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archonoelle

Jun 5

unificsation

the garden path ⊱✿⊰ 2/2

logan howlett masterlist · main masterlist

regency!au · logan howlett x f!reader

part 1

he’s a cynic who has sworn off love. you’re a jaded romantic under pressure to wed. when one season bids you greet each other after many spent apart, a deeper bond blooms despite outward differences… …and the fact that he’s friends with your father.

⚜️ WARNINGS/TAGS: AGE GAP RELATIONSHIP/dad's friend (go away if that’s not your thing!); estranged friends(?) to lovers; slow burn; period-typical misogyny and sexism 🥀 (not by logan of course); mcu/bridgerton cameos; heavy bridgerton references; yearning; reader gaslights herself a lot in this; emotional constipation; slight forced proximity; SMUT MDNI! (virginity loss/first time, dirty talk, oral, softdom!logan? he talks you through it; a bit of size kink; one pussyjob line; praise kink; creampie); nicknames (too many to list down)

⚜️ READER WARNINGS/TAGS: afab!reader, reader is Xavier's adopted daughter, reader has hair (mentions of brushing) and is able-bodied, reader is a virgin (i promise it's not infantilized!!!)

⚜️ WORD COUNT: 18.1k look at this wc total by the way. yeah no way this was gonna fit into one post lmao

⚜️ AUTHOR’S NOTE: guys it's FINALLY done. 40 hours of my life between january 3rd and today dedicated to this freaking fic. i want to cry. thank you for reading and indulging in my freakishly specific fantasies <3 thank you to @houseofhyde @flockoff-featherface for hearing me talk about this idea, and to @theworstwolvie @princessanglophile for reading the teaser, and to @superbassbuck who gave me feedback—you all mean so much to me.

if it sucks, lie 👅

Dearest Gentle Reader,

Any worthy member of high society would know that the first ball of the season bears many similarities to the beginning of war. London’s noblest reconnoiter and devise strategies for a plan of attack; playing a game not unlike the actual brutality unfolding on our shores.

Indeed, there were events that unfolded at Lady Danbury’s soiree last night which have caught this humble author’s eye.

Foreign dignitaries made for manifold attractions. The Maximoffs, who hailed from the East, brought along with them two coveted candidates for courting: twins Pietro and Wanda Maximoff, who enjoyed attention in the heaps from bachelors and bachelorettes alike.

The regiments stationed in town throughout the season meant there were handsome officers at last night’s ball. Militia often make good company, especially the ever-popular Captain Steve Rogers and Sergeant James Barnes, who reveled like the rest after a well-fought campaign. Their return from battle ignited another: this time in the ballroom, where mamas of the Ton competed to put their daughters in the men’s path.

While some officers were busy chasing skirts—or being chased by them—one actually did his duty of protection.

Sir James Howlett of Clawthorne Abbey was seen dealing justice to a trespasser, who was none other than his rumored half-brother, Victor Creed. The matter of their inheritance notwithstanding, the young lady who was harassed also happened to be Sir Howlett’s very own ward in her early years.

Although perhaps Sir Howlett should consider rescinding that relation. He and the lady were spotted emerging from a drawing room, one tenderly bandaged hand and two equally tender looks between the two of them.

After all, what woman wouldn’t swoon for a man who put himself in danger to save them from ruin?

Yours truly,

Lady Whistledown

“What are you reading?”

Calmly, you slipped the thin ivory sheet under the newspapers on the table. Your father strolled in, rolling his chair on his own. He looked to be in high spirits despite the evening that just transpired.

“Good morning, Father,” you chimed in innocently, as though your heart wasn’t stuttering at what you just read. “Just the dailies. Tea?”

“Please.”

He placed himself at the end of the table next to you. You poured him a cup as a footman walked in with a tray of bread and butter.

The morning was like any other, if not for the peace that seemed brittler to the touch, easily broken by the most minute of things—like the periodical you were hiding. Your father wouldn’t care for trifle gossip exchanged in such societal papers, but he might question why you were interested in it.

Really, you just wanted to know if it was unreasonable for your chest to flutter whenever you thought of last night—not from fear, but from Logan.

You did not want to share that piece of information over breakfast.

But Charles spoke anyway, and suddenly you had something new to worry about.

“I was thinking,” he began.

“You tend to do that,” you took a sip of tea.

He shot you a look. You pursed your lips.

“I suppose it’s good that you’re not so shaken over yesterday’s events,” he sighed, the liveliness about him quickly caving in to a cloud. “But you must understand. As your father, I feel… inadequate in such times.”

Brows knitted. You put down your cup, rising from your seat only to kneel by his side, concerned over the quick change in his mood.

“Father, what on earth are you talking about?”

He placed a hand over yours: the one you’d stationed by his chair. Warmth and comfort enveloped you, but you felt it—the gentlest of tremors within him, a rude reminder of his advancing age.

“I could defend you in thirteen different courts and thirteen different languages, but should a man lay his hand on you, I can do little more than cry out.”

The reality of it nearly shattered you. “Father, please—”

“No, let me finish.”

Charles clasped your hand in both of his.

“Dearest, I’d applaud your composure if this matter weren’t so grave. You’re far from defenseless, I know this, but the possibility of last night repeating itself weighs greatly on my mind.”

You looked at him, sensing the thread of an idea he was pulling you towards. He had that look in his eyes that you’ve come to recognize over the years.

“I think it’s prudent to hire someone to watch over you.”

You shook your head, shoulders sagging at the suggestion. As if the Ton didn’t have enough eyes already.

“Please, the mere thought is already too much.”

“Too much for you, maybe, but I’d personally find it a great relief—”

“I know yesterday could’ve gone really wrong, but I promise to be more careful.”

“And I trust you, dearest, but…”

The clearing of throat by the entrance silenced your bickering. It was the butler, both hands behind his back.

“Sir James Howlett,” he announced.

True enough, Logan walked in, the black tailcoat flapping behind him nothing more than a de rigueur he quickly shed after bowing at the two of you. You rose to reciprocate the gesture.

It was then that Charles was able to finish his sentence.

“…I already asked Logan for a favor.”

“Bad timing?” he asked, stopping in the middle of hooking his coat on a hanger. “I can come back later.”

“Nonsense.” “Not at all.”

Logan’s eyebrow arched at the scene, but he approached regardless.

You were still looking at him, gobsmacked at the fact that he was in the parlor at ten in the morning, looking like he was part of the household with that dark grey waistcoat and linen shirt.

“Tea, Sir?” you murmured.

He nodded. You didn’t bother calling for a servant and poured another cup.

Fingers brush when you handed it to him. The skin-on-skin contact jolted with remnants of sparks from last night: subtle, but far from nothing, enough to make you pull back a little faster than you should have.

His knuckles were bandaged, the same wraps as last night. The mere sight melted the butterflies in your stomach into quiet concern.

“Does it still hurt?” you whispered.

“It never did, sweetheart.”

You dared to glimpse at his face. His eyes looked more green in this light—its brilliance pulled your head to turn to your father, as if avoiding being blinded.

“What’s this about a favor?”

“Your father thought it’d be best for me to stick around.”

That pulled your half-asleep eyes wide open. “You’re to be the guard?”

“‘Guard’ feels like an exaggeration,” Charles chimed in much too placidly, “He’s just… keeping you company.”

“And you’re alright with this?”

Logan looked at you, face unreadable. “Your father and I spoke about it last night.”

“Without me?” you volleyed.

The expression on Logan’s face was slight, but enough for you to grasp. It read like the faintest of pouts.

“You were the one who wandered off on your own.”

“Have I not apologized for it in the carriage yesterday?”

Silence took over. Your gaze avoided his in favor of the papers, though if asked what news there was, you probably couldn’t answer.

Logan grabbed the bread plate, putting one on his, and then another on yours, before casually slicing some butter like your heart didn’t just bang itself against your ribcage, wanting out. The angle in which he sat next to you placed him so perfectly against sunlight—bright rays seemed to kiss the lines next to his eyes.

“This Victor character is still in town, doing,” Charles gestured with a hand, failing to find the words, “whatever the blazes.”

“The ass is probably tying up loose ends before he can piss off overseas,” Logan added. A dagger of a look from Charles at the language, and he sat back slightly. “…Sorry.”

You couldn’t even pretend to read the paper in front of you anymore. You took a sip of tea in hopes of calming you down, but it didn’t exactly work.

“It has been decided.” You clipped. “Hasn’t it?”

“‘Fraid so.” “Correct, my dear.”

As a last ditch effort, you threw a look to your father: the kind that cried a clandestine plea with nary a peep. Perhaps such a maneuver was childish, but so was this entire guard setup they shook on behind your back.

The look didn’t work, of course. If anything, his obstinacy for doing things his way got passed on to you.

“Only for the time being, child,” he placated. You sighed—but not exactly from disappointment.

You should be angrier about this arrangement. So why weren’t you?

“And does Sir Logan have any qualms about being a chaperone again?” you murmured, scanning a paragraph for the nth time to no avail. “As I recall, you protested against it back then.”

“Not like I have anything better to do ’round these parts, sweetheart.”

You dared to glance at him. Or at least it was meant to be a glance, before hazel eyes trapped you to them.

There they were again: the butterflies in your stomach. The blasted internal organ may as well be a conservatory of fluttering wings, at this point.

More hot tea, you thought as you nearly threw your head back, emptying the cup. Maybe that would help melt those pesky critters away.

How you were going to handle Logan being close to you all the time, you were about to find out.

Eyes. So many eyes were watching.

Decidedly, the habits of a soldier were impossible to unlearn, because Logan assessed a perfectly normal park with the exactitude one would a battlefield. So much uncovered space meant there was nowhere to hide from shot stares. Each person that passed by, no matter how genteel, might as well be an enemy spy of some kind—yes, even that matronly older lady with the huge skirt.

In fighting an open war with a hidden enemy, Logan knew that the eyes were one’s ultimate weapon.

High society had its way of concealing intentions behind thick curtains of ‘manner maketh man’, but a person of Logan’s years and experience knew better.

The day was a beautiful, clear blue. So was the lake. Many flowers were in good enough spirits to bloom, peppering paved paths with vermilion and amethyst and gold—nature’s very own color palette. The clouds painted cotton-like streaks on the sky that moved faster than usual, their reflection on the lake rippling like a sheet thanks to a light breeze. It smelled like spring.

So many beautiful things to look at. Why did people look only at you?

You, walking next to him as he pushed your father’s wheelchair forward, pretty parasol in hand. There was an air of ease about you as you spoke about a fabric merchant you met in Venice. And speaking of fabric, did the shade of your dress make you shine, or was it the other way around?

Logan almost couldn’t fault the turning of heads. If he hadn’t needed to watch where he was going, he’d be looking at you too.

The shadow of Victor’s ambush looked like it had escaped you completely. Granted, three days had passed since the incident, but Logan was beginning to believe that Victor wasn’t the only person he needed to protect you from.

