Page 122 of A Rare Find

Scandalous. Impossible.

Instead of a howl, their name tore from her throat.

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“Georgie!” She ran to them. They swung off the horse before it came to a full stop. An instant later, she was crushed to their chest, their arms around her, their momentum carrying her off her feet.

“You’re soaked,” she gasped. “Is that sweat?”

“Partially. I’ve been riding for hours. Through spots of very dirty weather. The downpours account for some of it.” Their face was pressed to the top of her head. She could feel their heart pounding into her. They smelled like rain, and like horse, and she never wanted to let them go.

“What happened?” they asked. “What did your father say? Is the Barrow Prince coming to dig?”

“You first.” She mustered her resolve and stepped back from them. “What happened? What did Mr. Arbuthnot say? Did he rescind his offer?”

Georgie stepped forward, eyes on her lips. She touched their arm in warning, and they flicked their gaze up to hers, and then over her shoulder. She watched their face turn rueful as they took note of the bay windows of Incledon Hall.

They were alone with her on the lawn but not necessarily unwitnessed.

They moved away, a few reluctant inches. “Mr. Arbuthnot did not rescind his offer.” They said it carefully. “I declined it.”

She looked at them without comprehension.

“I declined it,” they repeated. “Then I attended to some pressing business. And then I tried to catch up with you.” They’d lost their hat during the wild dismount. They glanced at it, upside down on the grass, and ran their fingers through their flattened hair. “I wanted to be here,” they explained, “in case you required a spokesman.”

“I didn’t.” Because she’d been crying, her smile tasted like salt. “I acquitted myself well, in fact.” Leaving to the side the Romeo. “I said what I had to say. There was much excitement.”

They tipped their head, peering at her intently.

“These are the traces of happy tears?” They lifted a hand, hovered their finger by her cheek.

She didn’t want to talk about it yet.

“You’re staying?” she asked. “In Twynham, I mean.”

Their eyes were like diamonds. How could anyone have eyes like that?

She wished she were nearer the tree. She wanted to lean on something. She wanted to lean on Georgie, but she was too aware of Incledon Hall looming behind her. Any moment, the front door would open and disgorge the men within.

“I’m staying,” said Georgie. They tilted up their chin, studied the sky. When they looked at her again, their eyes had absorbed some of its blue, and their face was tense.

“I seem fickle, don’t I?” They stated it like a fact. “Frittering. And flittering. Dithering.” Their laugh was strained. “I’ve always admired your conviction. At times, I was jealous of it, and offended by it, and until this summer, I didn’t understand it one jot. But I admired it. I lack conviction. I haven’t dedicated my life to anything, not like you have. I realized I couldn’t dedicate it to the stage. I’m not sure if the stage is the problem, or the dedication.”

She bit her lip at the echo of her past accusation. “You don’t seem fickle to me.”

“How’s that?” They sounded cynical, but she glimpsed something vulnerable in their expression.

“You might not have centered all your energy on a single enterprise,” she said, “and you might not ever—but it doesn’t follow that you aren’t dedicated. You’re dedicated to…” She thought of the way to put it. “Enlivening life. You enliven life for the people around you, as much as for yourself. You make bonhomie contagious. No matter the situation, you try, always, to make it better. You’re a show-off.” They frowned at that, and her lips twitched. “You’re an incorrigible show-off. You attract so much attention to your own person, it’s easy to miss the fact that what you’re doing is often in service of someone else. You’ve helped me immeasurably.”

The tense lines bracketing their mouth softened. “We found the gold.”

“We had fun doing it.” Her voice was hoarse. “I’ve never had such fun.”

They shot a glance at Incledon Hall and edged closer to her, forward and sideways, so the side of their hand brushed hers.

“I’m staying for you,” they said quietly. “Not only for you. It’s just—everything else I want connects to you, to how I feel about you, to how I feel about myself when I’m with you. I suppose I could say I’m staying for everything. Or that you’re everything. You’re everything.” They sucked in their breath, and their eyes weren’t diamonds, they were stars. “May we please go behind that tree so I can kiss you?”

She tried to walk back to the tree casually, but her legs trembled, and she ended up stumbling, then skipping, and she might as well have been swooning—her every motion was so, so obvious. To anyone who could see and knew how to look.