Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Dearest gentle reader,

As the social season has once again commenced, the streets of Mayfair become impassable with gleaming carriages, ballrooms alive with practiced personalities, and matrimonial battlefields where mamas advance with smiles sharp enough to gut any competing debutante's prospects.

For the upcoming six months, reputations will be minted, alliances negotiated, and young hearts steered—sometimes willingly, sometimes not—toward suitable matches. For while presentation to society is an honor, being chosen is nothing short of triumph.

This year’s arrival across the vast Atlantic has set the ton abuzz: the Byers family has at last entered London society. All eyes fall naturally upon Miss Jane Byers, who has ripened into marriageable perfection, reportedly possessing every quality our discerning society demands: untarnished loveliness, comportment born of genuine refinement rather than affectation, and a placid temperament promising domestic bliss to whichever fortunate gentleman secures her hand.

Yet Miss Byers does not stand alone in capturing society's ravenous attention.

Her brother, artist Mr. William Byers—present solely as guardian of his beloved sister—has himself become the object of widespread fascination. Possessing an elegance and countenance seldom bestowed upon gentlemen, he has quickly become the talk of the ton in ways I am sure neither he nor his sister ever expected.

Meanwhile, across the city, Mr. Michael Wheeler reluctantly  prepares to make his own debut among eligible bachelors. Though he accompanied  his family from America years past, following his sister's match with Lord Harrington, he has thus far skillfully evaded the matrimonial spotlight.

Well, no longer.

This season shall witness Michael Wheeler's emergence: he must charm, he must impress, he must appear amenable to matrimony.

As Her Majesty prepares to name her Diamond, whispers already crown Miss Byers as the Season's most coveted prize.

The question remains, however: Will Mr. Wheeler be the gentleman to claim her… or might society soon discover that the heart is rarely so obedient as tradition demands?

Yours in scandal and speculation,

Lady Whistledown

—

April, 1817.

The wheels of Michael Wheeler’s carriage ground to a halt before Lady Danbury's annual ball, the parade of opulence he'd dreaded since childhood.

His sister Nancy had been the one to demand him to go. Had all but stuffed him into this evening attire, her lecture still ringing in his ears. Two seasons without securing a match. Two seasons of imposing upon her and Steve's hospitality. Two seasons of refusing to fulfill his duty to family and fortune.

At least he had companions in his misery. Dustin Henderson and Lucas Sinclair flanked him in the carriage, their collars already wilting with perspiration despite the evening chill. They abandoned him to his brooding when they disembarked first.

Mike lingered in the carriage until the coachman's impatient shuffling forced his hand. He emerged reluctantly, feet leaden upon the marble steps.

He might have remained rooted beneath the portico until dawn had Dustin not returned to tug at his sleeve. "Chin up, Michael," Dustin said. His friend’s curls had been battered into submission by brilliantine. “Let’s make the most of it.”

Lady Danbury had chosen snow as her theme this year. The snow ball, she had named it, as if London hadn't endured enough of winter's bitter grip already.

The interior assaulted their senses with the merciless arctic shade of blue that coated every molding, curtain, and even the footmen's polished shoes. Beyond the grand entrance, white-jacketed servants stood at attention like an army of snowmen.

"I heard Lady Danbury commissioned real icicles for the chandeliers," Lucas murmured, appearing at Mike’s shoulder.

Mike gazed upward at the glittering daggers suspended overhead. "Perhaps I'll be fortunate enough to be beneath one when it falls," he said.

"We should all be so blessed," Lucas replied, tugging at his cravat where it strangled his throat.

The three of them—Dustin’s ebullient bravado, Lucas’s studied boredom, and Mike’s own surly dread—presented an odd trio at the threshold of the main hall.

The noise was immediate, an oceanic roar of music and conversation, but underneath it all lay the pulse of intent: every eye trained on the entrance, every whisper a calculus of courtship.

“Christ,” Mike sighed under his breath. His mother’s voice, from somewhere inside his skull, reminded him that vulgarity was a symptom of spiritual laziness.

Once forced inside, Mike allowed himself a grudging awe. The ballroom’s arched windows were etched with frost and, in the high vaults above, live snowflakes tumbled from a hidden apparatus, melting before they reached the dance floor. There was a smell of pine and chilled gin.

In the center, couples spun in urgent orbit, white and blue gowns flaring against the tailcoats of their partners. The string quartet played, sequestered behind a hedge of pale hydrangeas.

Lucas was the first to spot her: Maxine Mayfield, a fresh drop of color against the frostbitten monochrome. She hovered at the margins, her glass as empty as her bored gaze. “Go on, Sinclair,” Dustin prodded. “You said you were going to do it.”

Lucas hesitated, checked his lapels, then slid into the crowd.

“I give him five minutes,” Mike leaned in to whisper in Dustin’s ear with a wide grin. “Before he’s back with a rejection.”

“He’ll last ten,” Dustin countered, “if he’s smart enough to get her another drink.”

And that left just the two of them. For a time, they orbited the buffet, Dustin making small talk with every passing acquaintance while Mike busied himself with glass after glass of sweet punch.

He watched as Lucas escorted Maxine to the edge of the dance floor. They hovered there for a moment, neither ready to risk the first step. Lucas laughed, said something that made her eyes narrow—calculating, unimpressed, but not disinterested. On the second waltz, they joined in. Lucas’s form was atrocious; Maxine led more than she followed.

Dustin nudged him. “You could at least try to look interested. For appearances.”

“That’s what I’m doing,” Mike said, gesturing at his own sullen face. “This is my interested look.”

Dustin barked a laugh, then, catching sight of someone across the room, excused himself with a mutter, “Back in a moment, don’t get impaled by anything.”

Left alone, Mike found himself besieged. He had to endure a parade of introductions, speculative glances from hopeful mothers and a portly gentleman who spoke of his daughter as if the wedding banns had already been read.

He lasted only forty minutes before craving air—anything to escape the suffocating pretension. He snatched a glass of gin from a passing tray, pocketed two sad little canapés as he began the delicate art of weaving through the crowd toward the blessed promise of the French doors.

Pushing them open, he let the cool night breeze wash over his flushed face. He veered off the torchlit main path, choosing a darker trail that snaked between dense hedgerows.

A voice cut through the hush—deep, male, slurred at the edges.  

“—You’ve been tempting me all evening.”

Then a second voice, hesitant, youthful. "Please, sir. Someone might see."

Mike froze. Through the lattice of branches, he glimpsed two figures beneath a yew tree.

"Let them see," The voice had the cadence of someone who considered himself both a rake and a wit. "Let them envy me.”

Mike recognized the speaker at once—Lord Creel, with his blonde hair and quivering jowls, had a younger man pinned against the trunk, fingers digging into his arm.

“Sir, you’re—hurting me,” the youth whispered, his face half-turned in shadow.

Lord Creel leaned closer, pressing their bodies together. “I could hurt you far worse, if that’s your appetite.” He spoke in a predatory murmur. “It is certainly mine.”

Mike stepped forward then, while clearing his throat. Both men snapped their heads to look at him.

The moonlight revealed the cornered gentleman fully now.

He stood maybe a few inches shorter than Mike, his slender frame accentuated by evening attire tailored to the quarter-inch. His chestnut hair fell in gentle J's across his forehead, curling slightly at the nape where it brushed the starched white collar.

He was beyond beautiful, as if he had stepped right out of a romantic poem penned by Shelley or Byron. There was something almost effeminate in the sweep of his long, thick eyelashes that cast feathered shadows on his cheekbones as he blinked, and the perfect bow of his full lips any lady would envy.

Yet, these delicate features only served to accentuate the masculine line of his jaw and the broadness in his shoulders beneath his perfectly tailored evening coat.

Heat crawled up Mike’s neck.

"I beg your pardon," he managed, faltering as two pairs of eyes fixed on him—the younger with an expression like a caged animal, the older with a face already settling into its parliamentary mask of blandness as he stepped back. "Lady Danbury requests your presence, Lord Creel."

The older man blinked, and straightened his waistcoat. "Of course. Mustn't keep her waiting."

With a lingering glance at his quarry, Creel retreated back to the party.

In the silence that followed, Mike watched the young man exhale, shoulders sagging with relief. His breath came in measured pulls, lips slightly parted.

Mike couldn't help but notice what the moonlight revealed—freckles and moles scattered like stars across alabaster skin, one particularly bold mark hovering just above the curve of his upper lip as if placed there with deliberate care.

Those remarkable doe-like eyes—he could fully see now was hazel bordering on green—rimmed with tears, darting toward the path.

"Creel’s reputation precedes him." Mike offered, breaking the silence.

At the sound of Mike’s voice, those pretty eyes snapped back to him, narrowing with sudden wariness.

"I had matters well in hand," the young man replied, his voice calm despite the tremor Mike noticed in his hands. "But I thank you for your gallant intervention, unnecessary though as it was."

