“Itisrather like a dream come true, is it not?” she said, smiling. Despite herself she was becoming ratherfond of Miss Tweedsmuir. “But perhaps he will nothave me.”
“Not have you?” Miss Tweedsmuir’s tone was indignant. “If he will not, he must be the most foolish young man in the kingdom. Not only would he belosing Roscoe Castle and all its wealth and properties,but he would be losing one of the prettiest andpleasantest-natured young ladies of my acquaintance.”
Daphne laughed and startled her companion to no small degree by leaning across to the opposite seat ofthe carriage and hugging her.
She knew as soon as she awoke that it was different from the last three nights. And yet she dared not hopetoo much. Perhaps she felt that urge to get up and goand that deep, deep yearning only because she wantedto feel them, only because she knew that the Earlof Everett was returning home tomorrow and wouldprobably come the day after to force her to a decision.
She was shivering more from nervous excitement than from cold as she swung her legs over the edgeof the bed and wriggled her feet into her slippers.She drew on her dressing gown, tightened the sash,and lit the candle with deliberate thoroughness. It hadhappened once. It could not happen again. She openedthe door of her chamber and stepped out into the passageway, looking to the right rather than to the left. Shewas afraid to look left. She was delaying the moment.There would be only a blank wall there, of course.
But the door was there, looking so massive and solid that she was amazed she could not see it beyondthe shadows in the daytime. And yet, real as it wasand much as she had longed for three days to see itagain, she reached out hesitantly to take the metalhandle. She should just turn around and go back tobed, she thought. She should not deliberately stepback into history and get herself involved in its passions. Perhaps she would get caught there. Perhapsshe would not be able to come back.
She turned the handle. But that would mean that she could stay with Justin. That was what she hadyearned for for three days and nights. He had died,though. He had died without ever getting out of thetower. She felt sick with grief again. And with fear.
But for now he was alive. And for now she had found the way back to him. And life, she realized,could be lived only one moment at a time. She wouldenjoy each moment, then, until she must be separatedfrom him forever by the barriers of death and a hundred years. Lady Everett’s words, “There were nosurvivors,” echoed in her mind for a moment, but sheignored them and stepped through the doorway.
He was there. She could feel that he was there above her, awaiting her in silence and in darkness.But she would not have heard him even if he hadmade some inadvertent sound. The wind was howlingbeyond the walls and the slit arrow windows. Itsounded like a hurricane. She had not noticed thewind when she had been in her bedchamber. Therewas no light beyond the windows. No moonlight, nostarlight. Only total blackness. The light of her candle,guttering in the draft of the stairwell, seemed veryfragile.
She pushed open the squeaky door at the top of the stairs and peered inward. The room looked as deserted as it had before. But she could feel hispresence.
“Are you hiding behind the door again?” she asked.
He chuckled and stepped around it in order to draw her inside and shut it. He took her candle and bundleof food from her and set them down before taking herinto his arms and drawing her close against him.
His warmth, his smell, the firmly muscled contours of his body were so achingly familiar that she merelyclosed her eyes and sagged against him at first. Justin.Justin.
“I have missed you so very much.” She drew her head back and looked into his familiar and dear blueeyes. He was not wearing the black ribbon tonight.His hair was loose and in silver blond waves about hisshoulders. “I was afraid that I would never see youagain.”
His smile softened and he lowered his head and kissed her. Warmly, with opened mouth. She felt suddenly safe and happy again.
“I have got us into the devil of a mess, haven’t I?” he said. “At first putting off going home because Idid not know how to break the news to Paul that Ihad married his chosen bride, and then deciding tohide here until everyone had had time to cool downafter the disappearance of your father’s jewels so thatI could find out what had really happened and whySebastian had accused me. Cleeves did not see me,after all. But now there has been his murder and ourtwo families almost at war with each other. I havedone the wrong thing from the start, Margaret. Ishould not have delayed or hidden for a single moment. I should have announced our marriage as soonas it was solemnized. I wish I could go back and doeverything differently.”
“But you must not leave here yet,” she said, holding him more tightly, panic in her voice. “They are talking about hanging you, Justin. Everyone, exceptperhaps Viscount Everett, believes that you committed both the theft and the murder. Sebastian swearsthat Cleeves told him he had seen you, and Sebastianhas been telling everyone that I was your motive, thatyou needed the jewels in order to be able to marryme and get away from both Father and the viscount.If they find out that we actually are married . . .”
“What nonsense!” he said. “My poverty and Paul’s have been much exaggerated, you know. And doeseveryone know me so little that they believe I wouldsteal from my own wife’s father? Or from anyone forthat matter?”
“They will hang you if they catch you,” she said.Her voice was shaking almost beyond her control. “Let me arrange for you to be taken to France, Justin.I know some people who would do it for me—and foryou. I will come with you. We will live there until it issafe to come home again. Or for the rest of our lives ifnecessary. It will not matter. We will have each other.”
“I do not want that blot on my name, love,” hesaid. “And I don’t want it to be said that you marrieda thief and a murderer and that you fled with himbecause he was too cowardly to face his accusers.”
“I would rather that than be a widow,” she said.
“Margaret.” He hugged her tightly and rocked herin his arms.
“I could not live without you,” she said. “Life would have no meaning. It would be too empty. Too painful.I want you alive and in my arms. Oh, please, Justin,stay here and let me make some arrangements.”
She wanted to tell him that he would be killed if he tried to leave his hiding place too soon. And she, too.She wanted to change history. Was it possible tochange the past? But it seemed that Daphne could saynothing that Margaret would not have known.
“We will talk later,” he said, his lips touching hers. “I should send you back to safety without delay. Theworst part of my hiding here is that I put you in constant danger. But I must have time with you. An hour,love. We must have our hour together.”
“Yes,” she said fiercely. “Let’s forget all else for an hour, Justin. Let’s remember only that we loveeach other and have been married for just a little overa week. Make me forget everything else. I’ll makeyou forget.” Her fingers twined in his long hair.
It was for the last time. She knew that with a dull certainty and was not sure whether it was Margaretor Daphne who knew. Or both. Perhaps they were notafter all two different persons. Perhaps they were one.Perhaps she really was Margaret. She tried to push fromher mind the knowledge that it was the last time.
But he felt it, too. She could tell he did, though neither of them said anything. There was something alittle desperate about the passion with which theyclung together and kissed. She could hear the windhowling dismally outside. Nothing mattered but thatsmall room at the top of the tower, sheltered fromthe fury of the storm, and the two people inside it,pressing into the shelter of each other’s arms while thestorm of events and passions beyond their immediatecontrol raged outside the room.
“The candle?” she said as he stripped off his shirt and reached down to grasp her nightgown—sheseemed not to be wearing her dressing gown anylonger—and draw it up over her head.
“I want to see you,” he said, his eyes roaming hungrily over her exposed body as he peeled off his pantaloons. “I want to watch what I do to you and what you do to me.”
