He pulled her into his arms and kissed her right there on the steps.
“Mungo!”
“You will marry me.” The words cameout an order.
“Oh, come on, Mungo, you can do better than that,” Fred said from above them.
“Yes, that was pathetic.” Theo appeared at her side.
“Put your back into it,” Anna added as she squeezed under Theo’s arm and sat on the top step.
“I’m to do this with an audience?”
“Aye,” they all said.
Eliza was now pink cheeked and mortified. “Stop this. We can discuss it later.”
“And try for eloquence,” Bram said from below.
“God’s truth, you lot are trying,” Mungo muttered. “Can I not have a moment’s peace for this?”
“No, because if we leave you alone, you’ll make a mess of it,” Anna said.
He snorted at that, and then looked at Eliza—his woman and the person who had worked her way into his heart. She’d given him hope that his life would not be spent alone.
“Eliza, I love you.”
“Oooh, that’s good,” Matilda said. She was now seated beside Anna.
“Will you marry me and live in the Douglas house that I have just this morning purchased?”
He got a round of applause for that little speech.
“But it’s so fast, Mungo,” she whispered. “We barely know each other.”
“Speak up,” Theo said.
“She’s worried she doesn’t know me well enough,” Mungo said.
“We know him, and he’s wonderful,” Matilda said.
“And we think you’re wonderful, too, Miss Downing,” Fred added.
“E-Eliza,” she stammered out. “C-call me that.”
“Well?” He raised a brow at the scarlet-cheeked woman before him.
“I-I doubt anyone else would have you, so I guess I must.” Her smile was the sweetest he’d ever seen.
“Yes, you must,” Mungo added.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
They were married one month later on a gray day that did nothing to dampen everyone’s spirits. Ram’s donated, and now faded, carpet was rolled out and pews set up on either side on the grassed area in the middle of the Crabbett Close. While the weather was a touch warmer, it was still cold outside—not that anyone seemed to notice.
Mr. Peeky’s clergyman cousin had come through again with the pews, so there was a church out there somewhere where the congregation would be seated on the floor today.
Mungo stood with Bram, then Leo, Alex, and Theo.
