Finally, as her body started to settle, he drew his hand away and followed her over the edge.With a hoarse cry, his body shuddered as he spent inside her.
Afterward, not speaking, both were breathing hard, their skin damp with sweat.Jonathan had moved slightly to her side, but his chest rested half upon her still, and his thigh lay across hers, solid and real.
Lise wanted to memorize every detail of this moment.The smell of crushed grass and their mingled scent, the feel of his heartbeat starting to calm against her breast, the way his fingers trailed circles idly over her hip.
Reaching up, she touched the hair at the nape of his neck, where it curled adorably, damp with perspiration.He smiled and rolled to his side, taking her with him so they lay face to face.
Tracing the curve of her cheekbone with one finger, he said, “I love you.And I shall do so until I draw my last breath.”
Tears stung her eyes.“And I will love you always.”
They lay quiet for a few minutes, until she knew the moment when his mind began working again, planning, strategizing.His hand stroked up and down her spine in an absent rhythm.
“We need to think about how to do this,” he said finally.“How to get you safely to England.”
Her chest tightened.“Jonathan —”
“Traveling with me will be dangerous,” he continued, his voice taking on a crisp efficiency, assured of her compliance.“I’m thinking it best if you come later, after I’ve made it home.Much safer for Henrik to escort you after I’m back on English soil.”
Then he frowned.“Though I hate to wait or to part with you.We could arrange a meeting point at the port your father has arranged for my departure.I believe it will be Glückstadt.Perhaps at an inn —”
“No.”
The single word fell between them like a stone into still water.
He frowned.“What?”
She sat up, knowing this moment and the one after it and the next one after that would take her away from this bliss.From him.Regardless, she reached for her chemise, needing a barrier of clothing between them, as if it could protect her from the pain that was to come.A soft thin swath of linen would be her suit of armor.
After she dragged it over her head, she said, “I can’t go with you.I told you that last night.”
“But I thought —” He sat up, his expression bewildered.“Lise, we just ...You gave yourself to me.I thought that meant you had changed your mind.”
“It meant I love you.”Her voice came out much steadier than she felt.“And I came here because I wanted you to know that before you went away.I gave myself to you because I wanted one splendid memory to carry with me.”
“One memory?”His voice rose.“Lise, we belong together.What we just shared —”
“Was the sweetest goodbye,” she interrupted him.“Far better than in my bedroom last night.Don’t you think?But it was always goodbye, Jonathan.My place is here.With my family.In my homeland.”
“Your family would want you to be happy!”His tone was stubborn, and she knew he wouldn’t let her go without putting up a strong argument.
Putting on her stays, Lise’s fingers fumbled with the laces.“Henrik is injured because of me.I brought this trouble down upon my parents and my brother.In fact, it all stems from how I behaved in London.And how weak I am around you.”
At his stricken expression, tears pricked her eyes.
“If London was the beginning of all the trouble,” he said, his tone raspy, “then I am to blame because you were an innocent.”
She didn’t want this to become ugly.“I don’t see it that way.I made my own choices.In the end, it doesn’t matter how it started.This is my home.I have to stay and be strong.Friedrich won’t lose gracefully.I’m sure he intends to extract revenge.When he does, I will be here to face him, give testimony if necessary.My family needs me.”
“I need you too.”Jonathan grabbed his trousers, yanking them on with quick, angry movements.“And I think you need me, as well.Doesn’t that matter?”
“Of course it matters.”Tears streamed down her face now, but she wiped them with her sleeve and made herself stop from sheer will.“It matters more than anything.But you have a life waiting for you in England.A title, an estate, a future.I would be nothing there but the Holstein girl you married during the war.A curiosity.An oddity.Perhaps even a weight around your neck.”
“That’s absurd.”He shoved his feet into his boots.
She had to make him accept the inevitable, that she would stay and he would go.
“Your father is an earl.I may not be British, but I know that nobility marries nobility.”She pulled on her petticoat, each layer taking her farther from the satisfied woman who’d lain with the man of her dreams.
