Page 67 of The Subtle Craft of Courting Kate

Had it begun to rain at last? The weather had held all day, the sky maintaining its surly grey hue throughout the afternoon she’d spent in Rebecca’s company. It hadn’t been the prettiest of summer days, but the persistent threat of rain had kept the streets free of their usual congestion, and she had had what had turned out to be a lovely afternoon browsing books and enjoying a lemon ice.

By the end of it, when Rebecca had at last taken her leave to go home to her husband and children in advance of those bedtime rituals which her family held sacrosanct, Kate had felt much improved. Calmer. Less overset by the chaos of the last day. More certain of herself; more certain of what she wanted than she had ever been.

That tattered box of dreams she had packed away when she had been only a girl had been with her all along. When she had dusted it off and opened it up, they had all still been there just as she had left them years and years ago—still beautiful, still just as dear.

Only possible now, as they had not been in such a very long time. Those treasured happily ever afters within all of the books through which she had vicariously lived a thousand lives while her own had passed her by—there had been a time when she had thought they were the closest she would ever come to one of her own.

And now…now there was one meant for her, right at her fingertips. She had only to close her fingers around it.

Another plink against the window. Well, she had expected a hard rain eventually. Kate settled at the edge of the bed, pulling the pins out of her hair one at a time until the simple style came loose all at once. A few strokes through it with her brush, and she snatched a ribbon off of her nightstand to bind it up once more in a plait for bed.

With a book pilfered from the library at hand, Kate slid beneath the cool covers draped over the bed and settled back against the pillows to read.

A violent burst of plinks burst against the window. Not hail, surely—not come and gone so swiftly as that. Baffled, Kate slung her legs over the side of the bed and trudged to the window, easing it open cautiously. The brick façade of the house was dry. Not a drop had fallen…but a lone pebble sat upon the window sill.

“Katie. Thank God; I’ve run out of pebbles.”

Kate jerked at the sound of Elliot’s voice from below, slamming her head into the frame of the window opened above her head. “Ouch,” she muttered, wincing as she rubbed her aching head. And then: “Elliot? What are you doing here?” In the garden, at this hour! “Have you gone completely mad? It is going to storm at any moment!”

“I had to speak with you,” he said up to her. “Would you come down? Please?” His hands flexed impotently at his sides. “Even just—just a few minutes.”

That hesitation; that slight crack in his voice—they squeezed Kate’s heart in her chest. She had not been the only one of them whose life had been cast into chaos recently. He’d stayed all night upon the steps of his brother’s house, well into the afternoon today, for only the shred of a chance to speak with her. Even at this distance he looked haggard and torn and not at all himself. So far removed from the confident, carefree Elliot she had always known. There was nothing of his characteristic whimsy and joviality in him at this moment.

There was only wrenching uncertainty. Desperation. All evidence of that roguish dimple in his cheek was erased, leaving such strain etched into the lines of his face that it looked for all the world as if he might never smile again.

“Please, Katie,” he said, and she wondered what it had cost him to plead with her in that abjectly miserable voice. If there existed any pride left within him, she could see no hint of it.

It really was going to storm at any minute, but he had arrived here at this hour, looking as he did, having clearly gone through a similar sort of hell as had she. And she did not have it in her heart to refuse him. To make him wait it out another day, only for a conversation that would, by necessity, be less than private.

There was a reckoning still to come between them. A great many words to be said, words which she was ready at last to speak. Words meant for his ears alone.

“I’ll come down,” she said. “Don’t go anywhere.” Certainly not within line of sight of any of the downstairs windows. Last she had seen, Hodges was still about his work—and Mrs. Norris liked to take tea in the kitchen before she retired for the evening. If he moved from his spot, he might well be spotted and summarily ejected.

“Thank you,” he breathed, lifting one hand to press it over his heart. “Thank—”

Kate shut the window upon him and grabbed up her notebook on her way out the bedroom door. Silently she crept down the stairs, peeking carefully around corners as she wove her way through the house and toward the door leading out into the garden. The subtle scent of tea from the direction of the kitchen suggested that Mrs. Norris had not yet finished her nightly ritual, and so Kate held her breath as she tiptoed past the open door—unnoticed, thank God.

She eased open the garden door and stepped out into night, past the stone bordering the house and onto the grass. And there, just beyond the perfectly-manicured rosebushes, was Elliot. His golden hair ruffled and disheveled, as if he’d been tugging it in his hands, with an expression of such relief upon his face only to see her.

A muscle in his jaw jumped. He took one reflexive step toward her—and stopped. Waiting, she thought, for her to decide how close she wished to come. If indeed she wished it at all.

“Katie,” he said, so softly into that heavy stillness between them. Just a whisper. Almost a prayer.

Kate held aloft the notebook for his inspection. “This list,” she said. “The one you had me write out for you. For your ideal wife. It’s about me.”

Elliot swallowed hard, his jaw tensing. “Yes.”

Her breath hitched in her chest. “And what your brother—what Lord Andrew said—”

“Yes.”

“You love me.” She hadn’t meant it to come out that way, exactly, but the words had had a rather accusatory tone to them, one that made him flinch as if she’d lashed out with her fist rather than her words.

And still he uttered, “Yes.” Just that simple, concrete statement, as if he had given it all up. As if raw, bare honesty were the only thing left to him.

“And you never told me!”

“You never saw me,” he said simply, ducking his head. “Kate—Katie—my feelings for you were never your responsibility, and ought not to confer upon you any sense of obligation toward me, but I—” His voice cracked over the words, his hands lifted toward her in entreaty. “I never want to lose your friendship.”