Whoever coined the phrase ‘polite company’ to refer to the most civil of civilization was either generously naive or thoroughly stupid. Because nothing about the eyes trailing your walking form felt polite. Men raked their gazes down to your walking slippers, while women pinned theirs on your face, each person wearing an expression that betrayed their sentiments:

An interest piqued, as if wondering how they had not noticed you before. Polite admiration—the kind provided from afar.

And then there was that green, green jealousy. An emotion diametric to adoration. One could mistake it as grass, the way it grew quickly and easily everywhere.

However, Logan’s mild ire was eclipsed by sardonic empathy (rare as he may grant it), because of course a handsome gentleman by his lonesome couldn’t resist stopping you in your tracks.

He exchanged a few words with you, and that green weed of a feeling began to grow in Logan, too.

The man had failed to address Logan and your father entirely. Judging by his manner of behavior and dress, which were quite proper, this could only mean that he was enamored to the point of forgetting basic etiquette.

“My lady. Stephen Strange, at your service,” he bowed. “Terrible, what happened to you—should I ever see that Creed fellow within even an inch of my vicinity, I promise he will be dealt with.”

You blinked and replied, polite in expressing your thanks and speaking to him as though you were already acquaintances. It was this trait of yours that softened Logan to you all those years ago: the generosity of your sweetness.

So yes, he ought to join the jealous brigade when you smiled brilliantly at a passing joke about the gentleman’s name.

But a thought quickly soothed that ache.

Logan was allowed to watch you. Him; a gentleman who barely deserved to be called one. He was the one standing by your side while promenading with Charles. He had the privilege of being kept in your precious memories.

He was the person you trusted.

They could all stare, but Logan was the only one who had the excuse to.

And look, there it was: the little glance you always gave him in between conversation no matter how riveting, as if you could feel wafts of his restlessness. Its twinkle seemed to whisper “I’ll be there soon”, like he was a berth of return. Like you’d always come back to him eventually.

When this Strange fellow ended the chat with a kiss on your gloved hand, only then he seemed to realize that he’d ignored two of your wards, one of whom was your father. He nodded at Logan and Charles before walking off elsewhere, pace hasted by the faux pas.

The two masters of their houses exchanged a look.

You turned to your party and pointed up ahead.

“Shall we go over there? I spy a free bench. Perhaps we can stare at the lake for a while.”

I don’t think the lake is what I’ll be staring at, was what Logan wanted to say, but he settled for a nod.

“Of course, dear,” Charles smiled up at you, eyes squinting at the bright sun mirrored blindingly on the lake. “Do you suppose Esther packed us a snack?”

And so another day spent with your little family went by.

This was akin to what people did on holidays, Logan thought: schedules didn’t exist, save for going to the modiste’s or the confectionary on your whim—the latter more frequent than the former.

Sometimes he wished you were inclined to go out more, because whenever you stayed in, the estate would see guests.

Gentlemen calling on you, that is.

And of course Logan bore witness throughout, lounging in the drawing room with your father while you sat on the sofa with some poor fellow who looked too flustered to function. Logan would busy himself with something—the papers, or a book—while sneaking glances at your countenance.

If your heart was set on one, you did well to not let it show. The men who’d left Clairview likely felt the genial warmth of their host, but remained curious about where your affections lie; for you were obliging at least, friendly at most.

The only exception was when Pietro came to visit. The room actually echoed with twin laughter over what appeared to be a bilingual joke.

Coffee only amplified the glib bitterness between Logan’s ribs. He’d know—it was his third cup within the hour.

He downed them all anyway.

To be fair, he wasn’t the only one coyly watching. Charles was, too, with the superior elegance of a man who knew the game. But the true experts were the help, Logan noted: they flitted to and fro as though they have many a task, camouflaging comprehension with the invisibility of their rank. If Charles were a master player, Mrs. Pemberton was practically the one who set up the board.

With Clawthorne’s inheritance matter coming to a close, Logan was left with the menial organization of his house and heaps of free time—hence the loitering, although Xavier would call it ‘spending time with a friend’.

Such freedom usually inspired in Logan a boredom, at first, which later on would metamorphose into an unignorable desire to escape. To moor or mountain, vale or fountain, it mattered little: for if asked for Sir James Howlett’s defining trait, most would answer his tendency to rarely ever stay.

But as the spring days passed, he found himself slowly changing.ut he was slowly changing.

No longer did he enjoy the idea of finding distraction at his usual haunts. The boxing ring must have missed the weight of his punches, and profits at the gentlemen’s club had probably gone down with nobody to drain their whiskey.

Alas, even a man as taciturn as he was dissuaded by the company of more outgoing friends—you and Charles being the only two he had. Except designating that title to you was… odd.

Because although his relations with you were certainly friend-ly, something in him whispered it was more than that.

He had this urge.

Felt it when you roped him into chess for an afternoon. The weather didn’t look too promising, and Charles holed himself in his study over a pressing household matter.

“Just like the old days?” you held up the set with both hands.

When would you learn that bringing up ‘the old days’ almost always resulted in him teasing you?

There was the barest hint of a smirk on his lips. “Only if you put the knight next to the queen, just like the old days,” he murmured, “You always thought they looked good together.”

Logan was never a man of many words, but if tormenting you with them yielded such delectable reactions, then he’d do it till the end of time. The flush on your cheeks alone was worth it.

The rain became a deluge within a the hour, as though April showers had lost their mild temperance and wanted a taste of wrath. You remained in the parlor: weary of chess, you decided to sketch, sitting neatly on an armchair facing the dining table with a pad on your lap.

“You’re staring,” you said to him, eyes firmly pinned on your subject.

Cherries in a china bowl.

He stood by your side as patient strokes of charcoal built up into a gradual shade. The artwork bore resemblance to reality, enough to inspire a type of hunger in him: a hunger for something to bite into, although at this point he wasn’t sure if it was the cherries or something else.

The way your hair fell at the sides of your face made him want to touch you.

A touch was different from a bite, that he know, but touching would leave a mark on your relationship all the same.

So he clenched his fist until his knuckles—that were once red and raw from fighting a man for you—turned white.

When he could no longer take the suffocation to his circulation, he approached the dining table in two long strides, only to pluck a cherry out of its vessel. You clicked your tongue at the disturbance of your subject, eyes snapping up at him after he was ignored for God knows how long.

There you are.

In a bid to keep your attention, he ate one straight off the paired stem, not bothering to look away from you.

Then he held its untouched twin in front of your face like bait.

A second passed—then two, then three, fraught with what he thought to be consideration.

Until finally you took it, fingers twisting the cherry from its stem. You popped it in your mouth.

Heart attacks were rather common for men his age. He might as well be experiencing one right now, for a pang struck him—zipping from the back of his legs to the tip of his spine near the neck.

Its cause? Your lips closing in on the red little ball. Plump. Smooth. The size of that cursed beating organ doubled to the point of implosion.

Your face scrunched at the burst of flavor, chewing through it.

“Sweet,” you remarked quietly.

He had to excuse himself to erase the shape of your mouth from his mind. One step towards the edge and he’d have imagined you wrapping them around something else…

This path of physical attraction was deathly perilous, but it really wasn’t just your body that threatened the threads of his honor. If his only plague were mere desires of the flesh, there were many routes he could venture to quell it. Roads he traveled before.

Whiskey wasn’t the only thing he drank at the gentlemen’s club, after all.

Two days after the blasted cherries, you’d asked him to go on a morning ride.

“More for Blacklock and Tawny. Get them out of the beaten path,” you persuaded.

As if he was ever going to say no to you in the first place.

Then he saw you mount your chestnut mare with ease, and his chest ached.

Seven years ago, you weren’t so proficient a rider.

He had laughed (picture a most strained exhale instead) when your voice trembled at the slightest pick-up of your horse’s speed. Your grip on the reins was timid, letting your steed take charge rather than the other way around. Getting you to pull harder was tough: “I thought I might hurt her,” you’d told him afterwards—her being the horse, who’d watched the two of you chat in front of here like all was right in the world. Like you hadn’t cast your eyes on the ground, feeling like you’d failed his tutelage.

Now you galloped like the gales, reminding him of that blur he saw one foggy Farthings morning.

The route you took was moderate and lovely—a change of scenery for both rider and horse. The two of you remained quiet in favor of the sounds of nature: birds tended to love singing in the mornings, and the breeze shook branches in a gentle dance.

Except Logan’s thoughts strayed without a conversation to anchor them.

What else had you learned while he didn’t exist in your periphery? Who had the pleasure of taking you under their wing? Who guided your hand to teach you, like the time he showed you how to tug on the reins to get into a brisk trot, warm palm encasing the back of your hand?

Has anyone touched you?

As much as he wanted you now, he envied whoever got to see you become a woman while he was away. A slice of the past he would never get a taste of.

By the seventh outing, Charles suggested that Logan should simply remain at Clairview for the time being.

“The guest room would continue to gather dust otherwise,” the older man reasoned.

“I don’t want to impose,” was Logan’s unsure response. What if he roamed the halls one sleepless night, only to find you doing the same in nothing but a nightgown? He wasn’t so sure of his gentlemanly restraint that he’d invite it to be put to the test. The threads of his integrity might be thinner than what you wore to bed.

Charles shook his head. “Please, you won’t. It would be our pleasure.”

God. Why that word specifically, Charles?

Both men turned at your form seated across them, book in hand—Logan did so for a bead on your opinion, while Charles undoubtedly sought your support. Your face was calm and hard to read, but the words that came out of your mouth settled the matter.

“Spare Blacklock from running to and fro on the same path,” you chimed, “Stay with us.”

He’d evidently survived the heart attack from the day with cherries, but the way his chest twinged at your expectant look, Logan ought to call a physician for a check-up.

Wasn’t his heart made to be hurt? Why did it writhe in pain whenever you were near?

The next morning, he arrived with a modest suitcase of his things, and a bouquet of flowers especially for you.

Apple blossoms and violets on a bed of ivy.

The month of May had a peculiar talent of drawing people out of their comfortable homes, mild weather and all.

It was a rather innocent idea. Mrs. Pemberton brought it up as a simple interposition while pouring tea for your party one afternoon.

Long story short, that was how you, Logan, and Charles ended up here: in a pocket of meadow, fenced between a steady stream and the leagues that led to town. Nature was lush here in this transitory place. Birch and pine dotted green ground every few feet, their branches filtering golden sunlight into fascinating stipples of light that shifted and flickered with the passing clouds.

The trickle of water flowed nearby, its mere sound refreshing not only to you, but also to the ducks that rested their wings in the river. They quacked as though in play.

At one point in the afternoon, you caught a glimpse of a fawn, but the creature dashed away before you could convince yourself it was real.

Somewhere in the distance, you could hear the lively voices of the rest of your party: Charles was laughing at something Esther shrieked at, followed by the overlap of Mrs. Pemberton’s voice over Kurt’s. From what little words you could discern, it sounded like Kurt had tried to show your poor handmaiden a bug—fascinating to him, indubitably grotesque to her.

Meanwhile, you and Logan were comfortably situated under an oak tree’s generous shade. Your back rested against its wide trunk. Logan was splayed on the grass in front of you, laid down such that you saw only his head of hair and broad chest under linen shirt, the rest of him disappearing with a gentle slope in the ground.

