Epilogue
One year later
“Do you think she will be ready in time?”
“No, she’s never ready in time. I honestly don’t know what takes her so long.”
Joseph chuckled silently to himself, not bothering to glance at the sisters whispering rather loudly in the corner of the drawing room. He folded his newspaper, which he had been trying and failing to read ever since Ava and Maisie arrived over one hour ago, and reached for his glass of whiskey.
“Perhaps I should go and check on her.” Maisie’s eyes were on the door, her brows knitted. “Any longer and we may be late.”
“If you go up there, you’re only going to make it clear that we are planning something,” Ava said dismissively. She whipped her fan open. “Goodness, it is rather hot in here.”
“Allow me to open a window then,” Joseph said, making Ava jump in surprise. He laughed again as he stood. “You two are not as quiet as you think you are.”
Ava smiled sheepishly at that. “Oh, forgive us, Joseph. You weren’t meant to hear any of that.”
“Though, I’m sure you are no stranger to your wife’s whims,” Maisie chimed in.
Joseph had to agree. He’d been married to Catriona for almost two years, and he’d quickly learned that she tended to take her time when getting ready for anything.
Even on a regular, uneventful morning, it took nearly an hour for her to be prepared.
He didn’t mind it at all, but on a night like tonight, he supposed time was truly of the essence.
He opened the window and made his way back to his seat just as Dorothea entered the room. She halted, eyes scanning the drawing room before she pouted and frowned. “Is Stepmother not here as yet?”
“No, she isn’t,” Maisie said, sighing dramatically. Then she perked up, eyes filling with an idea. “Dorothea, why don’t you go and fetch her? Tell her that the food is getting cold.”
Dorothea blinked, thinking about it for a moment before she shook her head. “She won’t believe that. We always serve dinner when she’s ready, so she will wonder what the rush is all of a sudden.”
Maisie deflated again. “Goodness, you are too smart for your age.”
“Would you rather her go along with your foolish plan?” Ava asked, whipping her fan back and forth.
Dorothea giggled. She made her way over to where Joseph sat, climbing into the armchair right next to hers. She leaned closer, covering her mouth with her hand as she whispered, “Do you think Stepmother doesn’t know?”
Joseph leaned closer to his daughter, shaking her head. “I don’t think she has a clue.”
Catriona was likely sitting at her vanity table, carefully choosing her jewelry for the evening, because she was under the impression that she was going to have a normal dinner with her family.
She didn’t know that Ava and Maisie were here, and she certainly didn’t know what they had in store for her tonight.
“Do you think she’s going to like it?” Dorothea asked.
“I think she’s going to love it,” Ava answered. When they looked at her, she gave them a cheeky smile. “We aren’t the only two who don’t know how to whisper.”
“Honestly, someone should go and fetch her,” Maisie said again, clearly getting agitated.
Joseph took that as his cue. “I’ll go and see if I can speed her along,” he said as he got to his feet.
“The man of the day!” Ava exclaimed. “See how best you can create a miracle, Joseph.”
Joseph saluted the sisters with a chuckle as he left the room, picking up the bouquet he’d made earlier this afternoon as he went.
He made his way up their bedchamber where, as he expected, Catriona was sitting at her vanity table, twirling a tight curl around her finger.
Her eyes locked onto him in the mirror, and she twisted to face him.
“Joseph! Perfect. Come here for a second, won’t you?”
“Is something the matter?” he asked, approaching her from behind, holding the bouquet behind his back.
She faced the mirror again, frowning. “Do you think my hair looks a bit… overdone?”
“Overdone?” His lips twitched. “I didn’t think that was possible.”
“Of course, it is. I have far too many curls and far too many pins in the back of my hair. I am getting older now. Perhaps I should let some of my hair down. What do you think?”
“I think I have never seen you care this much about your hair before.”
She scowled at him. Truly scowled, which wiped his smile off his face. “So, you think I am being melodramatic.”
It wasn’t a question. “Of course not. I am only wondering why it matters to you so much.”
“Shouldn’t it?”
“If it does to you, then it does to me.”
Her scowl only deepened. Clearly, he hadn’t said the right thing. “How convenient of you to know how to say the right thing all the time.”
“Would you rather I say the wrong thing?”
She thinned her lips. Then she sighed. “Oh, forgive me. I am being rather crabby, aren’t I? I don’t mean to, I just…”
Joseph knelt by her side, taking her hand. Catriona immediately twisted to face him. “Just what?”
She sighed again before shaking her head. “It’s nothing.”
“It isn’t nothing. If it’s bothering you, then it couldn’t possibly be.”
She smiled, putting her hand against his cheek. “I will tell you later, then.”
Joseph raised his brows at that. The truth was that she’d been a little out of character these past few weeks, but the odd behavior came and went so quickly that he didn’t think twice about it.
But now it was clear that something was wrong, which bothered him.
However, if she wanted to wait until she was ready to talk about it, then he would wait. Especially on a day like today.
She tilted her head to the side, peeking behind him. “What do you have there?”
Joseph pulled it out, watching the glee fill her eyes. “Carnations, courtesy of Dorothea’s flower patch.”
“Joseph, they’re beautiful! I hadn’t realized that they’d bloomed.”
“She’s been taking quite good care of it. And she made sure to tell me that she would be quite disappointed in me if I do not make a bouquet for you today.”
Catriona giggled, sniffing the flowers. “I really have her to thank for this then. I shall show her my gratitude later.”
“You look beautiful,” he said, standing. He put both hands on her shoulders, looking at her in the mirror. “You always look beautiful. I thought that the day I first met you, and I will continue to think that until I draw my last breath.”
“Hopefully that isn’t for years to come,” she responded with a smile. “I intend to for us to grow quite old together, you know. So old we can barely walk.”
