Page 18 of Last Comes Fate

Was it possible he had gotten bigger in the last few weeks?

“Er, I’ll just, um, pop your clothes in the dryer,” I mumbled.

Xavier chuckled as I swiftly gathered his things and studiously avoided his gaze—or his other parts, for that matter. When I returned, I found (somewhat to my disappointment) that he had wrapped the towel around his waist. He had already fixed us both tea and set our mugs on a side table between two armchairs in the living room. I took mine and curled into the seat, eager to be more than a few feet from him. I caught his telltale scent of soap, fire, and salt, accentuated further by the briny Mediterranean drying on his body. Even in nothing but a towel, he looked so regal in his chair with his straight posture, broad chest, and black hair inky as an oil slick.

It reminded me of who he really was.

Not just a smart-mouthed chef from South London.

A duke, holder of one of the oldest titles in Britain.

And that was why I’d had to leave him.

“I didn’t kiss her, Ces,” he said again after taking a long sip of his tea. “Tell me you believe me.”

I sighed and tucked the edges of my dress around my knees, wishing I’d had the forethought to change into something more comfortable. “I—fine. I guess I can believe that. Even though I saw you.”

I wished I sounded more confident. I wished I were.

“She kissed me,” Xavier pressed again.

“So you say. But even if you did stop her, it wasn’t right away.”

“Because I was stunned by it, like I said.”

“You were surprised?” I snorted. “Xavi, she was all over you from the second she knew you were back. I watched her all summer, plastering herself on you like a corsage wanting to be pinned to your lapel. Just like every other aristocrat in the country, descending like vultures at all those stupid events. She just happened to live next door.”

“It wasn’t like that.” His frown created two strong lines between his brows. I resisted the urge to rub them away with my thumb. “You heard the conversation, babe. You knew I was talking aboutyou. Worried about you and me. I didn’t exactly expect Imogene to make a move.” He shook his head. “But maybe I should have.”

I scoffed. “You think?”

He gave me a long look.

I gave him one back. “Jagger and Elsie filled me in on her little crush on you. And the fact that you were expected to marry her at one point. You didn’t think to tell me about that?”

Xavier opened his mouth as if to argue but then seemed to give up. “Honestly, I didn’t think it mattered. I loveyou, Ces. How could you have thought I would do something like that to you?”

It didn’t escape me that he spoke in the present. Love, not loved.

But there was no use getting caught up in things like tenses.

“Maybe because it wasn’t just that,” I said honestly. “The whole betrayal wasn’t only her. In a lot of ways, it felt like the whole summer was leading up to that point. The kiss was just my breaking point.”

He looked at me hard. “Explain.”

“What is there to explain that I haven’t a million times already?” I took another sip of tea, if only to calm myself. Just the thought of rehashing this conversation made my blood boil. “From the moment Sofia and I arrived in the UK, literally no one wanted us there.”

“I wanted you there,” Xavier said. “And I was the only one who should have mattered.”

“The papers printed lies about us from the get-go,” I continued as if he hadn’t said a word. “Even took interviews from my turncoat of a mother. Your family, of course, hopped right on board and proceeded to badmouth us to every person within forty square miles. By the time we had to attend the Season events, every rich person in England was looking out for your American chit and child and wondering out loud in public if Sofia even belonged to you.”

“And what was I supposed to do about it?” he demanded. “Did you want me to fight every person in England? Sue every paper out there?” Xavier set his teacup down on the side table with a clatter.

“I wanted you to be onour side!” I blustered. “You acted like none of it mattered, Xavi. You brushed it off, told me to ignore it. I wanted you to tell your stepmother where to shove it, tell Imogene to stop petting you like a pony, and stop punching people just because you were a little jealous. I wanted you to be madwithme instead of at me! I wanted us to be a team, but you left us alone every chance you got!”

His mouth dropped like he couldn’t believe what I’d just said. “That’s—that’s how you really felt?”

“That’s how Ifeel,” I confirmed. “Present tense. And that’s why I had to go. I need to be in New York. I need to be around family.”

---