Breaking the spell, I stand, letting the quilt drop back to the ground. I chafe my hands up and down my arms as I ask, “So that’s why you do it? Family tradition demands that if the palace says jump, you say how high?”
I wait for Miles to scowl at me, but he just leans back against the wall and sighs.
“They’re paying my tuition,” he says. “Seb’s family. They’re paying for me to go to St. Andrew’s next year.”
I don’t really know what to say to that. I knew Miles was really loyal to the Bairds—obviously—but I thought it was more about friendship than the whole courtier deal.
“And not just that,” Miles goes on, “but the apartment in Edinburgh? That’s on their dime as well. Plus last year, my mum was sick—she’s fine now—but it was serious for a while. She needed private hospitals, specialists, all that, and I think they paid her hospital bills.”
“Miles,” I say softly, and he meets my eyes. All of this has come out in the lightest tone, like he’s just casually relaying some information, but his gaze is serious.
“I just want you to understand,” he says. “I owe them . . . everything. Everything.”
Pushing off from the wall, he tosses his hat to the chair by the door. “That’s why I was such a prat to you that first night.”
“To be fair, you’ve been a prat basically the entire time I’ve known you,” I say, and Miles gives the littlest smile. His hair is drying a bit in the heat from the fire, and it’s curling, turning a deep-gold color, shadows playing over his high cheekbones.
“I have,” he admits. “And I’m sorry. Truly.”
Swallowing hard, I wave that off. Now is not the time to start becoming friends, not when I’ve just realized he’s super good-looking and there’s rain and firelight and just the two of us, miles from anyone.
But I still can’t help but say, “It’s not like you haven’t done a lot for Seb. You keep him out of trouble. Well, as much as anyone can, I guess,” I amend, and Miles nods.
“It’s a big job for one man.”
I look back at Miles. “I’m just saying, yes, they’ve done a lot for you. But it’s not like it’s a one-way street.”
He’s watching me again. He really needs to stop with that because my toes are curling in my boots, my heart jumping around, and my face is burning.
“Thank you,” he says softly, and then, maybe feeling as weirded out as I do, he moves to sit down in front of the fire, taking my discarded quilt and making a little pallet there by the hearth. He sits, drawing his knees up and wrapping his arms around them, and after a second, I sit next to him.
Not too close, of course.
We sit in silence, watching the fire for a while, before I plant my hands on the quilt, leaning back a little. “Do you think Glynnis had someone shoot out our tire?”
Miles laughs, shaking his head. “I wouldn’t put it past her. She’s a bit mercenary, ol’ Glynn.”
“Oh my god, please tell me you have called her ‘ol’ Glynn’ to her face.”
“I have not, as I enjoy having my tongue actually in my mouth and not mounted to her wall.”
Crossing my legs, I turn to face him more fully. “I will give you a million dollars if you do it,” I tell him, and he looks over, tilting his head to one side.
“A million dollars?”
“A million dollars or what I currently have in my wallet back at the house, which I think is, like, five pounds in your weird Monopoly money.”
“Tell you what,” he says, putting his hands down on the quilt to lean back a little, “I will call Glynnis ‘ol’ Glynn’ if you promise to drink a Pimm’s Cup. No, not drink, chug.”
I screw up my face, sticking my tongue out. “Blargh.”
That makes him laugh again, and I’m smiling back when I glance down and realize that our hands are nearly touching on the quilt.
Miles follows my gaze, and his laughter dies.
They’re just hands, resting there against the quilt. His, graceful, long-fingered, mine with chipped polish and an octopus ring on my pinky.
The rain is tapering off now, but I can still hear it drumming softly against the roof, and to my right, the fire pops and smokes. Over that, there’s the sound of my own breathing, a little faster than it was before, and I hear Miles sigh as the two of us just keep looking at our hands, only the littlest space between them.
We’ve been closer than this before. The other night at the ball, when we danced, there was a lot less space between our bodies than there is now. Hell, that day in the park, I was basically in his lap.
But those things were for show, and this . . .
This feels real.
His hand edges just a little bit closer, his pinky brushing mine, and that—that one tiny touch—sends a shiver of sparks racing through me.
Sucking in a breath, I go to move my hand closer.
The door flies open with a bang, and Miles and I leap apart so dramatically you’d think we’d just been caught together naked instead of touching pinkies. He actually makes a sound, this kind of startled yelp that I’d tease him about had I not cried out, “Nothing! Nothing!” when we bolted apart.
Ellie and Alex stand there, still in their tweeds, rain dripping off the umbrella Alex is holding over both their heads.
Alex frowns, but Ellie is looking back and forth between me and Miles, her arms folded over her chest.
“We saw the jeep on our way back, figured you’d be here,” Alex says, and Miles nods quickly, smacking his palms on his thighs.
“Yeah, yeah, good thing we were close.”
Smiling, Alex looks around. “This place is cozier than I remembered,” he says. “And nice work on the fire.”
Clearing his throat for what has to be the 8,000th time today, Miles turns to the fireplace, picking up the poker and tamping the flames down, moving ash over the still-smoldering peat. As the fire dies, so does whatever spell this place has cast over me, and I go to stand next to Ellie, putting the past few minutes out of my head.
“You rescued us!” I tell her, my voice bright, and her eyes narrow just the littlest bit.
“Rescued or interrupted?” she asks quietly, and I roll my eyes, gathering up my damp jacket and moving past her to Alex’s Land Rover, which, thankfully, has a roof.
Miles climbs in the back seat beside me, and as the Land Rover heads back toward Baird House, neither of us say anything.
And we both keep our hands firmly in our laps.