Page 159 of The Grosvenor's Ghost
“How do you know that?” Ev whispers after a few minutes. “How do you know that I have ballet today?”
I shrug even though she can’t see me. “Just do.”
“Delphine only knows that.”
Fuck. I lean my head back on the door.
“I’m sorry.”
“What for?” She sniffs.
“Everything.”
Her door opens and I fall back into her room. “Thanks,” I smile up at her as I get up and sit on her bed.
“Welcome,” she mutters, staying by the door. “When are you marrying Phoebe, then?”
“What?” I laugh.
She gives me a look. “Don’t play stupid, Arthur. She fucking hates Digby.”
“Don’t I know it?”
“So, when are you going to ask her?” She sits on her floor, grabs the Peter Rabbit teddy she’s had all her life and starts playing with its ear.
I shrug. “When she wants me to, I guess?”
“She wants you to now,” she glances up at me.
“She tell you that, yeah?”
“We talk,” she says, nose in the air. “We’re very good friends.”
“I know.”
“Astrid is nice,” she shrugs. “But I love Phoebe. We all do. Even you do. Just marry her and get it over and done with.”
I smile. “It’s not that easy.”
She looks at me, lifts one eyebrow. “I know you were hauled up in Scotland for a million years but don’t tell me you’ve forgotten how to propose,” she shakes her head in disbelief and then gets down on one knee, opening her hands like it’s a ring box. “It really isn’t rocket science, Arthur, Christ.”
I push her over and she laughs, falling on her back.
“Did you miss me?” I ask her.
She scoffs, looks away. “Cop on, as if.”
“You did, didn’t you?” I poke her in her ribs. “Just admit it, you pussy. You missed me.”
“Actually,” she stands up, hands on her hips. “It was quite nice not having you around. No more wake ups at three o’clock in the morning because you were off your face.”
She says it playfully, almost laughs but I know that look too well. The fake smile you think you’ve perfected, how it doesn’t reach your eyes. The glint in your eye that says otherwise. I fucking made the look.
“I’m sorry I put you through that.”
She raises her eyebrows, folds her lips. “I love you because you’re my brother and it sometimes feels like I only have you in the whole world but I don’t know if I can forgive you. Maybe one day I will—and it isn’t to do with you or Phoebe or anyone else—it’s to do with me because I can’t get over it even if everyone else has.”
I nod, run a hand down my face. What can I say? Need to accept it, don’t I? Can’t force her to forgive me, can’t tell her to feel one way. If that’s how she feels then, yeah, that’s how she feels. No one’s fault but my own.
