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Gabe lifted Sophie’s hand to his lips and pressed a kiss against her knuckles. “You cannot know how sorry I am about that. I will—”
“It was hardly your fault,” she said softly as the door to the coach opened. After all, if Papa had said yes all those years ago, she never would have been apart from Gabe for even a day.
“I am still sorry all the same,” Gabe replied. Then he climbed from the carriage and lifted his hand back inside to assist her to the ground. “And I will spend my life making it up to you.”
Her father had quite a bit to make up for, honestly. Threatening Gabe with revealing the secret about his parents’ marriage. She’d always thought her father to be the most honorable of men. But his dealings with Gabe hardly spoke to the lofty pillar Sophie had once put her father atop.
Gabe glanced at the coachman and said. “Just a few hours, right?”
Lumley agreed with a nod. “Indeed, Major. And if we maintain the pace we’ve set today. We can reach the border by tomorrow evening.”
Tomorrow evening. Sophie would arrive at Gretna Green tomorrow evening and then, after all their years apart, they’d finally be husband and wife. It was quite the surreal thought.
“Perfect.” Gabe smiled at the servant in farewell as he led Sophie into the taproom.
The establishment was quite the raucous place, filled to the brim with locals and travelers alike. Everyone had a pint of something and it was difficult for Sophie to even hear her own thoughts over the din. Gabe leaned across the bar and said something to the barkeeper. Sophie managed to make out the word wife but nothing else.
The barkeeper nodded, then reached under the counter, retrieving a key that he offered to Gabe. He gestured toward a set of steps and muttered indiscriminate directions that Sophie didn’t have a prayer of understanding. Gabe must have heard every word, however, as he pocketed the key and led Sophie in the direction that the barkeeper had indicated.
After they climbed the stairs and arrived at a landing, the noise from below was diminished some. Sophie glanced up at the oh-so-handsome major. “I can’t believe you heard anything he said. It was so loud down there.”
Gabe smiled. “I’ve a lot of practice hearing things over cannon fire, love.”
Oh, she supposed that did make sense.
He squeezed her fingers and escorted her down the corridor until they arrived at a particular door. Gabe retrieved the key from his pocket, opened the door and then gestured Sophie over the threshold. In the waning light, he opened a flint box and lit a nearby lamp, swathing the small chamber in a warm glow.
“You told him I was your wife,” Sophie said as she eyed the small bed in the corner of the room. It was a far cry from her bed at Beckbury House. And it would certainly be tight fit for the two of them.
Gabe came up behind her and squeezed Sophie’s shoulders with his hands. “You will be that tomorrow.” His touch made ripples of awareness wash over her and Sophie closed her eyes, relishing in the sensation. “Certainly better if all those fellows down there think you’re already Mrs. Prideaux.”
Sophia Prideaux, a name Sophie had once repeated over and over in her mind as though willing it to be hers could somehow make it true. And tomorrow it finally would be. She shivered in anticipation at the thought.
“Are you cold?” Gabe asked softly, his deep voice enveloping her in the tiny room and turning her insides to mush.
Sophie shook her head. “Just thinking about the fact that I’ll finally be yours tomorrow.”
His lips found the side of her neck, heating her all the way down to her toes. “You’ve always been mine.”
How true that was. She smiled in agreement. “And I always will be.” She spun around to face him. How wonderful he was in every single way. “Will you make me yours tonight?” She’d been wondering that the last several hours along the road, but hadn’t spoken those words aloud until now.
A flickering of desire sparked in his hazel eyes. “I want you more desperately than my next breath of air.” But then he shook his head. “However after the way my father went about things in his life, I won’t have anyone question my respect for you.” He released a breath as he captured both of her arms with his hands. “When you’re finally mine in name, I’ll take all of you, but not until then, even if it kills me in the meantime.”
There was something so romantic in that. No one would ever know what happened between them this night. Only the two of them who had always loved each other, who had pined for the other while they were separated. And yet, there was more than love between them, more than desire…He wantedherto know he respected her. She was, after all, the only one who would know he’d been a gentleman along their journey. But that, it seemed, was everything. And that warmed her more than anything else in the world ever had.
Sophie stepped closer to Gabe, and his hands slid down her arms until he intertwined his fingers with hers. “I love you, Gabriel Prideaux, with my entire heart. And there is no man I have ever respected more.”
He dipped his head down and kissed her like he had so many times in the carriage that day. Heat pooled within Sophie and her nipples tightened against her borrowed homespun dress. Goodness tomorrow could not come soon enough.
After a moment, Gabe lifted his head and smiled down at her. “We should get some sleep. It’ll be a long day tomorrow.”
Sophie agreed with a nod and climbed under the counterpane on the small bed. It was lumpy and uncomfortable, quite possibly the worst bed she’d ever come across, but she didn’t care in the least, not when Gabe unbuttoned his regimental jacket and folded it over the back of a nearby chair. She’d never seen him in his shirtsleeves. He was quite noteworthy, all muscles, broad shoulders and that bit of skin she saw at his neck was rather mesmerizing.
Gabe sat on the edge of the bed and tugged his boots from his feet before finally leaning back beside Sophie. “The bed’s not very big, is it?”
Sophie turned on her side and rested her head on Gabe’s chest. It was so comforting listening to the steady beat of his heart beneath her ear. “I don’t mind.”
“Neither do I.” He squeezed her to him and she couldn’t help but smile against his chest.
