Page 13 of The Fortune Hunter’s Gamble

The furnishings suited him, handsome yet not ostentatious. The dark gold wallpaper held a subtle pattern, balancing the deep bronze draperies and dark wooden desk and wardrobe. The canopy over the tester bed dangled curtains embroidered in luscious tones of autumn red, copper, and deep brown. One upholstered chair sat before the fire with a small table and pamphlet atop, and a chest of drawers beside the bed held a small mirror in a carved setting. It was a room that soothed and calmed, did not flaunt, and smelled like cedar. Like him.

Sophronia sucked in a breath, surprised at the hurt that tore through her. Rowden had always smelled of cedar and clove, and sometimes horse. How she missed her friend.

A floorboard creaked in the hall outside. Someone was coming.

Sophronia slid her candlestick onto the chest of drawers and dove for the nearest space that could hide her, the inches between the chest and the thick column of the bed. She pressed herself against the wall and pulled the bed hangings about her.

The door swung open, then shut. A booted tread crossed the carpet before the fireplace, then stopped. Her heart seized in her chest.

The faint halo of light moved, and metal chinked against the small table before the fireplace. Her heart stumbled into an over-fast pulse, but above the roaring in her ears she detected the rustle of fabric. He was removing his coat.

Saints and feathery angels, he was taking off his clothing, and she was hiding in his room. Sophronia pressed a knuckle into her mouth to keep from squeaking like a cornered mouse.

A silence unspooled, thick and weighty. She tried to drag air into her lungs in the quietest manner possible. She’d always been good at hiding. She was the best among all the neighborhood children. She could be lost for days if she’d wanted.

Except Rowden always sussed out her hiding spots. It was as if he could read her mind.

Or smell her.

Fabric rustled against fabric, as if he were laying his coat on a chair. He drew in a breath, sharp and surprised.

“Ro?”

She bit down on her knuckle and willed herself to disappear. That old, fond name was a needle in her heart.

“I know you’re in here.”

His voice had changed, grown deeper, a mellow rumble with a slight rasp. Like warm brandy pouring down one’s insides, a velvety slide with a hint of a burn.

Letting out her breath, Sophronia twitched the wall hanging aside.

He stared steadily at her.

She stared back. All of her insides burrowed downward, as if attempting to hide from his dark, riveting gaze.

He’d grown taller. Or had she simply forgotten his size? Those last years together, they’d both grown so much. She’d sprouted the curves of womanhood, which made it harder to pull off girlish pranks. He’d grown into his lanky length, developed a chest, a firm jaw.

He was broader and harder now.

She swallowed, trying to bring moisture to her dry throat. “How did you know?”

He pointed to her candlestick perched atop the chest of drawers, beaming light with the innocence of a star.

“Oh.”

She stepped forward. This was Rowden. Once they’d played pranks on one another all the time. They’d been in and out of one another’s houses and bedrooms with the unconcern of vermin. He’d picked hay out of her hair when one of the ricks they were playing on had fallen in, nearly suffocating them both. She’d wiped vomit from his mouth after she dared him to eat the baby eel he’d caught with his bare hands in the River Dun.

“I was…” They were children no longer. A full-grown man stood before her, the breadth of his chest outlined by the patterned waistcoat, his solid shoulders and arms showing in the loose white shirt.

She wondered how that chest would feel beneath her hands.

Sophronia swallowed again. “I was curious what book you were reading.”

He raised an eyebrow. “And is your curiosity satisfied?”

About him? Never. Where had he gone, the friend who had once been her favored companion and the prop of her world? Why had he bolted and never returned after that day he found her getting her portrait painted? That was the first abandonment of her womanhood, the first loss occasioned by her marriage, and losing Rowden had been like her mother dying all over again. The one person in the world who understood her, who never chided, who laughed at her antics, who saw the world as she did—gone without an explanation, without a goodbye.

Rowden being still alive, unlike her mother, she had harbored hope he might eventually wish to renew their acquaintance, once she was happily married, once he was settled down, once they could find their way back to one another as adults. She wouldn’t have expected the same kind of intimacy, of course, but some cordial footing with her oldest and dearest friend could be desired.