His words were courteous. His tone was anything but.

"I meant no offense," Mike said, frowning slightly, his fingers tightening around the forgotten gin glass.

The stranger straightened his posture with deliberate grace and brushed fragments of bark from his impeccable jacket with affected nonchalance.

"No offense taken," he said coolly. "Now, If you'll pardon me."

He swept past, and Mike turned to watch his retreating figure with a mixture of confusion and fascination, back inside the swirl of the snow ball. Leaving Mike deep in an avalanche of feelings he could not place towards someone he didn’t even know the name of.

—

William Byers did not slow his pace until he was well past the threshold of the ballroom and the thrum of the orchestra and the thicket of conversation closed around him once more.

Only then, tucked into the perfumed, candlelit wilderness of Lady Danbury’s grandest chamber, did he truly let himself breathe and wipe at the fresh tears on his cheeks.

He pressed a hand to his chest, just below the throat, to catch the wild flutter there and steady it.

He had felt so helpless out there. So scared of Lord Creel’s pressure and callous touch. Had been seconds from being seen crying by the young man who had saved him. He felt pathetic. Felt so utterly out of control, he almost felt dirty.

He had not traveled to London for any form of attention. He had joined his sister to secure her future. To find her love.

Him? No. He knew he would not fall in love. Especially not with men like Lord Creel..

Will drew a breath and, with the mechanical grace of one trained from birth, adjusted his cuffs and composed his features into the mask of good humor and mild interest that had, thus far, served him well. Maybe a little too well in retrospect.

He wanted to believe no one had noticed his absence, it’s what suited him perfectly. He didn’t mean to place himself at the center of attention. It was Jane’s night. Jane’s prospects.

Her presentation to Queen Charlotte had already marked her with royal favor, elevating her above the swarm of debutantes all vying for the same prize: to be the diamond of the season.

And it was Jane's moment to shine.

But as Will walked inside, eyes immediately turned to look at him. Some whispered to each other, some beamed as they looked him over. 

He hated the scrutiny. Hated the way people at the edges of the room conducted a kind of silent inventory: the beauty and secrecy he carried. The abstract of his family name and where it slotted into the great ledger of American society.

Across the room, Lord Creel stood among a cluster of slightly older peers, his gaze fixed on Will with the calculating patience of a collector who had already decided where to display his next acquisition.

Will’s darting gaze quickly located Jane precisely where society demanded she remain: at the center of the room, half-encircled by a cordon of peerage hopefuls. Jane wore pearl white, her hair drawn up with a circlet of silk violets that made her look even younger than her nineteen years. She was radiant and composed, her polite laughter emanating at regular intervals as she fielded the conversational volleys of her would-be suitors.

Will watched as she turned her head, seeking him, and caught her eyes. Relief flickered across her features as it did his before she excused herself from her ring of admirers and navigated swiftly to his side.

“Will! There you are,” she breathed, voice low enough that only he could hear. “I thought perhaps you’d managed to slip away entirely. Mother would kill you.”

“Tempting, but hardly worth dying for.”

She smiled, then looked again at his face, concern flickering in her eyes, as if she could sense that something in him was off-balance.

“Are you quite well, brother?”

Will hesitated, then nodded. “Perfectly.”

He would not burden her about his unfortunate cornering in the garden by Lord Creel, nor that only the timely intervention of another man had rescued him. He had not even properly registered his own feelings about it, let alone found language to admit them out loud.

Jane accepted the answer, though not entirely convinced.

“Shall we make the rounds?” He then asked to steer the conversation where he wanted it, on her.

They did, weaving in and out of the prescribed social circuits. The next half an hour passed in a blur of polite introductions, half-remembered names, and the endless cyclical motions of watching Jane waltz with strangers. Will had always found the whole affair faintly ridiculous—the rigid choreography of manners, the way everyone agreed to believe that this was all very serious.

Will remained beside her as the dutiful guardian he was, and yet his thoughts refused to settle. They kept drifting back to his rescuer.

He had meant to be angry—had been angry, mortified to have been seen vulnerable. But now, removed from the moment, embarrassment gave way to reluctant honesty.

The young man had been… handsome.

Annoyingly so.

Tall, broad-shouldered without being imposing, dark hair catching silver in the moonlight. And those eyes—open, earnest, almost apologetic even as he interrupted.

Not mocking. Not smug. Simply… kind.

Will exhaled quietly, irritated with himself. He had dismissed the man rather sharply.

Before Will could follow that thought further, a subtle shift rippled through the cluster of Jane’s admirers. 

Someone was making their way toward them.

Will looked up—and could have sworn he had summed the man himself with his mind alone.

His dark savior.

Now properly lit beneath chandeliers and candlelight, he appeared even more infuriatingly handsome. Composed, though, Will caught the brief flicker of recognition in his eyes as they met across the small distance while bending down to allow Lady Danbury to whisper something in his ear.

His evening attire was a navy blue, double-breasted, with a judicious white cravat—was elegant but not ostentatious. Will watched, unable to help himself, as the young man kept moving towards them with a kind of deliberate grace through the crush of debutantes and their mothers, each step calculated for maximum effect and minimum effort.

At first Will felt only the expected jolt of embarrassment and a spike of irritation. 

He approached with polite confidence, then stopped before them with a bow, addressing Jane first.

“Miss Byers.”

Jane curtsied gracefully. “Sir.” she replied, her own voice trained to the same key of social pleasantry.

“Michael Wheeler,” he introduced himself, voice smooth, though his gaze flicked—only briefly, but unmistakably—back to Will.

Not once.

Twice.

Will felt heat rise uncomfortably at the base of his neck.

Michael turned his attention properly to Jane. “May I have the honor of this dance?”

Jane blinked, clearly surprised but pleased. Then, as etiquette demanded, she turned toward Will.

Will studied Wheeler carefully.

He noticed, with sudden irritation, that while the question was directed to Jane… Michael’s attention remained fixed on him. As if the question had been for him in another world.

“Yes, of course,” Will said, his voice flat, the phrase coming out cooler than intended. He did not release Jane’s hand at first, then forced himself to do so, suddenly irritated by his own petulance.

Jane watched her brother with a tenderness then turned back, placing her hand in Michael’s offered arm.

Michael inclined his head politely—though his eyes lingered a second longer than necessary on Will before guiding Jane toward the dance floor.

Will watched them join the other couples.

Watched as Michael placed a proper hand at Jane’s waist.

Watched as the dance began, the clockwork of the new waltz.

And watched, despite himself, as Michael’s gaze drifted back toward him once more.

Will tried to look away, but the contact was magnetic.

Catching his sister bloomed into exuberant delight, he finally tore his eyes away and only then realized his hands were trembling, the fine muscles at the base of his thumb juddering with the effort to stay composed. He pressed them to his sides, willing the sensation to pass, but it only grew stronger.

He told himself the warmth in his chest was nothing more than lingering annoyance.

—

Mike burned with the memory of William Byers under the yew tree, his cheeks wind-rouged and chest heaving, those full lips parted as if begging to be claimed, the line of his jaw taut with something raw and vulnerable and unspeakably beautiful.

The image had possessed Mike all the way home, haunting him into the quietest of hours, and infiltrating itself into his dreams where it ignited into something forbidden.

In the dream, he was kissing William passionately in the hush between hedgerows, mapping those beauty-marks with calloused fingers, holding the beautiful man pinned and arching and utterly open against the rough bark.

Mike had woken mortified to morning light, hard as a brick, mouth tingling and his hands fisted in the sheets.

Less than six hours later, Mike clutched his bouquet of yellow and violet x he had decided to handpick rather than buy, and tried to ignore the flutter in his stomach as Harrington's carriage jostled him toward Hopper's estate and what he told himself would be a simple social call, he just wasn’t exactly certain to whom.

Jane Byers embodied everything a sensible man should desire—beauty, wit, and fortune. And while she had not yet been crowned diamond of the season, much to many’s bewilderment, she had still favored him with her smiles at last night's ball. This match could secure his position, his future, his place in society. The flowers were for her, of course.

Yet William's face kept eclipsing all practical considerations.

The carriage wheels crunched to a halt on the gravel. Before him stood the grand house, its drive already lined with the conveyances of eager suitors. The season's formal courtship ritual had begun in earnest.

A stiff-backed butler appeared, guiding him from carriage to entrance.

The door opened to a tableau of the season’s carnivores: no less than sixteen gentlemen arrayed in the entry hall, bouquets at attention, each calculated to outdo the last in cost or variety.

Jane Byers didn’t need to be a diamond. She shone all on her own.

Mike immediately noted the undercurrent of the stares and titters. These men in line were threatened by his presence. Not for his charm—he’d never had much of that—but because he had the distinction of being not only American, but also distantly, inconveniently related to the Hopper estate’s prior owner. The social math didn’t favor him, but it made for fascinating tension in the room.

