“I am, and I will not.”
“Emilia.” His voice was rough, anguished. “I have things to explain.”
Music swirled through the courtyard, carried across on a light breeze. The leaves of the oak danced to the rhythm.
“That you still love Lady Cinthia?” She couldn’t keep the bitterness from her tone. “There’s nothing to explain. She’s perfect.” On the outside. “What man wouldn’t want her?”
“I don’t want her.”
Now he would lie to her? She looked down at her hands, gripping the sill. “Oh? Not since the last time you had her, when she was at your home, returned in your carriage in…how did Viscount Dunreid describe her state? Disheveled?”
“Dunreid doesn’t know of what he speaks.” Two more steps, and she could feel the heat of him behind her. “She was at my home. She wanted…”
His tone was tentative. She could hear how he searched for the right words. Pain filled her at the hope he would find them.
“She wanted what you suspect she wanted,” he finally said. “I won’t lie, a month ago, I would have said yes, engaged to Miss Thomas or not, but the viscountess was too late. My answer was no.”
Emilia closed her eyes. Tears slid down her cheeks. He sounded sincere. How could she know? She wanted so much to believe. Could she trust herself?
“I was so happy when you sent that necklace.”
“I didn’t.”
Her eyes flew open. She risked a glance over her shoulder. Serious grey eyes. Dark hair not as neat as usual. Unshaven. He looked miserable, and seeing him that way filled her heart with new pain.
“You didn’t?”
“Lady Cinthia did.” How cold his voice went as her name left his lips. “She, rightly, suspected I would see the necklace and believe you’d given in to Dunreid. She is the one who told me he sent one.”
“When she was with you, at one of your not-longed-for, not-scandalous meetings?” Emilia asked, the pain of imagining them together too sharp to relinquish with ease.
He came around her, to stand beside her at the window. A thumb, skin slightly rough, smoothed tears from her cheek. “I do not love her, or want her, or have even the smallest, remotest desire to set eyes on her again. Ever.”
“Ever?” Emilia’s voice sounded small. Could he be telling the truth?
He cocked his head. Across the courtyard, strains of a waltz drifted toward them. The hour was later than she thought. She should be locked safely in her room.
“Dance with me.”
Emilia nodded, unable to resist. A strong hand gripped hers, no gloves to mute the mingled warmth of their skin. Another hand slid along her waist. Holding her near, but with care, as something fragile, Robert turned her away from the window in time with the distant notes. With her gaze, she traced the folds of his wrinkled cravat, unsure where to look.
The arms about her were strong, a barricade against all that was evil in the world, something to brace her against a storm. She longed to believe they were the arms of a man who loved her.
But if she believed his words tonight, that he didn’t love Lady Cinthia, that she sent the necklace to sow strife between them, that also meant he hadn’t sent the gift. Robert had never declared his affection for her. A new despair unfurled in her.
“Emilia.” His voice was soft, oddly rough. “Look at me.”
She hesitated. Could she resist him once she looked into those grey eyes? Did she wish to resist Robert?
Emilia raised her gaze to his face. He smiled. Her attention shifted to his mouth, to the way his lips curved, to the scruff shadowing his chin. Was this how he appeared when he woke in the morning? She lifted her hand from his shoulder, touched his cheek. He leaned into her caress. Her face heated. She dropped her hand back onto his shoulder, breathless.
“I didn’t send the necklace, but I should have,” he said. “I had a hundred chances, which makes me a hundred times a fool for not telling you sooner.” He gave a gentle smile. “I love you.”
Her gaze snapped up to meet his. They stilled, though music still drifted in.
“You love me?”
He slid downward, dropped to one knee before her. He raised the hand he still held to his lips. His kiss, the press of his lips to the back of her hand in a fleeting warmth, made her dizzy. When he looked back up, his grey eyes shone in the moonlight.
“Marry me, Emilia Glasbarr. Love me. Grow old with me while our children run in the yard and we pick out fabulous carriage horses together and visit every museum, attend every recital. Let me be yours forever.”
New tears threatened. She dropped to her knees before him, pulled his face down to hers. Her heart, freed, took flight as their lips met.
