She pressed at her heart, which seemed to be escaping from her chest, trying to. It couldn’t if she suppressed it, crammed it back down between her ribs.
“Shh,” he whispered. “It’s not that horrible. I’m here.”
Lifting her fingertips to her cheeks, she found them wet. “I think… I think I’m scared.”
“Of what?”
“I did not want to fall in love.”
His arms wrapped more tightly around her, crushing her in the best sort of way. He inhaled, exhaled, shaky breaths of… what? Relief? “And now… do you… can you fall in love now?”
What had he said in the garden the night they’d met?I’m a man, and I’m not supposed to, but… I want to fall in love.She’d thought him brave and honest, been sorry for the hopelessness in his voice.
Now that hopelessness filled her while his own voice soared with hope. If he had fallen in love… could she follow in his footsteps?
“My mother,” she said, “embroidered a handkerchief for me as she lay dying. A pink, impractical thing. Hearts and flowers along the edges in an explosion of colors. Every color she could find floss for. She said it was for me to keep in my pocket on my wedding day. So, she could be with me. She wanted me to… love. And I wanted… What I wanted does not matter. It will not help my sisters. You understand they must come first. If anyone understands, it’s you. I must not marry.”
“Never?”
He stroked a hand down the side of her head. He should be pulling away now, putting distance between them, but he heldher as if he always would, as if nothing she could say would send him running.
“I must stay with them. Glenna…” She’d never said a word to anyone, but they spilled out now. Trust did odd things to the tongue. Loosened it. “Glenna will never marry of her own accord, and I am afraid if I leave her my father will force marriage on her.” She hid her face in Samuel’s chest. “But Glenna… Glenna does not like men.” Betrayal, that’s what this was, telling a man her sister’s secret, but it didn’t feel like that. It felt like safety and freedom. “Glenna was in love once. With a house maid. Two years ago. I sent the maid away so my father would not find out, and… and… it broke her heart. I will not destroy her again by abandoning her.”
“I understand.” He kissed the top of her head, his thumb rubbing peace into her shoulder. “I understand.”
“You will not tell anyone.”
Another kiss. “Of course not.”
“And you will not… she can still be friends with your sister?”
“Of course she can.”
Some chains she’d wound round her heart years ago rusted, flaked away into total disintegration, leaving her heart to beat fully and freely. “I trust you.”
“You always can.”
She believed him, as she’d believed no other man in her life.
The beautiful buzzing he played into her body with touches and caresses and kisses, the one that broke like lightning through her and had dissipated in sorrow so recently… a miracle of sensation.
But this, this open-hearted revelation, this certainty of trust and the warm safety of something bigger than the rest of it, connecting him to her—even better. A miracle of emotion.
Love?
She’d always thought it would be blade sharp when it came slicing out of the dark, like a needle come to sew her life shut. It freed her instead, and in the safety of love, light poured in, and cozy in the warmth of his arms, she slept.
Chapter Twenty-One
The house was too quiet. Much too quiet for possessing three young ladies of various loudness. Potentially six since, in all likelihood, Emma’s three were scheming together with Samuel’s.
“I should go across the square,” Emma said from close behind him, her hands lightly fisted near his arm as if she wished to hold on to him there. But wouldn’t.
Samuel whipped an arm up, holding a finger to his lips. “Listen.”
“Nothing?” The voice rang out from the direction of Samuel’s study. “You have nothing to say?”
“Lottie,” Samuel said, and then he made for the study with long, strong strides, Emma trailing after him.
