When she didn’t answer at once, he shook his head. “You told me it wasn’t because I taught you to waltz, but?—”
“It wasn’t.” She couldn’t bear to let him think so. Not when her feelings were so much stronger, so much more tender than mere gratitude. “I swear it to you, James.”
“Why, then?”
“Because I…” She might have let her fear take over then, but love, it seemed, would have its way, because the words were already rushing from her heart into her mouth, and falling off the edge of her tongue. “Because I wanted you, James, and because I…”
He drew closer. “You?”
“I-I love you,” she whispered.
But it wouldn’t do, that timid whisper. When you told a man you loved him, you did it with your entire voice, and with everything inside you. She drew closer, pressed her palm to his cheek, and looked into his eyes. “I love you, James.”
His face changed in an instant, the tension in his jaw releasing, and the boyish smile she loved so well— the lopsided one that made his eyes twinkle —lit up his face.
She’d only ever seen that smile when he looked ather.
“And why do you suppose I took you to my bed, Euphemia?”
She swallowed, and shook her head.
“Because I wanted you, too, you maddening woman! Istillwant you. I want you forever, Euphemia. I’m in love with you.” He gazed down at her with soft eyes. “Did you truly believe I’d let you go?”
She had believed it. At least, the dark corner inside her where all her old fears still lived had believed it, but that voice had grown quieter since she’d found James.
Perhaps the time had come to silence it entirely.
Love, after all, was so much stronger than fear.
“Don’t you see, Euphemia?” He stroked a fingertip down her cheek. “You’re mine now, and I’m yours. I’ve been yours for weeks, I think.”
The look in his eyes as he gazed down at her was so loving, so tender that hot tears rushed to her eyes. “I didn’t know.”
He let out a soft laugh. “Nor did I, at first. I’ve never been in love before, you see.”
She peeked up at him from under her lashes. “Me, either.”
He drew her into his arms then and buried his face in her hair. “You’re trembling.”
“Yes.” But there was no fear inside her. Only love.
She tucked herself against him and laid her cheek against his chest. “Your heart is beating so quickly.”
“In time with yours, Euphemia,” he murmured against her hair. “It beats in time with yours.”
Epilogue
STEEPLE BARTON, OXFORDSHIRE, DECEMBER, 1818
“Behold your future, Lady Fairmont.”
Phee had been turning over the first leaves of her latest Gothic horror novel— a wonderfully spine-chilling tome entitledFrankenstein—but she looked up, following James’s glance.
Lord Cross was seated in a leather chair tucked into the opposite corner of the drawing room, and baby Euphemia— or Mimi, as she was called, to distinguish her from her namesake —was enthroned upon his knee, giggling in delight, handfuls of his dark hair caught in her chubby fists.
“As Miles is Mimi’s papa, I’d sooner call thatyourfuture, my lord. Mine looks a great deal more peaceful.” She nodded toward Juliet, who was perched on the arm of the chair, her hand on her husband’s shoulder, and a sweet smile on her lips.
“Very well then, if you insist upon splitting hairs, it’sourfuture, and a more worrying one I can’t imagine.” He gave a despairing shake of his head, but for all his grumbling, he couldn’t hide the naked yearning on his face as he watched Miles bouncing Mimi on his knee.
