“I waited and hoped that you would return,” she began quietly. “I knew you needed to seek your adventures, but that did not mean that I would not have waited for you.”
“I never asked you to,” he reminded her, though his words were gentle.
“You never would have, but I did anyway, for three years. Then my mother died, and another year passed without you, and I had to face the fact that you weren’t coming back for me. I only allowed a betrothal because if I couldn’t have you, it no longer mattered who I married.” She swiped away a tear, angry at herself for crying in front of Crisp. “You never even came to see me after you returned.” That is what hurt the most. She had never forgotten her friend and she had never stopped loving him.
“I assumed you had married,” he said quietly.
“Did you even bother to ask anyone?”
Crisp looked away. “I didn’t want to know the name of your husband. I didn’t want to think of you with someone else.”
“Then why stay away for so long?”
“I left for adventure and to find my fortune.” He shook his head. “I was a foolish young man, but I had nothing to offer but a quarterly and I certainly wasn’t fit for the army or clergy.”
He wasn’t telling her anything that she didn’t already know.
“By the time I did make my fortune, I presumed it was too late to pursue you. I couldn’t come back until I had something more to offer and believed that I’d taken too long and lost you.”
“I don’t think you know how much I loved you,” Vanessa whispered. “My heart shattered as I hid on the docks and watched your ship sail down the Thames. I knew you had to go and understood the restlessness and wanting adventure. I just never expected you to be gone for eight years.”
“I didn’t either.” He took a step closer. “Is it too late? Was I gone too long?”
“That depends on how you feel now?” She feared his answer, but it was one she needed to hear. She’d longed for him for nine long years, and no matter how often she tried to remove him from her mind and her heart, Crisp refused to leave.
He was why no other suitor was ever good enough. There had been nothing wrong with them except that they weren’t Crisp.
“Vanessa, I think I’ve loved you from the moment you fell on me when you were stepping out of the carriage. I carried you in my heart when I left and kept you tucked away and safe.” He leaned his forehead against hers. “It wasn’t that my heart didn’t want you, it’s just that we were so young. You were young and what kind of life could you have with me?”
She looked into his light brown eyes. “I always knew you had to go, and I kept reminding myself until I began to believe that you weren’t coming back, and I was certain you had forgotten me.”
“Never that.” He lifted a hand to caress her cheek. “You were with me always and the happiest moment since I returned was when I saw you in that sitting room and heard you addressed asMissVanessa Claxton. Yet, I feared it was still too late. You may have forgotten me, or realized that it wasn’t really love, or that you wanted nothing to do with me because of my family.”
Vanessa brought a hand to his cheek. “It’s never been too late Crisp. You are the only man that I’ve ever really wanted.”
He leaned in and gently brushed his lips against hers. So sweet and so gentle. Just like the last kiss he had given her, right before he left. But Vanessa wanted more. So much more and hoped he would pull her close and deepen this kiss. Instead, he pulled away.
“My toes didn’t curl.”
Crisp barked out laughter. “They will one day, of that I promise, but you haven’t won our wager yet,” he teased.
“Ah, you’ve had success,” Lady Osbourne cried as she came upon them. Beside her was Lady Sewell.
She and Crisp stepped quickly away from the other as heat spread across Vanessa’s face.
“I am afraid we have been unable to locate the ruby, Lady Osbourne. But I assure you, we will keep looking,” Crisp assured her.
Lady Osbourne chuckled. “I never said it was a ruby, Lord Crispin. I let you assume that all on your own.”
Vanessa’s heart skipped. Had they been looking for the wrong item all along. And if they had assumed incorrectly then she should have corrected them.
“You said a heart had gone missing and that you were certain it was on the estate somewhere,” he reminded her.
“And that an attempt had been made to steal it in the past,” Vanessa added.
“That is true,” Lady Osbourne agreed.
“You described it as red, cold and hard, with a crack and some splintering, but that didn’t detract from its beauty,” Vanessa continued.
