Chapter 195: Lazy day
The morning light over Fitzgeralt Manor came soft and pale, slipping between the sheer curtains and painting quiet golden stripes across the bedroom floor. The world outside was just beginning to stir, with distant clatter from the kitchens and the muffled rhythm of gardeners moving along the stone paths, but here, in the master suite, the air was still and easy.
Lucas lay half-curled against the headboard, dressed in nothing more formal than a loose T‑shirt and soft lounge pants, hair tousled from sleep and falling into his eyes. A tablet rested on his lap, idly scrolling through a news briefing he wasn’t really reading.
Across from him, Trevor emerged from the adjoining room with a mug of coffee in each hand, still in his black pajama pants, shirtless, hair damp from the shower and falling over his forehead in disarray. He looked younger like that, less the calculating Duke, more just Trevor, the man who could walk barefoot through his own halls without a care.
He set one mug on Lucas’s side of the bed and climbed in beside him, the mattress dipping under his weight. "Still pretending to read?" he asked, voice low and warm from the shower’s steam.
Lucas accepted the coffee, fingers brushing Trevor’s as he took it. "Still pretending you don’t work before breakfast?" he countered softly, eyes meeting Trevor’s with a lazy glint.
Trevor smirked, leaning back against the headboard beside him. "I was making sure we get at least one morning like this. Before they come back."
f r\eeNovelFire.c(o)(m)
Lucas sighed theatrically, setting the tablet aside and curling one leg underneath him. "Serathine in her lecture mode, Cressida planning the flower arrangements like the fate of the Empire depends on them..."
"They probably think it does." Trevor’s voice held quiet amusement, but his arm slid behind Lucas, drawing him closer until their shoulders brushed. "We’ve got a day, though. They’re both off terrifying suppliers and renegotiating contracts."
"A day," Lucas repeated, smiling faintly as he sipped his coffee. He let his head rest briefly against Trevor’s shoulder. "Feels like a holiday."
Trevor tipped his head down, lips brushing Lucas’s temple in a soft, absent gesture. "Then we spend it well," he murmured. "No fittings, no schedules. Just us."
Lucas tilted his face to look at him, green eyes catching the morning light. "Just us," he echoed, and the quiet between them felt like something rare and precious, something they both knew wouldn’t last.
"So... what do we do?"