Page 110 of The Wolf Duke's Wife
“Quite thrilling,” Tristan murmured, and turned to the attendant with a gravity so gracious it bordered on generous, “you are correct, Mr…?”
“Griggs.”
“Mr. Griggs. I have committed a botanical outrage.” He reached into his coat and drew out a guinea, held as delicately as a thorny rose stem. “May the gardens accept a donation toward further outrages prevented?”
Griggs went pink, then officious, then pink again.
“I…this is most…well…strictly…”
“Strictness is the only way to keep us safe,” Tristan agreed with terrible sincerity, “please allow me to escort my accomplice out before she confesses and causes a scene.”
“I…well…yes…very good,” Griggs said, already convinced he had won a victory for civilization.
They retreated in excellent order, Christine barely containing her laughter until they reached a darker turn of the walk. Thenshe let it go. Bright and loud, the kind of laugh that turned a man’s head.
“I have never been evicted from anywhere,” Tristan said, delighted, “it is vastly entertaining. We should try White’s next.”
“And be barred for life?” she asked, “how you suffer for love.”
And there it is. The first utterance. I should reply to it. It is a Rubicon to be crossed. Reply. Now!
Christine’s breath misbehaved. She pretended to examine the foxglove instead.
“We have broken a rule.”
“We have paid for it,” he said, “it’s London. It is held together by rules.”
He had not replied, and she had not repeated. They walked on, and Tristan inwardly kicked himself. Silence reigned between them. He wondered if Christine felt foolish. If she believed him to be separate from her still, behind high walls.
Couples drifted past. A troop of young officers admired themselves in the gilt-edged mirrors set cunningly along a hedge. Tristan’s arm remained under her hand and, since the world was busy entertaining itself, she allowed her fingers to curve a little more securely around it.
“You’ve worked yourself hollow this week,” he said, softer, “I can tell because I do not trust you with a teacup.”
She smiled. “You have been watching me very closely.”
“As a man watches an engineer who has promised his bridge will hold.”
“And will it?”
He considered, then nodded. “I find myself reckless enough to walk across.”
“That is a compliment,” she said.
“It is a declaration in my language,” he said, and somehow managed to make the words untheatrical.
They strolled, companionably silent for a span. He felt the day unhook itself from his shoulders and fall away. He had been different since Canterbury House. He was gentler at the edges, a hardness turned on the world but not on her. Tamed was not the word. No one tamed a wolf. But even wolves could learn when to lie by the fire.
They passed a table where a boy sold prints, views of the Rotunda, caricatures of ministers, a lurid etching of a highwayman with too many buttons. A separate stack, smaller, lay to one side. Scandal-sheets, the paper roughly folded, ink still smelling of hurry. Christine felt the prickle along her scalpbefore she saw the headline. The boy flashed the top sheet to a passing couple with a wink.
SCULLERY DUCHESS DISGRACES OXFORD STREET
Her hand moved without her consent, snatching the sheet and crumpling it into a ball. The boy blinked.
“Half-penny, miss.”
Tristan had already paid and dismissed him with a glance that would have turned wine to vinegar. “Give it here.”
“It’s nothing,” she lied.
