“Oh dear!” she cried, just as Jennings shouted, “I’ll get it!”
They both jumped forward at the same moment the train decided to take another sharp turn, sending them tumbling onto the teastained carpet and into each other’s arms.
Beatrix was on top of Jennings now, so close that she could smell the aroma of black coffee and freshly pressed paper that somehow always clung to his clothes, no matter how long he’d been away from the halls of Donohoe & Company.
A blush quickly spread across Beatrix’s fair skin as she tried to pull herself away before Jennings could realize that she’d leaned into his lapel when she first caught his familiar scent. But the chain of her spectacles was tangled in the buttons of his vest, snapping her back so that her face was so close to his that one of her copper curls touched his cheek.
Jennings gently wrapped a finger around the strand and carefully put it back in place behind her ear. His lips pressed together and then parted, as if he’d decided to say something important.
“Next stop’s Chicago!” a harsh voice cried.
Beatrix glanced up as a man in an official blue uniform poked his head into their compartment, his eyebrows twisting together in confusion when he didn’t see anyone on the seats and then rising to his forehead as he looked down and saw them tangled together on the floor.
“We fell!” Jennings exclaimed as he freed Beatrix’s spectacles from his vest and helped her sit upright.
“Then you’d better get up again,” the train attendant said calmly, as if he’d seen stranger things in his time on the rails. “Chicago’s the end of the line, and you’ll need to stay there unless you’re planning to turn right around and head back to Boston.”
“I don’t think I’d mind at all,” Beatrix heard Jennings murmur to himself, so softly that she nearly didn’t catch the words.
After they’d settled back onto their seats—the teapot and cups stacked on the tray as neatly as they could be, given the circumstances—Beatrix let a few moments pass as she worked up the courage to turn to Jennings and ask a question.
“I hope that you aren’t disappointed to be returning with me to Chicago,” she said in a rush, the words spilling out so quickly that she worried he’d ask her to repeat them.
“Not at all,” Jennings replied, his own voice rising in surprise. “I’m happy to be going back.”
“Are you sure?” Beatrix asked. “You seemed so pleased when we were traveling along the East Coast. I’d hate to think that Mr. Stuart calling me back has spoiled any of your plans.”
“Let me assure you,” Jennings said, his words nearly as fast as Beatrix’s had been. “There’s nowhere else I’d rather be.”
“Really?” Beatrix asked, still unconvinced.
“Yes,” Jennings replied. “It’s only that you’ll be entirely focused on writing the next book now. Mr. Stuart’s given me my agenda, and it’s centered around getting the last manuscript ready for publication while you’re working on the new story. I’ll miss hearing you speak to readers and exploring new cities together and—”
Jennings stopped himself there and nervously brushed at the front of his vest, though Beatrix had thought he’d managed to get all the dust from the carpet off already.
“And the excitement of it, you understand,” Jennings finally managed to continue. “It won’t be quite the same when we return to Chicago.”
“No,” Beatrix murmured, stiffening a bit as she thought of the notebook buried in the bottom of her suitcase. “I don’t suppose it will be.”
“But once you reach your next deadline, Mr. Stuart will be sending us out on the road again, I’m sure,” Jennings said cheerfully.
Beatrix felt her heartbeat begin to race at that, quicker than it had in the moments just before she’d stepped behind a podium to speak in front of a crowd of strangers for the first time.
An expression that Jennings must have mistaken for disappointment flashed across her face, because he suddenly looked alarmed.
“But there’ll be plenty of time for you to see your sisters, of course,” Jennings said. “I know you’ve missed them.”
“I have,” Beatrix replied, reaching for the marigold pendant, which somehow remained warm though frost crept along the sides of the compartment’s window.
Beatrix wanted to tell Jennings that she’d miss him, too, and was looking forward to when they’d be boarding the train together again after she met her deadline. But the final word of that thought made her throat so dry that she couldn’t manage to speak.
Instead, she simply picked up the carnation that had fallen into the corner of the seat and carefully placed it in the buttonhole of his jacket.
A blush as red as the flower began to spread across Jennings’ cheekbones as he clumsily opened the journal where he kept track of all the tasks that waited to be neatly checked off and started talking about production schedules and galley prints.
After a few minutes, Beatrix let herself relax into the easy rhythm of his voice and the train swaying against the tracks, her attention riveted on the feeling of the rails rumbling beneath her feet and the scent of sugar and spilled tea. Drawing in a deep breath, she tried to bottle up all these sensations before they reached the station, where they would say their goodbyes.
Because if her sisters couldn’t help her sort through the mess that waited at the bottom of her suitcase, Beatrix very much doubted that she and Jennings would share a moment like this one ever again.
