CHAPTER 37: CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN

Carcel’s eyes widened, his mind a complete and utter blank. He had been caught. He had been caught smiling. A smile, he was certain, that made him look like a depraved lunatic.

He needed a lie. A fast one. A boring one.

He cleared his throat, the sound a rough, gravelly rasp. "The tea," he said, his voice stiff. He lifted his cup, his hand miraculously steady. "The tea smells... very good today."

He took a long, desperate sip. It was cold. It was bitter. It was, quite possibly, the worst tea he had ever tasted.

Rowan stared at him, his head tilted, his expression one of pure bafflement. "The tea," Rowan repeated, as if the word were foreign. "That is what made you smile? My friend, you are truly not yourself. You are talking like an old man." He paused and smiled. "Who made you this way? What’s her name?"

Before Rowan could press the matter, before Carcel had to invent a second, even more pathetic lie, a voice, light and clear as a silver bell, drifted in from the hallway.

"Sorry, am I late?"

The two men looked up.

Rowan looked up, his face softening with affection, ready to greet his sister. Carcel looked up as if a cannonball had just been fired through the wall.

She’s here.

His heart, which had been a dull, hungover, guilty-thudding thing, gave a single, violent, painful lurch. He froze. His teacup stopped halfway to his lips. He could not breathe.

Don’t look at her. Look at Rowan. Look at the eggs. Look at the salt shaker. Look anywhere but at her. He will know. He will look at you, and he will look at her, and he will know. He will see the guilt, the memory, the... the sin, written all over your face.

He failed.

He could not look. His eyes, against every command, against every last shred of his honor and self-preservation, were drawn to the doorway.

She was... radiant.

She was dressed in a simple day dress of pale, cheerful pink. It was the color of a rosebud, innocent and bright. Her hair, her glorious, wild, reddish-brown hair, was not unbound in a cloud of sin and temptation. It was pulled back from her face, tied in a simple, high ponytail that bounced against her back as she walked.

She was... cheerful. Her face was bright, her cheeks flushed with a natural, healthy color. She looked as if she had just had the most restful, peaceful, and perfect ten hours of sleep of her entire life.

"She looks..., Carcel thought, his stomach twisting into a knot of pure, agonizing self-loathing. "...beautiful this morning."

He was a monster. He was a creature of the dark and she was... morning.

"Good morning, Ines," Rowan said, smiling. "You are late. But I see you have abandoned your attempt to look like a dowager. You didn’t put your hair in a bun."

"I’m not going anywhere today," Ines replied, her voice a light, musical breeze. She glided into the room, her gaze flickering past Carcel as if he were a piece of furniture, a slightly distasteful chair, perhaps.

She is not looking at me, he thought, a strange, hollow feeling mixing with his guilt. She is not... She is walking past me. She is not... she is not even acknowledging me.

She sat in her normal position, beside Rowan, placing her directly in Carcel’s line of sight. He was trapped. He could not escape her. He had to sit there and look at the living, breathing, cheerful evidence of his crimes.

She unfurled her napkin with a soft, civilized snap and placed it in her lap.

Rowan, oblivious, took a bite of his toast. "I heard you were writing your diary this morning," he said, his voice full of a light, brotherly teasing.

Carcel choked.

He had just taken another sip of the dreadful, cold tea, and the word "diary" hit his throat at the exact same moment as the liquid. It was a violent, strangled, spluttering cough. He lurched forward, tea spraying from his mouth, his entire body convulsing.

"Good heavens, Carcel!" Rowan cried, half-rising from his seat as he threw his own napkin down. "Are you alright? First the strange smiles, now this. You are in a truly bad state. Edith! More water! Immediately!"

Ines, who had been calmly reaching for a piece of toast, finally, finally, looked at him.

Her "cheerfulness" did not falter, but her eyes... her eyes were different. They were wide, and bright, and they were knowing. She looked at him, at his coughing, spluttering, water-streaming-from-his-eyes humiliation, and a tiny, almost imperceptible, knowing smile touched the corners of her lips.

She was enjoying this.

"Yes, Your Grace," she said, her voice dripping with a false, sweet concern, "you do look quite unwell. Perhaps it was the... whiskey... from last night?"

She knew. She had heard him.

Carcel finally got his breath back, his chest aching, his eyes watering. He could only glare at her.

Rowan, oblivious to the undercurrents, just shook his head. "It is not the whiskey, it is this ’diary’ of yours, Ines. You have somehow managed to shock the Duke just by mentioning it." He turned back to his sister, his curiosity piqued.

"What could you possibly have to write about when you are home all day? Your life is not that exciting."

"You would be surprised, brother," Ines said. She took a delicate bite of her toast. She was not looking at Rowan. She was looking at Carcel.

She was staring, quite openly, at him.

Rowan, a persistent, good-natured fool, pressed on. "Like what? What ’interesting things’ happen at home?"

Ines did not answer immediately. She was too busy. She was... staring at him, remembering all that he did to her.

Rowrow’s question—"Like what?"—was still hanging in the air.

Like what? her mind echoed. Oh, brother. Like... last night.

She was staring at Carcel. She looked, quite brazenly, at his shirt. It was hastily buttoned, the top two buttons undone, revealing a V of skin and dark, crisp hair. Her hands... her hands had been on that.

Her gaze drifted, inevitably, to his lips.

They were chapped. They were, perhaps, slightly swollen. They were the lips that had...

Those are the lips, she thought, her own lips tingling at the memory, that... that did... that showed me what a kiss really is.

She had to answer Rowan. She had to say something. But all she could think about, all she could see, was the man who had, only hours ago, had his mouth on her breast.

She was lost in the memory. She was lost in the sight of him. Everything faded. There was only him.

"Carcel..." she said.

It was not a word. It was a breath. A sigh. A name, spoken aloud, in a soft, dreamy, intimate tone.

Rowan stopped chewing. He lowered his toast. He looked at his sister. He looked at his best friend, who had, at the sound of his name, gone rigid as stone, his face pale as death.

"Carcel?" Rowan repeated, his voice no longer amused, but slow, and very, very confused.