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But Sophie stubbornly shook her head. “You love me, Gabe. You said as much just a moment ago. And I do so love you.”
Gabe tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “Idolove you, that’s why I’d never ruin you, Sophie. You can’t come to Cumberland with me. It’s completely out of the question.”
“What if I want you to ruin me?” she said before she lost her bravado. Goodness, it was a suggestion she had never imagined she’d make. But what other choice did she really have? “My cousin, Arabella, she recently eloped in Scotland with Lord Avery. I don’t see any other path for us, so I think we should follow their lead.”
“Sophie,” Gabe’s low voice deepened even further. “Didn’t you hear anything I told you just now? If anyone should discover that my parents’ marriage was never legal…”
Sophie grasped his hands in hers. “Gabriel, Prideaux, do you honestly think me so weak in constitution that I would let your father’s unconscionable actions keep me from you?” If he did think such foolish thoughts, he didn’t know her nearly as well as she thought he did.
He squeezed her hands in return, sending warmth and tingles racing through Sophie as his warm hazel eyes searched her face for…something. “Sophia Hampton, do you honestly think me such a cad that I would jeopardize your good name by allowing you to align yourself with me?”
What a ridiculous thing to say. “It would be better for me to align myself with someone I don’t love and spend the rest of my life pining for you? Is that the future you’d rather subject me to? A miserable existence to be sure.”
He shook his head slightly. “I thought you and Greywood—”
Sophie gasped. Goodness! How had she forgotten about Mr. Greywood?
“What is it?” Gabe’s brow furrowed.
“I completely forgot he was going to take me for a ride in the park today. I do hope Charlotte put him off.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Sophie shook her head. “If he bumped into Papa, they might already be looking for me. But if Charlotte found him instead, she’d never give me away, and we’ll have plenty of time to get a head start before Papa realizes I’m gone.”
Gabe breathed out a beleaguered sigh. “Sophie, you cannot ask me to jeopardize your good name. I—”
“I’m not going back, Gabe. I am not. We love each other, and that is that.” She shrugged. ”So we’ll head to Scotland first. It’s not that much further than Cumberland, and then we’ll double back to your cottage after we’ve said our vows.”
“You don’t even know where in Cumberland we’re going.”
Well, that was true, but completely beside the point. “Wherever it is, it’s closer to Gretna Green than we are right now. You asked for my hand once. Don’t you still want it?”
“I want more than just your hand. I always have.”
And the first bit of joy bubbled up inside her. Together. They were going to do this together, no matter what, and come what may. She tugged him back to his feet. “Then come with me to Scotland, Gabe. Let’s leave right now while we still have a head start.”
CHAPTER 15
Gabe was foxed, but not so foxed that he didn’t understand what she was asking. Elope with her in Scotland? Tie her irrevocably to him for the rest of her life? If only he could agree. He’d have Sophie in his life and in his bed for the rest of his days. She was already in his heart, there was no shaking her from there, no matter the time nor the distance that had separated them. But he loved her too much to seal her fate with such ill-advised recklessness. One of them had to be levelheaded, and even with him deep in his cups, that chore fell to Gabe.
“You know we can’t do that, Soph.” He tipped her chin up so she had to meet his gaze. “Scottish weddings aside, if the truth about my parents ever comes out, you wouldn’t be received anywhere. You’d be a pariah. I won’t see that future for you.”
But Sophie,hisSophie, was not to be so easily deterred, and she met his gaze with a stubborn glint in her eyes. “If,” she stressed the word. “Ifit’s discovered. But I will not give you up on the chance somethingmighthappen. Your brother assumed the earldom over three years ago. Don’t you think if someone was going to call him out as a fraud they would have done so then?”
Well, Beckbury had promised not to say a word as long as Gabe left Hampton Hall and washed his hands of Sophie in the process. But there had to be others their fathers had served with, someone else who knew of Charles Prideaux’s first and legal wife. There was no guarantee that everyone who knew the truth would hold their tongues forever. “We can’t take that risk, sweetheart.”
Sophie heaved a frustrated sigh. “Every moment we stay here, is another moment we are giving Papa to catch us, Gabe.”
“You aren’t listening to me.”
“I am.” She frowned up at him. “Butyouaren’t listening to me. I love you, Gabriel Prideaux. I always have. And I will not sacrifice my future with you because of something that may never come to pass. It isn’t fair to me. It isn’t fair to either of us, and—”
“There’s a very good likelihood—”
“And…” Sophie pitched her voice higher to talk over him. “Even if it does come to pass and I am tossed from each and every drawing room in Mayfair, I will still haveyouwhich is all I’ve ever really wanted.”
Dear God, he loved her. Gabe couldn’t help but smile at her declaration. She’d always been so full of fire and energy, and if he—
