Lord Richard glanced at the door. “Could we, perhaps, take a walk?”
David led him along the high street. Most of its houses were small and squat, but they were Cotswold stone, and the street glowed gold in the sun. The pair of them earned some startled glances. Lord Richard’s size and sober magnificence attracted attention everywhere, and this was Vane country, with Cirencester not twenty miles distant. People knew him here.
David stopped on the stone bridge over the little stream, looking down at the trickling waters. “This is the Thames.”
“If you mean to startle me with that fact, you will be disappointed. Dominic and I used to ride to the Thames Head at Kemble when we were boys and imagine ourselves sailing to London. Are you from Cricklade? I don’t even know where you were brought up.”
“London.” David set off along the path toward the water meadows. There were a few workers and walkers around, nobody close enough to hear. “We may talk out here, I think. What do you want with me, your lordship?”
“As I said, I owe you an apology. I’m sorry, Cyprian. I am appalled you felt the need to flee my house, that I drove you to it. I should have talked to you, listened to you, and as for hurting you—I cannot say how much I regret that.”
Breathe in, breathe out. “And kissing me. Do you regret that?”
“I damned well regret the consequences.”
“Good.”
They walked on a few paces.
“Is that to indicate you would prefer me to leave you?” Lord Richard asked. “Or are you willing to talk further?”
“I don’t see what there is to say.” David stopped and turned to face him. “My—Lord Richard, let us be frank. I allowed myself to feel sentiments that you cannot or will not return. I am to blame for that. I dreamed above my station and paid the price for it. But I am now awake, and I cannot return to working for you. It is not fair to myself.”
Lord Richard began to say something. David turned to walk onward and felt the bigger man pacing him, limiting his long stride.
“You were quite right, your lordship,” David went on. “Anything between us would be—would have been—an injustice. I did not believe it, but you proved it to me.”
“When I pushed you,” Lord Richard said low.
“When you gave me no choice. When you made the decision for both of us without thinking to consult me. When you assumed, my lord, that although I have been managing your life for four years and more, I am not fit to manage my own.”
There was a very long silence.
“I see,” Lord Richard said at last. “I have more to regret than I thought.”
“You were right, your lordship,” David repeated. “It is not possible that someone of your station could condescend to someone of mine. You could certainly not do it for very long. I allowed myself to believe that affection might outweigh pride, but that was foolish. I am grateful to your lordship for your wisdom in this.”
“My God. I preferred it when you were on my side.”
So had David. He walked on.
“You are right,” Lord Richard continued. “About everything, including my overbearing ways, and I think we have shown between us why a liaison would never work. But I feel your absence.”
“Hire a new valet.”
“I wish people would stop telling me that,” Lord Richard said testily. “I don’t want a new valet. I miss you, Cyprian. As a companion, as an invaluable ally, as…as a friend.”
David shut his eyes. I miss you too, he wanted to say, but this was the way of madness.
“Thank you, your lordship,” he managed. “And I am sorry too. I did wrong that night, and I know it, but all that granted, where does it leave us now? You will not enter into relations with your servant, so there is no more to be said. I would have taken that risk for you, but you would not for me.” He heard Lord Richard begin to speak and cut him off. “And I cannot work for you feeling as I do and knowing it is not returned.”
“You do not know that.” Lord Richard’s voice was so deep it seemed to resonate in David’s ears. “Believe me, Cyprian, you are not the only fool here.”
“That is even worse,” David said bitterly. “That is infinitely worse.”
“I know.”
David stared at the lush grass of the water meadow. It was bright with flowers, yellow ones that hung down and purple ones that went up. He had no idea what they were called. Lord Richard had never needed him to find out.
“Tell me something,” Lord Richard said after a while. “Why did your mother look at me as though she wanted to stab me with a cake fork?”