Even without view of his face, he looked carelessly handsome.

The two of you had books in your hands, but you were talking to each other too much to be reading. The riveting topic at hand?

Men.

“I thought Anthony Bridgerton was popular?” he piped up, finally sitting up to turn and look at you.

You sighed. “His popularity is exactly what makes him so… irksome.”

He chuckled at your adjective of choice. It wasn’t everyday he got to hear you complain.

“How so?”

“Well, talking to him felt like he was trying to hire me rather than court me,” you flicked a blade of grass, clearly annoyed. “He kept asking me things like… what languages I spoke, or my proficiency in embroidery. Then, when I admitted I wasn’t so accomplished in the pianoforte—because he asked me about it, mind you—he suggested that I dedicate at least two hours a day for practice!”

Logan caught the huff you let out.

“Good luck finding a love match with that attitude. Did he excel in any of the things he asked of, anyway?”

“And he wasn’t handsome enough to distract you from all that drivel?” Logan teased.

You shut your book with indignation, eyes rolled. “Please. The redeeming qualities of his face are wasted with that personality. He reeks condescension.”

Perhaps Logan should feel bad for being so satisfied at your dissatisfaction, but he couldn’t bring himself to. The incident with Victor essentially thrust you into a social spotlight, so to speak. A signal to eligible bachelors: here is a girl worth fighting for.

A girl worth marrying.

The flux of admirers that came after elicited two responses in Logan he didn’t care to admit.

The first was pride that your loveliness was now apparent to all. The second was jealousy in wanting to keep you all to himself. It was an avaricious voice that slithered in the depths of him—he was the one who kept you, guided you, protected you. Did he not have the right to, for having taken part in the forming of your resplendency?

Logan broke from his treacherous thoughts. “What about the Maximoff boy?”

“Pietro?” You blinked, pressing and parting your lips, until finally:

“He’s great company.”

“But?”

You shot him a look, though unable to deny the suggested conjuction. In that defeat, you leaned your head back against bark, staring up at the gaps between leaves.

“But…” you sighed. “I don’t know. There is no but.”

“You said but.”

“You said but first.”

“Just spit it out, will you?”

Eyes met. The sunlight that illuminated you made the color of your irises more brilliant, and in that one second, it was like he glimpsed a hidden wistfulness.

“It’s foolish and romantic and you’ll make fun of me,” you protested.

What escaped him wasn’t so much a laugh as it was a huff.

“Say it anyway.”

“Fine,” you crossed your arms in an act of courage, “I don’t feel it with him.”

Logan paused, letting his question stick to the silence. He watched your face fall: first in the drop of your gaze, then in the slight downturn of your lips, then in the wisp of a hair that shaded part of your cheek.

“I don’t feel… the way people say you do when you’re in love,” you answer. Fingers play with the hem of your dress. “Which pains me, because he’s endlessly charming and exceedingly kind and—and anyone would be lucky to have him.”

Trying to un-sense the crack in him as he heard your sorrows was like putting honey back into its jar: impossible. Knowledge marred him already—he wasn’t so naive to not realize what it was that caused him these persistent pangs.

He spoke up. Whether to divert his or your attention, he wasn’t sure.

“Would you still let him court you?” he asked.

You pursed your lips. “I couldn’t, in good conscience.”

Then a small smile graced your face, but the words that follow were more lash than balm:

“I’d ask you if romantic affection could grow with time, but I forgot you were averse to it.”

The silence that befell the air brought to mind a certain time in the Clairview gardens, to that conversation that revealed the rift between you and him. It was the kind of quiet found in regretful conclusions: one that said any further discussion would be obsolete, because to reconcile the grounds you both stood at was impossible.

You believed in love. He didn’t. Or so he thought.

The stillness suffocated.

He resorted to a tease as a bid to break the unseasonable frost. Just as you had prophesied.

“You read too many of those books, buttercup.”

You thawed a little, lips a vexed simper. “I knew it. I knew you’d make fun of me.”

“‘M not making fun of you. It’s nice to know that you’re a young woman, after all.” As if he weren’t already acutely aware of that with every second he spent with you.

The more obvious gap between you and him was that of age, after all.

“And you? What are you even reading, history?” you blitzed. “I thought it’d be recent memory for you.”

Logan ran a hand through his hair once, fingers threading through dark hair. Grey strands caught the light, disappearing once he moved his hand away, but a glimpse was enough to make your heart jump. 'What was unfashionable to society looked so becoming on him, it was rather unfair.

“Speaking of history,” you murmured, this time with a tinge of sheepishness, “you must have loved at least once in your long life.”

Something in his hazel eyes softened as he looked at you. A proper lady wouldn’t flatter herself so easily, which was why you decided he must have unintentionally done so in reminiscence, rather than a result of looking at you.

“I’ve loved,” he confessed. “Many times, in fact.”

Ever the transparent character, your posture straightened with interest, eyes slightly wide. He found it adorable.

“But only at night, before it fades with the sunrise,” he concluded, gaze expectant.

The expression you wore was that of a woman appalled: jaws slack, cheeks warming more from shyness than from sun’s kiss, flush apparent even under the shade of the tree.

“That is… absolutely repulsive, you arse.”

He smirked. “You asked.”

“Rake,” you bit back, not without a slight mirth.

He would never deny the accusation, because that was exactly what rakes did: chase for scraps of intimacy after dark, mongrel-like in their greed. Sex offered him a glimpse of what he truly hungered for, wrapping that unattainable treasure like jelly around a golden nugget. Having it certainly didn’t hurt—not unless he wanted it to; and even then, it was a kind of pain that furthered pleasure.

But come morning, he’d find himself starving again.

For a closeness more than of bodies.

Like with many other great expectations, it was easier to avoid dealing with it. By sunset, if it was a difficult day, Logan would drown himself in alcohol of the same kind and bliss in a different bed—things that encouraged forgetfulness.

Rinse and repeat. A perfectly acceptable way of surviving.

You were playing with the hem of your dress again, looking down.

“I suppose you’re sufficiently entertained then?” Your tone was cautious. Curious, even, like the fawn that approached the river earlier.

He sat still and silent, not wanting to scare you.

Hesitantly, you said:

“With… the women?”

A misstep here and you’d bolt—which was the last thing he wanted, especially with the privilege of having you close for the many days past.

“You don’t want to hear about it, sweetheart,” he met your gaze, which narrowed at his response.

You shot him a small smile. “I’m far from a child.”

I know, he wanted to reply, and that’s why this is dangerous.

“Doesn’t mean you know all the ways a lady can be seduced.”

His voice dropped low, more vibration than anything, and he wished he didn’t notice the way your breath caught under the neckline of your dress that traced below collarbone.

He dragged his eyes back up.

“I know some,” you replied.

Now it was his turn to fall victim to stolen breath. Eyebrows knitted by instinct at your response, a wave of possibilities washing slowly over him. You weren’t the type to lie for a simple reaction, unless something in your nature had fundamentally changed while he was away—except so far, he’d found your better qualities as enduring as precious metal.

So he must trust that you did know some.

And some felt too much.

The roar of his heartbeat reached his ears, drowning birdsong.

He’d been gone for seven years, for goodness’ sake. Twenty-eight seasons during which you’ve come of age, danced, and maybe courted before you truly understood what the word meant.

Did a boy tell you how ladies were lured? Showed you? Was it a suitor that changed his mind?

Logan didn’t know which was worse: an inexperienced scamp or a grown man with no sane mind of his own—because the inability to please you should be a sin, and to let you go an even graver one.

“You’ve…”

The single syllable trailed nowhere, but you caught his implication, your hands raised as if he was pointing a verbal firearm.

“No—no, goodness, no.”

“Then how…?”

“Stories,” you blurted out, “I meant… I’ve read some.”

Like the gradual pool of a spilt drink, the grin formed slowly on Logan’s face, coaxed by uncageable humor laced with provocation. The words rolled out of his lips even slower—he wouldn’t waste the taste of the upper hand on each syllable.

“So when you say you like reading, it’s those kinds of books.”

Flame coated your cheeks red. It pulled him forward as though he were a moth, sitting closer to you.

“I—they—it was a book, I didn’t know.” Gone was the image of a collected lady; here was a stammering mess.

He didn’t even respond, dead set on elevating the suspense. You looked a mix of mortification and an inch towards the edge of tears.

Then his hand snatched the book out of your lap.

You shrieked, the sound melting into a laugh that was more in shock than amusement.

He nearly escaped, if not for you gripping his forearms as you screamed “Give it back!”, dragged up on your own two feet as he stood. He snickered in earnest. The sound distracted you enough for him to break free, striding to a stop a few feet in front of you, where he was safe to crack open the book at a random page.

His twinkling eyes scanned between the lines.

“You’ll find nothing satisfactory in there,” you seethed.

“Nothing is satisfactory when they’re words on a page, darling,” he drawled, still not looking at you, “It’s in the deed.”

The flush in your face returned. “You’re unbelievable.”

“This looks promising,” he murmured at a passage. Then, reading aloud, “‘…and in dream, Lady Chatterley found that the mere phantoms of the Duke’s mouth were enough to draw pleasure out of her own—’”

“Stop it,” you ripped the book out of his hands, ignoring his laugh, “I didn’t even know that was going to happen!”

“Now you do,” he teased, “You’re welcome.”

“How dare you.”

“Don’t blame me for milking this, buttercup. For once, you can’t run to your father and make me the bad guy.”

You scoffed, red-faced from anger and shame and every other emotion in between—but a secret part of you was relieved. Maybe now he’d finally see you as a woman instead of the girl he babysat.

“You’re cruel,” you spat weakly anyway.

“And you’re a naughty little lady,” he hummed back, “Now let’s stop, before I ruin whatever innocence you have left.”

This time, the quiet that took over made it seem like you were actually considering it.

“I’m afraid you’ve made me inconsolably upset, Sir,” you finally said, mockingly polite and not entirely honest, “Let us read in silence before I run away with the violence of my rage. The birds would appreciate it.”

He smiled at you like you were a bristling kitten.

“Sure. Tell me about Lady Chatterley’s dream later.”

“Sir!”

Logan ignored and indulged you all at once, sitting back on the grass to read his own book like you’d asked with his back towards you. Though the pages were spread, he wasn’t aware of a single printed word, mind set on the ghost-presence of your form behind him, the heat of you against that lucky tree.

Discovering the nature of your reading material brought him much relief—an unexpected response. It confirmed to him that you were a woman after all, with curious sensibilities that he didn’t proclaim to understand completely, like the rest of your sex.

Although, what little knowledge he had of women was proven to be… meaningful, in a manner of speaking.

His own book wasn’t half as exciting: less fantasy coitus and more factual accuracy on shipbuilding—a subject he thought he could occupy himself with for the rest of the afternoon, when in fact his attentions easily strayed to that passage about Lady Chatterley’s dream.

Had you reached that point in the story? That would explain your complete silence.

Even a glimpse or two of the indecency that followed the paragraph was enough to inspire his imagination. His eyes caught the words ‘spread’, ‘drank’, and ‘soft moan’—his brain strung them together in moving images.