“Mr. Wheeler, if you will follow me. Miss Byers has asked to see you directly.” A footman announced, and Mike followed him through the corridors, resisting the urge to look back at the snarling pack of bachelors.

They passed through a sun-washed gallery lined with oil portraits of Hopper ancestors, all stern and unsmiling, all slightly red about the nose. The scent of bread and jam drifted in from the kitchen.

He was led to the blue salon, a chamber lined in painted silk and cluttered with every variety of delicate furniture. On a low chaise at the far end sat Jane Byers, delicate as a swan in a violet gown, and a book balanced across her knees.

She looked up. “Mr. Wheeler,” she said with warmth.

“Miss Byers.”

He crossed the carpet, bowed, and offered the bouquet, which looked suddenly humble in the well-lit room.

“They’re lovely,” she smiled as she received them. “Thank you for calling,” Jane continued, motioning him to sit on a nearby chair. “I was hoping you would come.”

He looked at her properly then, noting the careful way she held herself. It occurred to him that she, too, was bracing herself—against the crush of expectation, against the relentless scrutiny of the social season.

There was suddenly movement at the doorway. William Byers entered quietly, head slightly down, curls still a touch wild despite a morning’s effort.

In the bright, unfiltered sunlight, his beauty was devastating. If anything, The William before Mike now outshone even last night's memory and hot, wet dream.

He moved behind Jane and fixed his gaze on a spot over Mike’s left shoulder.

“Will, you remember Mr. Wheeler,” Jane said, lifting her hand. William's formal stance dissolved as he reached forward to clasp her fingers. He nodded, but offered no greeting to him. Michael watched the column of his throat move as he swallowed. Last night’s exchange hung between them, enormous and invisible.

“We’re so pleased you came,” Jane continued, rescuing the conversation. “The weather’s perfect. Perhaps you’ll walk with us?”

“I’d be delighted,” Michael managed, words coming out a bit faster than intended.

Jane rose first, smoothing her gown. She threaded her arm through Mike’s so naturally, and with a gentle tug, they set off through the French doors, onto a patio.

William followed behind them, silent as a shadow.

The gardens were a living canvas. Early spring green crowded every bed, and the gravel paths were rimmed with narcissus and hyacinth. Jane led Mike between the rows, narrating the history of each imported shrub with pride half a Hopper would.

But Mike didn’t feel anything for the flowers. He only felt William behind him, the gravity of his silence, the cautious distance he kept.

Jane stopped when they reached a round pavilion nestled at the orchard's edge. "This is my favorite place, where Lord Hopper grows the most sensational roses." she said. "Though Will doesn't think much of roses. He finds them terribly unimaginative."

She looked back at her brother with a hint of mischief, who hovered on the edge of the scene like a stagehand afraid of upstaging the leads.

Mike shifted to face him, clasping his hands at his back to hide their trembling. "What flowers do you prefer then, Mr. Byers?" he asked, his voice carefully measured.

William's eyes widened slightly, suddenly caught in the direct beam of Mike's attention. “I think they’re a bit obvious,” he said, voice almost inaudible. “Everyone expects roses.”

Michael smiled. “You prefer something more subtle?”

William looked at him properly now, gaze pinning him as if they were suddenly alone in the garden. “I prefer wildflowers. They grow wherever they want, without anyone’s permission.”

There was a beat of silence. Mike felt his own mouth go dry.

Oh, goodness.

Jane, either oblivious or merciful, turned to study a cluster of crocuses. “Will’s an artist,” she said, her back to them. “He sees the world a little differently.”

William flushed. “Jane, please.”

But Mike was delighted. “I’d like to see your work,” he said, and meant it.

William's gaze flickered up, then away. "If you wish."

Jane rejoined them, smoothing over the moment. “He’s truly splendid. Perhaps you might sit for him, Mr. Wheeler?"

"I would be honored," Mike said, his words overlapping with William's murmur, "Jane, don’t impose on the gentleman’s time."

"I insist," Mike said, his voice dropping to match William's softer tone. "My mother has mentioned for years she'd like something to remember me by. A portrait would be perfect."

William's lashes fluttered as he looked up. "Then I shall endeavor not to disappoint her, Mr. Wheeler."

Jane smiled at the both of them. “You must stay for tea, Mr. Wheeler. There’s a strawberry tart, and—” she laughed, “—if I don’t serve it, Lord Hopper will eat the entire thing himself.”

Mike agreed, and they ambled back toward the house. Inside, the drawing room was laid with every imaginable pastry and cake, the table crowded with mismatched china. The footman poured tea, and for a while conversation drifted along the usual lines—books, the weather, the farce of the season.

The rest of the visit passed in a blur. When he took his leave, Jane pressed his hand and said, “Do come again, Mr. Wheeler. We enjoy your company.”

William offered to escort Mike to the entrance, and they walked down the long corridors in weighted silence, William slightly ahead of him.

Mike could not help but rake his gaze over William’s body, lingering first on those faint curls brushing the starched collar, imagining how they'd feel twisted around his fingers as he dragged his mouth across the vulnerable skin of his throat. His eyes burned a path down to that impossibly trim waist—God, he could span it with his hands, lift William bodily against a wall. His breath caught as his vision dropped lower still, to the full, perfect curve beneath tailored trousers. Heat surged through Mike as he imagined kneading his fingers into that flesh, spreading him open…

William cleared his throat, breaking the spell. They had reached the entrance hall, standing closer than propriety might dictate.

"I must apologize for my behavior last night," William said softly. "And for involving you in personal matters. I am in your debt."

“It was nothing.”

“It was not nothing.” Will's gaze dropped, color rising in his cheeks. “You… rescued me.”

Mike felt a rush of warmth at the words, his body responding traitorously to William's vulnerability.

"And… You appear to be a suitable match for my sister," William continued, his voice carefully measured. "I shall not object to your continued acquaintance."

"With you present, of course?" Mike asked, causing William to meet his eyes directly.

"As her chaperone, it is my obligation to accompany her. So yes."

“Good.” Mike replied, his tone carrying more meaning than the simple word.

William blinked as he seemingly tried deciphering it and Mike smiled before descending the steps toward his waiting carriage, feeling William's gaze follow him.

—

The next morning, the universe of London society had compressed itself into the borders of Hyde Park, every avenue and path thrumming with the slow, orchestrated collision of all who mattered. Even from the approach, the promenade pulsed with life.

Will thought, not for the first time, how little the English gentry had changed since the feudal ages; they simply swapped swords for hand-embroidered reticules.

He walked beside Jane, feeling the unsteadying mixture of a chaperone’s pride and a sibling’s reluctance. Jane had dressed for the occasion—a gleaming light blue muslin with a print of violets, her hair in a high, youthful twist.

They had hardly advanced twenty paces before the first wave of eligible gentlemen descended upon them. Their approach was relentless, yet exquisitely polite: measured greetings, bows with a flick at the end, as if hopeful Jane would notice their calves in the process.

Will observed as his sister navigated the conversational reefs with the same grace she exhibited in every aspect of her life, making each man feel—at least for the duration of his suit—that he was the only one to whom she had ever spoken, and the men lapped it up like sweet honey. Will envied her ease.

He kept at her side, half-absent in mind, replying to queries about the weather or their mutual acquaintance with practiced brevity. 

The Queen’s indecision loomed over the proceedings like the stubborn mist: still, no diamond had been named. 

“Do you suppose Her Majesty is waiting to see who endures the longest?” Jane mused to him, voice low and conspiratorial, as they pressed on to a quieter stretch of the walk. “Like a siege?”

“Or a bloodletting,” he replied. He noticed a gathering of young ladies further down, each clad in pastel silks and bonnets the size of serving trays, their eyes tracking Will with unwavering interest, and he felt an urge to look away on their behalf.

“You’re morbid,” she laughed.

It was at that precise instant—a moment when Will allowed himself the luxury of feeling, almost, at ease—that he sensed a new presence at the periphery. 

Lord Creel stood in the shadow of the elaborate statue recently erected to commemorate the defeat of Napoleon, ringed by a retinue of older men who seemed to have made him their gravitational center. Will could not understand the man’s appeal—he was all surface, all performance, and yet he commanded loyalty as if by right.

“Miss Byers,” he intoned, bowing with a depth unusual for so public a venue.

Jane curtsied, unable to hide her delight at being addressed by one of London’s most notorious personages. “My Lord. It is a fine morning, is it not?”

“The finest,” Creel said, eyes glinting, though not at Jane. It was Will he sought, a predator’s glance hidden in a smile. “And may I commend you, Miss Byers, on bringing such vibrancy to so dull a day? One expects the bluebells to outshine us all, but you have forced them into retreat.” Creel leaned in, lowering his voice but ensuring Will could hear every word. “You are a jewel, Miss Byers. It is a shame Her Majesty has yet to recognize it.”

