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“Your hair is splendid.”
“Perhaps. I happen to like the color. Butyourpreference is for black.”
“Where is this coming from?”
“Everyone knows. They all talk about it. Charlotte, for example. When we visited her summer before last, she worked devilishly hard on a match between you and an exquisite beauty with black hair.”
Charlotte was his cousin—their mothers had been sisters. But the Farringtons had taken her in when she was a girl and he was an infant, so they’d grown up together, close as siblings. He’d adored his tall, gangly, redheaded “sis” from the start, and she’d doted on him in return. Like Euphemia, she was a bit clumsy, her long limbs sometimes knocking his hat off his head. From an early age, he’d learned to accommodate her mishaps, teaching himself to anticipate trajectories and catch things mid-topple. But, as fond as he was of his cousin, he hadn’t appreciated her matchmaking schemes, and he’d quietly told her so after realizing what she had in mind.
“Charlotte is like a sister to me, as you know,” he said. “But even sisters make miscalculations. I spent a few hours at her neighbor’s house party, most of which involved garden chess, peach tarts, and my nephew extorting me shamelessly. The remainder of our fortnight in Northumberland I spent in the company of a different woman. Do you recall who that was?”
A heartbeat passed. “Me.”
“Right.”
“But that’s only because I’m your secretary.”
“How many gentlemen do you suppose take their secretaries along on a family visit in Northumberland?”
More silence. “None?”
“Right. How many gentlemen do you suppose purchase a cloak and muff for their secretaries to foolishly leave behind in London?”
“Only one,” she whispered.
“Right.”
“This can’t be true. You cannot possibly be…”
“In love with you?” His chuckle was laced with despair. “Good God, woman. I’ve loved you since Bergamo.”
She gasped. Staggered backward. Shook her head.
“Careful. We wouldn’t want a repeat of your innyard tumble.”
“Is this why you took me everywhere with you? Even to that dreadful market in Tangier?”
He smiled dryly. “I’ve always said, a treasure hunter is lost without his necessities.”
She wandered closer.Crunch, crunch, crunch. Huff, huff, huff.“You consider me… necessary?”
“As my own heart.”
A strange little half-cry squeaked from her. More tears caught the light—which somehow was growing brighter. Greener. Her eyes squeezed shut. Her fingers covered her lips. “Andrew,” she choked.
“I shall give you the letter,” he murmured, his heart twisting. Breaking. “You may do with it as you will. Burn it. Keep it. Send it to the parish rector.”
“Dear heavens,” she breathed.
“I’ll help you obtain a new position, if that is your wish. Butmywish is to remain your husband. In my heart, you’ve been my wife for a good while longer than one day.”
She panted, her breaths pluming white, her whisper of a nose pinkened from tears and cold. In a rosewater rush, she plastered herself against him, slid her arms inside his coat to grip his waist, and buried her face in his cravat.
Shock rocked him on his heels. Slowly, he wrapped her up tight. Tighter. They stood that way, holding each other, for long minutes. The only sounds were their breaths and the distant thunder of waves striking high cliffs.
“Andrew,” she murmured, her voice muffled by linen and wool. “Look at the sky.”
He blinked. Glanced up. The stars had all but disappeared. In their place was light. Brilliant green waved like a banner. Violet ribbons rippled at the edges. The lights undulated. Danced. Luminescence painted the black sky and white snow green and red and purple.
