“Yes,” he confessed. “But I shall happily listen to you until dawn’s fingers trace the floor, dear Duchess.”
She propped her chin on her fist and studied his face. He did indeed look as if the events between them had stolen his ability to make complex discourse. “Is that what this does to you? It takes away all your wits? That would explain a great deal about men.”
“Come here, love,” he growled ever so slightly, pulling her tight to him. “Before you denigrate the male species too greatly, I would argue, yes, that many men lose their wits over this particular action between men and women. You? You have made my wits full of dreaming and happiness.”
“Have I?” she gasped.
He nodded. “Yes, in ways that I never expected.”
“Is that a bad thing?” she asked carefully.
“No, Victory.” He slid his hands into her hair, which had spilled free of its bonds. He held it back from her face. Pointedly, he kissed her lips, then said, “I hope you come to love your singularity as much as I do.”
Love…
Love?
The very word sent her thoughts skittering. He didn’t mean it. He was using it hyperbolically. As a term of endearment. But oh, how she wondered what it would be like to be in love!
Dangerous, surely.
All tales warned that falling in love led to the abandonment of all one’s hopes and dreams. And resulted in the banality of wifely duties and babies.
She adored small children. But she was terrified that a true married life would steal her hopes away.
So she declared firmly, “I have had few friends, and I think that I’m beginning to find you to be one.”
He gazed into her eyes and slid his thumb along her bottom lip. “I would be honored to be your friend.”
She smiled at him, tentatively, relieved.
It was true, in any case.
She’d had few friends, few people that she could trust. So few people had wanted to be close to her because she wasn’t someone who could easily fit into society.
Her edges were too rough.
She was too terse. She was too blunt, and she wasn’t made for decoration.
No, she was made for more durable stuff than the gilded and barbed interactions that took place in the ballrooms of the ton.
She’d always liked that about herself, but many people did not.
“I’m glad you like me the way I am,” she said.
“I do, quite a lot.”
“Perhaps we can be happy together,” she suggested, feeling rather hopeful.
“I think you and I together will be as happy as anyone potentially can be.”
She did not pursue that line, but it gave her pause.
They were not the words of a hopeful or optimistic person.
After all, they were the words of someone who was resigned, someone who was cynical. And yet the actions of her husband were those of a hopeful man.
If he was so truly resigned and negative as his statement suggested, he wouldn’t try to help as many people as he did, would he?