“I wish I could ride him like you someday.”
“Someday always comes sooner than you think.” William grinned when the boy lifted his head, brows rising.
“Ya think I’m near grown, then?”
“If the way you work and eat is any indication.”
Dipping his chin to his chest, grinning, sheepish, the boy shrugged. “Mum always told me to eat good. Papa always told me to work good.” He dug into his pocket. “Look what I got from Cook. A wee present for fetchin’ water for one of the scullery maids. Here.”
William pushed the sugar biscuit back. “You eat them both.”
“I want ya to have it—”
The double doors whined open from the front of the stables.
Isaac stood, stuffing the treat back in his pocket, as if worried someone had come to retract the sugar biscuits.
“William?”
He stood at her voice. What was she doing here? After dark, no less?
Isaac’s shoulders slumped in relief that it was only Miss Gresham. In the past fortnight, she had come every day for their ride along the beach, and though the groom grumbled complaints now and then, no one else seemed to notice or mind.
William knew of one person who would.
“William, are you there?”
Isaac mumbled good night and left, while William set his bridle on the workbench and stepped forward with the lantern. “Over here.”
In the darkness, clasping a candlestick, she padded toward him. “I thought perhaps you were already asleep.”
“Something is wrong?”
“No.” She hesitated. Pulled a green-covered book from the folds of her dress. “You mentioned today that you enjoyed the novels you read when you were injured. I brought you another one from the library. For your evenings.”
He had very little time for sleep, let alone reading. He took the book anyway. “Thank you.”
She nodded, smiled, but it lacked conviction in her eyes.Her eyes.He stayed there, pulled in, sucked into the depth of them without meaning to.
This should not happen.
He knew that.
But he studied every inch of her face, every smooth line and slope, and fought the itch in his fingers to touch them. He wondered how soft her hair would be. Without the pins, without the tight curls. Just down over her shoulders, falling around her face, free and slick and black and—
She turned, but he stepped around her.
“You did not come for the book.”
“No.” A breath escaped. “I came because of this.” She handed him a letter, but he didn’t unfold it.
“What is it?”
“From Father. He is returning.”
“And?”
“He wishes me to accompany him to London for the season.”
