Page 95 of The Muse of Maiden Lane

“What do you require?”

“Only you.”

“Only me, acting as your model, you mean.”

“I mean you,” Teddy said. He pressed her hand. “And if anyone ever again has the temerity to insult you, through their rubbish poetry or by any other method, I promise you that henceforward they shall answer to me.”

Stella’s face fractured. She tugged her hand from his, eyes filling with tears.

Teddy moved toward her in swift dismay. “What have I said? I meant to reassure you, not upset you.”

She swiped at her cheeks. “I’m being excessively stupid. It’s only that…no one has ever defended me before, except for my friends. My brother was forever intimating that any insults were my own fault for inspiring them. He said I was too loud and opinionated—”

Teddy was learning to despise Stella’s sanctimonious brother. That anyone should try to dim her brilliance!

He brought his hands to frame her face, halting her speech. She broke off, meeting his gaze with quivering uncertainty. He heard her inhale an uneven breath.

“Be loud,” he told her. “Be opinionated. Be as much yourself as you wish—and then some. Once we’re wed, you and I will answer to no one but each other.”

Stella’s mouth trembled.

His head was already bent to hers. There were but a few inches left between them, taut with mingled breath and heat and the stirring fragrance of lilacs. The temptation was too great to resist. Heart thundering madly, Teddy closed the distance and pressed his lips to hers.

Her eyes fell shut as he captured her mouth. A soft murmur of assent throbbed in her throat.

The sound sent a wild rush of heat through his veins. But he wasn’t precipitate. This was too important. He kissed her again, with passionate deliberation.

She curled her fingers around his wrists as he cradled her face. It wasn’t a restraint. She was holding him to her, not pushing him away. Her lips softened beneath his, warm and sweet, and she was kissing him back, just as she had in Hampshire.

The grubbiness of the house fell away. The grime, the dust, and the grease-streaked, half-boarded windows. There was no one else—not Jennings, nor Teddy’s family, nor any of Stella’s friends. It was only the two of them.

I intend to fall in love with you, she’d said.

But Teddy had already fallen, with no intention whatsoever. He knew that now, beyond all doubt.

At length, he drew back from her. His thumbs moved over the blushing curves of her cheeks—tender, reassuring, distinctly proprietary. She was made to be his. He’d recognized it the first time he saw her.

“So, what say you, my beautiful shining star?” he asked huskily. “Is it a yes?”

Stella gazed back at him. Her lips were swollen, her breath unsteady. Her tear-damp eyes took on a gleam of determination. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, Teddy, I’ll marry you.”

Twenty-Four

The upstairs parlor in the Finchleys’ house in Half Moon Street was a cozy sanctuary, filled with overstuffed chintz sofas and chairs, tassel-trimmed ottomans, and dark wood tables that held towering stacks of leather-bound books and assorted trinkets from the Finchleys’ travels to India and beyond. A small pianoforte sat in the corner, heaped with sheets of music—the works of Chopin and Brahms mixing freely with the latest popular music-hall tunes.

A fire had been lit for the evening. The coals glowed merrily in the grate, casting off more heat than a wood fire.

It had begun to rain again late in the afternoon, not long after Teddy had returned Stella to Brown’s Hotel, the two of them largely at a loss for words after the kiss they’d shared and the agreement they’d come to.

“Shall I write to your brother?” Teddy had asked at last before bidding her goodbye.

She had met his suggestion with a look of alarm. “What on earth for?”

Jennings had cocked his ear from his place in the back of the wagonette, hanging on every word.

Teddy had shot the manservant a quelling look before replying to his newly minted fiancée. “I had the antiquated notion that I should ask his permission.”

“You needn’t,” she had said. “He’s made it very clear that he’s no longer part of my life.”