Lady Chatterley took on your face in this vision, with a flush not dissimilar to the one earlier adorning your cheeks. The fabric of your nightgown shifted as a pair of hands snaked up your bare legs, parting them to make room for a body to nestle within. He thought of your lips, the plump shape they took around a dark cherry, how he might use his own mouth to lure sounds out of them…

In his head, you’d moan his name. Not Sir. Not James.

Logan.

Because looking at you would affect his base ruminations for the worse (or was it for the better?), he chose to lock his jaw and stare at a technical illustration of a ship’s hull, as if it would erase the heat in his stomach faster.

But then minutes passed, and he hadn’t heard the flip of a page in so long.

Like Orpheus, he turned back to look at you.

When he’d expected you to be engrossed in enchantment, instead, there you were: head leaned against a tree, eyes closed. Your hand still rested on an open book, abandoned temporarily.

You were asleep.

Perhaps the excitement from earlier, the sun’s warmth, and waking up early in the morning had coalesced into a mood that lulled you to rest.

The sight melted Eros’ short-lived spell on him. It made his heart grow to no mean size, and the spaces between his fingers hurt from the avowed hope of something he couldn’t have.

But maybe, in this sliver of a moment, he could.

There was a glimmer in his blood, then a friction between his stubborn resistance and the urge to chase after it. A private increase of suspense with affection as its tipping point: that he could leave this one thing for you and be content with a void to fill in the arms of different for the rest of his life.

One brush of something real—just one. That was all he needed to tide through the years.

He knelt beside you, as quiet as his boots might let him, his own book forgotten on the grass.

Then his fingertips stroke your hair.

The movement was the slow inch of growing vine, like the time that passed around absence, like ardor in its most subdued form. Because no such circumstance would present itself twice: when else could he do this, but nary anyone but simple sparrows to judge his touch?

The backs of his fingers dared to trace the curve of your cheek. Hazel eyes followed, memorizing the flutter of lashes sat on skin. The slope of your nose. The slight part of your lips in slumber.

Lovely, he thought.

Unsurprising that he had no scruples about caving a man’s face with his fist for daring to threaten you. He’d do so many besotted things for you—things he wouldn’t even consider doing for other people, things he didn’t even think he could do.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. He used to think himself an outlier to this truth, having been attracted the most to the act of deserting familiar faces.

Now he wasn’t so sure. In fact, he found his foundations shaken.

The just one promised he made to himself was swiftly broken, for his fingers continued to stroke your cheek. Slow and careful, both in wanting not to disturb you and in making the moment last.

Some yards away, Logan caught a glimpse of blue checkers—Mrs. Pemberton’s picnic mat, the fabric batted and folded up.

It was time to leave.

He carried your soporose form towards the parked carriage, arm under knees and back. Felt the soft of your breath. Let your face hide against his chest. Caught flower scents on your skin.

A few hours later, you woke up to a familiar ceiling, and Esther asking how you felt. Sleepy, you’d answered, wondering who it was that tucked you in so comfortably under the sheets.

You went down for dinner anyway.

Nobody said a word about how it happened—how you got home. But somehow you knew.

Like your body relived his touch without permission.

The news sought him out before he could.

Early mornings at the harbor was always packed. Today’s cloudy part of later-dawn was no exception.

The air was thick with industry smog, damp fabric, and salt. People trudged in a shoulder-to-shoulder crowd that didn’t discriminate between class or gender. A more selective gentleman would abhor being part of such a scene, but Logan was used to it.

He was here on strictly business. No lingering in taverns with convenient liquor. No exchanging introductory handshakes.

A package awaited him. He had been notified by a Clawthorne page that had hurried to Clairview with the notice. The item sailed all the way from America aboard the same ship he took to the New World—her crew was respectable enough for Logan to trust with such precious cargo: the secured samples of an investment mine, which he’d visited on his previous expedition.

From the sea of heads, Logan stood blessedly taller than the rest, allowing him a glimpse of the silhouette he was looking for.

A portly man stood in the distance, the thinning hair on his head proudly displayed a great contrast to a bushy beard. His coat of dark green was open at the sides, revealing the unbuttoned collar of his inner muslin shirt and the extremely unkempt ribbon above it. Windswept, presumably. He was busy biting into a cigar. Beady eyes watched as men half his age lugged boxes down a wooden ramp that looked dangerously slippery from saltwater. Both his hands were in pockets, one of which had a small chain hanging past it, implying a pocket watch.

This was the Captain of the Barossa.

“Howlett!” he barked upon Logan’s approach, face pulled into a wide grin. “Been too long, m’boy.”

“Rough waters, Captain?” They clapped each other’s shoulders.

“Someth’n like that,” the Captain replied, before turning back at the deck behind him. “Collingwood! The goods!”

Some seconds later, a young man with a freckled face rushed towards them, a small box in hand. Unlike the much larger crates carried by the rest of the crew, this one’s material evidently enjoyed more care: it was lacquered and varnished in a darker color.

The young sailor called Collingwood handed Logan a quill and a piece of paper, which the older man signed. The small chest was handed to him expressly.

Logan cracked it open just a smidge.

“No slaves, as promised?”

“Pah! Only if you count the prospector himself one. Got his letter in there an’ ev’rything.”

Logan looked at him, eyes pressing for a more straightforward answer.

“Trust me boy,” the Captain’s voice dropped, “I went through great lengths to get this. Thought it impossible.”

The box snapped close before Logan shoved it into his inside coat pocket. “I’ll take your word for it.”

“Spendin’ the rest of yer inheritance?” The Captain huffed.

If Logan were three decades younger, he’d cough at the cigar smoke in his face, but that hazy taste was now a second nature. Shag tobacco, he recognized.

Logan decided he wouldn’t be so easily perceived. “News travel the high seas faster than I thought.”

The Captain grinned his yellow teeth into view.

Financial security wasn’t Logan’s main objective in procuring the object, but the Captain could choose to believe whatever truth he wanted to, and there would be no harm nor foul. He was a sailor after the sea’s own heart rather than man’s riches.

Still, Logan dropped a few heavy coins onto his plump palms.

“Little extra for your troubles.”

The Captain pocketed it, nonchalant.

“Sail’s up day after tomorrow. You joining?”

Logan blinked at the unexpected question. Another voyage.

“So soon?”

“Winds ‘re restless. Any later and we’d be caught in a storm, I reckon.”

Recollection rocked the hull of Logan’s mind, as though the Captain’s words lifted the anchor that kept it grounded. Thoughts washed up ashore like ambergris, forgotten and foul.

Leaving London was first on Logan’s list after the ordeal with Victor, but then the bastard went and caused an entirely different one involving you, and Logan hadn’t thought of leaving ever since. The days passed by like a forever holiday, where he got to spend no time apart from and all three meals with you. Light, soft, dappled in sunlight. It reminded him of faint dreams he would get while sleeping in trenches.

Perhaps this was the wake-up call he needed.

Departing with the Barossa was an opportunity he craved as early as the day after his return. Yet as it presented itself to him now, Logan found himself entirely unprepared.

Someone reeled him back to this place. Someone who smelled like flowers.

“I’ll think about it,” he murmured to the Captain, still strained with the thought of leaving, but already the older man was rummaging inside his coat, fingers producing sheets of crinkled paper.

The Captain slapped the document on top of the little chest that Logan held, then replied, “For when you’ve decided.”

With a final puff of his cigar, he marched up the gangway to shout more orders to his men.

Logan was left alone in a crowd of people. He peered into the papers that looked beyond familiar.

It said PASSENGER PERMIT FOR SAILING VESSEL in big letters.

An hour or so later, Logan arrived back to Clairview with two things near his chest: the same box in his coat pocket and a newfound conundrum. There would be plenty of time and space to ponder both—he reached home well before the hour of breakfast, and Charles had kindly let him use the den as a temporary office.

The first thing he did when he reached the dark room was examine the contents of that little box.

Its latch clicked open brazenly, unlike the small peek he took at the harbor earlier. It revealed a plush satin pillow base, tailor-made to fit the dimensions of the box.

Atop that cushioning sat a diamond, clear and brilliant. When it caught the light, it looked almost colorless, but the shade it casted was the complete opposite: an array of colors spilled on his desk, painting rainbow hues in infinite sparkling prisms. The cool-toned stone was much heavier than it appeared, weighty even in the expanse of his palm.

Then there were the passenger papers.

It sat like a patient judge on his desk, calling attention through the name of the ship it granted boarding and a date that loomed ever closer.

Logan’s sternum pulled taut—the day after tomorrow was practically no time at all, a parting most sudden to him and both his hosts at Clairview.

Funny how Fate worked sometimes. Here was the key to the path he’d longed for, because if Logan had it his way, he’d hop ships until he keeled over from a bad liver.

But that was before you.

Now, the thought of leaving you alone again both scared and soothed him.

Soothed, because it would finally mean the calming of violent emotions—emotions he weren’t sure he was allowed to feel for you. Absence didn’t make the heart grow fonder. It made space for other things to fill the gaps.

For all his disdain towards the men who courted you, he considered himself the lowest of them all: his face was too old next to yours, hands too marred with gunpowder and bloodied past, fingers too callused for the delicate fabric of your being.

You deserved so much better. Perhaps the reason why no suitor had passed Logan’s secret assessments was because your perfect husband was being crowned a prince in a different nation.

This was all without considering the reproach that would arise, should he dare pair himself with you. A ward and her guardian entangled romantically was just the type of gossip the Ton hungered for, and high society had a way of regurgitating even the smallest of whiffs into a full-blown storm.

What if they thought he’d planned this since your youth? Eyed you like prey, ignored a friend’s trust for the sole purpose of snatching his precious treasure of a daughter?

In that line of questioning, Logan couldn’t care less about his own image. The Ton could paint him black for all he cared.

It was you he worried for.

No matter how far from the truth such rumors would be, you’d still sit dead center in a radius of hurt. He knew that the sweet mouth of ladies hid scathing remarks very well—you’d be at the mercy of a brood of vipers dressed in feathers.

And Charles, bless his heart, would be burdened with yet another difficulty he didn’t deserve to face. Though Charles had the disposition of a saint, there was no guarantee that he wouldn’t come to doubt Logan’s intentions eventually. Mayfair’s malarkey was unfair like that.

You and he were too complicated to ever be fated. In this regard, leaving you was a simple decision. A soothingly simple decision.

But the thought of boarding another ship made him weak in the knees with fear.

He cursed his own greed and ran a hand through his hair.

The diamond was once again shut in its box. A visit to the town’s jeweler would be a much needed distraction.

Something lingered in the air that presaged tragedy.

It was hard to pinpoint exactly what is was, for scarcely a thing was out of place. The help adhered to their usual shifts, breakfast was white bread with the right shade of toasted gold, and the papers had nothing noteworthy. The sky was a perfect blue despite its grayish beginnings.

But scarcely a thing was not the same as nary a thing.

Logan wasn’t present for breakfast: a small irregularity that made a whole world’s difference. He went to town for business, said the footman.

