They left the solar together with Gray feeling glad that she would defend him to—he stopped walking and looked at her.
“How do you know my grandmother’s sister is a seer? I didn’t tell you. I didn’t even know.”
For a moment, she gave him a confused look, and then a guilty one. “Harper told me.”
He felt the blood drain from his face. “What else? What else did she tell you?”
“She told me this seer supposedly saw the possible mothers of your sons. Seven sons. I was one of them.”
“That must be why she gave you the key.”
She nodded her agreement and felt the pocket in her skirts. Her eyes opened wider, and she patted her thigh more urgently and then rummaged through the folds in her skirts and beneath. “Gray! The key is gone!”
“Gone?” he repeated quietly. She had to be mistaken. “Are you certain you had it with you?”
“Yes! I had it. It was in my room when I returned from the Gable’s house. I planned on checking the doors, so I went to my room to get it.”
“Alright, you had it up to that point. When do you remember having it last?”
She thought about it. “I had it when I checked in on you in your bed. After that, I went to the sitting room on the second floor above the cliffs, then I found Will, then you.”
He hurried back into his solar with her close on his heels. He lifted the blanket from the floor and seeing no key, hurried around the room moving everything out of its place. Not finding it in the solar, they backtracked, checking the stairs, and almost every inch of Gray’s room, and finally made it to the sitting room. Aria checked frantically in the chair she had been sitting in earlier. The key was not there.
“I’ll wake everyone,” Gray said. “Someone must have found it.”
Aria held up her hand. “No, please don’t wake everyone. If someone found it, I’m sure they’ll return it tomorrow.”
Gray felt an odd spark of hope where there had been only darkness before. “You don’t sound worried.”
She choked out a short laugh. “I’m terrified, don’t get me wrong. I miss my family so much, but…”
“Hmm?” he urged gently when she didn’t continue.
“But it’s been nice getting to know you.”
He couldn’t help the slow smile bubbling up from that newly illuminated place inside him. He hadn’t heard words like the ones she had just uttered since he was seven and his mother left him. This alluring woman, whom he’d known for a mere ten days, spoke them so easily, so honestly. She made him feel like a different person. A man who didn’t know he needed to hear someone tell him they enjoyed being with him. A man who wasn’t hated or mistrusted by all. A man. Even now, watching her rein in the terrible panic shining in her eyes, he wanted to step forward and take her in his arms. He wanted to protect her, comfort her and promise to get her home, despite something deeper telling him to beg her to stay.
“I feel the same way,” he admitted and stepped away from her. The sun would be up in a few hours, and it was safer to walk her to her room and bid her good night.
“Is that so?”
Gray heard the teasing lilt in her voice as she hurried to keep up with him.
“Then why are you running away?”
“I’m not running away,” he corrected coolly, then spread his gaze on her. “But if I was, it would be because I feared I might pull you into my arms to see what that was like next.”
“Huh?”
He glanced at her and shook his head. “Miss Darling, aren’t you sleepy yet?”
She stopped and put her fists on her hips and a playful smile on her lips. “Oh, so all of a sudden you want me to be sleepy. You just said it was nice getting to know me too, and now you’re being rude and aloof. What happened?”
“Nothing happened,” he said and kept walking. The last thing he wanted was to get into a discussion about why he was still running away from women at the age of twenty-five—or, more importantly why he was running from her specifically. Not just for her sake, but for his.
“Oh, right, Harper told me you were untrusting, unfriendly, and uncooperative.”
He stopped and turned to her. “You both had a long talk, hmm?”