Matthew motioned for her to come to him, and then he whispered something in her ear. She clapped her hands together and grinned. “Mr. Scarper says we can come to London for your wedding and there will be loads of extra ribbons there.” Her eyes beamed. “Is that true?”
Lucy bent down and looked Mandy in the eye. “I will be quite heartbroken if you don’t come. And yes, there will be loads of ribbons.”
“That is wonderful! But mostly, I’d like to meet the queen.”
Mrs. Garvis grabbed her daughter’s hand and pulled her into the house. “Mr. Scarper can’t introduce you to the queen,” she said.
“Yes he can,” Mandy replied, turning back to look at him. “He told me ages ago that he knew her, and that when he went back to London he would introduce me to her. Didn’t you?”
Matthew nodded. “I did.”
Mandy grinned up at her mother. Mrs. Garvis took a moment to examine all of their faces, then sighed. “If Mr. Scarper can get you an audience with the queen, then of course we will let him.”
“Mr. Harrison,” Matthew said to Mrs. Garvis. “It is time you all started calling me Mr. Harrison, or Matthew.”
Mrs. Garvis shook her head as if she expected their news to be declared fraudulent at any moment, but when no such declarations were made, she herded them all into the house.
The sun was already low in the sky when they finished tea. Matthew helped Lucy into the cart and climbed up after her, leaving several inches between them. She looked at the offending space and back at Matthew. “Have I done something to upset you?”
“No.”
She waited for him to elaborate, but he didn’t. He just clicked for Marge to start moving, then sat silently, not touching her at all while Marge made her way out of town.
“Are we revisiting the first week of our deliveries together, when you barely spoke to me?”
He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye and gave her a wicked grin. “No.”
“Then why are you sitting miles away from me?”
“Because.” He shook the reins, urging Marge to pick up her pace. Which she did. Slightly. “When we first set foot in the cart today, I thought it was so I could kiss you. Instead we’ve been talking and visiting with almost everyone in town.”
“You wanted to do that too.”
“I did,” he agreed. “But now, we are only minutes away from being completely out of sight from anyone, and I’d like to be completely out of sight of everyone the next time I touch you.”
“Oh.” The word came out of Lucy’s mouth like a short gust of wind. “I suppose that is all right with me.”
“Are you certain?” he asked. “I’ll most likely be fairly silent once I stop this cart.”
Lucy snickered. “No, you won’t.”
“You think I want to stop this cart so that we can talk? We’ve been talking all day.”
“No, I don’t mind you not talking. I just don’t think you are going to be silent.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“You made the loveliest growling noises earlier…”
His head darted around, his eyes burning against the darkening sky. He looked behind them. They were out of town, but still within eyesight. He clicked his tongue again. Marge, remarkably, started to trot.
His jaw was clenched and his fingers wrapped tightly around the reins for the full two minutes it took for the road to take a turn. Finally they were out of sight of the town. He led Marge off to the side of the road, pulled her to a stop, and dropped her reins as if they weighed hundreds of pounds and he couldn’t carry them a second longer.
He turned to Lucy, grabbed her by the hips and slid her to him. In one quick movement, his mouth was on hers, and just like earlier in Marge’s stall, the whole word faded the moment their lips touched. This side of Matthew was so new to her. Throughout all of their visits in town, he’d kept at least one hand on her, somewhere, and now, the first moment they were alone, his lips were on her as well.
After three years of not knowing her place in the world, Lucy had finally found it in Matthew’s arms. And his arms stayed around her, even when he pulled away a moment later. “Do you know how many fantasies of the two of us in this cart have played over and over in my mind the last few weeks? In the last hour?”
Lucy shook her head.