Even after Logan returned to Clairview later that day, you barely saw him. He chose to withdraw in the den doing God knows what. A part of you wanted to knock on that stubborn door and coax him to read, to play, to engage in whatever that meant spending time with him, but you swatted that childish urge aside to give him the space he seemed to privately demand.

Come dinnertime, the bad omen proved itself true, striking like sudden thunder within the parlor. You thought you’d braced yourself, but nothing could’ve prepared you for what was about to happen.

For what Logan was going to say.

“I’m leaving for America.”

He announced it without preamble, not a minute after the first bite of food. Whatever soup you took by the spoonful immediately tasted like dry ash—you could hardly drink it, too shocked to even will your throat to work.

The table grew church-quiet. There was no movement, like the room was suspended in time.

Charles’s eyes widened politely, but you weren’t so sure your father was as coherent as his perfect mannerisms implied.

“Again? When?” he asked.

Logan didn’t meet anyone’s gaze, looking down at his food which he hadn’t eaten.

“The Barossa sets sail the day after tomorrow.”

It took everything to not let cutlery clatter onto the table. The tips of your fingers turned frosty against a flurry of thoughts, ribs pulled tight with pain.

Was this the business he troubled himself with the entire day, finding an escape route? Had he woken up today stricken with the urge to flee? Did he decide enough was enough? What about the company he kept?

What about you?

“My, that’s… immediate,” Charles breathed.

Then Logan looked straight at you, hazel eyes gleaming more yellow in the candlelight, and you froze.

“It’s only for a month,” he declared, “We’ll meet again soon enough.”

The words unlocked a memory so pivotal, you could never chose whether you would want it emblazoned or erased forever.

It had been autumn, you thought. You remembered senses: a warm hand on your coat-covered shoulder, heat behind your eyes, and a tremble in your lips that you couldn’t control, too young to remain stoic at the face of loss.

Logan had said those words before. Right before the war. Right before he left you.

We’ll meet again soon enough.

How could he expect you to believe him now? The last time he said that, you ended up parted for seven years.

Perhaps his absence today was his manner of preparing you for the inevitable.

All at once, you felt like a little girl again, orphaned, abandoned for greater things.

You avoided his eyes and continued eating despite the loss of your appetite. There was nothing for you to say, and you needed something to help you swallow the lump in your throat. Bitterness coated your bones, their brittleness demanding you to finish your food and retire early, if only it meant you wouldn’t have to look at him again.

Might as well get a head start on not having him around.

Charles cleared his throat. The gentle sound landed heavy in thicket-like tension. There was an apparent sentimentality in his voice when he spoke.

“Well,” he finally said, “in that case, I’ll have Mrs. Pemberton prepare a sirloin for tomorrow night.”

What happened afterwards was an outburst of activities.

In the final day of Logan’s stay, one more suitcase arrived from Clawthorne. Apparently two small ones were enough for him to survive for a month in a faraway land.

The manor’s kitchen was a hubbub of industry: chefs worked doubly hard under Mrs. Pemberton’s instruction in preparing the best meal ever to grace Clairview’s dining table, as though they wanted Sir James Howlett to sing praises about the sauce reduction to the Americans.

Meanwhile, you weren’t so effortful in your send-off. In fact, all of your efforts were poured into evading his presence—part of a vow you made for yourself, and you were nothing if you didn’t keep your word.

It was easy to dodge in an estate so big. You slunk away from his eyes whenever they gaze at you for so much as a second too long. Thank goodness for the advantage of growing up in these walls: at the mere graze of heat, you’d expeditiously retreat to parts of the house you’d run to as a child who didn’t want to be found.

The staircase before the servant’s quarters. A hidden balcony in the west wing. An old nursery that was never redecorated.

All you did was trace the lines on your palm while you hid, and breathed.

This was for your own good, you told yourself. His absence was both poison and cure, and you were still confused as to the thin line that existed between the two: poison in that it hurt to not have him around, cure for your foreseeable future without him.

You only came face to face with him at dinnertime. Even then, you tried your best not to face him.

In some ways, the atmosphere felt like a continuation of last night. Fraught tension never left the room—at least for you. Much to your grief, Charles’s speech was jovial enough to suggest that he was not even the slightest upset in the first place, wistfulness notwithstanding.

“To our dear friend Logan,” he raised his glass, “who continues to be marvelous company, even after all these years. May your travels be abundant in both outcome and joy.”

“Thank you,” Logan’s reply was muted despite the occasion, “It’s been a pleasure.”

So these weeks were just that for him: a pleasure—the kind one finds in their entertainment. An amusement to pass the time while your heart slowly latched onto his despite yourself.

You offered no toast, only sat and stewed, just like the opening course: first in contempt for his choices, second in a brand of loneliness you’d acquainted yourself with seven years ago. Both left an increasingly unsavory taste in your mouth; even the most delectably cooked meats couldn’t encourage a drop of appetite in you.

Amidst the slight undercurrent of apprehension, Charles did his best in engaging Logan with talks of England, America, and the seas in-between. It was his words that brought you back from your mental stepping-out.

“We’ll be happy to send you off tomorrow. My daughter and I are accustomed to the harbor—you wouldn’t mind, would you, dear?”

For the first time that night, you held your gaze.

In your father’s eyes, you saw sympathy and a gentle coaxing. If anyone could convince you of a sixth sense, it would be him—for you’d never experienced speaking without words with other people. His voice in your head was formless, not even shaping words, but where it was linguistically abstract, you felt it.

It told you that concern, if not uttered, would be seen as nonexistent. You knew this to be fact—you were an adult.

But your restrained anguish meant you didn’t even know if you wanted to say anything. What would he have you do at this juncture—protest, negotiate, condemn? You knew of nothing that would stop him from boarding that ship, and so any bid to do so would be an effort destined to be wasted: much like the succulent sirloin that your tongue couldn’t so much as taste right now.

You settled for practiced civility.

“Of course not,” you replied, looking at neither men, cutting the meat on your plate in too-small pieces.

You felt Logan’s intense stare at the side of your face.

The second main course rolled around, then desserts, then plates were cleared to make way for wine glasses. You stopped a liveried footman from filling yours.

“You’re not partaking?” Charles asked.

“Actually, I was thinking of retiring early,” you announced, standing from your seat. Logan did the same, though you didn’t honor him with a look.

There it was again. One look from your father that delivered a thousand words.

Within it, he poured everything: a plea for you to reconsider, an encouragement for honesty, but also a compassionate understanding—that you were a person of your own, free to make your own choices—and if as your father he could give you the freedom you were often denied, then he’d give it to you.

I’ve decided, your eyes replied.

“I need rest,” were the words you said out loud, “what with our early departure tomorrow.”

A perfectly logical excuse, though only you and the heavens knew how much it hurt to be in Logan’s vicinity. One would mistakenly attribute the ache to a full stomach.

You were certain it was from a broken heart.

With that, you slid your chair back under the table, and bowed. Both men bowed back; Logan standing, Charles sitting.

You couldn’t see Logan’s eyes trail your form as you walked out of the room. You couldn’t see at all, rather, for fighting back tears meant that they lingered in your eyes, obscuring vision with unshed heat.

The warm bath helped, but only to the extent of you being in it. Afterwards, dressing up for bed felt cold—though at the very least you didn’t have to school your face in the presence of the men.

There was one person, however, whose scrutiny you couldn’t avoid at this juncture.

Esther was brushing your hair when she spoke.

“You’re not hiding it very well, my Lady.”

This was nearly a custom in her years of being assigned your handmaiden. Close in age, the two of you navigated a childhood confined to social etiquette that was designed to divide people of different standing. But friendship formed in defiance of those rules—she even traveled with you overseas to attend to you.

When Esther spoke like this, toeing the line of propriety and otherwise, you understood that she was seeking your spoken permission. Your reply was more of a challenge, fringed with the slightest of venom she didn’t at all deserve.

“Hide what, Esther? If you’d like to be plain, just ask.”

“May I please be plain with you, my Lady?”

“You may.”

From that point on, Esther was no longer your maid. She was a friend. A sister.

The young woman behind you sighed, hand on her waist, as though already lacking patience for the impending argument.

“I don’t understand why you won’t just tell him.”

Thorns grew in the crack of your breastbone. “Because there’s no point, Esther.”

“How do you know that?”

“He said so himself,” you turned to her, face steeled with resolve. “He was always meant to board that ship—he was always going to leave—even if I did tell him what I have gone through, thr-through pains to conceal, what of it? The man himself has told me he had no desire nor use for such sentiments!”

A beat of silence. At least Esther was generous enough to let you catch your breath.

“You’re letting him go out of cowardice instead of kindness,” she said, catching your eyes in the mirror.

Her response only felt like a slap in the face because it was true.

“What would you have me do, then, since you’re so wise?” you snarked.

Esther put the hair-brushing to a pause, lips pursed in vexation.

“Have you ever considered that maybe making your feelings clear would stop him from leaving?”

You sighed, palms covering your face, “Esther—”

“Or is your pride more valuable than honesty?”

“It is not pride that stops me, but the pointlessness of it,” you answered, voice measured, as if by controlling it would influence the flame in your chest all the same, “You must understand. He doesn’t want to marry—abhors the very idea of romance. This was one of the first things he told me upon his return.”

“Still—”

“Do you not think it plausible that he expressly said so to stop me from—”

The remaining words died at the tip of your tongue.

—falling in love with him.

Love.

How modern speech had diluted those four letters into something less, its meaning lost to overuse for matters entirely menial. Some people loved balls. Other people loved caviar. How minor it has become, thrown around so frequently within one’s daily vocabulary.

Meanwhile, the love that gripped you recalled a violence that hurt you more than it did the object of your affections. A furnace that ran on every instance you kept it hidden, its flame fed by each time you put on a mask to disguise it.

In fighting to conceal it, the love you had was at once moving and paralyzing.

Esther’s voice lowered to a whisper.

“Would you be happy if he left without knowing what you felt for him?”

I don’t know, you wanted to scream, the only way for me to be happy is if he stayed.

You looked down at your lap. “My affections are a burden, while he seeks freedom first and foremost,” you answered. “Knowing would only weigh him down.”

Eyes met again in the mirror. You managed a terse smile—the thinnest disguise you ever wore.

“I’ll be alright, Esther.”

She breathed—once, twice, her grip on carved bone hairbrush betraying her reluctance to leave the conversation to rest. But your eyes insisted on the lies you told, and she eventually relented: not because she bought it, but because she acknowledged your decision.

“If you say so, my Lady.”

She went back to comb through your locks, once again a handmaiden.

You weren’t sure how much time had passed since you climbed onto your bed. Your consciousness wouldn’t fall sacrifice to sleep.

There was no tossing or turning. It was a still sort of unrest: one that had you on your back the entire time, frozen under the sheets. The entire time, your eyes were tacked onto the shape of the canopy overhead, ignoring the wisps of sheer curtains that provided the illusory sense of shifting to a land of dreams.

Even ensconced in such luxurious comforts, you felt deprived. Exactly of what, you had only a sliver of an idea.

Perhaps you weren’t as decisive as you led Esther to believe.

