Her lips parted—but only a faint sound escaped, a soft, trapped breath. Delicious rouge surged into her cheeks, blooming up to the very edge of her hairline.
“I—no—I do not know—Mr. Thornton, it was nothing—”
“It wasnotnothing.”
The words came shaking from him, harsher than he meant, but truer than anything he had ever spoken. “It is vitally important. Do you understand me? I have lived with this—” he drew in a trembling breath, “—this little scrap of hope for months. I need to know if it was meant.”
She turned her face away, mortified, her hand covering her mouth. But after a moment, she forced herself to meet his gaze again. “Yes. I left it for you.”
The floor seemed to tilt.
Thornton gripped the ribbon as though it were the edge of a cliff keeping him from falling. “Why?”
She shut her eyes. “Because… it said what I could not.”
He eased a little closer. “About what? Is this to do with your brother?”
Her eyes flew open. “You knew?” she whispered, voice breaking. “You knew it was Frederick?”
He shook his head slowly. “Not then. Not that night. But I knew after your father's death. Higgins spoke of your brother. Bell told me enough to understand the truth.” His jaw clenched. “I honored what you did. I always honored it. And this—” he lowered the ribbon to her palm. “This was what… your gratitude?”
She gasped in denial. “No! I suppose… yes, gratitude was a piece of it. But it was more because I… I honored you, too.”
He tilted his head. “You did?”
She nodded. “Because after my brother escaped—after you protected me when you had every reason to condemn me—I wanted nothing more than to share with you the truth, because I believed I could trust you with it. That you deserved it, even if you did not wish to hear it.”
She sniffed, her fingers running over the stitching. “I wanted to tell you… what I could not say aloud then. That I understood your duty. Your care for me, and for my family. And—and what it cost you.”
He caught her hand and raised the ribbon between them. The embroidered words trembled in the silvery light of the window.
We must remember that we fight not for ourselves alone.
His voice cracked. “You stitched this for me.”
“Yes.”
His voice deepened in disbelief. “Forme?”
“No one else,” she whispered, a tear slipping down her cheek.
“Miss Hale,” he said, voice breaking entirely, “do you—do you mean what you said just now? In the folio? In your offer?” His breath came unevenly. “Do you want me? Not the mill. Not the arrangement. Do you wantme?”
She pressed a hand to her mouth, her shoulders trembling with the effort not to collapse under the truth. But he gently tugged it away, aching to hear her voice.
“Yes,” she gasped. “Yes. I want you.”
The world stopped. Tears spilled hotly down his face, unnoticed, unwanted, unstoppable.
“Then God forgive me,” he whispered, stepping toward her, “but I cannot live another hour not being yours.”
Her breath caught on a sobbing little laugh. “Truly?”
He knelt.
Not because he planned it,
Not because the moment required it,
