Page 138 of A Much Maligned Miss

“I was happy too,” he admitted, covering her hand with his, “but my happiness was mixed with the consequences of my own bad decisions. You would not marry me and that hurt like hell, but I did not suffer anything I did not deserve,” he added, seeing her stricken expression.

“No, Gervaise, that is not true—”

“It is true,” he said simply. “Initially I behaved badly toward you, and I was punished accordingly. It was no more than my just deserts.”

“Gervaise, I hope you do not think that I was meting out punishment to you, like some—”

“Strict governess?” he asked teasingly. “But you know I like that aspect of you.”

“Even so, I—when I refused you, it was not because, well, due to any lack of”—she floundered for a moment, uncertain of her words and turning rather pink—“regard on my part,” she concluded in a strangled voice.

“I should have told you that I loved you long before this,” he interrupted with a directness that seemed to calm her. “If I had, you might have trusted me.” He hesitated, threading his fingers through hers. “That day you first refused me, when you told me that I would tire of you, I should have told you then why that could never happen. But it wasn’t until after that that I realized what I felt for you was not just infatuation.”

“Infatuation?” Caroline whispered. “You really thought you were infatuated…with me?”

“Oh, I knew I was. I just didn’t know it was a permanent state of affairs.”

“I feel the same way,” she responded with gratifying promptness.

“You do?” She nodded and he lifted her hand, kissing her palm. “When we revisit my proposal,” he began tentatively, “I now know when it should have been.”

“When?”

“That first morning I met you at the bottom of your drive. On the way to St. Ives.”

Caroline did not look convinced. “I was terrified that morning,” she reminded him. “With a queasy stomach and a pounding head.”

“All the more reason for you to swiftly accede to my plans.”

She gave a gurgle of laughter. “That does not sound a very romantic scenario for us to play out.”

“No? But the night before you were not in your right mind, so…”

“A terrace on a cold night in March does not sound a much better prospect in any case,” she agreed.

“Then when? When should it have been?” he demanded. “How about that first time you woke up in my bed?” he suggested, daring her to remember the occasion.

“You mean, at The White Hart?” she asked. He nodded. “I don’t know… In any case, by the time you woke up I was already dressed and drinking ginger tea.” She flashed him a wry look. “You were irritable and out of sorts, if memory serves.”

“Probably because you fled the covers before I so much as opened my eyes.”

She snorted. “I don’t believe you thought me remotely attractive at that point.”

“Then you believe wrong. I was extremely attracted to you that night on the terrace,” he said, trailing a hand down the ruffles of her nightgown. “You were a revelation, but you were also intoxicated so I behaved myself.” Caroline cleared her throat.

“Besides,” he said before she could remind him she had been most unwell at The White Hart. “When we revisit the scene, I could wake first, lusty and amorous and much struck by the beauty lying beside me.”

“Really?” She sounded more interested now. “Now that…might have possibilities.”

“Distinct possibilities,” he agreed.

“Shall we explore them now?” she asked, robbing him of all breath.

57

Gervaise had stripped with gratifying haste, and they now lay under the covers together, facing each other.

“I’m waking first this time, remember?” he said.