Page 56 of Chateau Reverie

‘Even once we’re parted?’

‘Yes.’

He kisses the skin behind the shell of her ear, his fingers pressing into her hip. Claire feels desire flutter once more within her, and she squirms against him.

Then Leander says, softly, ‘I don’t know what to do. Tell me what to do, Claire.’

‘I could stay,’ she replies, before she can think better of it. ‘I could refuse to bid. We could remain here together.’

‘I can’t allow that. You don’t understand what torture it would be.’

She turns to face him. ‘And you do?’

He looks agonised. ‘I can’t-I can’t explain further. I’m sorry.’ He brushes a kiss over her cheekbone, an apology, a warning. ‘We can’t be together after this. That’s how it must be. And what about your grandfather? You can’t leave him, not now.’

Her grandfather. She had forgotten. Claire feels a surge of shame; how could she even consider. . .? But she knows why she considered it, of course she does. She scans his face, watching the way his pale lashes flutter over his cheeks, moth wings trying to fly. If she is not with him, she must become Genevieve once more; Leander Sterne is the only one who wants Claire Marchand, just as she is, and he is the only one who will feel loss at her disappearance.

‘It wasn’t your fault,’ Leander says.

‘Pardon?’

‘What happened to Genevieve wasn’t your fault.’

She shakes her head against the pillow. ‘You were not there.’

‘I didn’t need to be. It wasn’t your fault.’

‘I—’

‘It wasn’t your fault.’

‘But—’

‘It wasn’t your fault,’ he says, and Claire makes an embarrassing sound, a broken sort of sob, as tears begin to run down her cheeks. Leander has seen her cry more today than anyone else has her entire life, but he does not judge her for it; he simply holds her tightly until her shaking has subsided. What he does not realise is that no one else has ever said this to her before. He is now the only other person who knows what happened, and the only one who has ever been capable of absolving her.

‘I do not believe you,’ Claire says. ‘I want to, but I do not. I cannot.’

‘Do you think you will, someday?’

‘I do not know. I hope so.’

He kisses her.

‘You can’t stay here, Claire,’ he says after. ‘You can’t become trapped in this place.’ He strokes her hair; his voice is hypnotic. ‘It’s my fault that you’re here, but I’ll fix it. Sleep. You’ll be woken before dawn.’

Before dawn—she does not quite understand what he means, but she will have time in the morning. Time to decide. Claire’s eyes slide shut. She is exhausted, and Leander’s embrace is warm, and despite her grief, she feels sleep already begin to press at the edges of her mind. ‘Yes.’

‘Sleep,’ he says once more. He takes her hand under the covers. Dreamily, half unconscious, Claire interlaces their fingers.

His fault, she thinks. His fault I am here.

He is different to the others. I have always known he was.

But these thoughts quickly drift away. In their wake come the dim, fleeting images of a soon-forgotten dream.

Tridi

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