“A bit shorter than a mile if one crosses the nearby park,” she explained as one of her fingers lazily circled his nipple.
“Did you walk alone?” he asked, though his mind was beginning to consider a more pleasurable activity.
“Mr. Holt escorted me.” She lightly kissed said nipple and, for a moment, Navan forgot their conversation completely. “Then I saw Mrs. Dove-Lyon on my return.” Her tongue made another circle. “She was very kind to me.”
Navan’s face screwed up in displeasure and all thoughts of intimacies raced away. “Mrs. Dove-Lyon spoke to you in a public park? That does not sound of the lady’s nature. I doubt she would speak to me in a public setting, nor would I be expected to speak to her. It is just not done, Annalise.”
“There were not many around,” his wife said in her defense. “I was glad she did.” Then she suddenly clapped her hand over her mouth as she sat up suddenly.
He lifted himself upward on his elbow. “My dear, why were you glad Mrs. Dove-Lyon spoke to you before others?”
“It is not important,” she declared. “I am not one of those wives.”
“Those wives?” he asked as he also pushed himself to a seated position. “I require an explanation.”
“It is nothing. I am fine,” she said, but tears flooded her eyes. “I am not so unaffected.”
“Why is it necessary for you not to be unaffected, my lady?” he asked in hard tones.
As she stood, she gathered her dressing gown and slid it over her shoulders, but she did not look at him. With her back turned, she said through her sobs, “Mrs. Dove-Lyon demanded that… that… another woman…”
He left the bed to stand behind her. He laced his arms about her to provide comfort. “Another woman?” he encouraged.
“I should have known,” she sobbed. “When I presented Madame Emmeline,” she sniffed loudly, “your card,”—another sniffle—“she said she once was employed by another…” A deep sigh. “She had seen your card previously for another…”
Navan swallowed his own sigh. “I released her, Annalise, more than a month before I asked you to be my wife.” He would personally strangle Julia Baldwin for bringing harm to his Annalise. “I do not love her. I love you.”
She turned suddenly. “You love me?” she asked as she threw her arms about his neck.
“Of course I love you,” he admitted reluctantly. Navan had always been afraid to love anyone unconditionally, for those he held in tenderness always left him behind.
“I love you also.”
She waited as if she wanted the words to sink in. Her mouth settled into a stubborn line, and Navan could not resist the smile forming on his lips.
He pushed her long hair behind her ears. “The Valkyrie has awakened at last. A warrior maiden who will decide my fate and bring me happiness, rather than Odin’s hell.”
“I do not think a married woman can be considered a maiden,” she warned with a bit of a tease.
“Either way,” he asserted, “all that matters is you love me, and you cannot be rid of me so easily as one might suppose.”