Answers to complicated mysteries such as this usually revealed themselves to you while you were walking. Where there was air to breathe in.

So that was what you did: you rose before the sun and climbed down the curved steps that led you out of the house, quiet as a mouse who didn’t bother to wear a bed jacket despite the chill.

You had half a mind that the cold would help you think.

Air hit your face proper once you stepped out of the foyer. While you could see a hint of your breath in such temperature, its gossamer floating up before disappearing entirely, nothing else in the landscape moved.

You walked to the garden.

The hour was in that magic place between too late and too early; it washed everything in tinctures of indigos and dark blues. Who knew when the sun would be up? You hadn’t bothered checking a clock on your way out, but it wasn’t so dark that you were walking blind.

Aside from your footsteps on the path, not a single sound could be heart. The birds were asleep. Crickets, too, from the hollow silence that covered the world like a cloak. You coast, slow and steady into rows of botanical arrangements—somehow, the growth seemed to lure you in deeper, as though they could cast spells.

There wasn’t even a breeze to sway the flowers.

Mist coated the ground in the distance, its lightness smoothing the landscape into a singular plane, and it looked like a canvas; a painting of the here and now. Even the stars overhead felt closer to the ground, their watch not yet ended.

You reached the wisteria arch. What bloomed so lush and beautiful had turned sparse thanks to the passing of time: as May’s last dregs trudge on, their petals coat the ground more than their own stems, a pond of light purple that you could step on—soft like the end of a pretty dream.

Under the stars and that wisteria arch, you were completely alone in the world.

Until you heard the crunch of gravel behind you.

Turning in surprise, you saw him. Logan.

The source of your tumult stood on the path just before the clearing of the arch, himself in a state that echoed your own: clothes and coat haphazardly put on, hair tousled. Your eyes met, but he didn’t shrink—instead walking towards you with sure steps until you were face to face.

He hadn’t gotten the chance to do so in a while.

“I can’t sleep,” you offered plainly.

“Me neither.”

“Last night—” “I suppose—”

Twin voices overlapped and ceased at the same time, words rushed. He cleared his throat. You cut in through the quiet.

“I suppose you’re all packed, then?”

He nodded, but offered no more. Whatever he wanted to say must’ve ceased to exist, leaving you with stray thoughts about the nature of this… this power that kept pulling you to him. Like gravity, it couldn’t be seen, yet it existed so surely in your world.

The conversation you had with Esther made a mark on your mind, so much that you could recall it even now with your tormentor before you. One point about it bothered you in particular.

You thought he’d find your affections for him a burden, when in fact, he wasn’t entirely innocent, was he?

And because today was the last day of his existence in your life, your lips loosened.

“Esther, my handmaiden,” you began, “she… she told me the meaning. Of your flowers, that is.”

His only response was in the steady stare at you.

The day he moved in temporarily to Clairview felt like ages ago, when it had only been barely a season. The bouquet of flowers he gifted you then had long died, but the memory of it remained: you could recall each individual flower, and the ribbon that wrapped around them was now the decorative sash of a vase in your room—a keepsake.

Apple blossoms and violets on a bed of ivy.

Except when you received it, you didn’t know that apple blossoms signified ‘preference’, or that violets meant a giver besotted with love.

Ivy stood for ‘everlasting’.

Here you were, hours before his departure. It was clear now that those blooms together were an aesthetic choice rather than a symbolic one.

Your mind continued to rule out everything Logan ever did to remotely suggest attraction. You had no choice. Otherwise, you’d sooner curse yourself than think he was pursuing you, when he’d made his intentions or lack-thereof so unambiguous.

He stayed close to you—that was to protect you from Victor. He lingered during every suitor visit—much like your father, it was paternal care that encouraged him to witness the men’s true merit. He jested with you about romance novels—that was just his way of indulging you: a kindness that led you to believe you were no longer a girl in his eyes, because a mere girl you so certainly remained when he carried you to your quarters and tucked you in bed…

It frustrated you so, the amounts of self-immolation you went through. The constant over-correction of your suppositions inspired by his deeds.

You became a person whose talent was to mistrust her own feelings.

From the ashes of abandoned sense rose a sudden selfishness: to publicly kill this rhizomatic feeling once and for all. Make him watch as you cut it off; tree, root, and twig. Let them feed a final flame and finally be put to rest in its proper sepulcher, leaving you to wash your cold hands of them.

Here lies Your Feelings. May they stay dead forever.

Logan’s hazel eyes hadn’t left you.

You took a deep breath before the plunge. After this, there would be nothing left unsaid. A cross laid down. An agony ended.

You only regretted the shake in your voice when you eventually spoke.

“You must think me foolish,” you forced out, blinking too rapidly for this to be an ordinary speech, “especially after you’ve shared with me your disagreements toward such… starry-eyed sentiments.”

You swallowed. “I must admit, I thought—I hoped—that after all this time, maybe you’d find your opinions c-changed.”

In looking down at your walking slippers surrounded by petals, you missed the way his hand clenched.

“But I’m completely aware of my own folly—of the many times I mistook your actions as a sign for such a change, or worse, affection. And I am also aware of how selfish it is for me to say this to you despite your forewarning. It’s just that… before you’re gone—”

“Sweetheart—”

“I love you, Sir,” you quivered, finally looking him in the eye. “I think I have for a while.”

Despite the silence, the air took on the opposite of being settled. In a dead hour, the only thing that came alive was your breath and his, white threads drifting up with each labored exhale.

You parted your lips. Closed it. Then opened it again to speak:

“One word from you and I’ll cease this feeling forever. I promise.”

He took a step closer and suddenly you were in his arms, face against broad chest.

You had no time to register the warmth that shrouded you, already picking up the faint scent of tobacco and something you couldn’t gather in his overcoat—something you decided was innately him.

Then he placed a tender kiss on the crown of your head, and you swore your breastbone cracked.

“You can’t, sweetheart.”

This was it, you thought to yourself.

You didn’t know what you expected when you stuttered your feelings out in the open, but of course he’d turn you down gently—he was kind that way. Fresh wound made way for even fresher tears: they pooled in your eyes at the sweet pain he continued to inflict by stroking your hair.

“I know I can’t,” you croaked, voice wrecked from nothing but the riot in your chest, “but I’m not asking for permission, Sir, I just—”

He’d leaned down to look at you. You hid your face by stepping backward, escaping from his arms.

It was like you spoke to the petals on the ground instead.

“I wanted you to know. That’s all.”

“That’s not what I meant,” hands chased, once again encircling you. It snapped your gaze up—the twist in his face spelled out pain.

“You can’t just stop it,” he concluded.

You looked at him, thoughts messier than when you were in bed.

“I agree, but for my sake, I—I must try. Time heals all wounds, isn’t that what people say?”

“You can’t.”

“What would you know about stopping affection, Sir?” you nearly laughed, vision blurring with hot tears. “You’d reject it from even starting.”

“I’d know because I tried,” he snapped.

You froze.

“What exactly did you think I was doing the entire time I was here?”

The answer came flooding like a tidal wave. Memories washed over before you could purge them—before you could annotate with doubt, or amend what you thought were misunderstanding.

He’d bought you flowers. Promenaded with you. Stood every time you entered a room, and again when you left it. Teased you—something you’d never experienced before. You thought it an amusement on his part; experimentation at the detriment of your face that always gained color.

And then he’d fought with his own two hands at another man’s threat.

Then he asked you again, as if he could watch the thoughts unfolding in your head.

“Why did you think I was there—in the garden, at the ball?”

There was answer in his gaze, transparent in its voicelessness.

The sun hadn’t yet risen, but it felt as though night’s shroud was beginning to lift. A veil taken off of you, allowing you to finally see the answer hidden behind beautiful hazel.

He looked at you with fondness beyond friendship.

You knew, because that was exactly what you felt—that tempest of tenderness you tried to dismiss. It was a look you were sure you’d worn many times over.

A look of love.

“I was looking for you,” he rasped, “and the flowers meant what they meant.”

You nearly sobbed. “Then why are you leaving?”

“Because I thought it would make it stop,” the baritone of his voice dragged like gravel. “But even then, I hoped it wouldn’t.”

Before you could ask him what he meant, he stood in front of you, tips of your slippers and his boots brushing.

Then he gently seized your wrist, and, producing something from his coat pocket, he placed it in your palm.

Fingers unfurled around the cold object. You stared down at a diamond-encrusted ring.

A clear-colored rock sat at the center of the band, larger than the rest.

It looked to be about your size.

“It was meant to be a gift—just the stone—but I got ahead of myself,” he murmured, “went to town and had this made before my mind was.”

Air rushed out your lungs, shuddering from disbelief, as if you were still convinced the weight of the ring on your palm was dreamed up—that maybe you’d misheard what he’d said, that this was just another delusion taken too far.

But he leaned down, nose nearly brushing yours, and suddenly there was no space for a margin of error.

His breath caressed the side of your cheek.

“Never was good with words, buttercup.”

The rising tide of memories now ebbed backwards to a further past, pulling you along their magnetic current:

Swept you to a time beyond this spring, before he stood at the bottom of that staircase looking up at you—to your scared shrieks on horseback, to the clumsy way he braided your hair, to his stern attention at a skinned knee.

To curious questions and shuttlecock games in the summer, before finally it stopped at a goodbye exchanged in autumn underneath heavy coats—

“I love you,” he said.

You didn’t gather that the wetness on your cheeks was from tears, not until the back of his finger reached to gently wipe it away. The realization was too much: that all this time, you both shared a sacred honor, thieves who’d been stealing moments with each other, conspiring to hide affection from view.

His brows knitted. “You’re cold.”

Arms disrobed from the dark coat. The weight of the fabric found your shoulders, engulfing you in him.

It made you cry more.

He held you again, and your hands found his forearms. Lips brushed against your cheekbone, kissing away tears, then he moved to the corners of your eyes to catch them before more could fall.

“Sssh,” he cooed over your shaking shoulders, “it’s alright.”

Then you felt it: the cool metal sliding against your left ring finger.

Your chest nearly collapsed.

“Perfect,” he whispered, admiring the ring on your hand.

“Sir—”

Logan shook his head. “Don’t call me that. Not anymore.”

His name was stolen out of you.

“Logan.”

There was a pulse in his eyes, black expanding to swallow the hazel that was still brilliant in the dark.

Then, with a cadence as slow as poetry, he asked:

“I know I already put it on you, but would you do me the honor?”

If you weren’t already carrying so many feelings in you, you’d surely laugh with joy. Of course this was how your beloved companion proposed: with as little words and romance as possible.

But even so, for the first time, you couldn’t doubt his feelings.

You responded: first with a sob, then with a quiet nod.

His thumb wiped gently at a stray tear, the hand on your face all at once making you tilt your face up to meet more of his gaze. That same thumb moved slowly down until it grazed your bottom lip.

Bodies inched close, like sunrise to horizon. The sky took on a lighter blue.

He slanted his face against yours—

—and kissed you.

With the softest brush of his lips against yours, you felt the slow pains of growing uncoil under your sternum. The restlessness that brought you here was erased with his hand cradling your jaw, as if the kiss siphoned every ache you’d suffered and made it worth it.