Jane colored. Will saw the way Creel’s gaze never quite left him; the courtship was a pantomime for his benefit.

A flicker at the corner of Creel’s mouth. “Mr. Byers. Tell me—do you intend to remain in London for the duration of the season?”

“We are at the mercy of Jane’s invitations,” Will replied. His heart pounded in his throat; he could still feel the pressure of Creel’s hand on his arm, the way his words had cut so close to real violence in the darkness.

Lord Creel turned the full wattage of his attention back to Jane. “Then, if I may be so bold, I would like to invite you to the opera tomorrow evening. Signora Rinaldi is singing Orfeo; I have a box and would be honored by your presence.”

Jane glanced quickly at Will. He managed, “My sister would be delighted, my lord,” before she could even reply.

“Wonderful,” Creel beamed, and to Will it felt more like the baring of fangs. “I presume you will chaperone her, Mr. Byers?”

"I will." The words left Will's mouth as a challenge, a promise to shield Jane from any impropriety. Only after he'd spoken did the trap become clear. The opera invitation was merely Creel’s gambit, with Will himself as the intended piece to be captured. Another calculated move on Lord Creel's chessboard.

Lord Creel's mouth twitched into what might have been a smile as he bowed again. "Until tomorrow evening, then," he said before he melted back into the colorful current of society.

Jane exhaled only after he was gone. “What an extraordinary man,” she breathed, her voice tinged with awe. “I have never met anyone so…” She seemed unable to find the right word.

“Insistent?” Will supplied.

She laughed, then sobered. “There's something captivating about him, wouldn't you agree? One senses he navigates life's pleasures with practiced ease."

"One senses he collects what he desires without resistance," Will countered.

She accepted this, perhaps even admired it.

They continued along the path, Jane buoyed by the promise of her opera debut, Will suffocating under the certainty that tomorrow would not pass without incident.

His mind wandered to Michael Wheeler. How different the evening would be with him escorting Jane instead of Lord Creel.

Michael's parting word at Hopper Hall echoed in his memory: "Good."

One syllable, yet Michael had infused it with layers, weighted with unspoken meaning. Will found himself caught in a dangerous speculation: were Michael's intentions as self-serving as Lord Creel's? Or did he merely wish to ensure Jane's reputation remained untarnished?

The second possibility should have brought Will relief. Instead, he found himself strangely disappointed by it.

And now instead of Michael, every path now seemed to spiral toward the opera and Lord Creel. He wondered if the Lord would attempt something again, with Jane present. Or if, worse still, he would try to separate them. Will’s mind whirled with the dangers: confrontations behind the curtains of his private box, more whispered threats and unwanted touches.

Will cleared his throat. "I wonder if Mr. Wheeler might not be a more suitable match," he ventured, watching his sister's face for any flicker of interest.

Jane caught his hand in hers. "Oh, Will," she said, her voice gentle. "In London, a man's worth is measured by his holdings, not his heart. Lord Creel has three estates and a seat in Parliament. Mr. Wheeler has... excellent posture."

Will's jaw tightened. "There must be more to recommend Mr. Wheeler than his bearing."

Will knew there was.

Michael stood not only tall, but tall without looking down on others; his bearing suggested reliability rather than rank. Something in his manner—a steadiness, perhaps—went beyond his well-tailored exterior. He had shown consideration to Jane, certainly, but also extended the same courtesy to Will himself when it mattered most. In him, Will sensed not merely a suitable match, but a man whose company one might genuinely cherish, rather than merely tolerate for position or propriety.

But was he listing Michael's virtues for his sister's benefit, or because he found himself drawn to those qualities himself?

The path curved sharply, revealing a quartet of figures advancing from the opposite direction, and Will caught sight of the man on his mind and tragically felt his heart leap.

Michael Wheeler was striding up the walk, flanked by the two young men Will remembered from the ball, one of them hand-in-arm with a young woman with copper hair.

They cut a different figure than the typical London set. Even in their best morning coats, they moved with a frankness that bordered on ungentlemanly and very American, and—most strikingly—laughed with genuine pleasure, untainted by the practiced ennui so fashionable among the ton.

Recognition dawned simultaneously across both parties. Michael's gaze found Will's through the shifting crowd, and in that instant, the park seemed to hold its breath—sounds muffled, colors intensified, time suspended as Michael's face brightened with undisguised delight.

They converged at a crossroads, both parties bowing and curtsying with the awkwardness of people who only vaguely remembered they were supposed to.

“Miss Byers, Mr. Byers.” Michael said. “I hope the day finds you well?”

“Quite well, Mr. Wheeler. And yourself?” Jane replied.

“Splendid, thank you. May I present Mr. Henderson and Mr. Sinclair, and Miss Mayfield," Michael said, gesturing to each in turn.

"A pleasure," Jane said, her gaze lingering on Miss Mayfield's ensemble. "Your gown is exquisite."

"Max, please." The copper-haired woman's curtsy was perfunctory at best. Her eyes traveled over Will with unconcealed curiosity. "And you must be the famous Byers siblings. How are you finding London's marriage market?"

"We've just been conscripted," Jane replied with a conspiratorial smile. "Lord Creel has claimed his opera box requires our presence tomorrow evening."

Michael's gaze flicked to Will, whose shoulders tensed beneath his morning coat.

They all fell into step together, their party six strong, and for the first time in days Will did not feel like prey. Lucas and Max meandered ahead, holding hands with the obliviousness of people who had only ever belonged to each other. Dustin bounded through the crowd like an untrained spaniel, reversing course to deliver some clever remark to Jane or draw her attention to the more absurd specimens of millinery on display.

That left Michael and Will, walking side by side in the wake of their more exuberant companions. The path narrowed, forcing them closer together, their shoulders nearly touching.

The silence between them stretched, comfortable rather than strained. Will kept his gaze fixed on the gravel path, aware of Michael's steady presence beside him, a counterweight to his own turbulent thoughts.

"I feel concerned," Michael said finally, his voice low enough that only Will could hear.

"Your concern is warranted," he admitted, then winced at his own candor. "Lord Creel is... difficult to refuse."

Will risked a glance at Michael. There was no pity in his expression, only an open, patient regard, as if waiting for Will to decide what he needed from him.

Jane and Max walked several paces ahead, arms linked like old confidantes. Their laughter carried back to Will, bright and conspiratorial against the genteel murmur of the park.

"My sister deserves her happiness," Will said, his voice barely audible. "I haven't seen her this light-hearted in a while."

"Your sister is fortunate to have such a devoted brother."

Will felt the corners of his mouth lift. "What of your own family, Mr. Wheeler? Any brothers or sisters?" The question offered safer ground.

"One sister, older. She wed an Englishman and now lectures me on the necessity of suffering through the season—apparently it's what gentlemen of means must do."

"And do you believe her?" Will chuckled.

Michael's eyes glinted. "She would sooner die than admit being wrong, and I would sooner die than admit the contrary."

The path curved alongside the lake, where mirrored clouds drifted across water so still it seemed like glass. Will found himself exhaling fully for the first time in days. The weight of tomorrow's opera receded; the persistent shadows of his past dimmed. Here, walking beside Michael, he experienced something rare—the simple contentment of companionship that asked nothing in return.

Will stole a glance at Michael, drawn to the strong line of his jaw, his sculpted cheekbones, the confident set of his shoulders. Their eyes met unexpectedly, and heat rushed to Will's cheeks.

Michael's smile was warm before he turned toward the others.

"I believe we should also secure seats for tomorrow's performance," he announced. " The Harringtons have graciously offered their box. The soprano is said to be exceptional. Perhaps we might join forces for the evening?"

Jane's face brightened as the others responded with enthusiastic nods and exclamations.

"You have my gratitude," Will murmured, for Michael's ears alone.

Michael bowed his head, acknowledging a private pact they just formed, and Will felt something inside him give way to a strange and unlooked-for hope.

—

On the evening of the opera, Michael Wheeler found his anxiety sharpened to a point. It caught on everything: It snagged against his collar, tangled in his hair, sharpened his tongue to silence.

He spent an hour at his mirror, adjusting cuffs and smoothing lapels with uncharacteristic precision. The gravity of the evening demanded it, he reasoned— but beneath this excuse lay his true desire: to reflect back the solemn intensity he' d glimpsed in William Byers' gaze, to embody the role of the rescuer he’d not only taken upon himself but silently handed to by William yesterday afternoon.

Nancy's reflection appeared behind his in the mirror, her posture a study in deliberate patience as she leaned against the doorframe. She said nothing, merely observed his third attempt at the cravat with the faintest curl at the corner of her mouth until Michael sighed. "Out with it, Nance."

She raised an eyebrow, amusement playing at the corners of her mouth. "I've seen generals plan battles with less attention to detail than you're giving that cravat."

He abandoned the mangled silk, pulling it loose with a defeated sigh. "The Queen herself is expected to attend."

