Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
No one seemed to have a response to that, especially based on how the admission seemed to take everything out of Jonny. He slumped forward in his chair as a slight shiver from the cold river overtook him.
“I’m sorry,” he said, looking around at all of them. “I am. Truly. I put you all in danger.”
“It’s fine, Jonny,” Tommy said. “You did what you could.”
Minnie felt bad for Jonny, although she was still a bit sore that he had left them all in such an impossible situation and then had abandoned them once the police had arrived.
Jonny’s entrance, however, had been fortunate for her friends, for she had an idea that they had been up to far more tonight than just sitting around waiting for news.
It wasn’t like any of them to simply sit and do what they were told, to not take any action when someone they loved was in danger.
“Well,” Tommy said, “I have to get my wife home. But we will see you all soon.” He sobered. “I need you all to know how much I appreciate what you risked for us tonight.”
“Of course, Tommy. We’re a team,” Rhys said, hitting him on the arm as he and Emmaline also rose to leave.
They were nearly at the door when Minnie risked one look back at Ada, sitting there without drawing any attention to herself.
“One moment,” she told Tommy, touching his arm before she slipped around the rest of them. As she approached, Jonny also rose. When he walked by Ada, he said so softly that only Ada, and now Minnie, heard, “You missed a spot.”
He pointed to her hands, which Ada quickly folded in her dress, but not before Minnie noted the flecks of black that covered the underside of her thumb.
Minnie couldn’t help her triumphant grin. She had been right.
“Ada?” she said, and Ada lifted her brown eyes to meet Minnie’s.
“Yes?”
“I have something of yours.” She leaned down and placed the earring in Ada’s hand, the earring that matched the one she wore in her right ear.
Ada looked at her with concern in her eyes, but Minnie leaned down and whispered in her ear with a choked cry as emotion nearly overtook her, “Thank you.”
There was so much more she wanted to say, but she could tell that Ada wanted nothing more spoken of this. Her words would have to be enough.
With a squeeze of Ada’s hand, Minnie turned and rejoined her husband.
It was time to go home.
The moment they walked through the door, Minnie collapsed into Tommy’s arms.
She had held it all together until now, but suddenly the realization of how close they had come to losing everything nearly caused her to collapse.
Tears pricked her eyes as Tommy simply wrapped her in his arms and held her close.
“Shhh,” he whispered in her ear as he rocked her back and forth. “You’re all right. You’re all right now.”
His words belied his own emotion, however, as Minnie could hear the rapid beating of his heart beneath her ear.
“I was so scared, Tommy,” she admitted. “When he held that gun to you—”
“To me?” he asked incredulously. “What about you, luv? I thought Blackwood was going to take you away from me forever.”
“Never,” she said fiercely. “Nothing and no one could take me from you.”
“Now that this is over,” Tommy said, stroking a hand over her hair, “are you certain about this? About us? I know you love me, and I do too, but that doesn’t change your life, so far removed from what you knew.
I might now be working toward owning this shop, but a blacksmith will still never be able to provide you with the life that you’ve been accustomed to.
We’ve been married long enough now that you know what it means to be with me. ”
“What does it mean to be with you?” she said incredulously, leaning back just far enough that she could look him in the face.
“What does it mean to be loved? To have a man who cares about what happens to me? Who is by my side, my protector, believes in me, hears me, understands all that I ever wanted and needed was a man who wants me for me and not what I can do for him?”
Despite the circumstances of that night, of the seriousness of what he said, she couldn’t help but smile as she shook her head.
“Yes, Tommy. I am certain about this and what it means.”
“Even if you have to cook and clean and help me in the blacksmith shop?”
“Especially if I will cook and clean and help in the blacksmith shop,” she said before her lips quirked up in a smile. “Perhaps now that you’ve tried my cooking, you’re interested in another option.”
Tommy chuckled at that, those playful dimples that Minnie loved so much appearing in his cheeks.
“I’ll eat your cooking for the rest of my life if it means having you by my side.”
“Then you will have to get used to being hungry.”
“I will find us a bigger house, someday soon, once I’ve bought the shop from Jack. We’ll find a place nearby, where I’m not far from work, yet will have many more bedrooms.”
She stared up at him, unable to help the large smile that spread across her face. “Bedrooms we will fill?”
“I can’t wait to do so. A house near green space, where I can teach my children to fall in love with the game of football, just as I did as a child.”
Minnie focused only on his face, one that she hoped to now have a lot more time getting to know, with all of the threats on their lives behind them.
“I like the sounds of that,” she said. “Is this it now? Are we truly safe?”
“I’m still a bit concerned about Arthur Bellingham the Third,” Tommy said wryly, “but I did tell Inspector Finch about him. I’m not sure the police take kindly to foreigners trying to barter for women on their shores.”
“I will breathe easier once he’s gone, that is for certain,” she said, comforted by the warmth in his gaze. “And while we wait? What now?”
