He adjusted his grip on her, telling her wordlessly that if she wanted to leave, she could.
“And what did you know?”
“That no woman I have ever met has touched my heart as you have. That there is no one on this earth who can hurt me like you. I wanted to protect what is ours. I… I…”
Amelia froze.
“I scarcely know what love is. But what I feel for you, Amelia... If that is not love, then love must not exist. You are… Being with you is…” He pressed his eyes shut. “Like finding a second sun.I know no other way to describe it. I have tried, desperately, to convince myself that it was not true. But it is true.”
He caught her wrist where she held the cloth to his wound.
“I love you. I have loved you since you accosted my driver on Cornmarket Street and asked me to impersonate myself. I did not know it then. I have been slower than you deserve in knowing it. But it is true, Amelia. If you leave tomorrow, it will still be true. If you never speak to me again, it will still be true.
“I am not asking you to stay because I need you to save me. I am asking you to stay because the thought of you gone from my life is the only thing that has ever truly frightened me, and I have been a coward about everything else.”
The cloth slipped from her fingers. Neither of them moved to catch it. For a moment, it seemed he could not bear to look at her. Amelia did not move away from him. She felt him inch closer.
Gently, her fingers found his chest, touching the space over his heart.
“You could be saying anything and not mean it,” she whispered through silent tears.
“I mean it.”
“How do I know I can trust you? You have said yourself that you are a good actor, a persuasive liar in your own league.”
“I cannot answer that for you.”
“I do not want to decide for myself.”
“And yet you must,” he pressed. “Whether to trust me or not. Whether to leave or remain.”
She laughed miserably. “Remainwhere?”
“With me!” he stressed.
Her eyes locked with his.
“But we are not… Our marriage is…”
“None of that matters! It is just us, and now, and we can make of everything else what we wish. “
Tentatively, he interlaced his fingers with hers. Her skin tingled where their fingers met, her body alighting at her touch.
“What came before does not matter. Choose, Amelia. I would follow you to the end of the world at your command. I just… I just need to know.”
The seconds that elapsed between his offer and her kiss felt like they lasted hours. But her mouth was suddenly on his, hungrily pressing her lips to his.
At first, she did not know what it meant: a goodbye or something else entirely. But at that moment, it did not matter.
Because she was in his arms again.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Amelia moaned against Nicholas’s mouth as he drew her in closer.
You must answer him,she thought.This is insanity.
But her body had already answered for her. Every nerve ending she possessed had voted unanimously, and reason had lost the election in a landslide.
