27

A n hour later, Stephen gazed at Elizabeth across the supper table. Rather than settle at opposite ends of the ridiculously long table, they sat at one corner, as though it were a table meant for two and not for twenty.

He'd dressed in his formal best for the occasion, with a shirt under his waistcoat and all, though he was not certain if this sartorial choice helped or hurt his cause. Elizabeth's war might be against Reddington, but Stephen's struggle was for a fighting chance with Elizabeth. He suspected it would prove to be the most important battle of his life.

All he could do was try to show her what a relationship with him could be like, if she were willing to allow him to woo her. When she wanted him close, he would be there for her. And if she needed room for her thorns and her swords, he would give her the space and time she needed.

Thus far, she had consented to supper and a surprise. Stephen was anxious by nature—the sheer quantity of press-up exercises he performed to relieve the pressure were proof of that—but he was more nervous tonight than he could recall ever experiencing.

Elizabeth had made a salient point when she'd reminded him that any clue could lead them to the will at any moment, and bring this holiday to a close. Tonight's supper and a surprise might well be Stephen's final opportunity to prove himself a viable romantic partner and show her how much she meant to him.

"Thank you again for the keepsakes." Her green eyes sparkled over her glass of wine. "I cannot wait to take them home to my family."

Stephen could wait indefinitely for that dark day's arrival.

"It was my pleasure," he said aloud, because this was the proper response to thank you .

Yes, he'd built the contraptions, and yes, they were meant to be gifts for her family. But handing them over meant Elizabeth going away, and he was not ready for goodbye.

Not that he blamed her for missing her family. They sounded sweet and clever and unpredictable and ludicrously fun. Meals with Elizabeth were often spent with her recounting various exploits and misadventures, and Stephen laughing until his cheeks hurt. He adored her eccentric siblings without ever having met them, and was wildly jealous that her life was so full of meaning and family and love.

Elizabeth didn't need Stephen. She might still see him as a temporary amusement. Yes, she'd agreed he could try his best, but the very wording indicated she expected any romance between them to dissipate once they left these walls. Their interactions today would be an amusing future anecdote about that one time in Dorset, when she'd defended a castle with an improbably athletic tinker inside.

Stephen would soon be nothing more than an old memory… unless he could change her mind. Then again, maybe the future he could provide wasn't the sort she was hoping to have.

"Do you want children?" he asked cautiously.

She set down her knife. "Do I want children to exist in the world? Maybe. Do I want to birth them and raise them? Not in the least. Luckily, there will be plenty of baby Wynchesters without me having to contribute any."

She told him about the multiple nurseries at home, and Graham and Kuni's plans to provide a cousin for Chloe's baby.

The description sounded charming. It also sounded like there would not be room in the house for any of his painstakingly crafted gifts. Oh, who cared about the gifts? It sounded like there wasn't room in Elizabeth's life for Stephen .

His laboratory barely fit inside his own house. He'd build 105 more rooms with pleasure to make space for Elizabeth and her armory, but the effort was unnecessary. There was no hope of tempting her away from the home and the family she loved so much.

Elizabeth paused with her wineglass halfway to her lips. "Do you want children?"

He thought it over. "To be honest, I have lived my entire life assuming that was not part of my future. Between a childhood plagued with bullies, and parents who were not particularly pleased with the offspring they produced…" He shook his head. "Whilst I would never rebuff a child due to their nature, at this point in my life, I cannot imagine myself raising one at all."

She made a commiserative expression. "Too much drooling and screaming."

"That, and I enjoy being a recluse. I like to shutter myself in my laboratory for weeks at a time, working on contraptions that could save mankind or blow it up. I'm no authority, but I suspect filling a house with devices that could kill you is not the ideal environment to raise a child."

She raised her wineglass. "But it does sound like a party."

"Only you would think so." He clinked her glass and took a sip of wine.

"My only regret with the new brood of future Wynchesters is that they will never know Bean." She gazed pensively into her glass, then lifted soulful eyes. "He was everything a father should be."

Stephen shared her wistfulness. It must have been utterly magical to encounter a new family that welcomed her with open arms and loved her with their whole hearts, exactly as she was. Who thought it perfectly reasonable to have a dressing room that doubled as an armory. Who were a veritable beehive of togetherness and liveliness and jolly escapades. Who always said and did exactly the right thing whenever Elizabeth dipped below fifty percent.

How was he supposed to woo her away from that ?

Stephen gulped down the rest of his wine. The truth was, no one could compete with her family. There was no sense trying. If he had any prayer of becoming a permanent part of Elizabeth's life, it would be by convincing her he was worth making a little bit of room for. If not in her home, then in her heart.

