At least she had Effie back.
What a ridiculous thing to think. She didn’t “have him back.” She’d never had him to begin with. He was a treasured correspondent, yes, but he didn’tbelongto her.
Julianna blinked as they stepped into the sunlit street. Tea had felt like an odd, not entirely pleasant interruption in the usual unfolding of time. Although nothing was usual about being here, she supposed.
What now?
“It was a pleasure to meet you, Miss Evans.” Lord Harcourt sketched a bow.
Lord Marsden did likewise. “May we escort you to the Old Ship?”
She looked to Effie, who was back to being a silent, looming presence. She waited a beat. When he did not speak, she said, “Thank you, no. I can make my own way. I want to stop in a shop I passed this morning.” That last bit was a lie. Julianna had neither the money nor the inclination for the shops, but she wanted to get away from the gentlemen as expeditiously as possible.
They said their goodbyes, and just like that, Julianna was walking—alone—back toward the hotel.
Until she wasn’t.
“Wait!”
Her heart leapt as she turned to see Effie loping toward her.
He was back. The silent looming presence from the tea shop was gone and he was just . . . Effie. The relief was profound. But it was shortly followed by something else. Not anger, exactly, because as she’d just thought, Effie was Effie. She truly didn’t give a fig that he was a man, an aristocrat. It was a kind of disappointment, a wariness conferred by the fact of his maleness, and his nobility, having been obscured.
He tripped over a cobblestone but righted himself, skidding to a stop in front of her. “Let’s go sea-bathing!”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Sea-bathing! You have always wanted to try it, have you not?”
“I . . . have.” Though she didn’t remember telling Effie that. It must have been early in their correspondence. Before she’d read and reread every letter. Before she started keeping them in a box under her bed.
“Let us sea-bathe, then!”
She waited for more. A crackpot plan. Or at least a time and direction. He only kept looking at her, grinning.
“Now?”
He couldn’t mean now, could he?
“Why not?”
She looked into his eyes, and they were alive. Dancing in blue and brown. Just the way she’d always thought Euphemia Turner’s eyes would be.
She wasn’t sure why she was surprised by his sea-bathing proposal. Effie was adventurous. Impulsive.
He started toward her as if he were going to take her arm but checked himself. Took a step back. She didn’t like that. It felt like the wrong direction. “Aww, Jules, I’m sorry I was so odd back there. I’m just . . . overcome.”
“By what?”
“What do you mean by what? Byyou, of course!”
Julianna was certain no one had ever been overcome by her before. She could feel her cheeks heating, though she wasn’t sure if it was pleasure or mortification stoking the fire.
She stared at him, hands on her hips, and she gave over caring if to do so appeared odd, or improper. When he began to squirm, she asked, “Did you write all the poems you sent me?”
It was his turn to gasp. “Of course I did. How could you think otherwise?”
She merely had to raise her eyebrows for him to bow his head before her.
