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He is not very enthusiastic.
“Wonderful.” She places a light hand on her husband’s arm. “Isn’t it, dear?”
The duke wets his lips slightly before answering. “Profoundly delighted.”
The air on the hills of Winterbourne Manor carries a chill that slips inside your collar and never leaves, I walk over the stiff grass, the wind buffeting me and disheveling my hair.
I have no idea how we will manage the performance. Four temperaments that could not be further apart.
Lavinia, a tempest at the piano, Elijah, with that weary languor of his that hides more thorns than he admits. René a blade hidden in silk, and that human composition of his that the Duchess insists upon so vehemently. And me, stuck in the middle.
The point is: if the Duchess truly desires the composition, it means she knows.
She knows that René is Cendre d’Enfer.
What game is she playing?
A gust of wind rises from the valley, sliding down my neck and making me tighten my black cloak over my shoulders. Then a light, warm weight envelops me from behind.
“Viscount!”
“Mademoiselle Duprés.”
Her red hair brushes the nape of my neck.
“If you wish to cry scandal, Lavinia, it will only take a moment.” Elijah advances toward us, hands in his pockets, the posture of someone who has no desire to be involved but already is, despite himself.
A smile spreads across her lips.
“Jealous, little Elijah?”
She detaches herself from me with a fluid movement and walks toward him.
He takes a step back, then another.
“Stay where you are.”
She doesn’t care, she throws herself—there is no other way to define it—onto him with a short laugh, and the two of them stagger backward.
Elijah’s eyes widen in bewilderment as the balance of their weight drags them toward the freezing grass. I move on instinct, grabbing him from behind by the shoulders and steadying them both before they end up rolling down the hill.
“There,” I sigh, feeling Elijah’s breath grow shorter, “now it is you who are in an unseemly position.”
He clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth.
“The duke said the other guests will arrive shortly.” René arrives, still looking as annoyed as before.
Lavinia turns to me. “Other guests?”
Elijah runs a hand through his long hair, mussed by the wind.
“He has organized a group ride for the afternoon.”
Damn, I had forgotten.
Lavinia smiles, biting her lower lip. “It will be... interesting. Will you participate?”
Elijah shrugs with a light sigh.
