would have been the hardest thing I’d ever done. Now it definitely wasn’t, but it still hurt like fuck. I took it almost gladly, though, because the pain was swift and clean, and I knew I could take it.
I’d chosen it, after all. And that made it mine.
As much mine as my love.
I was weepy and exhausted by the time I made it to the warehouse, but in an okayishwelp, these are the reactions that I’m havingsort of way. Nothing sleep and time wouldn’t help. Halfway to the ladder to my mezzanine, I tripped over Ellery’s second-favourite boots—which had been left in the middle of the floor—and fell flat on my face.
Normally, this would not have improved my day. But the fact they were there after nearly two bootless, Elleryless months, and that she’d obviously wanted me to find them, albeit probably not nose-first, filled my battered spirit with genuine joy. She’d been here. She’d come back. Reaching for my phone, I intended to text her something funny and charming and not too desperate about Broderick, but ended up just sending:I miss you. Please come home.And to my surprise, a few minutes later I got back:okay. soon.Which was more than I could have hoped for.
I had a lot to think about as I crawled gratefully into bed. Like the fact my life had been a long string of fuck-ups recently, including but not limited to cheating with my engaged ex-boyfriend, coming perilously close to losing my best friend, and nearly destroying my family. It wasn’t a time I was going to look back on with pride, but now that I was through the worst of it—please, God, let me be through the worst of it—I was starting to understand that sometimes shit just happened, and sometimes the shit was your fault, but all you could really do was deal with it and live with it and try to own it.
Though, of course, the dealing and living and owning got way easier if you had people around. People who would stick by you and forgive you and help you when you needed it. And I knew I had that—would always have that—no matter how much it felt like my sky was falling down around me. I wanted it for Caspian too, even it meant he found it with Nathaniel, and not with me.
It wasn’t the ending I’d imagined for us. Not the one I’d dreamed of and yearned for and nearly lost myself trying to bring about. But it was what we had. It was still our story. And that would be enough for me.
Chapter 38
Right then. Dealing. Living. Owning. Not always easy, but it kept me focused, kept me moving forward. Work helped. George helped. Updates from Nik and Poppy’s place in Boston helped. Ellery still wasn’t back full-time, but her boots were often on the floor, and my bread and cereal kept disappearing, which I took as a good sign. As much as I missed her, I certainly had no intention of pressuring her. Check me out: all mature and shit. And thankfully, despite my brain dwelling pretty obsessively on worst-case scenarios for a couple of days, there wasn’t a peep from Jonas.
Things were quiet, which was what I needed. Without Ellery for them to happen around, the warehouse stopped being a party space and became more of ame in a blanket reading Georgette Heyer on the sofa and eating Galaxyspace. Which meant that, when there came a knock on the door one evening, it took me genuinely by surprise—especially because it was too late for an Amazon delivery and I hadn’t ordered takeaway. Probably it was Ellery, returning home in royal state, carrying neither keys nor money, and so I eagerly uncurled and went to let her in.
Except it wasn’t Ellery. It was Lancaster Steyne.
“Arden.” He stepped past me before I had the presence of mind to slam the door on his feet, face, or any other physical protuberances he might have possessed. “I think it’s time we had a talk, don’t you?”
Since I wasn’t sure what else to do, I followed him inside. “What could we possibly have to talk about?”
“Why”—he offered me a mocking smile—“Caspian Hart, of course.”
This was…this was not happening. Apart from the bit where it definitely was. Lancaster Steyne was in the warehouse. Right now. With me. And I know I’d got my judgmental on recently about other people getting murdery, but there was part of me that quite seriously wanted to go for a knife. I mean, no jury would blame me, right? Or would they—because Lancaster Steyne was a rich, sophisticated, well-regarded pillar of his community, and I was a tiny queer in a purple unicorn onesie who had recently been in the papers for kissing siblings.
At which point Steyne broke into my bloody reverie with the remark “I would love some tea. Earl Grey if you have it.”
And I was so completely out of it that I actually went to make him some.
“No milk,” he added. “I really can’t abide people who put milk in Earl Grey.”
Under normal circumstances, I might have agreed with him, though I’d have gone with “don’t get” rather than “can’t abide.” As it was, I hastily splashed some into the cup. “Oops. Sorry. Too late.”
He gave a deep, rich chuckle. “And I suppose were I to request bread and butter, you would give me cake.”
Oh no. He wasn’t getting around me with a cute literary reference. “You’re lucky you’re not getting a face full of boiling water.”
“Dear me. Such hostility.” He sounded entirely unconcerned. Which was annoying.
I brought him his tea and he made me stand there with it while he took his coat off—a velvet-collared Chesterfield that I hated myself for slightly admiring. Underneath he was in a dark grey suit, as crisp and well fitted as any of Caspian’s, though a touch more dandyish, with the French cuffs, and the jewelled cufflinks, and the opulent purple silk of his tie. He looked like a man who knew how to live well, and that thought made my skin want to slough off my bones.
He picked upThese Old Shades, glanced at it with mild amusement, and then put it carefully aside so there was room for him on the sofa. He sat like Caspian, one leg draped elegantly over the other, but with none of Caspian’s restlessness. Steyne’s was a bear trap poise: unyielding and cold and designed to leave you bleeding.
I handed him his fucking tea. “What do you want?”
“What I have always wanted: Caspian’s happiness.”
