“The thimble,” she managed, just from the corner of her lips, peeking out from the dip of his shoulder. “I never told you how I got it.”
He narrowed his eyes, his full attention now focused on the girl now curled so sweetly into his side. “Mae …” he said, sounding for all the world like a schoolmaster about to deliver a demerit.
“They wanted to know the details,” she muttered, burrowing still deeper, drawing her knees up and pushing them against his side. “All of them. Since the very first day we met.”
“Who did?!”
She was still for a moment and then, ever so slowly, peeked up at him from the crook of his arm.
“Oh, for the love of Christ and all His goats,” Roland exclaimed, an incredulous, infuriated laugh escaping his throat. “I am going tostrangleVix Aster. And you did it, didn’t you? How much does she know?”
Mae gave an apologetic little smile and a shrug. “Everything until the day of the picnic? But …”
“But?!”
“But I am bound to continue to divulge,” she said, quiet as a squeaking mouse, “unless such a time arises as I am otherwise bound to confidence that overrides the sovereignty of the thimble.”
“The sover…” he sputtered, staring down at her. “Mae Casper!”
She buried her face against him, shaking her head. “I know! I know!”
“You are never leaving this flat,” he informed her. “Not ever!”
“Oh, how terrible,” she muttered impishly, hugging herself tighter against him. “How shall I survive it?”
He sighed, melting away inside despite himself, and shook his head, unable to suppress the rumbling chuckle that followed. “You gave more than you got,” he said. “You’d make a bad gambler.”
“Oh, is that a fact?” she said, still muffled. “My turn again?”
“Indeed.”
There was a pause as she unfolded herself from her shame, considering her options. “Do you ever imagine being married?”
“No,” he said immediately.
“Oh,” she answered, soft but not judgemental.
“Well, wait,” he said, turning to look at her in the lowering light. “I suppose now I have. No before the question. Yes after.”
“I see,” she answered, still very soft. “Your turn.”
He smiled slowly, reaching out to trace the curve of her cheek. “Do you love me?”
She took a soft little gulping breath, biting down on it and swallowing it into her lungs. She nodded.
“Good,” he said, still gazing at her. “I should hate to be in love all by myself. Really hate it. Very much.”
“You aren’t,” she whispered. “You aren’t alone.”
“Neither are you,” he told her. “My love.”
“How did you imagine it?” she said, inching closer, snaking a bare leg through his. “Just now, when you thought of being married for the first time.”
“Like this,” he said, looking around the shadowy room. “You here on my pillows, asking me questions I only half want to answer. Your hair between my fingers. Your taste on my lips.”
“Not bells? Or aisles in a church?” she asked. “Not applause and a vicar?”
“Definitely not,” he said, allowing a snort to escape. “Isn’t that just the part everyone suffers through to get to the enjoyable bit?”
