“When did you become a radical?” she asked.
It was a teasing question, not really meant to be answered, but his expression darkened.
“What?” she asked.
“Do you know what happened after your family left?”
“No.”
“My father handpicked the next vicar. Made sure the man preached exactly as my father wanted, everything my father wanted. Obedience, humility, gratitude. An attitude appropriate to everyone except my father and the vicar. They never obeyed their own rules, much less Christ’s. Humility and gratitude weren’t in their vocabulary except when railing about the villagers.” He grimaced. “I never thought about what your father preached until someone else preached differently.”
She winced. “That bad?”
“That enlightening. It made me think. It made me choose what I wanted to believe, what I thought the Scriptures meant. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. That’s what I focused on.” Then he flashed her a smile. “And I wanted to be educated, so I did what I could to give that to my people.
She smiled. Her own father hated hypocrisy in all its forms. Clearly, that message had found fertile ground in Jonathan.
“So you’ve made changes. I’m pleased.”
“There’s a lot I can’t do as a viscount, but what I can change, I am.”
What a perfect man. If her father had taught her what could be accomplished with nearly no resources, she was excited to learn what one man could accomplish with all of Jonathan’s purse.
She stroked her fingers across his jaw, feeling the rough brush of his beard. Eventually—inevitably—her fingers landed back on his mouth.
“You have become everything I hoped you would,” she said.
“Hardly.” He dropped his forehead to hers. “But I’m trying. And I always felt—I feel—more powerful when I’m with you.”
She knew what he meant. He strengthened her on a level that she couldn’t even name.
“I’ve missed you,” she whispered.
“Let me kiss you again. Please.”
She smiled. “I was about to ask you the same thing.”
And so they kissed. Deeply. Passionately. And without thought to anything else. She was swept away on a tide of sensation. She gloried in the thrust of his tongue. How amazing to feel the grip of his hands on her hips as he pulled her higher on his body.
She knew what would happen when he lifted her up in his arms. She knew even as he carried her to bed that she wanted it, too. But before they went further, she needed one thing from him.
She pressed him back, her gaze going to his eyes. “In my satchel,” she said.
“What?”
“Get it.”
He did, his expression confused but accepting. And when she pulled a French letter from the contents, his eyes widened in shock.
“How do you have that?”
She always had that with her. “Do you know anything about my father’s flock?”
He shook his head.
“He’s a curate of Stepney parish.” Not quite as poor as St. Giles, but close. “I go with him as much as I can. We all do as he ministers to the poor, the beggars and the tarts. We carry supplies to give them. Medicines and these.” The French letters. “Many of the women won’t talk to him, but they’ll come to me. For these. They know it prevents disease and—”
“Pregnancy. Yes.” Jonathan took the item in question. “You carry this with you?”