Nancy crossed the room and took over, her fingers moving with practiced efficiency. "Since when had Her Majesty's opinion ever troubled you before?" she asked dryly, transforming the tangled silk into an immaculate knot with just a few deft tugs.

"The Harringtons have shown us considerable kindness. I would hate to reflect poorly on their judgment."

Nancy' s gaze softened. She smoothed the ends of his cravat and then, very deliberately, cupped his cheek. " You remind me of Mother in these moments. Dancing around what frightens you instead of giving it voice."

“Lord Creel doesn’t frighten me.” Mike said, aware of the childishness in the declaration.

“You should be. Men like him don’t stop until they win.” She stepped back, her eyes sharp. “If you mean to pursue Miss Byers, you had best be ready for a siege.”

He let the misunderstanding stand. After all, he'd already allowed Nancy to believe the same falsehood about his attendance at the ball, his morning call to the Byers household, transforming a simple promenade into tonight's opera plans. Better to be thought a suitor to Jane. The alternative truth pressed against his throat beneath the perfect knot she'd tied.

When she left, he finished dressing in silence, hands trembling only once, when he accidentally met his own gaze in the mirror.

In that unguarded moment, he glimpsed what he could no longer deny.

Dustin and Lucas were already waiting when he descended the stairs.

“God, Wheeler, you look like you’re about to bury a nobleman,” Dustin said.

“That’s the vision,” Mike replied.

Max appeared at the last moment, as radiant as ever in emerald green. She looked at the three of them, nodded in approval, and pronounced: “We look good. Now, let’s not make asses of ourselves.”

Their carriage ride to the opera house was conducted at breakneck speed, Dustin keeping up a steady patter of gossip and Lucas dropping the occasional one-liner that left Max grinning but Mike too preoccupied to notice.

He imagined the evening's possible outcomes, each more disastrous than the last. Only one scenario brought him any pleasure: his fist shattering Lord Creel's aristocratically stupid face, followed by William’s body pressed against his in the privacy of the Harrington box, curtains drawn, and Mike's mouth crushing against William's with such desperate hunger, making him gasp, tremble, moan for more.

Heat crawled up Mike's neck as he tugged at his too-tight collar, trying to banish the forbidden image from his mind.

When they arrived, the steps outside the theater were already thronged, each guest a tile in some mad, shifting pattern. Mike clocked the faces of the social piranhas.

A footman led them to the Harrington box, two above and to the left of the stage.

Dustin and Lucas pressed to the edge, arguing over the program, while Max commandeered the opera glasses and proceeded to itemize the scandal potential of every box in sight.

Mike's gaze swept across the theater too, halting abruptly when he spotted Lord Creel's box—positioned just below and to the side of theirs. Jane Byers glided in on Creel's arm, resplendent in crimson silks. Her dark curls framed a face that managed to shine with both delight and unmistakable trepidation.

It took Mike a second to spot William behind her, dressed in midnight black so pure it absorbed every scrap of his light skin. His dark hair was parted slightly off-center and swept back to reveal the full, impossible symmetry of his face, each feature balanced against the others like some mathematical proof of beauty.

Mike felt the air in the box thin out.

Jane caught sight of them across their slight distance, her hand lifting in a delicate wave. She turned to Will, lips moving in what must have been an invitation to join her at the railing, but he shook his head almost imperceptibly. He remained in the shadows at the back of their box, invisible to all but the most determined eye.

The first bell sounded. Mike watched the house settle, all movement condensing into a ripple of anticipation. The lights dimmed by degrees until only the stage and the gilded boxes glowed, painting each face in a flickering chiaroscuro.

Mike looked again, and he was relieved he could still see Will.

The opera began.

The music was immense and full of anguish, the heroine singing of impossible longing, of a love she could neither possess nor relinquish. It would have been beautiful, but Mike found himself unable to focus.

He checked the Creel box every minute. At one point, Creel leaned in to whisper something to Jane, who laughed nervously, but Will sat rigid and distant, gaze fixed on the stage.

Then, during the third aria, Will rose quietly, said something to Jane and slipped out.

Mike’s heart stumbled. He found himself half-standing, then forced himself back into his seat, shame pricking his skin. There was no reason to follow. Maybe Will had only gone for air, or to use the facilities.

But a minute after Will disappeared, Lord Creel stood, seeming to excuse himself to Jane and followed Will out of the box.

Mike’s body went cold. He hesitated only a second before turning to his friends.

“I’ll be back,” he muttered to his friends, rising.

He made for the corridor at a brisk pace, pulse hammering, his mind full of nothing but the desperate certainty of the only scenario he could afford to play out.

—

Will Byers had steeled himself for every flavor of anxiety that the opera would bring. The lingering stares. The brittle smiles of socialites as hollow as their conversation. And Lord Creel—a shadow that would inevitably fall across his evening. He reminded himself of Jane's eyes when speaking of the diamond title, glittering with ambition that rivaled the Queen's own collection.

Yet no mental preparation could dull the slow, searing anticipation of Creel's attention. Each passing minute wound the tension tighter, until Will felt like a watch spring ready to snap.

He watched as Jane fielded Creel’s attention with practiced ease, the very picture of courtly affection. Creel’s hands never lingered, his voice never raised; in public, he was the ideal suitor, even when his eyes wandered up and up, past Jane’s crown of hair, to find Will and lock him in a cold, predatory gaze. Each time, the glance was a needle: so brief you could dismiss it, so precise you could not.

Will had downed the first glass of champagne in a single motion. The second glass followed before the overture was halfway finished. By the third, his tongue felt tingly. Every detail of the theatre was overexposed, the crowd sharpened into a thousand little faces, none familiar, all leering and hungry for spectacle. Every so often, his eyes slid to the left, to the other box where Michael Wheeler sat in chandelier-lit profile.

God, Mike was handsome tonight. The black of his tailcoat made his skin seem almost pearlescent. His hair an even deeper black if that was even possible, and his lips impossibly pink even at a distance. When he leaned in to whisper something to one of his friends, Will quickly looked away to not be caught staring.

“Brother,” Jane whispered below him in her seat, not quite facing him. “Is something amiss?”

Will composed his face into its most neutral configuration as Lord Creel turned to look at him. “Only nerves. I suppose one never grows accustomed to the attention.”

She reached to squeeze his hand. “You needn’t fear for me,” she said. “I know what I am about.”

She glanced back at the stage and Will let himself, for a moment, feel pride: she really was exceptional, even among the diamonds-in-waiting. He wanted for her what she wanted for herself. He just wished it didn’t come at such a price.

The price of Lord Creel's eyes, hungry and certain, roaming his face.

At the end of the first act, Will slipped from his seat with a murmured excuse. The champagne had made its way through him already.

The marble-floored corridors outside the box were nearly empty. Will moved through the gleaming dusk, the chandeliers above him multiplying every shimmer until his own reflection blurred and doubled across the gilded mirrors lining the walls.

He paused at one of these, seeing himself: impossibly pale, curls untamable, effeminate in every crevice except for his angled nose. He tried to imagine what Creel saw in him—tried to guess at the sick calculus of desire that had made him a target in this season of prey and predator.

He had thought, once, that being wanted would feel like flattery. Now, it only made him want to crawl out of his own skin.

The lavatories were deserted. He washed his hands and braced himself against the cool porcelain, willing his heart to steady. In the deep, echoing quiet, the clamor of the audience was a distant, underwater thunder.

On his way back to the box, he walked more slowly, counting each stride, each breath.

He almost made it.

The hand that closed over his mouth was precise, tight, unforgiving. A second hand wrapped around his waist, yanking him hard, making his vision jitter. He was pulled into the darkness of an alcove, behind a section of drapes, flush against the front of his kidnapper.

For one wild, desperate heartbeat, Will begged for it to be Michael—Michael's hands, Michael's breath. But the fantasy shattered instantly. Michael had never once touched him, while Creel's particular violence had become unmistakable—the precise pressure of those fingers, the cologne that now filled Will's nostrils, the way his body was pulled backward until his spine curved against the unyielding form behind him.

He tried to scream but Creel's palm crushed against his mouth as the other hand clawed at Will’s shirt, tearing it from the waistband. Those fingers—cold, dry, possessive—spidered across his bare stomach, each touch branding him with revulsion that crawled beneath his skin.

Will clawed desperately at the hand silencing him, his other fingers wrapping around the wrist that violated his body.

“Shhh,” Creel hissed into his ear, and the sound was too intimate, obscenely so. “Did you truly believe I’d wait for your permission?”

Each desperate twist only ground Creel's hips harder against him, the man's arousal unmistakable through layers of fine fabric.

"Believe I would beg for what I can simply take?" Creel’s voice dropping to a guttural growl.

Will’s breath hitched in panicked gasps as Creel's thigh wedged between his own. Will's vision narrowed to pinpricks, his pulse thundering so violently he thought his veins might burst.