“Now, you should have a bath and go to bed,” he said sternly.
“Will you help me?”
“Not sure how I could resist that request.”
Drawing the bath was not quite as quick as at her parents’ house, Tommy’s soon-bare back muscles straining with the effort of carrying the buckets up the stairs, but Minnie didn’t mind watching him. Not at all.
She actually would be perfectly happy to sit here and watch him fill the tub, especially if he was planning on joining her in it afterward.
She finally moved enough to remove her clothing, putting it away in the wardrobe as Tommy stood, brushing his hands together in satisfaction. Sensing her movement, he turned, surprise flaring in his eyes when he watched her walk toward him, before they narrowed at her approach.
“What is it?” she asked as he bit his lip.
“However long we spend together, I don’t think I will ever fully understand how a woman like you decided to marry me.”
She stopped in front of him, lightly running her fingers over the muscles protruding from the tops of his shoulders, down his sinewy arms until she laced her fingers in his. She stood on tiptoe to come as close to him as she could, her lips but a breath away from his.
“I think the same thing every day and will forever be grateful that you risked everything to save me. To marry me.”
“I’d do it time and again.”
“But only for me,” she said sternly, and he laughed before he leaned in and nipped the end of her finger.
“Of course.”
Finally, he took her mouth, but just when Minnie began to sink into the deepening kiss, he pulled back, surprising her by picking her up, one arm under her knees, laughing at her gasp of surprise.
“First, time to bathe.”
The warm water wrapped around her like a blanket, and Minnie groaned as she sank into the tub. She opened her eyes to find Tommy watching her hungrily, and she crooked a finger at him.
“Come here.”
He followed her command, kneeling beside her and dragging his fingers in the water.
“That’s not quite close enough,” she said with a grin.
“How close do you want me to be?”
“Inside the tub would be perfect.”
“Do you really think we’ll fit?”
“There’s only one way to find out.”
She bent her knees even more to inch forward, giving him ample room to crawl in behind her. He shucked his pants and settled around her, tucking her back between his legs so that her head rested on his chest.
He picked up the soap and began to wash her carefully, reverently. Minnie didn’t think she had ever felt more loved.
“You know, this soap drives me crazy,” he murmured into her ear.
“What do you mean?” she asked, closing her eyes as she relaxed into him.
“The scent of it. Sweet peas, right? Whenever I walk into a room where you have been, I can smell you. When we are out with other people and you walk by me, one inhale of that scent, and my entire body is on edge, wishing that I was wrapped around you, my nose buried in your hair.”
Her jaw fell open. “It’s just soap.”
“It’s not just soap. It’s you.”
He leaned down and nipped at her shoulder. Minnie groaned into him, feeling his hard length pressed against her back. Tommy finished washing most of her body before he rubbed the soap over her breasts, setting her as on edge as he was.
He put the soap to the side as he returned his hands to where the soap had been, washing her off before he pinched one nipple and then the other.
She slid backward, not finding the friction she needed, but he provided it for her as he slid his hands down and began rubbing her sensitive bud in circular motions, exactly how she liked it.
“Yes, Tommy,” she moaned, arching up into him. Keeping his thumb where it was, he slid two fingers inside of her, working her, finding that place inside that had her nearly coming apart.
“That’s it,” he murmured in her ear. “You’re doing so well. Keep going. Come for me.”
“I want you with me,” she said, and he nipped her earlobe.
“We’ll have time for that later,” he said. “This is for you.”
At the thought that this was not the last of it for her tonight, she came around him, as he kept stroking, rubbing, until she finally collapsed back against him.
After a few quiet minutes, as they sat still and he finished rinsing her clean, Tommy lifted her from the bath and wrapped her in a towel. He dried her gently, then reached for her lotion—the one that matched her soap’s scent—and smoothed it over her skin.
“I can do that,” she laughed, but for once, Tommy’s face was hard, serious.
“Let me take care of you,” he said, and she could only nod in agreement.
By the time he was finished, his face looked so pained that Minnie refused to let him wait any longer. She stood and lifted herself onto the bed, shifting backward so that she was lying before him.
“Come here,” she said softly, and he crawled up the bed toward her until he was on top of her.
“Take me,” she whispered. “Love me.”
He didn’t need any further encouragement as he slid into her still-wet body, quickly finding his rhythm.
As Minnie stared into his eyes, she knew that this was not just any coupling. He was making love to her, showing her how much she meant to him while he worshipped her body and enjoyed everything she had to offer.
All she had was his, and she would give it freely.
“Minnie,” he cried as he reached down and began to circle her again, causing the pressure to begin to build deep within her, just at the base of her spine.
“I’m here,” she said. “So close.”
As he stilled against her, she began to pulse around him, their pleasure mutual, their understanding deep.
No longer was there any question about how long this would last, about whether they were truly meant for each other, or whether she would tire of this.
For she would never tire of Tommy. Any life he could provide her, she would be there by his side.
Now and always.