Honor and Desire (Gold Sky #3) - Rebel Carter Page 0,21
celebration if not for cake to be enjoyed later?”
“Then what of your cake-for-breakfast habit?”
She stopped at that and then grinned at him, her motivation to get under skin suddenly leaving her at the mention of her favorite breakfast food. “Every morning deserves to be celebrated with cake.”
August grinned at her and nodded, sipping from his glass again. “You’re right. It does deserve to be celebrated. That’s why I got you dessert.” There was a tone in his voice that she recognized, the one that was protective and a touch lower, the kind of voice she’d heard when the boys at school had picked on her for her growth spurt and August had to put them all in line about giving her grief.
There had also been the time she was so sick they feared she’d gotten scarlet fever when she was eighteen. He hadn’t left her side then, staying close to her and refusing to care for himself when she was ailing. And who could forget when she’d started riding in earnest two years ago, and she’d taken a fall so hard that she broke her arm and suffered a concussion. For weeks, the man had fussed over her more than her own mother, and every word that came from his mouth had been this low and slow voice.
He’d only ever spoken to her in this voice, one with hushed words and a touch deeper that she felt it in her bones when he was worried for her.
It was a nice voice.
Seylah liked this voice, even if she didn’t know why he was worried for her now.
Her fathers were fine. He’d read the telegram himself, hadn’t he? What was the cause for his protective streak to show?
And how damnable was it that she liked knowing he was thinking of her enough to be concerned?
That shouldn’t be.
“What’s wrong?” She tried.
“Nothing,” August said, leaning back in his chair once more, eyes moving slowly over her as if he were trying to memorize how she looked.
“I’m all right, I swear it.”
He nodded. “I know you are.”
“Then why are you fussing over me like a mother hen?”
August lifted a shoulder in a shrug. “What’s wrong with me looking after you every now and then?”
Seylah’s mouth opened, there was a retort on the tip of her tongue, just begging to be let loose, but with him looking at her the way he was, with those blue eyes warm and open, his handsome face softened by compassion, she couldn’t find it in her to let the words fly.
She closed her mouth and swallowed hard. “Nothing...I suppose,” she added as an afterthought, pulling a chuckle from August. Seylah felt his hand brush against hers, rough fingertips trailing over her knuckles so light she could nearly convince herself that she had imagined the sensation. She nearly sighed at the sound of it. There was something to hearing him laugh, as slight as it was.
She lived for the moments when it was like this between them. Soft, tender, so akin to that feeling of romance that she was willing to endure the misunderstandings to simply bask in these simple and precious few moments.
“You suppose?”
She raised her eyes to meet his and gave a slight nod. “I find it agreeable.”
The corner of his mouth lifted in a smile. “I’ll make sure to note today as a lucky day.”
“The luckiest,” she said, returning his smile. Her heart skipped a beat when she again felt him touch her, this time a thumb against her wrist, and all of time seemed to stop around them so long as he was touching her. Seylah knew she should not feel this way, that it wasn’t fair in the least to August, nor herself, to misconstrue this friendly touch as anything but the familial comfort it was meant to convey.
August did not want her as she did him. Of that she was sure.
Of that, he had been afforded ample time and opportunity to act upon, and yet the man remained close but only so much. They were as close as any two people who were not of blood could ever hope to be, and save that one fateful night in their youth, nothing had ever blossomed between them.
Seylah may be untried in the ways of love and romance, but she understood enough to comprehend that given the time and years shared between the two of them, that if their friendship had not grown into love by now, then there was no hope for it.