“Listen carefully,” Creel murmured, lips skimming Will’s jaw. "One more second of resistance from you, and your precious Jane becomes nothing.”

Will froze then. His scream died in his throat, becoming nothing but a high, broken whimper that vibrated against Creel's palm.

“I will destroy her so thoroughly that even the servants will cross themselves at the mention of her name. No balls, no marriage, no future. Just a ruined girl shipped back to America in disgrace, where she'll wither and die alone."

Creel’s free hand moved under Will’s shirt as Will’s grip on his wrist let slightly, daring to scrape his fingers up Will’s ribcage, leaving lines of fire in their wake.

“I will be everything she needs,” Creel continued, voice now almost soft, confiding. “And you—” here his hand left Will’s ribs, travelled lower and pressed to Will’s groin—“You will be everything I need. Her future for your submission.”

Rough hands sought the outline of Will’s cock through the fine, black fabric. The other hand clamped harder over his mouth, trapping all the tiny, mewling sounds that spilled desperately from his throat.

Will’s body betrayed him: he could feel the heat pooling at his center, his breath coming in shuddery little bursts, his eyes stinging with shame.

Jane's face flickered in his mind—her future, her dreams, all of it balanced on his surrender. Will let his body go limp, his resistance melting away. Against his back, he felt Creel shudder with triumph, a low groan of satisfaction vibrating through both their frames.

"Good boy," he murmured, his free hand abandoning its exploration at Will's front to claim possession of him from behind, kneading the curve of flesh through fine wool, marking territory. "You understand now."

Will registered then, with a horrifying clarity, that he would let this happen if he had to.

His mouth filled with copper, warm and slick. He'd bitten through his own tongue without realizing, but the pain was distant beneath the roar of his humiliation.

Will fought not to move against the rough hand unbuttoning his trousers before pushing them down.

A single, whimpering sound escaped him, making Creel wrench his hips backward, grinding Will against him with bruising force, pressing the length of himself against Will’s ass, only his underwear was the last armor.

And then, suddenly, the darkness of the alcove shattered as the curtain was ripped aside and the blinding hallway light poured in.

Michael Wheeler stood framed in the arch, shoulders squared, jaw locked, his eyes so wide and black with fury that for a moment even Lord Creel seemed to shrink.

"Take your hands off him." Mike’s voice was low and deadly, the accent gone flat stripped of its careful English veneer.

Creel did not let go, not fully. He straightened as he slipped his hand off Will’s lips, but keeping him close as if he might use him as a shield. “This is none of your affair, Wheeler,” he said, “Go back to your box and pretend you never saw—”

Mike lunged forward and wrenched Creel's grip from Will's body. The older man stumbled backward, colliding with the opposite wall of the corridor with a dull thud. Will's knees buckled beneath him, his body no longer held upright by his captor's force. Instead of meeting the cold marble floor, he found himself caught against the solid warmth of Michael's chest, trembling within the circle of his unexpected embrace.

Mike' s touch carried none of the violence of moments before—just steady hands that held without claiming. "William," he whispered, and Will realized through his haze of shame and dread and desperate relief that this was the first time he'd heard his full name from those lips.

Will lifted his gaze. Michael’s face was inches from his, the fury draining away, revealing something raw and unguarded beneath as he raked his eyes over Will’s tear-stained, rosy face, fixed on him as if nothing else in the world mattered.

Behind them, Creel slunk away, his labored breath fading as he melted back into the flow of the corridor's shadows.

The world outside the alcove—the Queen, the opera, even Jane—seemed impossibly distant. All that mattered was the warmth of Mike’s body, the safety of it.

Suddenly, footsteps echoed in the corridor. Will's stomach dropped as he became acutely aware of his dishevelment—shirt torn open, angry red marks rising on his exposed skin, trousers bunched around his thighs. The compromising position of being cradled against another gentleman's chest struck him with fresh horror.

Michael reacted without hesitation. With one fluid motion, he reached for the heavy curtain while still supporting Will's trembling form. He drew the fabric closed and plunging the two of them into the darkness of the alcove, shielding Will's vulnerability from whoever approached.

"Are you steady enough to stand?" Michael whispered, his breath warm against Will's temple.

Only when Will managed a shaky nod did Michael's protective embrace gradually loosen.

Will turned away from Michael, fumbling with his clothing. His fingers refused to cooperate as he tugged his trousers back into place. Each button slipped from his grasp, as if mocking his desperation to restore some fragment of dignity.

"Forgive me," he managed, the words scraping his raw throat. "This is my fault."

"How could you possibly—" Michael whispered.

His hands flew to his face, pressing against his eyes as if he could physically hold back the tears that escaped anyway, sliding hot and shameful between his fingers. "Leave me," he whispered, the plea barely audible. "I'm begging you to leave."

Michael remained motionless behind him, the silence stretching between them. "Of course, If that's what you need," he finally spoke, and slipped out through the curtain.

Allowing him to finally break down.

—

Violence had never been in Michael Wheeler's nature. His hands were made for writing, not wrenching, and his lineage held no tales of duels or vendettas. Yet standing alone in that corridor, the world ran red behind his eyes.

The urge to hurt Lord Creel was so vast and immediate that he felt it in his very pulse. Not just with a warning shove against the wall—no, a proper, devastating facer that would send the aristocrat sprawling, that would make him taste blood and humiliation in equal measure.

There was no question what Creel had done.

Mike's entire being ached to go back to Will, to offer comfort or vengeance or both, but he had honored Will's whispered plea to leave him. He'd only retreated as far as his loyalty would permit, which was a few steps down the hallway.

At last, a silhouette darkened the curtain's edge before Will emerged into the corridor. He halted just outside the doorway, one palm pressed flat against the wall as if the floor beneath him had suddenly tilted. His chin dropped to his chest, and a tremor passed through him—just one, but so violent that Mike heard the soft, broken sound it forced from Will's throat.

Every fiber of Mike's being urged him forward, but he remained where he stood, allowing Will the dignity of his own recovery. Mike shrank back into the shadows of another alcove as he watched Will slowly move toward the far end of the hallway, and only after the doors of the Creel box had closed behind him did Mike finally release the breath he'd been holding.

Returning to his box, Mike found Dustin leaning forward in animated discourse with Max and Lucas. The three of them faced the stage, shoulders shaking with barely suppressed laughter as they dissected the second act's theatrical indulgences.

“Where’d you vanish to?” Dustin hissed as Mike slid into the row. “You missed the entire duet!”

“Needed some air,” Mike replied, not taking his eyes from the Creel box. From this angle, he could see the aftermath.

Jane was perched on the front edge of the box beside Creel, who was perfectly at ease, a showman’s smile on his face. And behind them, Will.

Mike felt sick with helplessness. This was the genius of men like Creel: what he did in the corridor might as well not have happened. Within the walls of the upper echelon, reputation was the only true law.

The opera thundered on, a relentless parade of suffering made beautiful, the soprano’s voice climbing higher and higher until it seemed certain something would break. Mike found it unbearable. Every time he glanced at the box, Will was in the exact same position, not moving, not clapping, his gaze fixed on the stage or perhaps not fixed anywhere at all.

He realized, as the third act shuddered toward its conclusion, that he could not let this be the end of it.

Creel had made his move.

Mike would make his.

He waited for the final curtain, then stood and pulled his coat close around him. He left his friends to their whispered critiques and made his way out, slipping through the crowds toward the main exit. At the base of the grand staircase, he watched as box after box emptied out into the grand foyer, the swirl of finery and perfume forming a current that swept everyone toward the street.

The Queen’s retinue emerged, their passage clearing a wide berth down the crimson-carpeted stairs.

Then he saw them: Jane gliding on Creel's arm, her red gown catching every glimmer of the chandeliers, her cheeks bright with the knowledge that all of London watched her descent. Behind them, Will, maintaining the precise distance that propriety demanded, his features schooled into perfect emptiness.

Mike saw the moment Jane spotted him. Her expression transforming from practiced poise to genuine delight.

“Mr. Wheeler!” she called, her voice ringing clear through the chatter and the churn of departing guests.

She tugged free from Creel and descended the steps with a swan’s grace, pausing only when she reached the landing where Mike waited.

"Miss Byers," he murmured, allowing his voice to carry just far enough for the Queen to crane her neck, catching him bowing over Jane’s hand, brushing the back of her glove with his lips.

It was a calculated gesture, one he’d practiced in his head a hundred times but had never performed with real feeling. Tonight, he gave it everything he had.

Jane tilted her head, a conspiratorial gleam in her eyes. "Tell me, was the opera to your liking?"

I found it utterly captivating," he replied with practiced lightness. "Though I must admit, my gaze wandered often from the stage to your box. Even Puccini's finest aria paled beside the vision you presented this evening."

