Into the Darkest Day

Matthew smiled tightly; there was nothing friendly about it. “I’m not a jive bender like you.” He made it sound like an insult.

“So why don’t you give it a whirl? She looks like she’d like a spin around the floor.”

Lily sat frozen in her seat, mortified by the exchange.

“Yes, go on, Lil,” Sophie said. “Go bebop.” She’d put on the American accent again, and both she and Tom laughed far too loudly at her supposed witticism.

Lily glanced at Matthew, who had risen from his chair.

“Shall we?” he said, without any particular enthusiasm. He held out his hand, leaving Lily no choice but to take it.

Out on the dance floor, they were surrounded by jitterbugging couples, moving with such swift assurance their limbs were nothing more than a blur of motion.

“I’m really not a good dancer,” Lily said, feeling she had to remind him.

“My feet have been warned.” He put one hand on her waist, warm and firm, and Lily put her hand on his shoulder.

While couples flew and spun around them, they managed a simple box step.

“I’m sorry about Tom,” Matthew said after a moment. “He’s a bit high-spirited. I don’t think he means any harm.”

“Neither does Sophie.”

“A good match, then.”

“Or a very bad one. They’ll egg each other on.”

Matthew raised his eyebrows. “Would that be so bad?”

“I don’t know,” Lily admitted. What was she so afraid of, when it came to Sophie? When it came to herself? “I don’t really have enough experience to say,” she admitted, then blushed.

“Experience?”

“Of life. Of… romance.” She blushed even more, amazed she’d said such a thing. She never would have, if she hadn’t had that slug of whatever it was in the flask, still burning in her belly.

Matthew seemed unfazed by her confession. “That’s no bad thing.”

“Isn’t it?”

“Better to wait for the right person than waste your hopes on someone wrong.”

What was he saying…? Lily glanced up at Matthew’s face, shocked to realize just how close he was. He wasn’t handsome in the hale and hearty way of Tom Reese, the way she expected all Americans to be, but there was something compelling about his dark looks, his sense of quiet containment. She only wished she knew what he was thinking, how he felt.

“Am I terribly boring to you?” she blurted, emboldened further. “Do I seem like such a…” She swallowed painfully. “A little girl?”

Matthew glanced down at her, his dark eyes narrowed. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-one.”

“I’m only two years older than you.”

“Are you?” She’d thought him much older, perhaps near thirty. “I feel as if everything I’ve said tonight has been a bit stupid and foolish.”

“Not at all.” He nodded back towards the table. “You’re a font of wisdom in comparison.”

Her lips twitched at that. She realized she liked the way he spoke—so clearly and precisely, choosing each word before deciding to speak it, as if each one mattered. She liked a lot of things about him. “Your standards must be rather low, then,” she teased, and he raised his eyebrows.

“Not at all. Quite the contrary.”