“It is?”
The greenery was still stunning, lush vegetables and herbs of all shape and stripes twined from the ground. Organized in clean, neat sections and filling the air with a distinctly green and fresh scent. To say she was surprised was a bit of an understatement.
Especially considering the sheer size of the thing and the fact that it seemed to be in place of a more traditional garden.
“Daisy, you didn’t mention_” she started to say, but her lady’s maid was gone.
What is going on?
Veronica knew she should leave, but looking up at the huge sunflowers and the vast variety of tomatoes, she felt entranced. Like she had stepped into a beautiful world.
"What are you doing here?”
She froze. His voice, strong and commanding, set shivers down her spine. She tried to ignore how her stomach flipped as she heard him walk up to her. His heavy steps stopping a breath away.
With no other choice, she slowly turned to face Christopher. He looked in every way like a furious God, whose holy grounds had been trespassed on.
Chapter Eight
Dressed in a simple linen shirt and pair of trousers, Christopher knelt in the dirt, removing stubborn, unwanted plants from some of his vegetables. After his life crumbled all three years ago, he had found solace in his routines. Something about the predictability of his days and weeks made him feel stable.
Something he needed more than ever, considering his new wife.
“At least you don’t sneak into my study and snoop around instead of asking me what you want to know,” Christopher said to the trellis of peas he had been tending to.
“Andyou are easier to talk to than a mouthy, five-foot nothing, hellion of a woman!” he grunted and he yanked at a stubborn weed.
Despite it not being the most fashionable of pursuits, he loved his time in the garden. It was one of the few places he felt truly at peace.
Especially since all other places he felt comfortable in meant he would also be cooped up in the house. It was hard even after all these years to go anywhere, even just in the village without anyone staring at him.
And now, Veronica was omnipresent in his house. Or it felt that way. Her scent lingered in every room after her tour of the castle, and her words, her guilt and pain, echoed in his mind.
“Even my servants won’t shut up about her!”
He could feel her all around him, her presence lingering the air he was breathing. He even though he could hear her voice echo in his mind...
His head jerked up. Itwasher voice, calling out to her lady’s maid.
In an instant, Christopher was walking towards her. Surely he was mistaken. Why would she want to go into a vegetable garden?
But there she was. In a warm, reddish cloak, looking around the earth he tended to and made his own. Bending over to inhale the still ripening vegetables and smiling at them like they were the most precious things.
His heart squeezed.
“What are you doing here?” he asked, though it sounded gruff and commanding even to his own ears. She froze, still looking up at the sunflowers above her.
He walked up to her, and when she turned around the pressure in his chest only got worse.
She is afraid of me. And I don’t think I can blame her.
As her eyes dipped to his chest, to the collar he left gaping open because he hated how restrained his cravat made him feel while gardening. The scarring on his upper chest and neck was clearly and easily visible, and he expected her to run for the hills. She hadn’t done it when she first saw the scars, but she had to show her revulsion atsomepoint.To react like most people did when first seeing him like this. But those sapphire eyes simply evaluated him, calm and thoughtful, making him feel exposed in a way no disgusted or horrified expression ever had.
Why is she looking at me like that?He knew what he looked like. “I bet this is not what you expected your future husband to look like?”
“I know I shouldn’t say so, but,” Christopher prepared himself for the blow, the pity or the disgust she was sure to admit to. Only when she continued, it took him a few minutes to realize what she said. “But I would take you, scars and all, over Lord Gallmore.”
A surprised laugh escaped his lips, and the pressure on his chest eased, just a little bit. “I hadn’t talked to the man before your—well our, I suppose—wedding. But he seemed a bit of a slimy sort.”
