He lowered his head and kissed her. It was not a kiss of passion. It was gentle, careful, full of gratitude, and the staggering relief of having almost lost something precious and finding it whole. Christina closed her eyes, her hands sliding from his wrists to his shoulders, holding on.
The sound of hooves prevented him from saying more, within a few moments, Christina was caught up in the crushing embrace of Lord Wickton.
"Pennington will pay for what he has done." Lord Wickton's face was white in the moonlight. "I will not — cannot — allow this to stand."
Lord Coventry put a hand on Lord Wickton's arm. "Then might I leave you with the gentleman? I will return Christina to London."
Lord Wickton nodded, looking to Christina. "Are you well enough to ride?"
"I am."
"I will find a carriage somewhere," Lord Coventry promised. "I will not return her to the house upon my horse. You need not fear that. I will do my utmost to keep the ton from hearing of this."
Lord Wickton nodded. "I thank you."
Without another word, he turned and marched towards the inn, leaving Christina and Lord Coventry alone again. He pulled her close once more, his head lowering so she could feel the heat of his breath on her neck. Raw, overwhelming relief poured through her as she clung to him.
"I feared I had lost you," he whispered, his voice catching. "I cannot imagine all you have endured."
"I trusted that you would find me." She held him as tightly as he held her, a smile breaking through the tears. "It was that hope that pushed me on."
His hands lifted from her waist, cupping her face so he could look into her eyes. They stood there, silent, the moonlight pooling around them and the night holding its breath.
"We have almost been twice lost to one another," he said, lowering his head. "There is more to come, I am afraid. The ton may whisper, might hear of what has happened — but I want you to be assured of my devotion to you. I care nothing for what society might say, nor what they think." His lips touched hers lightly. "All I care about is you, Christina. I want nothing more than to bring you happiness." He kissed her again. "I love you desperately."
"I love you too," she whispered, her eyes closing as she rested her head against his chest, hearing the steady beat of his heart. In that moment, as they stood together beneath the wide, star-scattered sky, Christina's heart settled once more. Despite Lord Pennington's threats, despite her own fears and dread, Lord Coventry had come for her. She had come for herself.
Now, she was finally back to where she truly belonged.
20
The hackney was the cheapest sort — its cushions threadbare, its springs creaking with every shift of weight on the road. Morning light crept through the window and fell in a pale wash across Christina's hands, resting in her lap. Her hair was loose, tangled from the night, strands of it falling across the shoulders of a pelisse that was not hers — Isaac had found it at the posting house, borrowed from an innkeeper's wife who had asked no questions and accepted a handful of coins with a quiet nod.
The cut on her arm was bandaged with a strip torn from the sleeve of Isaac's shirt. He had done it himself, kneeling beside her in the flickering light of the yard while the hackney was being readied, his fingers careful and his face white. Now the fabric — linen, faintly scented with sandalwood — lay warm against her skin, a strange and tender intimacy.
Isaac sat across from her, his riding coat rumpled and powdered with road dust, his hair in disarray. The dark shadows beneath his eyes told the story of a night with no rest, no pause, nothing but the furious rhythm of hooves on cobblestones and the urgent questioning of stable boys and innkeepers in the dark.His hands rested on his thighs, still and deliberate, but she could see the faint tremor in his fingers — the last remnant of a fear that had not yet fully released him.
The hackney swayed gently. The clop of hooves on cobblestones marked a rhythm that asked nothing of them. For a long time, neither spoke. The silence was not the guarded, brittle quiet of two people who did not know how to begin. It was the deep, exhausted peace of two people who had run out of distance to put between themselves and the truth.
Christina looked at Isaac. He was watching London appear through the window — the first chimney pots, the first church spires, the morning haze that hung over the rooftops like gauze. His profile was sharp in the early light, his jaw set, his eyes unfocused. He looked, she thought, like a man who had been fighting for his life and had only just realized he had won.
"Christina?"
His voice was softer than a question. Almost a prayer.
She opened her eyes — she had not realized she had closed them — and smiled. The smile came easily, without the careful construction she had once required. It arose from somewhere deep and unguarded, and she let it remain.
She reached out her hand.
He took it. Their fingers laced together, and they sat like that for a long moment, simply holding on. The hackney rocked them gently, the morning light pooling over their joined hands.
"When I saw you outside of the inn," he began, and his voice was unsteady, the careful composure he normally wore stripped away. "When I realized it was you coming toward me out of the darkness — I thanked God, Christina. I thanked Him with everything I had."
His thumb traced an arc across the back of her hand — the shared gesture that had become theirs, the small, private vocabulary of touch that no one else could read.
"You escaped that inn yourself." He leaned forward, his grey eyes holding hers with an intensity that made her breath catch. "It was your courage, your cleverness. I was only there to catch you."
"But you were there," she whispered, pressing his fingers. "That is what matters."
