“It’s tradition,” Jonathan said innocently.“I wouldn’t want to deprive them of the full forest experience.”
“Tell us the story!”Charlotte demanded from her place on the same branch.
Lise glanced at her parents.They didn’t know she’d gone back to the tree.Thus, the story she told was notthestory.Instead, she explained how they’d hidden from soldiers right near this very tree, in the giant’s berries, and how brave their father had been.
“You wouldn’t yell out names with soldiers nearby,” Henry pointed out.
“Of course we wouldn’t,” Lise agreed, putting an end to the nonsense.
“After they left,” Jonathan said, taking up the story, “I climbed this tree, called your mother’s name from right where you are now, and I knew I would love her forever.”
“That’s silly,” Charlotte pronounced.
Henry agreed.“You can’t know you’ll love someone forever because of a tree.”
“Can’t you?”Jonathan challenged.“I did.”
Henry still appeared doubtful, but Lise’s daughter shrugged, apparently willing to accept her father’s romantic nonsense.“I want to see the berries,” she said, holding out her arms for Jonathan to catch her.
The children ran ahead, but their grandparents had no interest.
“Big rocks,” Lise’s mother said, letting her husband take her hand and lower her to a fallen tree trunk before he sat beside her.
The memories rushed back as they approached the passage, now so overgrown, it was impossible to enter until someone went back with an axe.The children had to be content with circling around the boulders’ perimeter.Lise couldn’t resist peering between the brambles, however, trying to get a look at the enclosure.
Jonathan touched the small of her back, and she jumped.
“Do you ever think about that afternoon?”he asked quietly.
“Which afternoon?”she replied, although they both knew exactly which one.
“The one where you gave me everything before breaking my heart?”
“Oh, that afternoon.”She turned to face him fully.“We’ve had so many hundreds of afternoons like it, but that one ...”Lise thought of her deflowering and of belonging to Jonathan for the first time.
“Dear God,” she added.“It was beyond the pale.And then I foolishly walked away.My legs were trembling, by the way.”
“I know,” he said, a little smugly.“You weren’t foolish though.You were trying to protect your family.”Her husband cupped her face in his hands.“Besides, you raced all the way to Harwich to stop me from sailing back into danger.”
“We were both rather dramatic, weren’t we?”
“Terribly dramatic.”He kissed her forehead, her nose, her lips — soft, sweet kisses that still made her melt after all these years.“I wouldn’t change a moment of it.”
“Not even the part where you were imprisoned?”she asked.If he hadn’t escaped, their story would never have had a chance to happen.
“Perhaps that part,” he conceded.“And the part where I was nearly killed by that French captain.”
“And the part where I sent you away?”she asked.“Right in this spot?”
“Especially that part.”His arms came around her waist.“Though it did make our reunion that much sweeter.”
“Mama!Papa!”Henry’s voice interrupted their moment.“Can we come back tomorrow?”
“We’ll see,” Lise said.“Uncle Henrik might be here by then.We’ll let him settle in and bring him and his family with us.They’ll enjoy it tremendously.”
As they returned to her parents, Jonathan put a tired Peter on his shoulders, and they began the walk to the wagon.Lise could tell her husband had something on his mind.But he held his tongue until they were in bed that night, in her old room overlooking the back of the estate.
“I’ve been meaning to discuss our future plans with you,” he said, cradling her against his chest, absentmindedly stroking his hand up and down her bare thigh, causing gooseflesh and shivers.“For next year, I mean.”
