“If you keep going, I will chase you. I will not stop chasing and pleading with you to let me hold you…to let me love you until the end of our days. Nothing will make me give up. I do not care about pride or even the possibility of being shattered. Because I know you…and what I know is that you are a lady of quality, of kindness, of patience, of boldness, of courage, of love…a woman who would walk beside the man she loves with only one thought…and that is to live her happiest life with him and their children.”
The curtains dropped, and her face disappeared. Something dark tore through his heart, and he rushed forward, but then she was there jumping out of the carriage into the rain without waiting for the steps to be knocked down. Such relief pulsed through him, he swayed.
“Hugh?” she questioned softly, her steps hesitant.
He would have given anything for her to rush to his side once more, her face flushed and enlivened. A puckered brow stared back at him with caution, her hovering distance felt like a thousand miles and not just a few steps.
“Please…please do not leave, do not ever leave, for I would not be able to bear not sharing the joys of life with you.”
“Leave you?” She pressed a hand over her chest. “Did you not get my letter?”
“I got it.”
Confusion knitted her brows. “All two pages?”
He lifted the single piece of paper that had been crumpled in his grip.
“Hugh—”
“I love you.”
She stared at him, just stared, her face carefully contained. Did she understood what he said? What if because he had never said the words, she did not know the sign that communicated it? He thumped a fist against his chest and peered at her through the sleeting rain.
“I love you.”
The motion was almost violent, but he felt desperate that she should understand. “I was afraid. Afraid of loving you…afraid of love…because I thought what I knew of it only led to pain. But everything with you is the opposite. You are my reason. My weakness. My strength. You are my joy, Phoebe. The happiness you seek in life, I see it every day in your smiles, in your eyes, in the way you touch me…the way you kiss me, the way you hold me against your body.”
She took a step back, and his heart cracked.
“How detestable I’ve been to treat you with indifference when I so desperately love you. I conceived marriage to be my duty to my father, who scarified much for me, and nothing more. I did not believe in love…in truth, I did not think about it, for it was insignificant to everything I envisioned for my life. I must have fallen lamentably short of all your expectations with my distance. These last few weeks how I’ve held myself from you sinks me quite below reproach, especially since…the moment you sent me your first letter, against everything I’ve experience and learned, I was captivated.”
She took a small step toward him, her lips parted, and her palm pressed against her heart. Her bonnet hung limply on her head, and her dress had soaked.
Their gaze collided. And he realized then it had been weeks since she looked him directly in the eye.
“My feelings are unalterable. I love you…desperately. You are my reason, Phoebe…and you have been from the very first letter…it just took me a while to know it.”
She rushed to him and flung herself at him. Hugh did not care her momentum had toppled him over into the muddy earth. It only mattered that she was on top of him, staring down at him, heartbreaking love glowing in her eyes.
He closed his eyes in abject relief. She kissed his lids, the warmth of her breath, the loving touch of her hand against his cheek burning away the cold.
“I love you, Hugh.” He felt the shape of her words against his lips, and they burrowed deep inside his heart.
He cupped her cheek and kissed her tenderly, barely brushing his lips over hers. And I’ll ensure you never regret it, my love.
…
Later that night, Hugh slipped from the sleeping arm of his wife. He paused when she muttered, twisted, and flung one of her legs over his, trapping him. With a smile, he gently arranged her and eased from the bed. After quickly dressing in his trousers and shirt, he left the room and made his way to the library. He drew up to see Caroline there, curled on the sofa, reading a book. She glanced up when she saw him.
“It is frightfully late.”
She wrinkled her nose. “I could not sleep. Why are you here?”
He padded over to the large desk and look down. “Phoebe had mentioned the letter she wrote me spanned two pages. I only saw the first one.”
“I know,” Caroline said softly with a smile.
Hugh stilled. It was then he recalled she had been the one to frantically alarm him that Phoebe had left him.