“Now, now,” Darius said gently, “we got her to Italy, and she was reasonably content there. The talk died down, and Frommer’s people were decent about it, too.”
“I suppose,” Trent said slowly. Decent enough to ignore a woman who’d legally become part of their family. “But back to my point.”
“Your confession, rather.”
“Fine, call it a confession, because that’s what it is. I am relieved to pass Leah off to Reston, and I did much less for her than you did. I would like to pass the rest of our family’s situation along to him as well, just not quite yet.”
“I’d prefer to do that before the ceremony, not after, but I can’t argue with you as strenuously as I ought,” Darius said. “Leah deserves to know the truth, and like you, I want to be out from under the deceptions of the past, but we need to take Reston’s measure first. Let him and Leah get used to their married state and perhaps bury the man’s father.”
Trent ran a hand through his hair. “Hadn’t thought of that. Suppose that will be a bit of a distraction.”
“Suppose. You ready for another drink?”
Trent hesitated. He was trying to moderate his drinking, which was growing steadily greater in quantity.
“Half,” he said, reluctant to leave his brother drinking alone. Darius pursed his lips and nodded, leaving Trent with the conviction Darius saw more than he let on.
Leah was going to hate them. There was no way on earth the truth could come out without Leah being mortally put out with both of her brothers—and that would kill Darius more quickly than any penchant for vice and crime.
When Darius brought the decanter over, Trent grabbed the neck of the bottle and held it over his glass until the tumbler was full to the brim.
Leah drifted in a comfortable, contented fog, the rocking of the carriage and the warmth of her husband’s embrace soothing her into a drowsy, post-wedding lassitude. Nick must have been dozing as well, for he’d gone silent before they’d even left Town, and as darkness had fallen, he’d kept his peace.
Leah could not quite sleep, but because the seat was well upholstered and considerably deeper than any she’d seen before, she was content to doze. Her brother Darius’s words of parting after the wedding breakfast kept ringing in her memory:
Had that been the sum total of Aaron’s interest in her? Leah told herself it wasn’t, that Aaron had been genuinely fond of her and as considerate as a very young man could be. But Darius—damn his too-knowing brown eyes—had a valid point as well. Aaron Frommer had been fond of dramatics too, and of feeling victimized by his place as a marquess’s fourth son. He had been making a play for his father’s attention by riding to Leah’s rescue, trying to assert his independence while proving he’d not achieved it, in truth.
She curled down onto Nick’s chest more snugly, thinking this was an admission she could make because Nick had married her, and married her knowing her past and accepting it.
Accepting her.
“Penny for them?” Nick’s voice vibrated under her ear, and his hand came through the darkness to rest on her cheek. “I’ll light the lamps, if you insist.”
“I’m fine without them. I was thinking you are uncharacteristically silent.”
“Tired,” Nick said softly, his fingers feathering over each of her features in turn. “And worried about my father.”
“You felt his absence today at the wedding,” Leah guessed, closing her eyes beneath Nick’s explorations.
“I felt that, and his presence, his approval. He would like you, Leah. Approve of you. He
“You say that as if you’re sure.” Leah turned her head so Nick’s fingers could wander more easily.
“I didn’t realize his approval was a factor until Ethan pointed out Bellefonte would get on with you swimmingly.”
“What are you doing?” Leah asked, stifling a yawn.
“Touching my wife’s face. You met Magda? She’s older than she looks, probably older than Della. Her parents lived into their nineties.”
“I’ve never met anyone who lived so long.”
“Her father lost his sight early in life,” Nick went on, “and she used to tell me about him touching her mother this way. Magda said she was closer to him as a child, because he could tell her mood by the way her feet hit the stairs on their porch, by the way she came through the door, by the feel of her hand in his, or the sound of her exhalations. I’ve been fascinated by that, by the thought that her father knew his daughter so well.”
“A blind hound often does well enough, provided he had some sighted years first.”
This was a new facet to Nicholas Haddonfield, this thoughtful, quiet man with excruciatingly gentle hands. Leah tried to tell herself it was yet more of his cozening, but the notion simply wouldn’t wash.
Nick’s thumb brushed over her lips. “Maybe someday when I am an old, blind hound, I will know your moods by touch, sound, and instinct, Leah Haddonfield, and perhaps you shall even know mine.”
In the soft darkness of the spring night, Nick sounded so wistful, and his hands were so tender as they skimmed and caressed and danced across her face, she felt a lump constrict her throat. Maybe Darius had been right, and this misbegotten union might flower into something real and lovely and permanent.
“I would like that, Husband.” Leah turned her cheek into his palm and kissed the heel of his hand. “I would like, someday, to know you by instinct.”
Leah drifted off, content in Nick’s embrace, and did not wake up until he was hefting her into his arms and trying to extricate her from the coach without disturbing her.
“Nicholas, I can walk.”
“Nonsense,” Nick said, shifting as he freed her from the coach. “I will carry you over this threshold, for it’s one we own. Belle Maison, thank God, is still in my father’s hands.”
Leah did not protest, though she wanted to. With his talk of blind fathers, dying fathers, and thresholds that “we” owned, he was looping one thread of longing after another around Leah’s heart.
“My lord, my lady.” An old fellow standing by the mounting block bowed and picked up his lantern. “Congratulations, and welcome to Clover Down. The lad will light your way.”
Nick nodded his thanks as the coachmen steered their conveyance around to the carriage house and a young footman held up a second lantern to illuminate the front steps of the manor house. The butler opened the door, offered them congratulations and welcome, and was quickly waved off to bed. Leah gained her feet only when Nick had deposited her in the master bedroom, which to her surprise boasted an enormous tub of steaming, rose- scented water.
“A lookout was no doubt posted,” Nick said, “and the water kept heating in the laundry until we were spotted. Your staff wants you to feel welcome.”
“I most assuredly feel welcome. Perhaps you’d like to go first?”
“We can share. Because this is our wedding night, I will be your lady’s maid.”
Leah turned and offered him her back, thinking how odd it was, to be so casually intimate with Nick once again, and how nonchalant he seemed with the whole business.
“I feel as if I’m watching some woman who looks like me embark on her married life with a man who resembles Nicholas Haddonfield,” Leah said, her back to her spouse.
Nick’s fingers made short work of the myriad buttons on Leah’s wedding dress. “Maybe married life, if it’s to be successful, is no different from the rest of one’s life, or it shouldn’t be.”
“This feels different,” Leah decided, “but not strange.” She turned, the back of her dress gaping, and lifted her hands to Nick’s chin.
“Hold still,” she said, unfastening his sapphire pin and untying the elaborate knot in his cravat. Without pausing, she undid the buttons of his waistcoat, and then relieved him of his sleeve buttons, which also sported inset sapphires.
“You do clean up well, Nicholas.”
“You aren’t going to stop now, are you? I am hardly ready for my bath.”
