“No, of course not,” George said. He gave his head a little shake. How the mighty had fallen. He’d been reduced to dangling for gossip from the butler. “Good night, Temperley.”

He made it to the stairs, his foot perched on the first step, when the butler called out, “They do speak of him.”

George turned around.

Temperley cleared his throat. “I do not think it a breach of confidence to tell you that they speak of him at breakfast.”

“No,” George said. “Not at all.”

There was a long beat of silence.

“We are keeping Master Edward in our prayers,” Temperley finally said. “We all miss him.”

It was true. Although what did it say about George that he missed Edward more now that he was missing than he ever had when he’d merely been an ocean away?

He walked slowly up the stairs. Manston House was much smaller than Crake, with all eight bedchambers clustered on one floor. Billie had been put in the second-best guest bedroom, which George thought was ludicrous, but his mother always insisted upon keeping the best guest bedroom free. You never know who might unexpectedly visit, she always said.

Has the King dropped by, he always parried. This generally earned him a scowl. And a smile. His mother was a good sport that way, even if the best room had gone empty these past twenty years.

He paused in the middle of the hall, not quite in front of Billie’s door but closer to it than any other room. There was just enough of a crack under the door to show a faint flicker of candlelight. He wondered what she was doing in there. It really was much too early to go to sleep.

He missed her.

It came to him in a startling flash. He missed her. He was here, in the same house, sleeping just three doors down, and he missed her.

It was his own fault. He knew he’d been avoiding her. But what was he to do? He had kissed Billie, kissed her until he was nearly past the edge of reason, and now he was expected to make polite conversation with her at the breakfast table? In front of his mother?

George would never be as sophisticated as that.

He ought to marry her. He rather thought he’d like to, as mad as that might have seemed just a month earlier. He’d been quite warming to the idea back at Crake. Billie had said “you don’t have to marry me,” and all he could think was—

But I could.

He’d had just a moment with the idea. No time to think or analyze, only time to feel.

And it had felt lovely. Warm.

Like springtime.

But then his mother had arrived on the scene and started going on about how adorable Billie and Edward were together and what a perfect match they made and he couldn’t remember what else but it was nauseatingly sweet and according to Temperley went very well over breakfast with toast and orange marmalade.