Rose stared into his familiar eyes looking so intently back at her.
“It wasn’t all trifle and cream while you were gone,” she said quietly. “I did not simply bounce back to living the way I had before we met.”
Finn offered her a half-smile. “You were quite the social miss, as I recall.”
She felt her cheeks warm. “I suppose I was.” William had said something similar to indicate she’d been considered a bit flighty. “I was young.”
“I’m not condemning you. You were doing exactly what a beautiful young lady without a care in the world should have been doing.”
Rose sighed. “I feel as though I’ve aged a hundred years in the past month,” she said.
“Oddly, you don’t look a day older than 85.”
She slapped his arm.
“In truth,” Finn added, “I know exactly what you mean. I feel the same way. I thought I was an adult before. Looking back, though, I was a child. I built ships. I saw you and fancied you and fell in love in two shakes, and married you without a nod to propriety.”
At his mention of their marriage, she remembered the treasure she’d found earlier.
“I found the locket in your room. I can’t believe it survived.”
“My room?”
“Yes, I went there first before I came here.”
He shook his head. “That was dangerous.”
“The danger had come and gone from there, as it turned out.” She explained about the state of his living quarters. “Was someone looking for something?”
He shrugged. “Not that I can think of. Most likely another attempt to scare me the hell out of Boston. I have nothing from my life before, except the locket.”
“It’s amazing that you have it still.”
“No,” Finn contradicted her, staring into her eyes. “If I survived, it would, too. Not surprising at all. I never took it off, not until I came back and ...,” he trailed off.
“And what? Saw your wife at her engagement party?” Rose supplied, tamping down any guilt over William. She had no reason to feel badly in that regard.
“Something like that.”
Finn slipped his fingers between hers, so they were firmly intertwined. Pleasurable sensations feathered through her. They had both grown up and grown apart, but her body’s reaction to him felt exactly the same. She knew what pleasant sensations would occur if he simply stroked the back of her hand with his thumb.
Then, as if reading her thoughts, he did so.
It was through her favorite gray gloves that he traced a heated path on her hand and then up her wrist. She clamped her lips around any sound that threatened to escape at his touch.
“I know I have no right to be jealous,” Finn said, his voice low. “But seeing you with another man, it was ... it made me ... I couldn’t stand it.”
She nodded. Merely imagining him chatting up some young miss while in England or Scotland pained her.
Again, as if knowing what she was thinking, he said, “I want you to know that I was faithful to you the entire time I was away.”
His words were a gift that went a long way to assuaging her lingering resentment over the hurt he’d caused her.
“From the first time we kissed, I could never imagine being with any other woman.”
Finn dropped her hands and briefly closed his eyes, running his fingers through his short hair until it stood on end.
“Despite what you think, I know the worst thing I have done to you was not staying away. The worst thing I did was to come back and ruin your perfect new life.”
