He stared at her.
Her cheeks flushed, but she lifted her chin. "Not improper feelings," she said, "but affection, loyalty—a tenderness I have carried for years. I never expected anything in return, Thomas. Never. But when you asked me to enter a marriage that would end as soon as it began, it required that I give everything while expecting nothing."
He swallowed hard.
Her voice softened. "I accepted because I wanted to help you. But I am only human."
The room felt utterly silent. Thomas felt as though his entire chest had been torn open. He had always known Emma was loyal, dear, indispensable. But he had been too careful, too fearful to consider what lay beneath. Now he saw it clearly—saw *her* clearly. Not just a friend, not just an ally, but a woman: warm, devoted, strong; a woman he had needed for years without realizing, and whom he might now lose.
"Emma," he whispered. "Do you still feel affection?"
Her breath caught. "Thomas, please do not ask what you do not wish answered."
"I *do* wish it," he said, low and rough. "More than you know."
Their eyes held, unshielded at last.
A soft knock shattered the moment. Emma startled; Thomas stiffened.
"Forgive me," he murmured. "I will see who it is."
He opened the door to find a footman carrying an envelope sealed with dark red wax. "From London, my lord. Marked urgent."
Camden's seal. Thomas broke it at once, and the letter inside made his blood freeze. Camden, it seemed, had heard rumors of Emma's frequent association with a certain neighboring gentleman. He suggested, with thinly veiled malice, that a petition for annulment might be justified given such impropriety.
Thomas crushed the letter in his fist.