Page 77 of The Girl Who Fell Through Time
The door opens before she can gather the nerve, and in walks Marta with the breakfast tray. She stalls as soon as she enters, noticing the two of them in bed. Selene places a finger to her lips.
Don’t wake him up.
Marta places the tray down with all the care of a mother laying her newborn down in a crib, and scuttles away just as silently.
Dorian stirs. His brow furrows before his eyes flutter open, still heavy with sleep. Selene watches as awareness slowly seeps into him, the shift in his breathing, the subtle tensing of his fingers still resting in her hair. His grip on her slackens, though he doesn’t pull away entirely.
For a moment, he just looks at her, and Selene wonders if he’s remembering the night before as vividly as she is. The warmth of his mouth, the weight of him pressing her intothe mattress, the way he had kissed her like he’d been waiting for it for years.
She should say something. Should acknowledge the intimacy they woke up tangled in.
“Good morning,” she murmurs instead.
Dorian clears his throat, his voice rough from sleep. “Morning.” His gaze flickers down to where their legs are still entwined, and for a moment, neither of them move. Then he shifts. “I—” He stops himself, jaw tightening. “Did you sleep well?”
“Yes.” She glances at his arm, the one draped over her hip, and trails a fingertip lightly across his knuckles. “And you?”
He exhales through his nose, a breath that feels almost like a laugh. “Surprisingly well.”
There’s something in the way he looks at her then, something unreadable, and Selene’s heart stumbles in response. She should pull away, she knows that. But she doesn’t.
“I—”
A sharp knock at the door startles them both, and this time Dorian does pull away, sitting up with a wince as his injured arm protests the movement.
“Dorian?” comes Soren’s voice. “The constable is here to speak with you again.”
Dorian gets up, pulling on his boots and picking up his glasses.
“Do you really need those?” Selene asks him. “All the time, I mean.”
“My eyes tend to ache without them,” he tells her. “And I find I like to see everything with as much clarity as possible.”
He picks up the suit jacket from where Selene left in the night before, frowning at the arm. Confused, he tries the second sleeve as well. “You didn’t have Greta maketwojackets, did you?”
Selene laughs. “No, I just fixed your one from last night.”
Dorian looks just as confused as before. “This is excellent work,” he remarks.
“Thank you.”
She expected him to ask her why. It seems silly now, and she’d expected light teasing at best. The Duke would have said she was wasting her time if she’d done something like that. She presented him with an embroidered handkerchief once, stitched with a dog that resembled his favourite hound. He’d patted her head like she was a child presenting him with a simple drawing, and told her that he had plenty of handkerchiefs.
But this is Dorian, and he was made for surprising her in a myriad of tiny ways.
Dorian smiles, pulling on the jacket, wincing slightly as he lifts his arm. Selene crosses the room to assist him, helping him into it and smoothing it down. Dorian catches her hand as she moves away.
“Thank you.”
He kisses her palm, and for a minute, Selene thinks he might kiss her again, but Soren bangs loudly on the door, and the spell is broken.
A short while later, Marta comes to help her dress. She’s selected a simple, dove-grey gown with minimal embellishments, which suits Selene’s mood. Her hands shake slightly as she raises her teacup, and she can barely eat her breakfast.
Dorian is back before too long. He smiles at her—a little too brightly—and sinks into the opposite chair, tearing into a piece of buttered toast she’s left out for him.
“Good news,” he says, in-between mouthfuls.
Selene had almost forgotten such a thing could exist. “Oh?”
