“She ended our courtship and married a duke.”
She choked on a sip of wine. “That...” She cleared her throat. “That must have been rather disappointing.”
Deerhurst shrugged. Thinking back, that part of his past hurt the least. “Perhaps for a moment, but afterward I counted myself as the lucky one.”
“Oh? Why is that?”
Deerhurst almost laughed. He could clearly hear the questions she didn’t ask.Who is this woman? Who is the duke? Have I met them?
Deerhurst shrugged. “The duke shipped her off to one of his estates in Wales. You have a vivid imagination, love. Why would a man ship his wife off to barren lands?”
“Either he did something, or she did something.”
“Exactly.”
She pouted. “Now I’m dying of curiosity, Deerhurst.”
“Save your inquisitiveness for the next picnic. Otherwise, what will we have to talk about?”
She laughed. “There will be another?”
“That’s up to you, love.”It’s always been up to you.
“Papa!” Abigail came running back, breaking the spell. “Look what I picked!” She offered him a small white flower. “Do you know what it is?”
“A flower?” Deerhurst asked, unsure.
“Let me see,” Phaedra said, and Deerhurst was surprised when she set her wine glass on the ground and crawled forward on her hands and knees, inspecting the blossom. “I believe it’s jasmine.”
“It smells nice.” Abigail sniffed the bud and stuck out the flower to Deerhurst. “For you.”
“Thank you, pet, but I don’t know what to do with flowers.”
Abigail leaned in to say, “You give it to a wench, of course.” She looked at him as though he ought to know this.
Saints preserve him.
Deerhurst took the flower from his daughter, and when her stare became expectant, he said, “Oh, you want me to do it now?”
She nodded eagerly.
He smiled and offered the flower to Phaedra.
“Oh, right.I’mthe wench.”
“Do you accept the flower or not?”
“Accept.”
Just as she reached for the flower, and before Deerhurst could think better of it, he leaned over and secured it in her hair.
“There,” he murmured.
Abigail clapped her hands, and they both watched as she dashed off again.
“She is lovely,” Phaedra said.
“She will have a harder life than most.” Deerhurst paused. “You are right, she is the reason I gave up on taking a wife.”
