“Perhaps not happily,” Gemma said with a playful wince, “but we will do it.”
Lily took the chance to look at her husband again, and his gaze on her was steady, expression unreadable. She managed to smile a little at him and was relieved to receive one in return for her efforts.
Not a great one, or even an obvious one, but there was no denying a smile was there.
The evening proceeded as expected, various dances bringing either amusement or comment, and Lily had no objection to remaining by the wall, never dancing but hardly being ignored. Thomas did not come to her, but as the event wore on, she could see in his face that it was no fault of his own.
What a pair they were. One unwilling to be bold enough to move, the other trapped by his fellows and unable to move should he wish to.
There was no regret when the night was over and it was time to depart. Lily welcomed it gladly, wishing for nothing more than solitude and comfort. Her friends wished her well, their expressions filled with encouragement that she felt bolstered her weary fortitude.
Thomas helped her into the carriage, and they were off toward their London house in a moment, the sound of the carriage wheels and the horses’ hooves echoing more loudly in the silence.
“I must confess, I did not enjoy myself tonight as I had hoped,” Thomas announced without any hint of preamble.
Lily looked at him, wary of his meaning and his energy. “No?”
He shook his head, his eyes dark in the dim light of the coach. “I was rendered immovable by others around me, conversations I could not end, and my attention clamored for unlike anything I’d expected. I lack the character and confidence to brush that all aside in favor of my own wishes.”
“So do I,” Lily told him, her fingers beginning to tremble in her lap. “What did you hope it would be?”
“I’d hoped…” He paused, shaking his head and laughing to himself. “I had hoped to recapture the lightness I’d felt at balls in London in the past rather than the drudgery they have been in more recent years.”
Lily’s heart thudded anxiously within her, making speech momentarily impossible. Did he mean the times where he was free? Or could he be speaking of the time when they had been more free with each other rather than so confined and strained as they were now?
She dared not hope for the latter.
“To be perfectly frank,” Thomas went on, “as much as I am able, at least, I had hoped for everything to be as light as they had once been when I suggested that we come to London. I fear I am susceptible to habit and pattern here and have not felt anything that I had wished to for the time we have spent here.”
“Nor I.” Lily smiled, her spirits gently lifting with every additional word he spoke to her, particularly with the tone of them so warm and open. “And I have found myself clinging to old habits as well, rather than deviating for something new. Or more.”
The shadows in the coach rendered her view of him a little obscured, but she thought she caught a smile on his handsome face. Then he leaned forward and plucked one of her hands from her lap.
“Lily,” he whispered, her name a rasping sound from his lips, “let’s not stay in London. Let’s go somewhere new, somewhere without habits or distractions. Somewhere to just be ourselves for a time. Will you come with me?”
Had he proposed to her with this energy in the first place, she’d never have felt despair in it.
“Yes,” she answered at once, squeezing the hand holding hers. “Let’s go now, let’s go tonight, or in the morning, if we must, but yes, let us leave!”
His laughter at her response gave her wings, and the friction of his fingers brushing against hers warmed a long-chilled part of her heart. “If I’d known you’d be so keen, I’d have asked you last week.”
She beamed, unable to do anything less. “Where will we go? We have no other house but Rainford, and I cannot think that will be an improvement on London for us yet.”
Thomas shook his head. “No, I completely agree. How would you feel about removing to Cornwall?”
Lily reared back in surprise, the suggestion one she had not considered in the least as she’d dreamed of leaving. “Cornwall? How could we remove there? Do you know anyone?”
“I have significant business interests in Cornwall, though I have yet to see the place myself,” he shrugged, his smile undiminished. “I know a few gentlemen through those business interests, and they speak with great adoration of their home county. I have been discreetly inquiring as to houses available, either for purchase or to let, and there are one or two in a particularly lovely area that we might consider. What do you say to that?”
What did she say? She wasn’t sure what to say with such a plan, particularly set in a corner of England she knew so little about. Cornwall was universally considered the poorest of England’s counties, but it also boasted of the greatest beauties. She had never met anyone who had spent significant time there, and she had never considered it a place she’d wished to see.
She had nothing against Cornwall, she’d simply never considered it.
But with the prospects her husband mentioned and the equally enchanting prospect of being away from all that was familiar and known…
“Cornwall sounds perfect,” Lily told him, sighing with relief and delight at the idea. “I’ve no
