He rattled off more facts, but he never looked at her. She frowned at how far he was pushing her away.
“Dash,” she whispered after he’d talked for what felt like forever.
He cut himself off and glanced at her. “After this stop, I think it would be prudent for me to ride outside the carriage a while,” he said. The door opened and he motioned her to exit. “Your Majesty.”
Tears stung her eyes, but she blinked them away as she took the footman’s hand and exited the vehicle. She managed to greet the innkeeper and his wife by name, cooing over their lovely little inn and indulging in a tour. But all the while, her mind raced and she kept looking back at Dash over her shoulder.
He would always push her away, it seemed. No matter how much he wanted to be close, no matter how much she wanted it. He had on that terrible night when Alistair died and they’d nearly kissed. He’d done so any other time they got too near.
She had spent years with the power to snap her fingers and get what she wanted. But not him. And she feared the chances she had for such a thing were running out if she did not make a move he couldn’t counter, couldn’t deny and couldn’t run from.
A few hours later Dash paced the terrace of Menington House restlessly, pausing occasionally to look out toward the sea. The rest of their journey had gone uneventfully. He had ridden outside the carriage, trying to maintain some sense of decorum and find his lost focus. Failing at both.
All he could think of was Gia’s expression as they talked. The naked desire on her beautiful face. The need that mirrored his own.
Christ, it wasn’t that he didn’t know they both wanted this. But she’d always reined that in and he had followed suit. He’d reminded himself of the things that kept him from moving. At first her marriage, unhappy or not. Then the fact that she was queen and he a lowly servant. The fact that she had duties to fulfill and if he did not fulfill his own, then he risked her future.
He wanted in private and tried to tell himself that every side glance from her, every caught breath, every time she clung to his arm a little too tightly was a figment of his heated imagination. Remnants of erotic dreams that haunted him many a night.
That he was wrong in seeing those things in her even when they were right in front of his face, taunting him.
Today there had been no denying the heat between them, nor that it came from both sides of the equation. And it had taken every ounce of his control not to dig his fingers into her hair, pin her back against the carriage seat and kiss her like he’d wanted to kiss her for ten long years.
He blinked as the door from the house opened and she stepped outside. She had changed from her travel clothing to his favorite dress in her repertoire. Not a ballgown, though she always looked delicious in those. No, this was a gorgeous dark green-and-black striped silk dress with long sleeves and a scooped neck that just hinted at the lovely breasts beneath. It made her dark eyes even darker. The setting sun hit her hair and lit up the ruddy highlights one might not notice in candlelight.
He was struck mute for a moment as he looked at her, drank her in down to the detail, as if by memorizing her every curve and hollow that he would be fulfilled despite the distance he still had to keep.
“Good evening, Dashiell,” she said.
Her soft voice broke the stupor she had put him in and he staggered toward her, hand outstretched toward her chair. “The staff thought that, with a night so lovely as this and with only the two of us in attendance, a terrace supper might be charming.”
She smiled as she paced past the seat he had indicated, moving toward him in certain strides. He held his breath as she reached him, then stepped around him to the terrace. She braced both hands on the stone wall there and leaned forward, breathing in the sea air in a deep gulp.
“It is majestic,” she whispered.
He continued looking at her, even though he knew she was talking about the huge rocky outcroppings just beyond the beach below the residence. “Always has been,” he murmured.
Her cheeks filled with just a touch of color but she didn’t address the comment, only turned back. “I’m happy to have a quiet meal tonight,” she said, waiting as he pulled out her seat and then taking it. He took the one at her right. “Surely the few days will be very busy.”
“We could go over the timeline again if you would like.”
Usually she would answer in the affirmative. She always liked to review and re-review. He’d discovered that over his years in her service. Preparation was key for Giabella. She talked through things until she had every nuance in her mind.
Tonight, though, she shook her head. “You left your calendars in the carriage with me earlier today. I looked at them extensively during the journey.”
He flinched ever so slightly at her gentle reminder that he’d abandoned her because of his lack of control. He didn’t have a chance to apologize, though, because the supper began to be served.
Once their first course had been left before them, Giabella leaned closer. “Why don’t we talk about happy things, Dash?”
She was giving him permission to find a path away from tension. He took it. During supper they talked about her children, especially Sasha, the daughter she had adopted more than fifteen years earlier. The child that had brought Dash to her when he presented the girl to the king and queen after she’d been orphaned.
The moment that had changed his life in so many ways. He saw Sasha as his own child, as much as Giabella’s. A person they loved as deeply as they might have if they had created her together. That connection was a bond they’d built that had led to all the others.
“She is so very happy,” Giabella sighed at last. “She and Thomas are very well matched.”
He nodded. “Her last letter was gushing with joy. She looks forward to returning to Athawick shortly, though.”
“Do you think she will have news soon for us?” Giabella asked, her gaze dancing.
He arched a brow. “Of a child, you mean?”
“Our first grandchild,” Gia said, then her expression fell. “Because she sees you as her father. Far more than Alistair ever was.” Her lips thinned.
He smiled as he thought of Sasha over the years. “If I am the father of her heart, then I am very proud to be so. And perhaps they will have news for us. Though I think any of your recently married children could be the first. They seem to be in a race to see who is most passionately in love.”
Giabella blushed slightly. “That is certainly true. Any or all of them could tell me good news any day. I will like being a grandmother, I think. A fine replacement title by the time it comes true, no matter what the outcome of this election. I will throw myself wholeheartedly into the endeavor. You will be scheduling me for changing nappies and embroidering little hats. A bore for you.”
Dash swallowed as he set his fork down on his empty plate. She was offering him an opening to tell her about the offer Grantham had lodged to him weeks before. The future he had been hesitant to share with her because it would end this chapter of their lives together.
Perhaps all the chapters of their lives. Or perhaps it could begin another. He had no idea.
“Your Majesty,” he began.
Something in her expression shifted. She set her napkin on the table and got to her feet, forcing him to do the same. She went back to the terrace wall. Once there, she pivoted. “I would like to walk on the beach.”