His gaze returned to mine. “No.”
There are conversations that begin as accidents and end up changing the architecture of your heart.
That was the first one.
The second happened because I’m an idiot about rain.
A summer storm rolled in three days later while I was sitting at the fountain with a botany encyclopedia from the library balanced open in my lap. The smell hit first—wet earth, charged air, the metallic sweetness that comes right before a downpour.
Then the first drops.
I should have gone inside.
Instead I sat there and let the sky break over me.
Maybe because I had spent three weeks under control so total it had started to seep into my skin.
Maybe because being soaked felt like choosing something for myself.
Maybe because I wanted to know whether the garden still felt like mine in bad weather.
It did.
The rain came harder, warm and fierce. My dress clung to my shoulders. Water ran down my spine. The fountain disappeared into the larger sound of the storm.
I didn’t know until later that Roman had watched me from his office window for nearly twenty minutes.
I found out from Nico, who leaned against the upstairs hall rail that evening with the smug look of a younger brother who knows too much.
“You know he sent Cora out there with an umbrella, right?”
“I didn’t take it.”
“I know. That’s why he kept standing at the window.”
My pulse did something irritating.
“You all need hobbies.”
Nico grinned. “You are the hobby.”
That night I woke with a fever.
Not dramatic enough for a hospital, just bad enough to make everything miserable. My throat burned. My head felt packed with wet wool. By evening, Cora had bullied me into tea, broth, and an extra blanket.
Sometime after midnight, I heard the door open.
I knew it was Roman before I saw him. I could tell by the pace of the steps, the careful lack of noise, the way the room seemed to pay attention when he entered.
He crossed to the bed and set a steaming mug on the nightstand.
When he turned to leave, I said his name.
“Roman.”
