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Reaching over to a lass half-filled with inky liquid Without a word, he pressed the glass to her lips as if she couldn’t be trusted to hold it on her oithout spilling it

Pandora sipped cautiously The drink was delicious, with rich flavors of toffee and pluue She took another, deeper taste, her hands creeping up to take the glass from him "What is this?"

"Port Have the rest" He curled his arm loosely around her bent knees

Pandora drank it slowly, relaxing as the port sent warmth all the way down to her toes The stor back and forth with the sea as it leapt in roaring liquid hills But she arht of the hearth played over them

He reached into the pocket of his waistcoat for a soft folded handkerchief, and blotted the last traces of perspiration fro the cloth aside, he stroked back a lock of dark hair and tucked it carefully behind her left ear "I’ve noticed you don’t hear as well on this side," he said quietly "Is that part of the problem?"

Pandora blinked in a that even her family, the people who actually lived with her, hadn’t perceived They had all learned to accept, as a matter of course, that she was careless and inattentive

She nodded "I hear only about half as well in this ear as I do in the other At nightin the darkeverything goes topsy-turvy, and I can’t tell what’s up or down If I turn too quickly, I drop to the floor I can’t control it; it’s like being pushed by invisible hands"

Gabriel cradled her cheek in his pal her with a steady tenderness that sent her pulse into confusion "That’s why you don’t dance"

"I canis i" Self-consciously she looked away and drained the last few drops of port

He took the elass from her and set it aside "You should have told ht if I’d known"

"It wasn’t far I thought a candle would be enough" Pandora fidgeted with the belt of her flannel robe "I didn’t count on tripping over my own slippers" She extended her bare left foot froown and frowned at it "I’ve lost one of the one of her hands in his, Gabriel lifted it to his lips He wove a pattern of gentle kisses over her cold fingers "Pandorawhat happened to your ear?"

Her soul revolted at the prospect of discussing it

Turning her hand over, Gabriel kissed her palainst his cheek His shaven skin was smooth in one direction and softly abrasive in the other, like a cat’s tongue The firelight had turned hiolden everywhere except for those eyes, the clear blue of an arctic star He waited, damnably patient, while Pandora summoned the nerve to reply

"Ican’t talk about it if I’ her hand from his cheek, she crawled out of his lap There was a persistent high-pitched ringing in her ear Covering it lightly with her palers on the back of her skull a few times To her relief, the trick worked

"Tinnitus," Gabriel said, watching closely "One of our older family solicitors has it Does it trouble you often?"

"Only now and then, when I’m distressed"

"There’s no need to be distressed now"

Pandora cast hiers into a tight ball "I brought this on myself Do you remember when I told you that I eavesdrop? I don’t do it as much as I used to, actually But when I was little, it was the only way to find out anything that was happening in our household Cassandra and I took all our meals in the nursery and played by ourselves Soo by beforeanyone other than Helen and the servants Ma trip, or Theo would be off to boarding school, without even saying goodbye When my parents were at home, the only way to attract their notice was to ed Cassandra into my plots and schemes, but everyone knew she was the nice twin Poor Helen spentto be invisible I preferred causing trouble to being ignored"

Gabriel picked up the length of her braid and played with it as he listened

"I elve when it happened," she continued "Orin the ht, it was dreadful They would screas Naturally, I poked , and went to eavesdrop They were fighting about aEvery word sounded like a piece of so to pullopen and e He must have seenHe reached for , he boxedCassandra says she helpedfroht ear mended in a day or two, but I could only hear a little out of the left one, and there was a beating pain deep down Soon I took ill with fever Ma to do with the ear, but I think it did"