Even when you parted, he was never far, only enough to watch fluttering lashes peer up at him.

Then, like your lips called for his, he dipped down to coax you into another kiss.

And another… and another.

You shivered—not from the cold—and Logan pulled you closer, something you thought wasn’t possible. One hand encircled your waist, the other steady at the back of your neck. His lips tasted like him, a thought that drew a sigh out your mouth.

“Tell me to stop,” he breathed against you.

You tugged at the front of his shirt. He groaned, kissing you deeper. Thank goodness for his hand cradling your head, because you grew dizzy at the blood rush.

In being held by him, you were felled by him.

His tongue was honeysuckle-sweet as it laved past the seam of your lips, drinking you with every pass. The slightest graze of teeth on your bottom lip stuttered your breathing: he teased without reprieve, and you realized with a heady rush that, once again, you were a student under his tutelage.

You’d never done this before—and his method of teaching was by doing.

So you slowly, slowly did the same, closing his bottom lip between your teeth, and sucked.

Your palms on his chest almost jumped at the low purr reverberating underneath.

When you part, your lips and his were the color of stewed cherry, having enjoyed the sweet fruits of Time’s vines—like full-bodied grapes, your feelings were left in an unopened cellar, morphing into a substance most intoxicating.

Now that everything was spilled out in the open, you were tempted to overindulge.

The hands around his shirt begged at much, but he was the one to put it into words.

“Please, God, let me have you.”

You nodded your assent, and not a second later, gravity forsook you as he lifted you in his arms. The maneuver left you breathless with a spiked heartbeat, and in that temporary panic your arms clutched at his shoulders. His forearm was warm underneath the bend of your knees.

“Logan—what if someone sees?”

“Tell them you’re feverish,” he murmured into your hair, quickly making his way back into the manor.

The way your body temperature climbed, at least you wouldn’t be lying.

There was nobody to find Logan whisking you in his arms down the hallways of the house. The sky was not yet light, its color shifting in a long yawn: either reluctant to give way to another day, or wanting to enshroud you for a little longer.

He was on you the moment the bedroom door closed—you were the one with the sense to lock it before he could kiss you again, this time with unmasked hunger. Your feet scarcely touched the ground and already he corralled you against the thick wooden door, the gentle impact ridding you of his loose coat that once covered your shoulders.

But he tore himself away, cool air rushing to meet the skin your cotton slip didn’t cover. Eyes blinked open, lost—

—until you saw the way he was looking at you.

His face held back a raging sea of want.

Lips descended again, this time on your jaw.

“Gonna show you how I really feel,” voice scraped skin, “Will you let me?”

His grip didn’t just held your waist—you sensed a restraint that told you he was holding himself back. A delay before the dam burst, as if waiting for you to say yes.

Once you did so, neither of you would be the same again. The thought made you shudder.

Logan pulled away from your neck, eyes searching yours.

“Please,” you whispered.

What unfurled after wasn’t a burst of impatient movement—instead, you shuddered at the ripple of his shoulders under your fingers as he tugged your body closer to his. He was slow, kissing you again while he prowled forward, feet forcing yours to step back back back until your calves hit the edge of the bed and the world tilted.

Your back landed on the soft mattress. He hovered close by, suspended by muscled forearms.

One of his hands cupped the side of your cheek, and at that moment you felt the outpour of his reverent disbelief—like he couldn’t fathom having you in every sense of the word, including the five that longed to see, hear, touch, smell, and taste you.

“You have no idea how much I want you,” he rumbled, fingers stroking your jaw.

You’d normally reject such a notion, having longed for him just as much. But perhaps, in the gap of age and knowledge between yours and his, you truly didn’t.

Because you wouldn’t even know how to imagine kissing him like this: like a kindling fire that provoked your blood to thrum with thirst. Still, he remained languid, slowly dragging you to the center of the bed before tracing the slopes of your face with his lips.

Cheek. Eyelid. Forehead. Temple. Jaw. Ear.

You twisted slightly underneath him, sensitive of each brush, but he was steadfast.

It’d be foolish to rush what begged to be known for so long. The ache that lived through seasons almost demanded he took his time.

So he started with your lips first, but not before staring at the way they parted: portent as though spelling out the words ‘drink me’.

Which was exactly what he did.

Lips press against yours, mouths open. When you thought he couldn’t give you more, he did just that—slowly building you up with each devouring, letting you down gently at the parting. The lazy rhythm felt like needle into fabric—thread, pull, thread, pull—as if the two of you were mending time-torn ruptures, stitching up a seven-year emptiness.

It’s always been you, you thought, mind ringing with want.

The moan that escaped him made you realize you spoke the words out loud.

It was as if your confession gave his hands a license to roam, and the excuse you prepared of a fever started to feel like a self-fulfilling prophecy. They were as patient as his mouth. His touch was bright, making you weak—each drag of calluses against your skin drew goosebumps in its wake.

He touched your collarbone first, sliding to your shoulder before he palmed the curve of it. Then there was a slow stroke down your upper arm, to your waist and hips…

Only when your fingers dug into his biceps, he cradled your knee.

And gently parted it.

You chest heaved. Warmth trailed up your thigh above the fabric of your nightgown, and you wondered: if it felt so good above clothes, how would his touch feel under?

“You know what happens, don’t you?” he murmured, looking into your eyes. “Read it in your books?”

In another time and place you’d accuse him of clairvoyance, because he started to part your knees further, kneeling in the gap between your legs. Fingers teased an inch or two below cotton, administering strokes that should feel calming, except they only serve to stir you to the beginnings of madness.

You nodded. Caught his pupils dilating in the dark.

If only you knew you wore the same look on your face.

“Tell me you want it.”

“I want it,” you whispered.

“Are you sure?” he asked again.

The answer you gave was more breath than voice. “Yes. Please.”

“You trust me?”

His question was a bid for consent. You replied with loyalty, a small smile on your face.

“I accepted your proposal, didn’t I?”

Logan masked the jump in his heart by mauling your neck, tearing a giggle out of you that melted into a much less innocent sound.

Fingers traversed daringly under the hem of your slip, inching up until the material of it moved in the same direction. Palms caressed your bare skin. You shivered, unaccustomed to his warm touch and cool air in parts of your body that rarely got to breathe.

While you looked down at how high your chemise had ridden up, he was looking at your face.

His hand grasped the hem. “Is this okay?”

You nod.

And then, gingerly, you clasped a hand above his, encouraging him to lift it up.

Emboldened by your instruction, Logan moved his hand up, peeling the fabric to reveal inches of you he hadn’t seen before, until you raised your arms up to let him take it off of you entirely.

His jaw went slack.

“Christ, look at you.”

Your heart banged against ribcage, repercussions of choosing to be vulnerable like this. But there was no room for fear—not when he stared at you like that.

Worshipful as he beheld the temple that was your body, sacred sinew that housed a life he treasured more than his own.

He dragged a path down the center of your body. Your chest heaved at the reversal of roles in this very moment: his hands were the student now, discovering every new curve of you underneath them, eyes memorizing the way you shivered as he made his way back up.

It was on this path that he dared to cup your breast, thumb deliberating above a hardened peak before he allowed the pad of his finger to brush against it ever so slightly.

You writhed, whimpering.

“Feels good?”

You nodded. He shook his head.

“Use your words, sweetheart.”

You obeyed, voice thin with need. “Yes.”

“Yes, what?”

“Yes, it—feels good,” you sighed.

Flames licked your body as he began to massage your tits, palms cupping flesh while his eyes drew hot paths, past your torso, to the waistband of your underwear.

“You ever touch yourself here?” he squeezed. Then, with one hand on your inner thigh, “Or down here?”

The question amplified the rush of blood on your cheeks. “O-Once or twice.”

He hummed. For a second, he imagined you doing it—here, behind the sheer curtains of your canopy bed, hand buried under thick winter quilts while you burned in defiance against the cold outside. The thought almost got him drunk.

“What did you think of?”

Your head lolled to the side, too embarrassed to even face him. He tutted, hand cupping your jaw to make you look at him.

“Tell me.”

In your deliberation, your lashes fluttered. Then came your damning answer.

“You.”

It nearly undid him.

“Gonna make you feel good,” he murmured, leaning down to nibble your neck even before saying all the words, “just lie back and let me.”

He marked you with all of his warmth, hands slowly tracing a path that nearly made you beg for mercy or for more, you didn’t know. But your true ruin arrived later, when his mouth followed that same trail—down, down until he hovered over your chest, hot breath blowing on a nipple.

When he took it within the cavern of his mouth, you cried out softly.

Hips chafed against air on instinct, a movement he reacted to with one hand pinning your hipbone down while his thumb drew soothing circles on your skin. Your fingers raked through his hair. He hummed against you, tongue flicking once, twice, thrice before he moved to the other side, and you crumbled all over again.

Two fingers hooked onto the waistband of the only thing you were wearing. The garment was taken off of you within seconds.

For the first time, you were naked in front of a man—the only one you’d ever loved.

Logan murmured hell and something else blasphemous as his eyes drank you in. Blood roared too loudly in your ear for you to tell.

“You’re still clothed,” you said, tugging at the front of his shirt.

He couldn’t even look away from you as he took it off.

While you were busy admiring the expanse of his chest, littered generously with hair that you’d only gotten glimpses of, his hands snaked up your thighs again.

Only this time, one of them moseyed between your legs. A finger swept a slow stroke up your core, and you nearly thrashed, a weak mewl escaping you at the shiver that wracked you. His other hand kept you down.

“So wet already.” You’ve never heard his voice sound so lost.

And then he pulled back, only to slide down between your legs, coming face-to-face with a part of you you’d never even seen clearly before.

“Logan—” you piped up sheepishly, a warning.

“Hm?”

But he hummed it against your mound, so of course your consciousness thinned. Unbidden, your mouth parted, revealing a sound so sinful you felt him rumble back vibrations near your core.

For the first time in a while, Logan’s gaze drifted to the window, like it usually did.

As it turned out, the sky caught his attention. It was catching fire, much like your body: a thread of pink began to appear on the horizon line, thin but unmistakable, even with the row of conifers that stood in front of it.

“As much as I’d kill to hear you,” he purred, “we don’t want the help thinking you’re screaming from murder. Stay quiet, alright?”

Maybe the question was rhetorical, because he didn’t stop for an answer.

His tongue was molten as it licked between the seam of you. The heat and pleasure ripped a sharp moan from your gullet, too fast to dampen with a hand cupped over your face, but there wasn’t enough time for horror to settle in your stomach—not when he busied himself between your legs, kissing you there the way you’d learned one can be kissed only moments ago.

This was a reintroduction, in many ways: not only were you getting to know each other, he was getting to know you more than you knew yourself. A mutual education.

You’d have plenty of time to study him later.

“Taste so sweet,” he moaned into you. You made the mistake of glancing down at the same time as a finger found its way to your entrance, circling, and it took everything not to scream like he had warned you.

If only you had even the slightest of a sane mind, you’d notice how hypocritical he was being.

