“After asking three footmen and a very confused stable boy.”
Oliver giggled. Maribel aimed a half-hearted glare at her husband, who merely extended his hand.
His palm was warm when she took it. Callused now—months of working alongside Oliver in the garden had left their mark. She rather liked it.
They walked through the house in comfortable silence, through corridors no longer strange, past rooms she’d claimed as her own. Out the terrace doors, down the stone steps, into the garden that had transformed from wilderness into wonder.
The evening light turned everything gold. Roses climbed the old stone walls—deep crimson, pale pink, that buttery yellow Oliver had so clearly delighted in. Lavender edged the paths, its scent rising warm on the breeze. And there, beneath the jasmine arbour where that ancient stone bench sat cleared of ivy?—
Maribel stopped walking.
Candles. Dozens of them in glass lanterns, casting soft light across the stone and the flowers and the bench where someone had scattered rose petals.
“Thaddeus.” Her voice came out rougher than intended. “What is this?”
He didn’t answer immediately. His hand tightened around hers as he guided her forward, toward that pool of candlelight, toward something she couldn’t quite name but felt building in her chest.
When they reached the bench, he released her hand. Stepped back. Drew a breath that made his shoulders rise and fall.
Then he dropped to one knee.
“We’re already married.” The words tumbled out before she could stop them. “You realise that, yes? The ceremony, the vows, the guests who did not know me at all and possibly gambled on the likelihood of the marriage ending abruptly…”
“I realise.” His mouth twitched despite the solemnity of his expression. “I was there. It was miserable.”
“It was rather grim.”
“The worst day of my life, if I’m honest.”
“Mine as well.” She swallowed against the sudden tightness in her throat. “Though it’s improved considerably since.”
“Has it?” He reached into his pocket and withdrew something small. A ring—emerald and gold, catching the candlelight. “I wondered.”
“Thaddeus—”
“Let me finish. I’ve practised this.” He cleared his throat. “Six months ago, I stood in a church and promised to honour you, to cherish you, to remain by your side until death. I meant none of it. Or rather—I meant to fulfil my obligations, to do my duty, to provide you with the protection my name could offer. But I did not mean the words as they should be meant. I did not choose you. Scandal chose you for me. Necessity. Obligation.”
The evening breeze stirred his dark hair. A rose petal drifted past, landing on his shoulder.
“You deserved better,” he continued, his voice dropping lower. “You deserved someone who looked at you and saw not a solution to a problem, but a woman worth wanting. Worth pursuing. Worth standing before God and witnesses and declaring that you had become essential to his existence.” He held up the ring. “This was my mother’s. One of the few pieces she treasured above all the grand jewels in her collection. She told me once that true love required no ostentation—that the simplest things, chosen with care, held more value than anything expensive could buy.”
Maribel’s vision blurred. She blinked hard.
“I’m not good at this,” Thaddeus said. “At words, at feelings, at any of the things that apparently come naturally to men who weren’t raised by a father who believed affection was weakness. But I’m trying. For you. For Oliver. For the life we’ve built from the wreckage of that grim ceremony.”
He paused. Met her eyes.
“Maribel Eleanor Ashcroft Blackwood. Will you marry me? Not because society demands it. Not because Oliver needs us both. But because I love you. Because I cannot imagine waking to a morning that doesn’t begin with you stealing all the blankets and arguing with me about breakfast. Because you saw past my walls when everyone else simply avoided looking. Because you taughtme that control and connection aren’t enemies—that letting someone close doesn’t destroy you. It saves you.”
The tears spilled over. She let them fall.
“I want to choose you,” he said. “Properly. The way I should have done six months ago. Say yes.”
“Yes.” The word came out choked. “Of course yes. You ridiculous man, did you think I’d say anything else?”
He slipped the ring onto her finger—it settled beside her wedding band like it had always belonged there. Then he was rising, pulling her close, kissing her in the golden light whilst the candles flickered and the roses swayed and somewhere in the house, Oliver was likely interrogating a footman about where they’d gone.
When they finally broke apart, both laughing and crying, Maribel pressed her forehead to his.
