“She does look well with a sword,” he decided. “She looks well always. Perhaps it’s best that she doesn’t always have the accompaniment of that particular accessory, however. I might not have made it this far.”
“Doubtless not,” Tommy agreed.
They watched for a moment, the little red flecks from the bonfires beginning to dance visibly in the air as the sky darkened. When Oilver turned to wave goodbye to them, they both waved back.
“What was that with Silas before, by the by?” Freddy said without looking down again. “The wager.”
“I think you know the answer to that,” Tommy replied wryly.
Freddy chuckled, turning to level her in his gaze, meeting her cobalt blue eyes. “I just mean the specifics. Was it the flirtation? Just speaking to me? A fully reconciled marriage?”
“Oh, that,” Tommy replied, her wrinkles rearranging with a grin. “You will never know.”
“Tommy,” Freddy said with a fond and exasperated sigh as Claire turned and started walking toward them.
“Don’t muck it up,” Tommy suggested, patting his arm, and turning to walk beyond the fire, leaving him there to receive his wife in privacy.
“I won’t,” Freddy answered, only softly, only to himself.
Claire smiled at him as she arrived, close enough to speak, her eyes shining brightly opposite the flames. “He won’t go down without a fight,” she told Freddy with a little laugh and a shrug. “The governess is in for some suffering.”
“He’s had a lot of excitement,” Freddy replied, gesturing with a tilt of his head toward the food stalls. “Are you hungry?”
Claire hesitated, as though she were for a moment remembering the last time he’d offered her food.
He hadn’t meant it that way at all, but the way she looked just then made him feel positively wolfish, a slow grin spreading over his face. “If the stalls don’t suit you, I could always take you back to the cottage and whip something up, of course.”
She gave a little hiccup, covering her mouth and averting her eyes. “Freddy!”
“Well, I actually could,” he told her, unable to stifle a laugh. “Come on, I know which ones have the best offerings. Do you like pasties?”
“The little pies?” she said weakly. “Of course I do.”
“Ah, right,” he said, taking her hand without asking and tucking it into his elbow. “You’ve a weakness for pie, don’t you, my love?”
“Freddy!”
He laughed, and this time she did too, blushing and shaking her head like she couldn’t quite believe herself.
“What else can you make?” she asked, a teasing lilt in her voice like she thought perhaps she’d imagined the baking, even now.
“I’ve a talent for sauces,” he answered with a little thrill of pride. “So anything that goes well with them was worth learning. Abe and Millie are particularly fond of my hollandaise and fish. White fish, if I can get it. Pastries are actually new for me, but I really like how involved and tactile it is. It keeps my mind still.”
“Does it really?” she replied, softer now, thoughtful. “Like the walks you take in the mornings?”
He almost stopped walking, the strength of his surprise was so great. He faltered just enough to need to skip back into place without losing his stride, and turned to stare down at her as they reached the stalls, the scent of cinnamon and roasted nuts rising from behind the tattered curtains.
“You’ve been watching me take my walks?” he asked, perhaps a little more gruffly than he’d meant to.
She was the next to hesitate, her mouth forming a little O shape like she realized she’d given something away. “Notwatching,” she lied blatantly. “I have … heard tell …”
“Claire,” he said flatly.
“Oh, all right,” she said with a little wriggle of her shoulders and a stomp of her foot. “I was watching. Angrily.”
“Angrily?” he repeated, raising his brows. “Why the devil would that anger you?”
“Oh, because you’re so … why are you … ugh.” She pulled away from him, throwing her hands onto her hips. “You wouldn’t stop tormenting me, even when you weren’t thinking of me at all. I’d look out the window and there you were, glittering in the sun,picking up dirty rocks and putting them in your pockets, and it was soconfusing, Freddy.”
