Chapter 13 #2
“Thy love has buried all others, nor has any woman after thee put sweet fetters upon my neck.”
Aidan.
Gwen turned her head just enough to glimpse him peering over her shoulder. Her heart leapt with such a surge of warmth it nearly hurt. He was here. And not the distant man from the breakfast table, but her gentle, poetic husband. The man of the night before.
“You put me to shame, husband,” she whispered. “What need is there for my efforts if you translate with such poetic skill?”
He moved to take the chair beside her, and she felt the absence of his nearness like a sigh against her skin. His presence, steady and calm, enveloped her like a balm.
“I am naught but an ordinary man,” he said, his voice deep and soft, “with a muse of great grace to lift my voice.”
His gaze caressed her face, and she blushed, her smile widening until it ached across her cheeks.
“You are home.”
His lips curved. “I am home.”
She took in his appearance. His coat was a different hue from this morning, his linen crisp and clean. He smelled of starch and soft leather, not the sweat of a mount.
“You changed?” she asked, tilting her head with gentle curiosity.
His smile dimmed slightly. “I thought it would be dinner soon,” he said. “So I scrubbed Valor’s sweat from my skin … that I might find you.”
Gwen leaned back to glance at the casement clock. “I shall have to prepare for dinner myself, I suppose.”
“Or,” he murmured, his voice lowering into a rumble, “we can have a tray brought to your room.”
His fingers brushed the back of her hand. Bare, ink-smudged, warm. The touch was light but adoring.
“Truly?”
His eyes roamed with undisguised appreciation. “Oh, yes.”
Gwen beamed, shoving her chair back with eager delight. “Yes!”
Aidan rose in kind, but she halted suddenly, her hand suspended in midair as a remembered thought flared in her mind.
“Oh, wait!” She plopped back into the chair, skirts rustling about her ankles.
He paused mid-step, brow lifting with curiosity as he eased back into his seat. “Something amiss?”
“Your mother paid me a visit,” Gwen said, folding her hands atop her notebook, the edge of her thumb smudged faintly with ink.
His brows rose slightly, but he said nothing.
“She told me about what happened with Lily.”
A subtle shift crossed his features. It was barely perceptible, but Gwen saw it, the narrowing of his eyes, a faint tensing in his jaw. “Lily?”
“She thought I ought to be told now that I am family. About the footman who attacked her.”
Aidan inclined his head slowly, though his expression remained carefully neutral.
“I was horrified,” Gwen continued, voice low with feeling. “She is so small and kind. What sort of brute could think to harm her?”
Aidan’s lips curved faintly, but the smile was shadowed. “Lily is far sturdier than she appears. She has borne all with admirable resolve.”
“I can see that. One would never guess such a thing had occurred. Still, to hear it from your mother was a great shock.”
He nodded, gaze drifting away for a heartbeat before returning. That familiar veil of distance flickered across his eyes again. “Was there more to the conversation?”
“Well …” Gwen hesitated. “She told me that you carry guilt over Lily’s scandal. That she stepped forward to protect Lord Filminster by giving him an alibi, one that was not entirely true.”
At that, Aidan straightened, rubbing a hand through his hair in agitation. “That is rather a wealth of family confidence to be shared in a single afternoon.”
“She spoke with love and concern,” Gwen said gently. “Not gossip.”
He exhaled sharply. “You do understand, I hope, that word cannot get out about what Lily did? Filminster was under heavy suspicion, but he could not have committed the crime. Lily witnessed enough to know he was innocent. She merely … shifted the details to ensure the truth would be accepted. If anyone were to uncover the full truth, if she were accused of perjury, it could destroy her. And Filminster.”
“She is safe with me. I have no desire to spread tales … and no one to tell, even if I did.” Gwen paused. “But your mother was right, was she not? You blame yourself for Lily’s scandal.”
Aidan’s brown eyes fixed upon her, and Gwen saw his discomfort ripple behind them. He was clearly disconcerted by the bluntness of her question, but how else could she have asked it?
“I have felt regret,” he admitted slowly, “that I chose to go out that night, carousing with friends. Had I been at home, I might have stood as Filminster’s alibi instead.”
Gwen’s brows drew together. “So Lily does not wish to be married to Filminster?”