Which meant Stephen could not shutter himself up in his makeshift laboratory with his goggles and his algebra. He would have to woo her the only way he knew how: with something unnecessarily complicated and more than a little gruesome.

"Are you up for a trip downstairs?" he asked.

Her brows lifted. "I'm up for anything you wish to show me."

He pushed to his feet and held out his hand. "Then come with me. It's time for the surprise."

She placed her hand in his. He squeezed it gently. He would rather have tugged her forward into his chest and wrapped his arms around her and kissed her with all the emotion lodged in his heart, but he didn't want to push things before she was ready. He'd done enough of that already. If he was lucky, there would be plenty of time for torrid embraces and passionate kisses in the future.

"Over here." He led her down the corridor toward the spiral stone stairs that descended into the dungeon.

At the mouth of the stone opening, a sconce hung on one side. Below this, Stephen had placed two unlit torches. He let go of Elizabeth's hand to light the tips in the flame of the sconce. He handed her the first one before attending to his own.

"Are you giving me a tour of the dungeon?" Elizabeth asked.

"I can. But there's something I think you'll like even more."

They crept down the stairs carefully. The subterranean cavern was black as pitch. The orange flames of their sputtering torches lit their faces with an unnatural yellow glow and sent shadows dancing and skittering along the dark crevices of the dungeon.

Her eyes sparkled in the torchlight. "How delightfully ominous."

He motioned for her to follow him past the rows of stone caves with their rusted iron bars on crooked hinges. At the farthest point from the only exit, the ceiling dipped low and the walls grew narrow. A pile of large gray boulders lined the squat far wall like a dam to block the flow of water—or rivers of blood.

"Did they flood this place?" She glanced over her shoulder toward the cells. "To drown the prisoners?"

"Maybe. The stones have another use now."

"Wall art?" she said doubtfully.

"Misdirection. It's not a solid wall at all." He handed her his torch.

She leaned closer. "What are we doing?"

"You'll see." He rolled up his sleeves and pushed a waist-high boulder with all his might.

At first, it refused to budge. Then it scooted a few inches across the dust and dirt of the stone floor. And then it rolled, gathering steam and momentum until it knocked into another pile of rocks two feet from where Stephen had started pushing.

A gaping black hole as high as his hips lurked just behind where the boulder had stood.

"What is that?" Elizabeth stepped forward. "An animal's warren?"

Stephen grinned at her. "The den where I go to hibernate."

"You went in there? Why?" She rethought her question, then handed him his torch. "Why not?"

Stephen's chest thumped. How could he not fall in love with this woman and her bravery? He adored that her natural response to being led to a gaping hole in a gothic dungeon in the dark of night was to surge forward and see what else she could find.

"Tilt your torch at an angle," he cautioned. "If it scrapes the top of the tunnel, the flames could extinguish."

She nodded her understanding, orange light dancing over her animated face.

He dropped to his knees and began crawling through the narrow opening, sending up a silent apology to his tailor for ruining yet more of the man's handiwork.

Elizabeth crouched behind him without hesitation. When he glanced back, she was hiking up her skirts with her free hand as she edged her way forward a few inches at a time.

Ten feet later, they neared a dark, dank cavern. The air smelled musty and stale, as though the dust had been untouched for years until their intrusion.

"Not very beachy," she ventured. "This has nothing to do with the clue?"

He shook his head. "No. This is for you."

As they emerged into greater darkness, he helped her to her feet, then hooked his torch into a notch in the wall.

She frowned. "Where are we going now?"

"Nowhere." He stepped out of the way. "We're here. Look around."

She lifted her torch. Orange flames sent murky golden light shimmering along a spiderweb of tall, narrow tunnels, branching forth in all angles from where they now stood.

Eyeless skulls grinned down at them from every surface. Here, the walls were not made of stone, but rather row after row of interlocking bones.

Elizabeth gasped. " Catacombs ."

She ran forward to inspect the closest wall, passing the torches from one side to another to display skulls in strange patterns amongst the thousands of stacked femurs and ulnas and rib cages.

Off she went down one of the tunnels, leaving Stephen to hurry behind her lest he be left in the darkness surrounded by the remains of the long dead.

When they reached another opening like the first one, piled high with bones like a beaver's dam of sticks, she spun to face him, mouth agape.

"Do you like it?" he asked quietly.

"This is the most romantic evening I have ever experienced," she answered, her eyes shining. "You are the cleverest suitor in the world."

"It isn't difficult," he demurred. "If I see something one hundred percent Elizabeth, I give it to you."

She slotted her torch into the wall, then threw her arms about his neck. "Let me give you one hundred percent of this ."

She kissed him. Passionately. Of her own free will.

He held her tight. For the moment, there was nowhere he'd rather be than here, in the darkness. Kissing Elizabeth.

Relinquishing another previously guarded part of his heart.