Page 71 of Love and Other Disasters

Sophie gulped, looking at him and still trying not to cry. “This changes everything.”

“Yes, I’m sure it does. You have better options than remaining here as a governess. You can do anything your heart desires. You always could though.”

Sophie hurried to Jasper, caught his face in her hands, and pulled him down until his lips were inches from hers. He looked surprised. “Thank you, partner,” she whispered.

She could be Jasper’s mistress and continue their affair now.

He grinned back at her and then kissed the tip of her nose. “You are very welcome, Sophie Regina Radcliffe,” he promised, settling his hands on her hips. “Now, I find myself in need of your wise counsel again. There is yet another thorny issue that I desperately need a solution for. I’m certain you will know what I should do.”

She smiled at him. How far they’d come from those months when they’d disliked each other so much that they couldn’t have a civil conversation. They were truly becoming the best of friends. A pity that would change, with her return to London even more pressing now. But she could go back to London and hope to see him sometimes and still help Jasper build his fortune, and madam’s, too. “Anything? What can I do to help you now?”

Jasper took up her hand again. “I am not sure of how to proceed about a matter of great delicacy.” There was a hint of a bashful smile on his face now, and he threaded her fingers through his and squeezed her hands tightly. “Tell me what a rake must do to discover if the woman he admires, loves, most in the world might consider marrying him one day?”

Chapter Twenty-One

For a moment, Jasper feared Sophie might faint. She must not have imagined what had been growing in his heart for some time because of her influence and friendship. He had not believed himself capable of such love, either, until it had almost been too late to declare himself her man. But he did not want Sophie to marry anyone other than him. Jasper wanted Sophie to be his forever, and not as his secret lover or mistress while she tended other people’s children or the business of the brothel. He wanted her to have her own children and career. And he wanted to be there to support her in every endeavor.

“I… I…” she stammered.

“Too much of a surprise?”

“Well, yes,” she said, and then rushed away to pick up Isabelle, who had started to complain that no one paid her any notice.

Jasper wanted Sophie to belong with him here at the palace or anywhere else she cared to live. As long as he could be somewhere nearby, he thought he could be happy with just the crumbs of her attention, too. It had nothing to do with the money she would inherit from Madam Clover. That would not come for years and years, if he had any say. Money hadn’t influenced his decision one bit. But falling in love had.

Even if she said no today, he would stand by her decision and ensure she saw her London friends and complied with the old madam’s last wishes in the end. He would not let her responsibilities be stolen away from her, as Nash must surely have intended to do all along. Why else hide correspondence discussing an inheritance? Was it any wonder Madam Clover had been concerned enough to come looking for Sophie, too?

He took Isabelle from her. “What do you want in a man, Sophie?”

“I have it,” she promised, tickling the little girl under the chin, and leaning into him. “What more do you want, Jasper?”

So, so much, but something remarkably simple, too. He caught her eye. “Everything, but what I want most amounts to two things—you and us.”

“Us?”

“Just as we are, with a little more us, perhaps.” He nodded and decided there was no point dithering over the right wording or waiting for a better time. “Marry me, Sophie. Become a doting aunt, but be my partner in all things forevermore. Travel to London with me or without me to visit your friends. They are your family. I respect you and them. Ravenswood will never be your prison again.”

Sophie grew still, and then her breath rushed out of her. “I thought you were set against marriage.”

“I just hadn’t spent enough time with the right woman. There is no one better suited to giving me all this than you,” he said, sweeping his hand out to encompass her and the children nearby.

This was everything. Family, responsibilities, and the passion of a surprising love that had come out of nowhere. Caught him so much by surprise that he had not known what to do about it soon enough.

“I never knew I needed this before you showed me what was missing from my life. I will, of course, maintain some rakish tendencies, but be warned, I plan to divert them entirely to your seduction. I will steal you away from your responsibilities to have fun with me alone often, I suspect. We will follow your rules or none at all. I leave the choice entirely for you.”

A pair of small hands landed on his thigh, and he found his nephew Liam asking to be picked up. Jasper lifted him and deposited him on his hip, so the boy was face to face with them all. Thomas arrived next, standing close but a little apart. He’d not quite recovered his composure from when Jasper had given him a stern talking to. He gestured the boy closer and was gratified when he was hugged by the child. “What do you say, Sophie? Care to take a long walk with me and see where we end up together?”

“We are going to the woods,” Liam reminded him. “Thomas would really like to go with us, too.”

Laura could be there at this time of day, too. He’s spotted her at the edge of the woods again yesterday, but she’d ridden off before he could have a hope of reaching her. If the children were with him, and they were on foot, she might just come out at last.

He glanced at Sophie. “I don’t know. You’ll have to ask Sophie if she could bear the long walk today.”

He arched a brow, waiting for her response to taking a trip to the woods and to the prospect of marrying him one day as well. She still seemed a little shocked that he’d offered, to be honest. He would give her as much time as she required to decide. She had been the recipient of two proposals in one day. Only one of them had come from a place of love. She’d been disappointed in love before, and he could understand her hesitation to commit herself to another rake. Marriage had never been his priority, but Sophie was now. He would let her come to her decision in her own good time.

He dropped Liam to his feet and adjusted Isabelle in his arms. The little girl was such an amusing bundle of joy, but became heavy after a while. He’d like to hold her as long as he could until he had his own. A child who represented the best of him and all of Sophie, because to him, there was no better woman to be found anywhere.

Jasper presented his arm to Sophie, and after a moment, she hooked hers through it. Her grip grew tighter as they proceeded downstairs together and stepped outside into the sunshine without encountering his brothers. When they started moving away from the palace, she did not release him, but held fast and stayed close.