Page 43 of Discovering Her Earl

“Goodnight,” she whispered before turning and darting through her door. He hadn’t had a chance to say anything in return.

As he closed the door to his bedchamber, he wondered if he would have said anything or would have done something instead.

Something, like kiss her.

And damn if he wouldn’t be thinking about that all night.

*

When Julian entered the breakfast room the next morning with his bright smile, Elaina felt something akin to butterflies in her stomach and excitement in the vicinity of her chest.

How had this happened? How had she gone from irritated and angry at him to… well whatever she was now. She didn’t quite have a word for it. All she knew was it was unwanted and distracting.

She didn’t want to go back to hating him, she didn’t feel it was deserved and her quest for vengeance never became much of a plan in the first place. But this… attraction that had taken over was disturbing.

What was she going to do? She couldn’t act on this unfettered interest in him. She knew well how that would be received. She’d lived through that already and didn’t want to feel that type of rejection ever again.

She needed to find a place in the middle. A place that was safe from both extremes. For now, that place would be the far corner of the site away from the man who tempted her to distraction.

Elaina sifted through a pile of dirt while thinking over how she could get rid of Lord Melville. Not in a permanent way, though there was plenty of dirt and tools with which to dig a fitting grave if it came to that.

At one point, weeks ago, she may have briefly considered it. Briefly being about an hour, but surely not a minute more.

She’d been infuriated with him and might have thought things would be easier if he no longer walked the earth. She wasn’t proud of it, but it had been a thought.

Now, she didn’t want him to go to Egypt for an entirely different reason than she had before.

She had completely given in to his charms. Worse, she didn’t think they were charms as much as he was simply an inherently good person. She didn’t understand it. This version of him didn’t fit with the man she’d met years ago.

She spent most of the day as they worked thinking of how she might handle the situation. It was nearly time to pack up and return home.

“Ho there! I think I’ve found something,” he called and pointed to the dirt in front of him.

They had yet to find anything on this dig and she didn’t really expect to, so she assumed he had come across an interestingly shaped rock. But when she came closer, she could make out a handle. Like one would find on a pitcher or a jug.

“Very good,” she said excitedly. Her earlier quandary put aside for the moment, she kneeled in the dirt next to him.

She loved this part of excavation. It made the hours of combing through dirt worthwhile.

“You’ll want to use the small probe and the brush to loosen the dirt in small sections and brush it away until the entirety of the artifact is revealed and can be moved whole.”

“Don’t you want to do it?” He gestured to the piece of pottery sticking out of the earth.

She would have loved to take over and exhume the piece herself, but he’d found it and it was his right to see it through. He’d yet to have the chance and it wouldn’t be fair to take it from him. Enemy or not.

“You found it. You get to remove it from the earth.”

“But if I break it…”

“You won’t. Do it just like we talked about. I’ll help you.”

He stood and stepped away. Then came back. She realized he was pacing in a small circle, staying well away from the artifact and her. His fingers squeezed and released as he breathed as if he’d just run for an hour or so.

She didn’t know what was wrong with him, but he was clearly in distress. His breathing had become shallow and quick.

She cut off his next lap and gripped his wrist to make him stop.

“Julian?”