He did. His aunt’s face was grave, her eyes searching his with an intensity that made him want to flinch.
“She is here,” Lady Ashworth said at last. “She is safe. And she is asleep in her chamber, as any sensible person would be at this hour.” She paused. “And Lord Weston has not yet proposed.”
The relief that flooded through Christian was so overwhelming that he nearly staggered.
“Thank goodness.” The words came out in a rasp. “Thank goodness. I thought—I received a letter—I believed I had come too late—”
“A letter?” Lady Ashworth’s brow furrowed. “From whom?”
“I do not know. It was signed ‘A Friend.’ It said—” He ran a hand through his hair. “It said Fiona was on the verge of accepting a proposal. That I ought to hear it from a personal source rather than the gossip columns.”
Understanding dawned in his aunt’s eyes—followed by something that looked suspiciously like amusement.
“I see.” She released his arm and stepped back, studying him with those sharp, knowing eyes. “And this letter prompted you to ride through a storm, arrive at my doorstep at dawn, and demand to see the woman you sent away weeks ago?”
“Yes.” Christian did not flinch from her gaze. “I was a fool, Aunt. A coward. But I am done running. I am done hiding. I came here to tell Fiona that I love her, that I will spend the rest of my life proving I am worthy of her, and that if she will have me—if she can forgive me—I want to marry her.”
Lady Ashworth was silent for a long moment.
Then she smiled.
“Well,” she said. “It’s about time.”
She stepped aside and gestured toward the staircase.
“Second door on the left. And do try not to give the poor girl a fright.”
Christian did not need to be told twice.
He took the stairs two at a time, his heart pounding, his palms sweating, his mind racing with everything he wanted to say. He reached the second door on the left and stopped, suddenly paralysed.
What if she refused him? What if she had decided, in the weeks since her departure, that she was better off without him? What if he knocked on this door and she told him to go away, that she had moved on, that his chance had passed?
“Be brave,”her voice whispered in his mind. “For both of us.”
Christian raised his hand and knocked.
A long pause. Then, muffled by the door, a voice he had heard in his dreams every night for weeks:
“Who is it?”
He opened his mouth to answer—and found that his voice had deserted him. His throat was too tight, his heart too full. He could not speak.
So instead, he did the only thing he could think of.
He opened the door.
Fiona was sitting up in bed, her hair a tumbled mess around her shoulders, her eyes still heavy with sleep. She wore a white nightgown, simple and unadorned, and she looked so beautiful that Christian forgot how to breathe.
She stared at him. Her mouth opened, but no sound came out.
“Fiona,” he said, and his voice cracked on her name. “I am sorry. I am so sorry. I should have come weeks ago. I should have followed you the moment you left. I should have—”
He did not get to finish.
Fiona was out of the bed and in his arms before he could blink, her body slamming into his with enough force to drive him back a step. She was crying—he could feel her tears soaking through his shirt—but she was also laughing, a wild, joyful sound that made his heart sing.
“You came,” she gasped against his chest. “You actually came.”