Aidan grimaced, the muscles of his jaw taut for several seconds before he spoke. “Lily and Filminster are in love. She told me only this afternoon that she has no regrets.”
Relief swept through Gwen, bringing a soft smile to her lips. “I am glad. I was unsure what to think.” Her voice softened further. “Is that why you insisted on marrying me?”
He blinked, surprise flashing across his features before he gave a decisive shake of his head.
“No. You and I … we are nothing like Lily and Filminster. You are my Venus. My own Cynthia. The fetters upon my neck are sweet, Gwen Abbott.”
Gwen inhaled sharply, her breath catching. The words curled around her heart like ribbon. Did he mean … could it be …?
She longed to ask outright, but the question lodged in her throat. It was too bold, too exposing, and her pride still bore the sting of this morning’s uncertainty. Instead, she clung to what he had said. Words so lyrical, they could only be born of true affection.
Do not push him.
She recalled her whispered confession the night before, spoken half-asleep, and the regret that had shadowed her all morning. She would not risk their fragile connection by demanding more than he was ready to give.
Instead, she smiled gently. “Thank you.”
Aidan’s brow lifted, eyes warming with hope. “Now to bed?”
Gwen stood, her answer in the simple motion. They left the library hand in hand, ascending the stairs together in breathless silence.
Her heart brimmed with tenderness as she glanced at him. Tonight, he seemed almost carefree. But would he still be here tomorrow? Or would he retreat again into that quiet world of his thoughts?
When they reached her chamber, she fumbled with the latch, laughing as they tumbled through the doorway, mouths meeting in a fevered kiss.
“Uh …”
Gwen jolted back. “Octavia!”
The lady’s maid stood stiffly by the wardrobe, her gaze fixed to the floor as her hands fidgeted with the hem of her apron.
A dull blush crept across her cheeks as she dipped into a swift curtsy.
“I shall … just …” She gestured vaguely toward the door behind Gwen and Aidan, not daring to lift her eyes.
Gwen’s own face flamed with heat. The air in the chamber felt thick, almost too warm. Her fingers tightened against her skirts as she stared somewhere just beyond Octavia’s shoulder, her voice emerging with forced composure. “Could you arrange a dinner tray?”
Octavia nodded quickly, her cap ribbons fluttering as she edged toward the exit.
Aidan stepped aside with gallant ease, inclining his head in a brief bow.
Octavia gave a strangled nod, then darted from the room with the hurried rustle of muslin and the soft clink of the latch as the door clicked shut.
For a breathless moment, silence held them suspended. Then laughter spilled between them. Relieved, uncertain, and full of the awkward joy of shared understanding. It was the kind of laughter that unknotted lingering tension and made the world feel newly tender.
When their mirth had subsided, Aidan crossed the chamber to draw the heavy curtains, casting the room into softened twilight. Gwen blinked, her eyes adjusting as the carved furnishings faded into silhouette. A hush settled, the quiet echoing like a held breath.
He returned to her then, his hands firm but gentle as they found her waist and drew her toward him. Though she could barely see him in the dimness, she could feel the nearness of him … his warmth, the quiet rasp of his breath.
She lifted her arms, curling them about his neck. Her fingers brushed the fine hairs at his nape as she leaned into the strong line of his frame. Their bodies aligned in perfect familiarity, a closeness that drew a sigh from her lips.
“I have been thinking about last night,” he murmured, his lips brushing her temple, his breath stirring tendrils of her hair.
Her heart fluttered. “I … have thought about it, too.”
His hands glided along her waist in slow, reverent passes. She swayed gently in his hold, the muslin of her gown whispering against the wool of his coat. The chamber felt quieter still, as though the very walls wished not to intrude.
He drew her closer, and their foreheads met, a tender joining that felt sacred.
When he kissed her, it was not hurried. It was a question, an offering. Gwen answered with quiet conviction, her hands moving up to trace the breadth of his shoulders. She felt the tension there. The effort, the burden. And smoothed it away with a soft touch.
He stilled slightly as she explored and then caught her hands in his. His own trembled faintly as he pressed them to his chest, where his heart beat in steady cadence.
“Let me take care of you,” he whispered.
Her reply was quiet, but certain. “Yes.”
Together, they turned toward the inner chamber, the only sound the whisper of slippers on the polished floor and the hush of two hearts beating in gentle accord.