Jane's cheeks flushed prettily as Mike held her gaze a moment longer than necessary, ignoring the bewildered expressions of his friends in the periphery. He wore this artificial gallantry like an ill-fitting costume, the practiced words and gestures foreign to his nature, but he played the part with unwavering commitment nonetheless.

Because the Queen and her entire retinue were within earshot, and Creel, forced to pause above, watched them both with a venomous glare.

Jane turned to call up the stairs. “Will! Do come down. Mr. Wheeler is here.”

Mike braced himself, but Will’s face was a mask: polite, composed, betraying nothing. He descended slowly, never quite looking directly at him. Mike’s heart pounded with the knowledge of what strength it must have taken to show himself at all.

Creel, for his part, swept down the last flight with a flourish and positioned himself just a hair too close to Will.

"Wheeler," Creel said, his tone honeyed with false warmth. "One hardly glimpsed you in your box tonight. Was your company truly so lacking in charm?"

Mike inclined his head, holding Creel’s gaze. “There were other matters requiring my attention in the second act, my lord. You understand how the season is.” His lips curved upward slightly, a gesture more challenge than courtesy.

Something dangerous flickered across Creel's features—recognition that while decorum prevented physical confrontation, the battlefield of polite society offered weapons of its own.

“Indeed,” Creel replied, his smile tight.

Will came to stand beside Jane, his eyes fixed on the floor. Mike, unable to help himself, lowered his voice and asked, “Are you well, Mr. Byers?”

Will's chin lifted slowly, eyes meeting Mike's at last. In that unguarded moment, something flickered across his face—a storm-tossed emotion that was neither gratitude nor fury.

“I am well, thank you,” Will said, his voice steady.

Creel hovered, fuming silently, unable to reclaim his role as chaperone without making a scene.

Mike extended his arm to Jane with deliberate courtesy, escorting her through the crowd to where their carriage waited in the street. He held the door as Will handed his sister up into the velvet interior.

Before following her, Will paused at the threshold, his gaze locking with Mike's in a moment that carried the weight of everything they could not say aloud.

Then the carriage rolled away into the night, bearing toward Hopper Hall, and Mike stood motionless until the clatter of hooves against cobblestone faded into silence.

For now, he contented himself with the knowledge that the Byers siblings had left the opera unscathed, at least for tonight.

—

Will did not sleep. He lay prone in the kingsized guest bed on the second floor of Hopper Hall, covers tangled at his ankles, mind roiling with the previous evening’s horrors and odd comforts. The memory of Creel remained visceral— the palm clamped over his lips, the nauseating weight of unwanted attention pressed against his spine.

Yet as dawn approached, the terror had receded, leaving in its wake a more bewildering preoccupation: how differently it had felt to be in Michael Wheeler's embrace—a similar physical closeness, yet worlds apart in meaning.

Will had spent the last hours before sunrise dissecting Michael's actions with obsessive precision. Appearing at the opera to show support. The rescue that followed, swift and sure. The way Michael had maintained his distance afterward, as if he understood Will's shame without judgment. The spectacle he'd made before London's elite, drawing even Her Majesty's attention. Will could not fathom why a stranger would risk so much on his behalf—what Michael Wheeler could possibly want from him.

He couldn't stop hearing it—that single word Michael had spoken on the mansion steps. Good. One syllable, yet it contained multitudes Will couldn't parse no matter how many times he replayed it in his memory.

The sound of Jane's voice, bright and insistent, carried up the stairwell in triumphant declarations: "I am the diamond!"

Will's heart raced at the sound. He dressed without thinking, fingers fumbling with buttons while thoughts of Michael Wheeler consumed him, barely noticing as his feet carried him down toward the breakfast parlor.

Jane was in the middle of the drawing room, pacing back and forth, as their mother and Lord Hopper sat on the couch together with big smiles. Jane was radiating excitement, a wrinkled newspaper page gripped between her manicured fingers.

She barely noticed Will as he entered, so engrossed was she in her reading. Only after he leaned down to press his lips against their mother's cheek in greeting did she finally glance up. Her eyes gleamed with an almost manic joy as she looked up at him.

"Will," she said, her voice quivering with excitement, "I've done it! The Queen has chosen me as the diamond!"

Will thought he had heard right. A genuine smile spread across his face.

He smiled and pulled her into a hug. "I always knew Her Majesty would recognize what was right before her eyes."

At closer look, the paper in Jane's hands revealed itself as Whistledown's Society Gazette, the most notorious and unrepentant gossip rag in London. Will had always refused to read it on principle, but Jane devoured every issue as if it were Scripture.

Jane broke away and cleared her throat before reading.

Never let it be said that the Queen of this season is slow to judge—or, for that matter, that the Queen's judgment is ever wrong. It is with delight that I report Her Majesty has conferred the title of Diamond upon Miss Jane Byers, of the American Byerses, a young lady whose debut has dazzled all who beheld her. It seems Miss Byers has achieved what no lady in two years could do: she has tamed the notorious Michael Wheeler, whose reputation as a rake has only been matched by his reluctance to appear at any function with the same companion twice. Yet last evening, at the opera, many witnessed Mr. Wheeler in a gesture so gallant, so transparently besotted.

Jane paused here, the color high on her cheeks. “She writes as though it’s settled.”

Michael's name struck Will like a discordant note in an otherwise perfect melody, leaving him with a hollow he couldn’t name.

Will scanned the column, absorbing the rest: sly references to the ‘American match’ soon to be finalized, repeated use of the word ‘dazzling’ and, most notably, a veiled swipe at Lord Creel, described as ‘a certain peer who finds himself upstaged in every arena.’

There was no mention of the events in the corridor, no hint of what had transpired between Will and Creel, or Will and Michael.

The implication was clear: Jane had triumphed.

The rest was irrelevant.

“It’s settled, then,” Jane said, her voice softer now, almost reverent. “The Queen has spoken, and Whistledown has seconded her. I am the diamond. And Michael Wheeler is—”

“Besotted,” Will finished, the word sour on his tongue.

She giggled. “He was so attentive last night, Will. Did you notice? He was more gallant than any man I have ever known.” She looked at him then, her eyes suddenly searching. “You like him, don’t you?”

Will hesitated, not really certain how to phrase how he felt about Michael. So he simply smiled at her in answer, and yet the motion felt almost foreign.

He excused himself from the celebration under the pretense of needing air. Outside, he drew a deep breath that did nothing to ease the tightness in his chest.

This was what he wanted, wasn't it? Jane triumphant, Michael Wheeler—wealthy, respected, gallant Michael—now clearly pursuing her. A match infinitely preferable to Creel. Yet something twisted in Will’s stomach like a knife when he now pictured it.

He saw Michael Wheeler in his mind: the line of his jaw, the cut of his shoulders, the peculiar intensity of his gaze. Will couldn't forget how those same lips that had brushed against Jane's knuckles with apparent adoration had, only moments earlier, shaped the sound of his own name while strong arms sheltered him from harm.

Michael had appeared at the opera, just as he had materialized in the garden before. Twice now, Michael had emerged from nowhere to stand between Will and danger.

Will shook his head, banishing the thought. It was preposterous. Michael Wheeler had no reason to help him—no reason to risk anything for Will’s sake. There was only one logical explanation: Michael’s ambition. He wanted Jane, and perhaps saw Will as part of the bargain.

Will wanted to be angry about that. He wanted to believe that Michael was no different than Lord Creel, no different than any of the men who circled Jane like wolves, looking for a way in.

But he could not.

Try as he might, he could not make himself believe Michael was dangerous.

He could only believe that Michael was necessary.

Will needed to see him, to speak to him without the pretense of chaperonage, to ask the question that had lodged in his heart since the moment the drapes had opened between them.

And there was only one way to find out.

Will went upstairs and packed the things he needed. He asked a passing footman for the carriage, and when the coachman asked for a destination, he gave it without hesitation: Harrington Hall.

He left without a word to Jane. It was better this way, he reasoned—his meeting with Michael was merely a precaution, a brotherly duty. The flutter in his chest when he thought of seeing Michael alone had no bearing on his decision. None whatsoever.

The carriage wheels jostled Will from his thoughts only when it pulled up before Harrington Hall. By this point the city was smothered by that sickly-sweet drizzle particular to London in early spring.

The house loomed with the kind of pride only money and centuries could instill—a facade clean enough to signal moral virtue, windows squared off like a general’s medals, each one glimmering despite the overcast sky. Someone had spent a fortune on the garden alone; crocuses and narcissus crowded the borders, trembling in the cold but still determined to bloom.

He stepped out with his satchel and a big, empty canvas clutched in one hand, self-conscious at the presumption of visiting so early. The Byerses’ own rules would have forbidden such an intrusion, but Will’s sense of urgency had drowned out his usual misgivings.

The raindrops found him despite his haste, and a footman met him at the door, eyes flicking from Will’s damp curls to the canvas like he was a peddler come to the wrong entrance.

