Precisely enunciated, the words gave him pause. He held her gaze for a long moment, then, also more quietly, said, “I told you I loved you.” His eyes suddenly widened. “You do understand French?”
“Enough for that, but I didn’t catch much else. You speak very rapidly.”
“But I said the words, and you understood.” His voice gained in strength. “It was you who never returned the sentiment.”
She lost her temper. “Yes, I did! Just not in words.” She could feel the heat in her cheeks, refused to let it distract her. “Don’t tell me you didn’t understand.” She gave him a second to do so; when his face only hardened, she jabbed a finger into his chest. “And as for saying the words, believing as I did that I was your mistress, such a confession would have been entirely unwise.”
She realized the implicit admission, sensed by the flare of heat in his gaze that he hadn’t missed it.
Lifting her chin, she continued, determined to have all clear between them, “It’s all very well to say you love me, but many men doubtless think they love their mistresses, and tell them so—how could I tell what you meant by the words?”
For a long moment, he held her gaze, then he gestured, as if brushing the point aside. In the same movement, he reached for her; grasping her elbows, holding her steady, face to face, he locked his eyes with hers. “I need to know—do you love me?”
The question, the look in his eyes, went straight to her heart.
She closed her eyes, then opened them and searched his. The rain was cascading down, the night was wild and black about them, yet he was totally focused on her, as she was on him. She drew breath, shakily said, “In my world, love between a man and a woman usually means marriage. In yours, that isn’t necessarily so. You said one word, but not the other. You knew my background—knew I wasn’t up to snuff. I couldn’t tell what you meant, but…that didn’t make any difference to how I felt about you.”
He studied her for a long moment, then released her, stepped close, framed her face with his hands. He looked down into her eyes. “Je t’aime.” The words resonated with a conviction impossible to doubt. “I love you.” He held her gaze. “I want no other woman, not for a day, not for a night—only you. And I want you forever. I want to marry you. I want you in my house, in my bed—you already reside in my heart. You are my soul. Please…”He paused, still holding her gaze, then more softly continued, “Will you marry me?”
He didn’t wait for her answer, but touched his lips to hers. “I never wanted you as my mistress. I only ever wanted you in one role—as my wife.”
Another subtle kiss had her closing her eyes, swallowing to get her words out. “Do you think you could see me as the mother of your children?”
He drew back and met her eyes, his expression faintly quizzical. When she said nothing more, he replied, “That’s understood.”
“Good.” She cleared her throat. “In that case…”
She paused, holding his black gaze; she still couldn’t entirely take it in, that the future of her dreams was here, being offered to her, hers for the taking. He hadn’t got down on his knees and begged, yet… smiling, she reached up and wrapped her arms about his neck. “Yes, I love you, and yes, I’ll marry you.”
“Thank God for that!” He pulled her to him, kissed her thoroughly—let her kiss him back in a wild moment of untrammeled joy with the rain drenching them and the moors a black void about them, then he sighed through the kiss, sank deeper into it, wrapped his arms about her and held her close. Until that moment, she hadn’t appreciated just how tense—how keyed up, how uncertain— he’d been.
Through the kiss she sensed their emotions meet, touch, ease—the fraught worry of recent times, the uncertainties, the fears, all faded, submerged beneath a welling tide of unfettered happiness.
When he lifted his head, dragged in a huge breath, and eased his hold on her, all that fraught tension was gone, and he’d reverted to his usual dictatorial self.
“Come.” He kissed her hand and turned her back to the coach. His curricle stood across the road, the pair with their heads hanging. “There’s a good inn in Chittlehampton, just off the road a little way back. It’s closest.” Hard hand at her back, urging her along, he glanced at her— met her eyes. “We should get out of these wet clothes before we take a chill.”
She seriously doubted, once they got out of their clothes, that they would be in any danger; she could feel the heat in his gaze even through the darkness.
He called orders to the coachman, then opened the coach door and looked in. “We’re going back to the Chase.”
A chorus of wild cheers and a “Good-oh” from Maggs greeted the pronouncement. She stuck her head past Tony to add, “But we have to stop at an inn for the night. I’m too wet to get back in. I’ll follow with Tony.”
Her brothers were thrilled, in alt at the prospect of returning to a house she suspected they saw as paradise, and not at all averse to spending the night at an inn along the way.
Tony helped the coachman turn his team, then he drew her protectively back while the coach lurched and started back down the road. In its wake, they walked to his curricle. Closing his hands about her waist, he lifted her to the seat. The rain was easing; she waited until they were rolling along before saying, “About my brothers.”
He glanced at her. “What about them? They’ll live with us, of course.”
She hesitated, then asked, “You’re sure?”
“Positive.”
She tried to think of what else remained, what else needed to be settled between them…
“Good gracious!” She looked at him. “What happened with Sir Freddie?”
Later, kneeling before the fire roaring in the hearth of the best bedchamber of the Sword and Pike in Chittlehampton, one towel wrapped around her while with another she dried her wet hair, she remembered how Tony had laughed.
How delighted he’d been that he—the question of becoming his wife—had exercised her mind to the total exclusion of Sir Freddie.
She had Dalziel to thank for Tony’s rapid return. Tony had sent a rider hotfoot to London as soon as they’d reached the Chase the previous night; by return, Dalziel had sent word to bring Sir Freddie to London, but then had changed his mind. He’d met Tony on the road, and taken Sir Freddie into custody; apparently Dalziel wanted to visit Sir Freddie’s home in his company.
It seemed clear Dalziel’s interest had been sparked by Sir Freddie’s claims of another, still unidentified ex-traitor. For her part, she’d learned enough about ex-traitors to last her a lifetime.
Yet Tony’s reaction out on the road buzzed in her head. Almost as if he hadn’t been sure that her connection with him wasn’t in some way dependent on the threat of Sir Freddie. That that threat somehow ranked more prominently in her mind than it did.
The latch lifted; Tony entered. He’d taken it upon himself to see her brothers settled; Maggs would sleep in their room, just to make sure.
A smile curved his lips as he paused, studying her, then, smile deepening, he came toward her.
“Stop!” She held up a hand. “You’re still dripping. Take off your clothes.”
His brows quirked, but he obediently halted. “As you wish.”
The purr in his voice was distinctly predatory, the speculation in his eyes equally so. She inwardly grinned, turned back to the fire, and continued to dry her hair.