He leaned down and rested his forehead against hers. “Because you’re the only person who should get to decide your future, and I didn’t want you to feel trapped for the rest of your life.”
“And you set up things so we could get an annulment so that I’d have a choice about marrying you in the end?”
“I wanted to bring you to the Commonwealth. I thought you’d love it. I assumed you’d want to stay and...” He shook his head. “I suppose that wasn’t fair of me, was it? Even thoughI said you could have your own choice, I assumed you’d want to stay here with women who’ve been through similar things.”
“I’m glad you brought me here. I mean, Mrs. Mc— Martha had written me about improvements they’d made to the property with my donations, but seeing it and meeting the women I’ve helped was so much better than I could have imagined. I hope my investment accounts do even better next year, simply so that I can raise the amount I donate every month.”
Of course she’d say that, this dear, sweet, generous woman God had given him. He couldn’t stop his lips from forming a gentle smile. “I hope that happens too.”
“But none of what I saw here makes me want to stay. I still want to be your wife, but do you think San Francisco will be safe for me?”
He released her, but only so that he could pick up the telegram from the desk. “Very safe. The envelope Mrs. McWhirter gave me when I dropped you off was a telegram from Alexei. Your father is in jail awaiting trial, and I can’t imagine Leeland will want anything to do with your family after a scandal as big as this.”
He handed her the paper. She took a moment to scan it, then squealed and launched herself back into his arms. A moment later, she pressed up onto her tiptoes and settled her lips on his.
He moved his hands up to frame her face, then brushed the tear tracks on her cheeks with his thumbs as he deepened the kiss. She melted into him, her fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt. He tasted salt, whether it was from her tears or his own, he didn’t know. All he knew was that he kissed her until the taste of salt faded, then rained kisses across her cheeks and neck before finally dragging his mouth back to hers.
When he finally pulled away, she looked at him through wide, shining eyes. And then she smiled. A real, true smile. Thekind that could only come from having a merry heart. The kind of smile he’d been waiting to see on her face for years.
Bear ye one another’s burdens. Do justice to the afflicted. Fear thou not, for I am with thee.
All three of those verses were coming together in the woman before him, a woman he’d almost missed out on making his.
“I love you so much,” she whispered.
He planted a kiss on the soft place where her neck and shoulder met. “And I love you just as much, maybe even more.”
And he planned to spend the next fifty years of his life making her smile.
But he wasn’t going to tell her that. He was going to show her. Every day. Until she figured it out for herself.
42
Sitka; Two Weeks Later
Alexei spied the ship entering the sound from his position behind his desk. His monstrously large desk, which was situated near the back of his monstrously large office, inside the monstrously large former governor’s mansion atop Castle Hill.
But even from this distance, he recognized the sails of theAlliance.
He set the map he’d been studying down on his desk and stood, then took a few steps closer to the window overlooking the sound. The wall to his left held another window that overlooked the town, giving him a full view of all the goings-on in both places.
He’d been governor for less than a month, and every minute of it had come with an endless list of things to do. He’d been staring at a map of Alaska, trying to figure out where a company from California could put a cannery without forcing the Tlingit clan in the town of Petersburg to relocate like the clan in Klawock had. He had yet to come up with a solution, but he had to think of something.
That was one of the things he’d had to agree to before Secretary Gray was willing to appoint him governor. He had to acknowledge the US government’s official stance that none of the Alaskan tribes had any claim to the land, that the US government had paid Russia for the land, and that Russia had taken it from the various tribes by force.
It wasn’t true and he didn’t agree with it, but he’d had to agree on paper; otherwise Secretary Gray would have appointed someone who was just as intent on trampling the rights of the natives as Simon Caldwell had been. So he was trying to use his position of power for good. So far it hadn’t been easy, but he hadn’t given up hope of finding a solution that would prevent the town of Petersburg from relocating.
The other concession he’d had to make was about Inessa. She would be attending Reverend Jackson’s industrial boarding school in Sitka in the fall. The only concession he’d received regarding the government’s Indian policy was that Ilya could continue learning at Evelina’s school in Juneau.
It seemed like a small victory, but it was enough. As Mikhail had pointed out, even if he had to make a few compromises, Alaska would do better under his governorship than under any of the previous governors.
Or at least he hoped it would do better under him. But if he thought the paperwork involved in running a trading company and shipyard was cumbersome, then the paperwork he faced as governor was enough to bury him whole.
The ship sailed deeper into the sound, its nose pointed toward the wharf in front of his family’s warehouse. It was close enough now for him to make out the sailors working on deck and a family of four standing on at the railing. Sacha and Maggie had finally returned from San Francisco, along with Maggie’s younger siblings that Sacha had adopted, Ainsley and Finnan.
He turned and strode toward the door, then yanked it open. “I’ll be back in an hour,” he told Lyle, the clerk who had outlasted Alaska’s past three governors. “I’m going down to the harbor to greet my brother.”
The thought of Sacha returning put a smile on his face, but so did the thought of Yuri and Rosalind being settled in San Francisco.
