“I had not imagined that…” Greys squeezed her and then shifted so they were no longer joined. “She was not resentful?”
“Not really. She was sad that she couldn’t be with him more, but because of that, I think they never took one another for granted…” But then she frowned.
“What?” he asked.
“My father did not provide for her after his death—for us. I never understood that.”
“But your brother continued to provide for you.”
“Chase didn’t have to. Hechoseto.” Her mother had been carrying their younger sister at the time of their father’s death. It had been a devastating time and but for Chase coming into their lives, they would have been destitute.
“Your brother cares for you and your sisters very much.” Zeke stroked her back now, and her arms. Diana shivered.
“Are you cold?”
“No,” she answered.
“Perhaps it was an oversite. It’s not unheard of for a solicitor to forget to add an addendum to a contract or lose a codicil.” He spoke quietly.
This time it was Diana who shifted, forcing him to loosen his arms around her. “Do you really think that’s possible?” If that were the case, it would mean that, although their father had kept them a secret from the world, she’d not been naïve to believe that he’d loved them.
“Would you like me to look into it?”
“You don’t need to go to any trouble.”
“It’s no trouble. I’ll bring it up with Chaswick tomorrow.” But then he fell silent, and she knew he was worried about her respectability, or perhaps even more so, his honor.
“There is no need for you to speak with him about… either.”
“Diana…” He began.
“Zeke…” she teased him back, hoping to postpone the guilt that would eventually plague him. “This was lovely.” But wringing a proposal for marriage from him was not why she’d come, “You must consider yourself free to begin courting Lady Isabella in earnest.”
“No.” His response was quick. “I took something from you tonight. I’m going to marry you.”
“No. I gave myself to you, and you gave yourself to me,” Diana corrected him.
But that tiny line had appeared between his eyes again.
“Diana, why did you come tonight?”
She shook her head. “Not for—”
“I know. So why did you come?”
“I don’t know. I-I- couldn’t imagine that what happened in Blackheart’s swimming bath was the end of whatever this is. It felt more like a beginning, but then you didn’t come to the musicale.” She held up a hand. “I know you have your duties and your priorities, but… I just couldn’t go on without knowing—”
His face was mostly impassive. Was she making any sense at all?
“Without knowing…?” He prompted.
“Without knowing you.”
An expression flashed across his face, one she couldn’t quite recognize, but he was shaking his head. “Diana…”
“I wondered what it would be like.” She jerked her chin up. “And I think you wondered too.”
He stiffened and fell silent.
