She looked up at him, but only with her eyes. Her face remained tipped slightly down, and he had the oddest notion that if he did not meet her gaze, if he did not hold it with his own, she would return hers to her tightly clutched hands, and the moment would be lost forever.
“What are you?” he whispered.
She shook her head. “I have no idea.”
“Is anyone hungry?” Andrew suddenly asked.
George blinked, trying to snap himself out of whatever spell had been cast over him.
“Because I am,” Andrew continued. “Famished. Utterly. I ate only one breakfast this morning.”
“One breakfast?” Billie started to say, but Andrew was already on his feet, bounding over to her side.
He set his hands on the table, leaning down to murmur, “I was hoping I’d be invited to tea.”
“Of course you’re invited to tea,” Billie said, but she sounded just as off-balance as George felt. She frowned. “It’s a little early, though.”
“It’s never too early for tea,” Andrew declared. “Not if your cook has been making shortbread.” He turned to George. “I don’t know what she puts in it, but it’s divine.”
“Butter,” Billie said absently. “Quite a lot of it.”
Andrew cocked his head to the side. “Well, that makes sense. Everything tastes better with quite a lot of butter.”
“We should ask Georgiana to join us,” Billie said, reaching for her crutches. “I’m meant to be helping her plan the entertainments for the house party.” She rolled her eyes. “My mother’s orders.”
Andrew let out a bark of laughter. “Does your mother even know you?”
Billie threw an irritated look at him over her shoulder.
“Seriously, Billie-goat, what will you have us do? Head out to the south lawn to plant barley?”
“Stop,” George said.
Andrew swung around. “What was that?”
“Leave her alone.”
Andrew stared at him for so long George could not help but wonder if he’d been speaking in tongues.
“It’s Billie,” Andrew finally said.
“I know. And you should leave her alone.”
“I can fight my own battles, George,” Billie said.
He glanced over at her. “Of course you can.”
Her lips parted, but she seemed not to know how to respond to that.
Andrew looked back and forth between the two of them before offering Billie a small bow. “My apologies.”
Billie nodded awkwardly.
“Perhaps I might help in the planning,” Andrew suggested.
“You’ll certainly be better at it than I am,” Billie said.
“Well, that goes without saying.”
She poked him in the leg with one of her crutches.
And just like that, George realized, all was back to normal.
Except it wasn’t. Not for him.
Chapter 9
Four days later
It was remarkable – no, inspirational – Billie decided, how quickly she’d weaned herself from her crutches. Clearly, it was all in the mind.
Strength. Fortitude.
Determination.
Also, the ability to ignore pain was helpful.
It didn’t hurt that much, she reasoned. Just a twinge. Or maybe something closer to a nail being hammered into her ankle at intervals corresponding to the speed at which she took her steps.
But not a very big nail. Just a little one. A pin, really.
She was made of stern stuff. Everybody said so.
At any rate, the pain in her ankle wasn’t nearly as bad as the chafing under her arms from the crutches. And she wasn’t planning to go for a five-mile hike. She just wanted to be able to get about the house on her own two feet.
Nevertheless, her pace was considerably slower than her usual stride as she headed toward the drawing room a few hours after breakfast. Andrew was waiting for her, Thamesly had informed her. This was not terribly surprising; Andrew had called upon her every day since her injury.
It was really quite sweet of him.
They’d been building card houses, a characteristically perverse choice for Andrew, whose dominant arm was still immobilized in a sling. He’d said that as long as he was coming over to keep her company, he might as well do something useful.
Billie didn’t bother pointing out that building a house of cards might very well be the definition of not useful.
As for his having only one working arm, he needed help getting the first few cards balanced, but after that, he could set up the rest just as well as she could.
Or better, really. She’d forgotten how freakishly good he was at building card houses – and how freakishly obsessed he became during the process. The day before had been the worst. As soon as they’d completed the first level he’d banned her from construction. Then he banned her from the entire area, claiming that she breathed too hard.
Which of course left her with no choice but to sneeze.
She might also have kicked the table.
There had been a fleeting moment of regret when it had all come down in a spectacular earthquake of destruction, but the look on Andrew’s face had been worth it, even if he had gone home immediately following the collapse.
But that was yesterday, and knowing Andrew, he’d want to start again, bigger and better the fifth time around. So Billie had collected another two decks on her way to the drawing room. It should be enough for him to add another story or two to his next architectural masterpiece.
“Good morning,” she said as she entered the drawing room. He was standing over by a plate of biscuits someone had left out on the table that ran behind the sofa. A maid, probably. One of the sillier ones. They were always giggling over him.