He was eventually led through a marble vestibule, every surface gleaming. The Harrington house was notorious: not only did it hold the largest private library in the city, it had been the site of at least two duels (one merely verbal, the other less so), and three separate Parliamentary scandals.

“Mr. Wheeler is not at breakfast, sir. I have sent up to his rooms.”

Will nodded, and the man glided off, leaving Will standing in the echoing hallway beneath a monumental painting of the First Lord Harrington conquering a mound of pheasants.

“Mr. Byers!” called a voice from the upper gallery. Will looked up to see Nancy Harrington leaning over the banister, her morning wrapper cinched tight, a look of genuine amusement on her face. “The men of this household are not renowned for their morning habits, I warn you.”

Will bowed. “I’m afraid I did not consult the clock, Lady Harrington. Forgive the imposition.”

She swept down the stairs. “Nonsense. You are a friend, are you not? Or are you here on behalf of your sister?”

“Neither, precisely.” Will' s pulse quickened as he searched for a plausible explanation. "I'm here on a matter of art, actually. Mr. Wheeler has agreed to sit for a portrait."

Nancy’s eyebrows shot up. “I was not aware.”

“It was… an arrangement made last-minute,” Will improvised, feeling heat rise in his cheeks. "A portrait for his mother's birthday—he thought it would please her."

Nancy’s eyes glinted, and for a moment Will thought she saw through him completely.

“That is… lovely him. Michael’s gifts are usually limited to rare books and boxes of dreadful fudge from St. James’s.” She moved closer, lowering her voice. “But you should know, he did not return until a scandalous hour last night, and he has not yet descended.”

“I don’t mind waiting,” Will said.

She gestured toward a sitting room, inviting him to take a chair. “I’ll have him sent down as soon as the household can rouse him. Meanwhile, you are welcome to wait here—unless you prefer to set up your canvas in advance?”

"Is there a particular room where he might be most... at ease?"

“The library,” said Nancy. “It’s where he spends most of his time writing. Last door on the left. I'll send him to you directly.”

Will thanked her and made his way down the corridor, the weight of her gaze following him.

The library was silent, the air inside fragrant with old paper. Will found the perfect spot near a window, propped his canvas on the traveling easel. Despite his practiced movements, a tremor betrayed his fingers as he laid out his paints.

The soft whisper of footfalls against the carpet announced someone's approach. The library door swung open.

Michael Wheeler entered like a man who had not expected company, disheveled in a way Will had never seen him—hair tousled from sleep. He wore a shirt open at the throat—no cravat, no coat, his sleeves rolled carelessly to the elbow. It made him look simultaneously aristocratic while like he’d just escaped from a schoolroom brawl.

Will had not expected the sight of Mike to hit him with such force.

He froze at the threshold, eyes widening as they found Will, as though he couldn't quite trust what he was seeing.

“Mr. Byers,” he said, his voice cracking with sleep. “What—”

“Lady Harrington told me to set up here. She said you’d join me.” Will tried for casual, but his heart fluttered wild and trapped.

Michael regarded him for a beat in confusion.

He bowed apologetically, brow furrowing. “I must confess, it seems to have slipped entirely from my mind."

Will's throat constricted. "Please, think nothing of it," he managed, though shame coiled inside him. Here he stood, an uninvited guest in the bright of morning, yet the confession refused to leave his lips—he had fabricated the entire arrangement on a desperate whim.

They stood in silence for a moment, neither willing to claim the next move.

Michael broke it first, stepping closer to Will. “I’ve never sat for a portrait before,” he admitted. “I wasn’t sure how to dress.” Mike’s lips quirked as he gestured to his own lack of formality. “Or, I suppose, undress. Do you require me to—?”

Will’s ears caught fire. “No. This—this is perfect.”

"Okay, where would you want me?"

“Anywhere you feel most natural,” said Will, who had not planned even this far.

Mike obediently dropped into the armchair behind the desk, then slouched lower, crossing his legs at the knee, and gazed at Will with that same wry, quizzical intensity that had made Will’s insides twist.

“Is this all right?” Michael asked.

“It is all right with me if it feels all right for you,” said Will.

Will noticed with clinical horror that his own hands trembled as he prepared the canvas, the brushstrokes that usually felt like muscle memory suddenly foreign.

"So, you feel most at home in the library?" Will asked.

"Well, I do have a passion for the art of storytelling. I write my own prose when I have the time."

Will sketched quickly, letting his hand do the thinking. It was only when he reached for the black, to shape the planes of Mike’s cheekbones, that he glanced up in earnest.

"That's fascinating to hear. What do you write about?" 

"Adventures."

"Your own?" Will glanced up.

Michael smiled. "No. I have not yet lived through any myself."

Michael watched him in the manner of someone who knew he was being observed, but did not mind it.

After several minutes, Will dared to speak as he dipped his brush in ochre, eyes fixed on the canvas. “I'd say you making Jane the diamond of the season was quite adventurous of you.”

“I did nothing.” Michael's hand moved through the air as if swatting away the very notion.

Will shook his head, brush paused mid-stroke. “You keep saying that. But the Queen herself followed your gaze. The entire ton watched you watching her. You transformed my sister from a wallflower to wonder with nothing but your attention.”

Michael smiled genuinely. "I merely made everyone notice what was already in front of them. Your sister possesses a quality that even the Queen could not ignore for long."

Will could not argue what was true.

The pencil moved faster now, confidence returning with each new line. Will risked another glance, this time measuring the slope of Mike’s jaw, the slight tilt of his mouth. He realized with a pang that he wanted, very badly, to capture not just the face but the exact look it wore right now—some mix of challenge and invitation.

“So, you will be marrying her then?” Will asked, too bluntly, regretting the words even as he said them. “Jane, I mean.”

Michael looked startled, then thoughtful.

“I care for your sister,” he said at last, “and she is everything a man might hope for in a wife.”

Will nodded, color high on his cheeks. “But?”

Mike's gaze drifted toward the window, his teeth catching briefly on his lower lip as he seemed to weigh his next words with careful deliberation.

"About last night," he said instead, voice dropping to a murmur that seemed to brush against the silence rather than break it. "I wish I'd reached you before he—" He stopped, jaw tightening. "I should have been there sooner."

Will’s hand jerked; a thin slash of pigment cut across the sketch. He steadied himself, wiping it away with the side of his thumb.

“You rescued me, again…” Will said, the words tearing free with a rawness that embarrassed him. “If you hadn’t come…”

Michael half-rose from his chair, a movement so sudden that Will's brush clattered against the easel.

"Please," Will said, more sharply than he intended. "Your position was perfect." Michael settled back, his body stiffening into an artificial stillness that might have been amusing under different circumstances.

Michael's jaw clenched as he thought of Lord Creel. "I should have confronted him properly," he said, his knuckles whitening where they gripped the armrest. "Should have given him a facer for daring to lay his hands on you."

Will did not know what to say. He had never in his life been the reason for anyone’s courage. He felt himself flush all over.

Will cleared his throat, finally daring to speak his mind about the one thing that had resided in his mind without fee the last couple of days. "The other morning, after you called on Jane—when I told you I would chaperone your meetings with my sister—you said something."

Michael's eyes found Will's again. "Did I?"

“Good.”

Michael blinked, the silence clenching them in tension.

“Good?”

"You said it would be 'good' to have me there." Will's voice faltered on the word.

Heat crept up Will's neck as he watched Michael's expression change.

"Oh, yes," Michael said softly. "I remember."

"Why?" Will's brush hovered mid-stroke.

"Because your presence is..." Michael paused. "A comfort. Expected, certainly, from a brother as devoted as yourself, but welcome nonetheless."

The space between them seemed to contract, filled with words neither dared voice.

Until Michael did.

"And... I value your company, William." His fingers traced an invisible pattern on the armrest. "Should Jane and I... well. I've observed the bond you share. I would never wish to sever it. I’d care for you both." His gaze lifted, meeting Will's directly. "I would decorate her chambers with roses, and yours with wildflowers."

The tenderness in his voice undid Will completely. He retreated behind his canvas as unbidden tears threatened to spill. His palm pressed against his mouth, stifling the sound that rose in his throat.

"William?" The creak of the chair betrayed Michael's movement.

“I told you not to move!” Will commanded, voice sharp with panic.

Michael froze, settling back.

Will looked down at his sketch, realized it had become less a portrait of Michael than a map of his own longing.

Right then and there, he realized that he had fallen in love with Michael Wheeler.

He had come here seeking ulterior motives but found only sincerity—a man who loved without reservation, who treasured the very qualities others might consider flaws, who offered his heart so freely.

The truth crashed over Will like a wave: his own heart was the deceptive one here. The realization burned his throat as he forced out the words he didn’t mean but needed to say to not lose him:

“Marry my sister, Michael. You have my blessing.”