The heavy, carved library door clicked shut behind them, sealing them in.
The darkness was absolute. It was thick, and warm, and it smelled of old paper, lemon-oil polish, and the faint, clean, herbal-soap scent of the man standing just a foot away.
For a moment, neither of them moved. They just... existed. Two shadows in a black, silent room, both of them breathing just a little too fast.
This time, Ines wasn’t shy like the first time. She was... expectant.
She heard him move, his steps sure and silent on the carpet. He was not fumbling. He knew exactly where he was going. She heard the scratch of a match, and a second later, a bloom of gold.
Carcel lit the large, brass-based lamp on her reading table.
The light flooded outward, painting the room in amber and shadow, illuminating his face.
And he was... different.
He was not the haunted, hungover, guilt-ridden wretch from breakfast that morning. He was not the cold, rejecting, duty-bound duke from the shed. He was not the pained, exhausted man from the carriage.
He was... Carcel.
He was wearing a simple, dark, open-collared shirt and dark trousers. His hair was slightly damp, as if he had just, as she had in the hallway, come from a bath. He looked... relaxed.
Instead of taking one of the heavy chairs, he simply, with a masculine grace, sat on the edge of the reading table, one long leg extended, the other foot resting on the floor. He crossed his arms over his chest, the muscles in his forearms flexing, and he just... looked at her.
And he was, to her absolute, profound relief, smiling. It was not a grin. It was a small, lazy, half-amused, and deeply, dangerously attractive smile.
Ines, who had been standing, stiff and nervous, by the door, felt the tension drain out of her. She, in turn, sat down in the large, leather-winged chair opposite the desk. The roles from last night were, quite literally, reversed. He was on the perch, and she was the student, looking up.
She smiled back, a small, genuine smile of her own.
"I guess my talks really got to him," she thought, a small, warm thrill of victory, of understanding, flowing through her. "He is not feeling guilty. He’s free. He understands. He is... he is back to the same Carcel from the first lesson."
This was good. This was perfect. This was, she thought, the ideal state for research. He would be able to answer her questions without guilt.
She reached into the deep pocket of her robe.
Carcel, from his perch on the table, watched her. His gaze was curious, amused. He had been watching her since she’d entered the room. He had noted, with a profound, bone-deep, and complicated sense of relief, that she was not wearing the pale blue, whisper-thin, scandalous instrument of torture from the night before.
Tonight, she was in a robe of thick, dark, royal-blue velvet. It was still, he noted, silk. And it still clung, in a very distracting way, to her curves. But it was opaque. It was better. It was, he thought, a small, valiant attempt at propriety. He was, absurdly, proud of her for it.
Then, she pulled out the papers.
Not a paper. A stack. A thick, terrifyingly organized sheaf of papers.
She shuffled through them, her brow furrowed in concentration. "This won’t do," she muttered to herself, her voice low and serious. She pulled one sheet out and set it aside, on her knee. "This... this is for later."
Carcel’s smile widened. "Later"? She has a curriculum. She doesn’t seize to intrigue him every time with her actions.
She continued to shuffle. "And this..."
He’d had enough. He uncrossed his arms.
In one, lightning-fast, lazy-panther move, he leaned forward, reached down, and snatched the entire stack of papers from her hands.
"Hey!!!"
Ines’s eyes, which had been on her notes, flew wide with pure shock. She jumped up from the chair, her hands grabbing for the papers.
"Give those back!" she hissed, her voice a scandalized whisper. She made a desperate, flailing leap for them, but he was too fast.
He was, as she had noted, infuriatingly tall. He simply held the papers high, far out of her reach, his gaze dancing with a mischief she had not seen since before the war.
"Don’t look!" she pleaded, her hands now flat on his chest, a futile attempt to push him, to reach her precious notes.
"Where did that fierce personality go now?" he teased, his voice a low, amused rumble. He was enjoying this. He was enjoying this far too much. "Why are you so shy? Where is that Ines who was lecturing in the morning?"
Ines was silent.
"You are the one who summoned me here, are you not?" He continued.
He looked down at her, at her furious, flushed face, at her small hands pushing against his chest. His smile was devastating.
"Besides," he murmured, his voice dropping, his eyes turning dark, "I have seen more than this."
Ines froze.
The words hit her like a splash of cold water. He... he had. He had seen... well... everything.
She stopped pushing. Her hands, which had been on his chest, fell to her sides. She backed away, her face a burning, furious, mortified shade of red.
She sat back down in her chair with a sharp, huffy thump. She crossed her own arms over her chest and glowered at him. She pouted.
Carcel’s smile widened into a full, heartbreakingly handsome grin. He had won.
"Now," he said, his voice light, "let us see what ’Chapter Two’ of our lesson contains, shall we?"
He sat back, making himself comfortable on the desk, and began, with a casual, horrifying interest, to shuffle through her private, secret, scandalous list of questions.
He looked at the first page. His eyebrows shot up. He looked at the second. He... he actually coughed to cover a laugh.
"Ines," he said, his voice full of a false gravity, "this... this is a very thorough work."
"Just... just give them back," she mumbled, her face now buried in her hands.
"Oh, no. I cannot do that. A good teacher must review his student’s work." He cleared his throat. He was going to read them.
He was going to read them out loud.
"Question one," he began, his voice a deep, neutral, storytelling monotone. "’When does a man get aroused?’"
He paused, and looked at her. She was peeking at him through her fingers, her eyes wide with horror.
He continued, his voice growing more amused. "Question two: ’What kind of conversation...’"—he squinted at her writing—"’...happens before intercourse?’ An excellent, practical question, Ines. Very logical."
"Stop," she whimpered into her hands.
"Ah," he said. He had clearly reached the end. He was silent for a bit, and she could feel his amusement rolling off him in waves. "And, Oh ... you are wondering... ’what a man’s part looks like.’"
He lowered the papers.
Ines slowly, slowly, lowered her hands. She was a statue of silent, scarlet humiliation. She was going to die. She was going to die, right here, in this chair, of unadulterated shame.
He was not laughing. But his eyes... his eyes were dancing. He was no longer the haunted, guilty duke. He was... he was a mischievous, terrible, awful man.
And he was, she realized, waiting. He was waiting for her to speak.