Page 140 of The Good Duke
He withdrew a small-sized purse, setting the coins within ajingle. Then after he’d fished one out, he lobbed it at the now rippling waters.
Plunk.
Persephone stared bemusedly as that coin disappeared under the water’s surface.
How very different they were. And how very different their lives had turned out. He possessed a wealth so great, he could cast money aside without a worry, while she sat lamenting the idea of those valuable funds sitting at the bottom of his pond.
She dropped her knee atop her chin and rubbed it back and forth over the cotton fabric.
Of course, that’d always been their destinies—Simon a peer, born into a noble family, and Persephone, a female of a respectable family but, as a woman with no male relatives, an uncertain fate.
Funny that. As children, one didn’t think about the tribulations life would bring or the uncertainty of fate. One lived only in the moment, laughing and carefree and not imagining the hard things to come because, well, a child’s mind that hadn’t yet experienced hardship couldn’t even begin to fathom it.
Simon held a coin under her nose. “A wish?”
Making no move to take it, Persephone smiled wryly. “I’m not tossing an actualcoin, Simon.”
“Not even for a wish?”
“Especiallynot for a wish.” She snorted. “I will not throw money away foranyempty game.”
A lifetime ago, she would have. A lifetime ago, she’d have not given it a second thought. She would have, with a hasty word of thanks, eagerly snatched it from his fingers and sent it sailing with her unspoken wish for company.
Her skin pricked and she glanced at Simon.
He wore an expression the likes of which she’d never seen upon his features—as if her words had deeply affected him.
“Take it, Seph.”
His quiet urging cut through her melancholy. And because it was easier to accept the coin than talk with him, this time Persephone took his offering.
As she did, her fingertips brushed Simon’s. Even that very slightest of meetings sent a shiver of awareness racing through her.
Unnerved, she launched her coin—too far.
The pence went flying over the pond.
“Well, that can’t be good,” Simon drawled. “Though it is harder to say which is worse luck. Having the wishing stones thrownatyou or—”
“Are we going to do this, Simon?”
“Make wishes?”
“Act like nothing happened earlier today.”
Simon slowly rubbed his empty palms together. “No, you are right.”
Yes, she was.
And yet neither of them had truly been good to or truthful with one another.
“I’ve been b-bothered by my horrid treatment of you, Seph.”
She gave him a sideways look. “Are you referring to your vile treatmentthisafternoon?” Persephone lifted an eyebrow. “Or one of the many other times since I arrived?”
He bowed his head. “I deserve th-that.”
“Deserve what?” Persephone said bluntly. “I’m truly asking which because there’s been so many times you’ve been a bastard to me, Simon, I really can’t be sure which time is keeping you from your sleep.”
