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For a moment he only stood beside her, looking out at the gray-green water. “About last night,” he said at last, voice low. “Behind the curtain.”

Her lungs forgot how to behave. “Yes,” she managed. “I recall there was…some discussion of politics.”

“And one extremely ill-advised kiss,” he said. “Which I do not, in the slightest, regret.”

Heat skittered up her throat. “It was very ill-advised,” she agreed. “I have spent all morning trying not to think about it.”

“How unfortunate,” he murmured. “I have spent all morning doing nothing else.”

That ridiculous, dangerous warmth unfurled in her chest again. This was worse than the curtain; here there was open sky and any number of possible witnesses.

“If anyone sees us—” she began.

He glanced up and down the empty stretch of shingle: only distant children and a quarrelsome boat far away. “Then we shall be accused of treason against decorum and consigned to the tower,” he said lightly. “But for now, it is only us, and your feud with these stones.”

Before she could decide whether to laugh or flee, Chester dropped to one knee in front of her.

She stiffened. “What are you doing?”

“Trying to improve your acquaintance with Brighton, as promised,” he said calmly. “Walking on shingle doesn’t work properly in boots. May I?”

He nodded toward her laces, waiting—for once—not like a duke expecting obedience, but like a man asking for trust.

Her throat went dry. No one touched her feet. Doctors had, when she was a child and too feverish to care; a maid, when she was too weak to stand. Men certainly did not kneel in front of them on beaches.

“You…don’t want to inspect my ankle?” she said, before she could strangle the fear into silence.

Something flickered across his face—swift and pained. “No,” he said. “I want to keep sand out of your boots. That is all.”

Oh.

Heat that had nothing to do with embarrassment threaded under her skin.

“I can manage,” she murmured, half-heartedly.

“I know you can,” he said. “You always do. Allow me, just this once, to make it a little less of a battle.”

His hands were gloved, his touch impeccable. He worked carefully at the laces, loosening them without tugging, without jarring her ankle. When he eased the first boot off, he slipped it immediately behind the rock, out of sight of any stray passerby.

“Other boot, if you please.”

She lifted her right foot more cautiously. He supported her heel in one palm, steady as a shelf, while his other hand untied and worked the leather free. The position made her acutely aware of every vulnerable inch of herself: the thin stocking over her instep, the uneven pull of muscle just above her ankle, the treacherous thud of her heart.

If he noticed any of it, he gave no sign. The second boot joined the first behind the rock.

“There,” he said, straightening. “Now you have a choice. May I?”

He offered his hand.

It was absurd—a gentleman on a beach, coat on a rock, boots hidden like guilty secrets. And yet when she put her bare feet down, the sand was soft and cool and gave without resentment.

She let him draw her up. Their hands fit together with an ease that made her toes curl against the sand, pebbles, and the shingle.

“Careful,” he warned. “The ground has opinions.”

“So do I,” she said, testing her weight.

Left sure, right… less rebellious than usual. The sand, forgiving where stone resented, accommodated her uneven stride instead of punishing it. Closer to the water, the surface firmed—hard-packed, ridged by the retreating tide.