“I’ll be careful.” He nuzzled her crown with his bearded chin, then planted a kiss there. “Aren’t I always?”
“Well…” Gwen thought back to the fight with Kip. “Not really?”
His huff of amusement ruffled her hair. “I blame any recent misbehavior on the trolls. They’re a terrible influence.”
“Thanks, bro!” Lorrie called out from the kitchen, where she was now devouring an herbed leg of lamb with tzatziki sauce. “We try!”
One more tender squeeze and one last, soft kiss on Gwen’s mouth later, Hugh exited into Max’s library elevator. Unable tomaintain any pretense of good cheer in his absence, Gwen chatted with the trolls and Max for only a few minutes before leaving to take a shower and her long-awaited nap. Only to lie awake for over an hour on the library couch, worrying about what might be happening to Hugh at that very moment. Listening for the distinctive rattle and thunk of the elevator in motion, which would indicate his return.
Then she slept, emotionally and physically exhausted. And thank goodness, she woke hours later to the pleasant scent of smoke and the sight of Hugh’s shadowed face as he bent toward her for a sweet, short kiss.
“You’re here,” she sleepily mumbled, and struggled to sit up. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” His strong arm around her back helped ease her upright. “And yes, I am definitely here. In the too, too solid flesh.”
“What?” Her nose crinkled as her muddled brain struggled to process his words. “Why would you want to be a liquid? Or a gas?”
“There’s also the plasma state, don’t forget. And that was a Shakespeare reference.Hamlet.” He paused. “I realize that I’m not helping my cause, should I wish to contradict the trolls’ opinion of me as a pretentious bore.”
“Probably not.” Relieved beyond words that he was back, un-imprisoned, and able to participate in displays of unprovoked pedantry, she heaved herself into his open arms. “Oh, gods and goddesses, I’m so glad you’re okay.”
His hand clasped her nape warmly, urging her face against his neck as his chin nestled into its usual spot on her crown. “I can feel that.”
She squeezed him fiercely. “What happened?”
“The council questioned me.” His body had tensed slightly.“There’s no direct proof that I set my own apartment on fire, so unless new evidence comes to light, I’ll face no charges.”
From the extreme neutrality of his tone, she had to assume that his description of events was leaving outa lot, and she wanted to hear the whole truth. Not a sanitized Kidz Bop version thereof.
“I repeat.” She raised her head far enough to meet his eyes. “What happened, Hugh?”
With a sigh, he switched on a table lamp. “I was hoping to spare you the details. Not because I don’t trust you,” he quickly specified, “but because you’re already grappling with too many worries at the moment. I have no desire to add more.”
Squinting against the glare of the lamp, she simply waited.
Resigned to defeat, he sat beside her on the sofa, gathered her back into his arms, and described the barely veiled glee of some of his colleagues, the ones who resented his strict adherence to the Council’s rules. The open agitation of his mentor, Josiah. Beech’s eventual call for a vote and pronouncement of the unanimous—if reluctant, in some cases—verdict: Hugh was free to go. The SERC chair had also officially granted Hugh an indefinite leave of absence to deal with the tangled mess of his previously pristine life.
No part of that explanation seemed to bother Hugh much. So why was he so tense?
“Did something else happen?” Gwen tried to sort through the possibilities. “Did you get bad news from Thora, or…?”
All at once, the stiff scaffolding of his posture seemed to collapse, and he sagged into her embrace. “My mother and father waylaid me after the meeting.”
“I imagine they were…”Total assholes? Terrible parents? So shallow I could barely dip a toe in them?“Concerned.”
He ducked his head to rest it lightly against her shoulder. “Not so much concerned. More…displeased. Alarmed. Angry.”
“At you?” Now she was the one vibrating with tension. Protectively, she cupped her hand over the back of his skull and glared at the gilded mirror over the fireplace. “Because you’ve done nothing wrong, and if they don’t see that, they’re the disappointments. Not you.”
Scooting back against the sofa’s support, she silently urged him to rest his body more fully against hers. With a sigh, he let her bear some of his weight. Leaned into her, his angular frame cushioned by her softness.
His voice low and quiet, he recounted that conversation too. Not all of it, she suspected, but enough. He described his parents’ utter shock at his unprecedented scandal. Their agitation at the prospect of lost clients and lost social standing. Their anger at his refusal to redeem the Blacke family’s reputation by casting Gwen aside.
At that part of the story, she had to interrupt. “Hugh, listen. If it would make things easier on you, I can keep my distance while you continue your investigation.”
Because she might be falling for him, but that didn’t give her the right to ruin his relationship with his parents or upend his entire life. In fact, it made her evenmoreloath to hurt him.
“It’s too late now.” He didn’t sound sorry about that. Just matter-of-fact.
