Chapter Forty-Eight

J oss crossed the room to where Hettie stood. "You are everything I could have ever dreamed of in a woman, and that is why I was so afraid to love you. I've lived my whole life with the notion that I didn't deserve good things because good things never came my way. But you... what man could ever deserve you? I'm a baseborn gutter rat who never knew my father and who has only the barest memories of his mother."

"And Arthur Ernsdale was a titled gentleman, a peer of the realm, who drank, wagered, and tormented his way through life. The station of your birth does not define your character!"

"No, it does not. But there are others who do not share that belief and... it isn't simply that I climbed up the social ladder with this marriage, it's that you have climbed down. They will all look at you differently. They will look at me with contempt. Contempt that is more than likely well deserved," he confessed. The admission was more troubling than he wished to consider. But what he wished to do and what he had to do were very different things.

"You do not deserve their contempt."

"You do not know that! There are horrible things in my past, both distant and recent, that make me the absolute worst choice for a husband."

Hettie merely shrugged. "No. Arthur Dagliesh was the worst choice for a husband. I was a prisoner in that house. Bought and sold by my father into a loveless marriage to a cruel man who would slap, shove, or otherwise abuse me for the slightest infraction and took every opportunity to belittle and humiliate me. Will you do those things?"

"Never."

"Then you are not the worst choice, are you?"

There were things that she could only know if he were brave enough to tell them to her. Vincent would keep his secret forever if need be, but it seemed grossly unfair.

"I tried to return to Bow Street after my injury... and failed. Not because of the damage to my shoulder, not because I could no longer take down a suspect or subdue a criminal caught in the act. I couldn't do the job, Hettie, because I couldn't stay out of the opium dens." He waited for her to ask him why, waited for her to denounce him for that weakness of character. But she did not. She simply stood there, patiently waiting for him to continue the woeful tale.

"It was the laudanum after I was shot. At first, it was only to numb the pain. But it doesn't just numb physical pain. It numbs everything. And then one day, not having it causes a kind of agony I cannot describe. Your body aches from head to toe. You are alternately sweating and burning up or trembling from a cold that cannot be combatted with a dozen blankets. Puking your guts up—but laudanum, diluted as it is, only offers a small amount of relief. And that relief becomes less and less each time. So you find stronger laudanum, and stronger still when it ceases to have the desired effect."

"Opium is a terrible thing, Joss. It destroys people, their lives, their families... but you came back from that!"

"Because Vincent pulled me out of it. Because he dragged me from one of the dens, locked me in a room and then threatened anyone in the area who sold it if they even considered supplying me. It took a week for the worst of the pain to go away. It took another two weeks for the craving to pass. It took more than a month for me to realize that by essentially keeping me as a prisoner, he was saving my life. If he hadn't done what he did, I'd be dead now."

She nodded. "And so would I. Because you wouldn't have been there to save me that night. Do you still crave it?"

There had been times when he did. But he recognized one undeniable truth—he craved her more. "In the beginning, I craved it constantly. Then I began to only crave it most of the time. Then some of the time. Then only infrequently. And since you came into my life—not at all. Because there is something else that I crave, something else that takes up my every waking thought and torments me in my dreams."

She licked her lips nervously, her gaze locked with his. "What is that?"

"Who... who is that," he corrected. "And the answer should be quite obvious. It's you, Hettie. From the moment we met, it's been you."

She said nothing, but when he reached for her, one hand cupping the back of her neck while the other snaked about her waist, when he pulled her against him, she came willingly into his arms and let her head rest on his shoulder. He could feel the heat of her tears, and each one, he would atone for.

"I do not deserve you," he said. "And I know that. But it was pointed out to me that there isn't another man who does. And I at least, finally, have the sense to see that. Whether I deserve you or not, I will appreciate you. I will be grateful for you. And I will strive every day to be certain that you know how wonderful I think you. Strong, smart, desirable. Everything. You are simply everything."

*

Hettie was overwhelmed. Speechless, even. She could barely think, much less articulate a response. So she did the only thing she could that might show him how she felt. Even standing on her toes, she wasn't tall enough to reach him. So she grabbed his shoulders and pulled him down to press her lips to his.

She kissed him with everything she had, with everything she felt. Relief. Giddiness. Hope. But above all, she infused that kiss with the love she felt for him. The love she had thought would never be returned and would simply wither away over time.

When he lifted her in his arms and carried her to the chaise lounge that faced the fireplace, unlit given the warmth of the day, she simply clung to him. She was half afraid it was all some beautiful dream and that she would wake up to the reality that the happy ending she hoped and prayed for had not come after all.

"Please don't let it be a dream," she whispered.

"It's not a dream. I can pinch you if you like," he offered.

Hettie smacked his arm. "Don't you dare."

He pressed his lips to the tender skin just below her ear. Then he scraped his teeth over that same spot, biting down just hard enough that it was impossible to deny the reality of it. Even as she shivered at that sensation, she couldn't hold in her laughter. It rang out clearly.

"Do I amuse you?"

She shook her head, still smiling, still trying to hold in her giggles. "No. But you have made me very, very happy. So happy that all I can do to let it out is simply laugh."

"You could," he said, "put me out of my misery and tell me that my affections for you are returned."

That did halt her laughter. "Do you honestly think you are the only one who can fall in love at first sight? Do you really believe that I would have given myself to you that night in the Mint only out of gratitude or the heightened emotion of our situation?"

He shrugged. "Perhaps."

"Well, no. I didn't. I wouldn't. You made me feel safe... but you also made me feel . And for so long I'd just been numb to everything. I'd had to be in order to survive marriage to Arthur. But with you, simply ignoring my feelings or locking them away—it wasn't an option. Do you believe in fate, Joss?"

"I didn't. Like many things, I'm having to reevaluate my stance on the matter," he admitted ruefully.

"I do believe in it. I believe that we—and what we can have together—that's our reward for all that we've been forced to endure in this life. I don't mean to squander that." Pulling back from him just long enough to release the buttons of her day dress, Hettie shoved the garment down over her arms, to her hips, and then, with more determination than grace, she rose and managed to get herself out of it entirely.

She'd forgotten for a brief moment how much her body had changed in the two weeks since they'd seen one another. When his shocked gaze landed on the swell of her belly, she wanted to hide from him. But somehow she didn't. She made herself stand there before him and let him look his fill. When he brought his large hand up and placed it tenderly over her, cradling the place where their child was growing within her, Hettie felt tears stinging her eyes. "Our child will be loved," she said. "Love grows from love. The more we love one another, the more love we'll have for our child."

"Children... let's have a house full of them. They'll never be alone and will always be surrounded by people who love them."

Hettie stroked his cheek. "So will you."