Because while he’d ordered you to keep quiet, he was liberal with his own noise. Wet sounds of his lips smacking against your slick and the greedy slurps of his tongue echoed in your room. Your screams would’ve implied a murder, but this?

The help would think you harbored a stray dog in your quarters.

When that finger came to play with the slick bundle of nerves, a sensation yanked your awareness to feel only pleasure. You muffled your mewl with a fist.

“Logan,” you hiccuped, “n-not yet—”

Your lover parted from you with a slick ‘pop’, sighing into you as you clenched around nothing. Left bereft from the loss of his maddening friction, you found space to finally breathe, swallowing lungfuls of much-needed air.

Then his eyes met yours, letting you speak.

“Want you inside when—when I—”

The column of his throat bobbed with desire.

In one fell swoop, he was kneeling again, wiping his mouth before bowing his back to lean over you. Your lidded eyes caught the tortured lines that formed on his face.

The moment was small, yet too sacred to miss.

He unbuttoned his breeches and yanked it down. Your gaze followed his at that exact second, and you swore you felt the heat of his length just as clearly as you saw him—it throbbed, you swore it did, because the space between your legs did the same.

A thought flitted past, enough for your feeble mind to catch.

Was that supposed to go inside of you?

As it turned out, the thought was quite crystal on your face.

Or maybe it was the way you slowly clawed backward that clued him in, because he followed you just as closely, as if cold from the gap of your bodies.

“‘S alright, pretty,” he cooed, but the slight smirk gave away his true feelings.

Nervousness washed over you. It seized your stomach first and your chest cavity second, doubling your heart rate a fatal realization: that he’d done this many times before, and you hadn’t at all.

There wasn’t even room to be jealous of the line of women that had warmed his bed. Not when you were so sure of how you felt for him—except your body felt like it needed convincing.

“Will it hurt?” you asked.

And then, like your words turned a knob in him, the smugness on his face was no more, melted slowly into a steady understanding. His hand came up to comb through your hair.

For a moment, you vaguely recall him doing the same to you during a particularly fearful thunderstorm in your youth.

“Not if we take it slow,” came his reply, softly spoken between sweet kisses across your face. “If it does, you tell me, and we stop.”

You nod while looking into his eyes.

“Okay.”

Shivers skittered down your spine when he angled himself into you with a hand, blunt tip resting on your folds. You linked your arms around his neck for something to hold on to.

“Feel that?” he growled past gritted teeth, “That’s all for you. You made me like this.”

Those words paired with the slide of his hard length between you nearly made you sob at how empty you felt.

“Logan, please just—I need—”

He hummed right next to your ear.

“Sweet thing. I know. Let me take care of you.”

The way he slid into you was love, most sacred and profane.

A reedy gasp shattered the silence as he slowly notched the tip inside of you, your eyelids fluttering from alien sensations. Hands gripped his forearms, while he loyally spanned one of his around your waist to hold your body the way he needed to.

How strange—the feeling burned, but to say it hurt would be somewhat false.

Hazel eyes kept a vigil on your face.

“Doing so good,” he rasped. “Want me to stop?”

You shook your head.

“Keep going.”

And he did. You traded the air in your lungs for more of him, his cock pushing slowly into you, stretching every hollow crevice you didn’t know you had.

Great thinkers of ages past had proclaimed man a paradoxical creature. The man making his way inside you might be the biggest paradox there ever was.

Because despite Logan’s reputation for being tight-lipped, right now, he certainly was not.

As if your mind wasn’t broken in enough fragments, he pressed his lips against your ear and spoke your ruin. Every phrase was both torture and reward, afflicted unto you whenever you took in more of him, inch by devastating inch.

“Breathe, sweetheart.”

“Oh, attagirl. Thaaat’s it. Let me in.”

“There we go. Good girl. Good girl.”

He kept going. You kept taking him, until your vision started to blur around the edges. Until every crevice you didn’t know existed was filled with him.

Until he sheathed himself to the hilt.

He moaned, open mouth above yours.

“God, you’re fucking perfect.”

The stretch of his size was scintillating for only a few moments. After deep breaths, the heat melted into a kind that soothed, almost lulling you into contentedness. You were starkly aware of a second heartbeat forming between your legs. His pulse or yours, you couldn’t tell.

Not that it mattered, now that you’d taken all of him.

It was as though you’d crossed into a foreign place, both cavernous and expansive in its perpetuity, so long as you and he were one. Perhaps a state of mind rather than space. It whispered to you in divine dichotomy, taunting the fullness of love with an alluring siren call to sink deeper, feel more.

He succumbed first, thrusting lightly into you. You jolted in response, nerves alight at even the slightest of friction.

The both of you traded shuddered breaths, and then he did it again.

“Look at you,” he panted, “so good for me.”

You pursed your lips, muting a whine.

Something dangerous lit up behind his hazel eyes, which had nearly turned onyx from lust.

Something that smelled a challenge.

His length sank in again—only once, but meaner, faster, enough for an actual noise escaped you. You clasped a hand over your mouth, frightened at how loud you were becoming.

He parted his lips, but the words felt like they came out of his chest.

“Let me ruin you. Only I get to ruin you.”

The way he began sliding in and out of you, there was scarcely any space to think, let alone respond. Intelligence faded, replaced by the base instinct of a much overdue hunger. Your body spoke to him with each spasm of your walls, every noise you failed to suppress a celebration that fueled his vigor—for not keeping quiet, he didn’t admonish you, as if forgetting and breaking his own command.

“You’re the only one,” he husked, almost drunkenly slurring while he swiveled his hips into yours, “Prettiest thing I’ve ever seen. Only I get to have you like this, don’t I?”

You choked on his name. Whispered yes’s against his lips.

His pace quickened. The mattress creaked. Your fingernails began to dig into his skin. Through the crescendo, he spewed constant syllables dripped with need:

“Take it, ‘s all for you, good girl, good fucking girl—”

Shapes formed behind your eyelids. Before long, his strokes shifted into something punishing, one syllable gritted out for every time he pounded home.

“I—” thrust,

“—love—” his hipbones slammed against yours,

“—you,” he drove an inch deeper. The impact threw your head back against the pillow.

Sobs wracked your shoulders, violent and unbidden. Each push coiled a knot in your lower belly, tightening it to a point of erratic desperation. The sounds and actuality of him driving into you punched overwhelming pleasure, so much that your hands flew to your face, hiding it from view as you thrashed, head pressed sideways into the pillow.

He stopped completely.

Your heart almost did too.

Fingers gently pried yours away, stripping you of your shyness. His hand guided your chin back to face him, surveying your teary pools of lust for eyes.

“Eyes on me, sweetheart. Wanna see you when I make you cum.”

Then every snap of his hips siphoned suffering out of you, like poison out of an old wound.

The many times you’d sting yourself with the thought of unrequited affections, paid back in full with a thousand times the owed pleasure. He rutted into you with untamed devotion, crashing into you like an ocean that had found its anchor, a tortured soul craving heaven in your eyes.

Heat gripped you everywhere—behind your eyes, in your stomach, the bright spot he hit as he buried himself in you. You caught him right before the precipice. He kissed you just in time.

You screamed his name into his mouth anyway.

This time, his hand held yours. The one wearing the ring.

It felt like flying and falling all at once.

White burned the edges of your vision as you came, your voice tapering into a keen moan. He choked out an expletive at the clamp of your walls around him, following suit with the desperate saw of his pelvis against you.

And then you were full—of him and the thing he leaked. It flooded you all the way inside before spilling out, the amounts of it suffocating, like every part of his body sought to claim every part of yours.

The moment seemed as though it could stretch as long as the sun endured. Or until the moon failed—whichever happened first.

Sweat-misted limbs tangled with each other. His hazy eyes looked down on yours.

You kissed.

And kissed, and kissed, filthy and holy with every pass of each other’s lips, a collection of relieved sighs and grateful prayers exchanged in between.

At the final part, you saw color in his face. The sun was coming up, threaded golden light pouring slowly into your room.

As his forehead came to a rest against yours, you sighed, basking in the affection of the man you thought wasn’t destined for you—only to find that, after life’s maze and love’s riddles, you were exactly where you needed to be.

With him.

You gently brought his hand to your lips, and pressed them against the knuckles you’d once upon a time bandaged.

The sun caught your diamond ring in a brilliant glimmer. He echoed you then, taking your left hand and kissing the back of it.

“You’re going to miss your ship,” you murmured.

“Yeah?” he hummed. “Well, I’m not leaving.”

He buried his face into your neck, both to breathe you in and to hide the smile that took over him.

You laughed softly, arms wrapping around his back before your fingers combed his hair.

Blame the exorbitant amount of time it took for the two of you to finally be together, because he felt the same hunger rise in him again—alarmingly fast for a man his age, yet not at all unwelcome, by the look he peeked on your face.

He pulled you up by your wrists.

Either you couldn’t contain the shriek or you’ve stopped bothering to mask it at this point.

He sat you on his lap, slowly coming alive inside of you. You shuddered.

“Logan,” his roaming hands threatened your clarity of speech, “the help will be here anytime soon—”

The funny thing? You did nothing to get off him.

“Fifteen minutes,” he murmured, palms on your hips, “fifteen minutes, and then I’ll bang on Charles’s door to ask for his blessing.”

Then he bounced you on his cock once, and you moaned.

“For now, you need to show me how good you’ve become at riding.”

Pliant were your limbs as his hands arranged them—there was no resistance as he helped you bracket your knees outside of his.

You did as you were told. What were you, if not a dedicated autodidact?

The only time Logan left your side after that was, like he’d said, to ask your father for your hand in marriage. According to your betrothed, the older man’s shoulders had sagged so low he thought they were going to drop—such was the extent of your father’s relief.

“I had a feeling,” Charles had admitted, “but it was far beyond my right to impose my assumptions unto both of you.”

And if I’d boarded the ship? Logan had asked.

With a bright smile, Charles answered:

“Well, we’d have gone with you.”

The wedding was going to be in June.

You didn’t think it was possible for a person to be more satisfied than your soon-to-be husband.

As it turned out, Esther wouldn’t let you hear the end of it.

taglist: @princessanglophile @its-in-the-woods @chubbyhedgehog @ireallyhatelawnmowers @tw1sters @singulartoast @thexweapon @the-quick-red-fox @freiys-fics @tezooks @umadirectioner @theworstwolvie @nikkitabarnes @flockoff-featherface @flaree6

can i also say it is fucking prophetic that i watched kate and leopold right before doing the last push for this second part... (nudging @singulartoast here) because what the fuck do you mean:

he carries kate to bed and tucks her in,

liev schreiber (victor creed) is in this movie,

leopold goes and grabs a ring to propose,

and he freaking speaks flower language???? (there's also a charles in the movie HELP 😭)

bye. idk. the guy who wrote the story of kate and leopold is a man called steven rogers (not to be confused with a popular fictional character of the same name) and i think my mind melded with his a little.

ok yap over. see you in the next one (i'm all out of words)

#AAAAAAAAA #tHIS EAS SO GOOD #wolverine🥀#favs

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