Page 38 of A Question of Worth

He did not rehearse what he would say. He had tried, in the small hours of last night, sitting in the chair where the decision had first been made, and had found that there were no words adequate to rehearse. Every sentence he constructed had sounded like a speech, and he did not want to give her a speech. He wanted to stand in front of her and say what was true. He would know the words when he saw her face.

His hands rested still on his knees, open and loose, the thumb idle against the palm. The old reflex was absent. He did not miss it.

The carriage slowed. The houses here were set back from the road, their gardens visible through wrought-iron gates. He heard birdsong — a blackbird, clear and insistent — and then the crunch of gravel as the wheels left the paved road and turned into the drive.

Despite his brother's reassurances and his own mounting hopes, Nathaniel could not deny that there was still a curl of anxiety in his stomach as the carriage approached the house. Taking in a deep breath to steady his nerves, he lifted his chin and climbed out of the carriage and walked up the steps to the front of the house.

"Lord Ashcombe here to speak with Miss Fairleigh."

The butler nodded and then gestured down the hallway. "You will find Miss Fairleigh in the gardens, my lord. Might you wish for me to show you the way?"

"No, no. I thank you." His steps led him along the hallway, towards the doors that would lead to the gardens. The doors opened onto gravel, and he heard his own footsteps as he stepped outside — a measured, steady sound that she would not hear from where she stood among the roses. The path curved through beds of early summer colour: delphiniums standing tall against the garden wall, lavender beginning to open along the border, the heavy heads of peonies bowing under their own weight. The morning light lay across it all with the gentleness of a day that has not yet decided whether it will be warm, the air still carrying the coolness of the night before.

He slowed his pace without meaning to. There was no audience here, no ballroom, no watching faces to manage. It was only a garden, and a path, and the sound of his breathing, and the knowledge that she was somewhere ahead of him around the next turning.

She did not see him arrive, her attention taken by the roses. Sunlight caught her hair as she bent over one of the blooms, turning it to pure gold. There was a light smile on her face, no longer the anxious young lady he had first encountered. There was a new happiness about her now; the weight she had carried for so long finally set down to be entirely and completely forgotten.

I love her.

The whisper in his heart was confirmation of his affections, the sensation fierce and overwhelming. He loved her kind heart, her willingness to forgive, her tender hope. Had he not watched her battle against theton's whispers? Had he not seen her quiet courage which, near to breaking, had still survived within her? It had been her strength of mind which had told him to stayback from her, her resolve to put him ahead of herself which had challenged him the most, and had made him see the true beauty of her character. She was extraordinary, and Nathaniel fully believed he would never be able to find another young lady like her.

I do not want to ever step away from her again. I want her to always be beside me.

She looked up, and he was already moving — no pause, no negotiation, no shoulder pulled back at the midpoint. His feet carried him across the garden before his mind had entirely decided to go, and for the first time in as long as he could remember, he did not stop himself. Her smile was so radiant it stole the breath from his lungs, and when he reached her, he took her hand without hesitation, without the old careful distance.

"Eliza." Bowing over it, he pressed a tender kiss to the back of her hand, heat beginning to spiral through him. "How glad I am to see you."

She did not put a hand to her hair. She did not smooth her skirt. Her hands rested at her sides, open and unhurried, and she did not notice their stillness — which was, she would later think, precisely the point.

"And I you." She smiled up at him. "It feels so very strange to have it all at an end, does it not? There is no longer this burden to carry, no longer this confusion that binds my heart and mind."

He did not release her hand. "You must feel a good deal lighter."

"I do." Her eyes twinkled. "When I awoke this morning, I felt so joyous, I practically skipped to the dining room to break my fast. I do not think my aunt has ever seen me in such a frame!"

With a chuckle, Nathaniel pressed her fingers. "I am heartily glad to hear it, Eliza. Truly."

The smile on her face lingered but softened. A silence grew between them as Nathaniel held her gaze, feeling the weight of all he wanted to say settling on his shoulders. It had all seemed so very easy before he had been with her, his thoughts had been settled and uniform. Now, however, looking into her eyes and having her so close to him meant that everything had fallen into disarray.

"I — " Closing his eyes seemed to help him recall exactly what it was he wanted to tell her. "Eliza, when we left the solicitors yesterday afternoon, you stated that you hoped I would still be a part of your future."

There came a short pause. "Yes, I did."

"I did not have opportunity to answer," he continued, opening his eyes to see her blue ones searching his face. "With your inheritance, you are able now to do just as you please, are you not? Without constraint or obligation."

Her free hand lifted and settled on his arm. He felt the warmth of it through his sleeve. "That is so."

"I — I want to tell you that whatever your future may be, whatever hopes and intentions you have for it, I should very much like to be a part of it," he said, the words spilling freely now. "I would not dictate your choices, Eliza, truly. Finally, you have a freedom that is all your own, and I would not dare to take it from you. All the same, I cannot imagine my own life spent alone and without you. You said that you hoped I would be present in your future — Eliza, that is the very same hope that is in my own heart also."

Her breath caught as she closed the distance between them, sending fire shooting into his veins.

"I would not hold back the truth of my heart from you," he finished, his voice catching. "I must tell you how deeply I feel, Eliza. I must tell you just how much I have come to care for you. When you said that we should part, when you told me that youwanted to protect me by placing distance between us, it was then that I felt such a searing pain that it overwhelmed me. I knew then that I could not ever be willingly parted from you."

Eliza did not respond immediately. She was very still — not the old stillness of forced composure, the chin pulled taut, the fingers pressing seams, but a different stillness altogether, one she did not recognise in herself. Something small and old moved in her chest. It was the familiar voice that had followed her since she was a girl sitting in her father's cold parlour whilst he counted what he had lost, the voice that had told her throughout the Season that gratitude was not the same as being chosen.This is not real. This is kindness. He will see clearly in a moment and step back.

Her hands, which had been resting open at her sides, curled slightly — one last reflex of the old grip, the fingers pressing inward as if reaching for a seam that was no longer there. Then she looked at him. His face was entirely unguarded. His hands hung open and visible at his sides. His eyes were on hers and not past them, and there was nothing in his expression that resembled performance or duty or the careful management of appearance. He was simply there.

She let the voice go.