The laughter of the garden felt too loud.

He had always found spring afternoons tolerable at best—flowers blooming where structure should be, bees making sport of chaos, siblings speaking too quickly, too much. But today, the garden was too loud because you were in it. Sitting beneath the shade of the elder tree, skirts hitched slightly above your riding boots, one brow arched as you explained, in perfectly maddening detail, how your latest contraption could help prevent carriage-wheel collapse.

You chewed on a bit of chocolate as you spoke, utterly relaxed, utterly unaware of the war you were waging in him simply by existing in his line of sight.

Anthony stood some distance away, jaw clenched, hands behind his back like some stiff soldier—but not really watching the demonstration. No. His gaze had locked onto you the moment you stepped out of the carriage that morning, Mayfair sunlight kissing your cheekbones, your posture tilted by the weight of your new silk moth sleeping on your shoulder like royalty. That old, familiar flame roared to life in his chest—not gently, not fondly. Viciously.

You were supposed to be gone longer.

Not just from London. From his mind. From his ribs. From the fraying edges of whatever control he’d spent the past ten years pretending to cultivate.

He'd almost managed it. After your departure, at age twelve, he'd screamed himself hoarse in the Bridgerton attic, punched the stable door so often his knuckles looked permanently bruised for a year. By the time he was twenty, he had trained himself to think of you as a relic of childhood. Something he'd grown out of. Like wooden toys. Or hope.

Then you walked back into his world at twenty-three, all soft laughter, sharp science, and maddeningly curved lips that still chewed chocolate like you were the only person on earth allowed joy.

And it came rushing back. Every ounce of it. The possession. The need.

He’d held you on his lap once, while you napped against his shoulder, your cheek sticky with sugar, and his arms too tight around your middle. He remembered your warmth, your scent—sun and metal and peppermint. He remembered pushing Colin down the stairs because he dared offer you a daisy.

And now?

Now Colin stood beside you again, far too close, laughing at your mention of “electromagnetic forces,” and Anthony felt the burn rise up the back of his throat like bile. Like madness.

He stepped forward.

“Have you not anything better to do, Colin?” Anthony asked, too sweetly, too suddenly.

Colin startled. “I beg your pardon?”

Anthony smiled. “Surely you aren’t trying to keep her attention hostage with idle jokes. She was in the middle of something useful. Scientific. I would rather not see her distracted.”

Your brow arched at him. “He was merely helping me unpack the measurement scale, Anthony.”

“Yes, well.” Anthony didn’t look at Colin again. His eyes settled on yours. “You never needed help. Not with anything. Isn’t that right, darling?”

Darling.

He hadn’t meant to say it aloud. The word escaped like a bruise, the way a man says the name of a god when he’s too far gone to pretend he’s in control.

He stepped closer, hands now clasped behind his back so you wouldn’t see the tension in them. You had always been able to read him. He hated that. He adored that.

Your mouth opened to reply—probably something logical, detached, painfully reasonable—but he was already there, plucking the measuring instrument from your hand and setting it on the nearby table.

“I’ve not had a moment alone with you all day,” he said, voice softer now, a thread of something deeper threading through the words. “Come. Walk with me.”

A command dressed as a request. You tilted your head, curious, not yet obedient.

The years had made you harder to guide. Less malleable. But not immune.

You stood, brushing off your skirts, and Anthony offered his arm, the picture of gentlemanly grace.

You took it.

But as you walked through the archway toward the quiet rose path beyond, he leaned down, his voice low in your ear, warm and dark and edged with something unnamable.