“I shall have to use you as my cane, then. It will be a nice excuse to take you everywhere with me.”
“Shall I walk unhindered then? What of my cane?”
“That’s why we have Dorothea.”
She laughed heartily at that and any remnants of her odd behavior fled. Catriona stood, taking his hand in hers. “Let’s go downstairs. I’m sure you and Dorothea must be famished waiting for me.”
“You know, and yet you make us suffer,” he joked.
“But you love me all the same,” she said with a shrug.
He took that opportunity to press a kiss on her temple. Over the past year, he always took advantage of any opening to kiss her, still enjoying the way she blushed every time.
Hand in hand, they left their bedchamber and made it downstairs. They were only a few paces away from the drawing room when Ava and Maisie’s voices found them. Catriona looked at him in alarm.
“What are my sisters doing here?” she asked in alarm.
Joseph couldn’t hold back his grin. He shrugged, and Catriona narrowed her eyes at him.
She started ahead again, her steps hurried. She entered the room to Ava complaining that she was going to go upstairs herself. She stopped talking mid-sentence, surprised.
And then all three girls, Dorothea included, leaped to their feet to exclaim, “Surprise!”
Catriona was frozen at the door, her eyes wide. She looked at Joseph, then her sisters, then Dorothea, then Joseph again. And then realization dawned in her eyes.
“Oh right,” she said with a growing smile. “It is my birthday.”
“Surely you didn’t forget?” Maisie gasped.
“Again?” Ava exclaimed.
“Does she do it often?” Dorothea asked. The two sisters turned to Dorothea and nodded.
“I don’t do it on purpose,” Catriona defended herself, drifting further into the room. Joseph stayed on her heels. “I simply don’t pay the date much mind.”
“Which is exactly why we decided to do something special this year,” Maisie said. “You’ve always made sure we’re happy on ours.”
“You don’t have to—”
“But we wanted to,” Joseph cut in. He slid his arm around her waist, pulling her into his side. “And you’d better get used to it because this will be your reality for the years to come.”
She leaned into his embrace. “I think I will adjust quite nicely.” Looking back at her sisters, she asked, “So will you two be joining us for dinner?”
Ava and Maisie shared conspiratorial looks, smiling. “Something like that,” Ava said.
“And what is that supposed to mean?”
“It means it is a surprise,” Dorothea spoke up eagerly, grinning from ear to ear. “But I think you’re really going to like it.”
“So it’s time to go.” Maisie made a shooing motion with her hands. “Let’s go now. Out the door with you.”
“We’re leaving the manor?” Catriona asked, bemused.
“I think it’s best not to ask any questions,” Joseph told her with a chuckle. “Because you won’t be getting any straight answers.”
“Did you help with this?” Catriona asked. She let herself be ushered out the room. “Because there is something unnerving about the thought about my sisters being the lead on this.”
“It was my idea. They simply helped with the execution.”
That seemed to ease her mind which pleased Joseph immensely.
Before Catriona came into his life, he never would have known how to tap into that sensitive side of his heart, the one capable of showing his love as much as he could say it aloud.
Sometimes he wondered if he was doing a good enough job in showing her how grateful he was to have her. Tonight was the perfect time to do so.
They all made their way outdoors where two carriages stood waiting.
Joseph and Catriona climbed into one by themselves while Maisie pulled Dorothea along to ride with them, likely because she sensed that Joseph wasn’t going to be able to keep his hands off Catriona.
The moment they were alone, Joseph did what he had been wanting to do since he went to fetch her in their bedchamber but wasn’t sure they had the time.
He pulled her into his arms and kissed her deeply. Catriona leaned into his kiss like she always did. Like the first time, the second time, and the hundreds of times since then. He hoped she never stopped. He hoped he still stoked her need to be close to him like he had for her.
But she was the one who pulled away first. “Tell me where we’re going,” she whispered, her breath brushing his lips.
“That defeats the purpose of a surprise,” he whispered back. They were alone in the carriage, but he reveled in the intimacy.
“I don’t want to be surprised. I want to know.”
“Why don’t you just relax and enjoy it?”
She pecked him lightly on the lips, and he felt her smile rather than saw it. “If it involves my sisters, I won’t relax until I know everything in great detail. It is quite terrifying when they put their heads together, you know.”
“Even though I am involved?”
“That eases my mind a bit, but I still want to know.” She kissed him again. “Please?”
He was already a goner. “We have planned a birthday dinner for you.”
She pulled away, surprise coloring her eyes. “Truly?”
“It will be held at Heaton Manor,” he explained. “Your uncle is there right now ensuring that everything is in order though judging by how long it took us leave, I’m sure he has been waiting for some time. And then…”
“Then? There’s more?”
“The dinner will only be family. But later in the evening, the ton will arrive for an evening ball.”
“A ball?” Catriona scrunched her nose. “I am not very keen on balls, but if was planned in my honor, then I’m sure I will enjoy it.”
“You will.” This time, it was he who kissed her. “Because it not like normal balls.”
“It isn’t?”
“For one, it will be a masquerade ball. But after the toast, you, Dorothea, and I will be taking our leave.”
“Will we?”
“And we will be going to Scotland, back to your home before you had to leave.”
She pulled away from him, eyes wide. “Truly?”
“Yes, truly. We own it now. I thought you would like to return and—”
He didn’t get the chance to finish because she was launching herself at him, raining kisses all over his face. It was so overwhelming that he could hardly breathe, and he couldn’t think of a better way to go.
When she finally pulled away, she was winded and grinning from ear to ear. “I have a surprise as well. I was going to tell you later as we prepared for bed but seeing that that is a long ways ahead of us, I think it is best to say it now.”
“What is it?”
“I am with child.”
Joseph could only blink. They had been trying for some time now to no avail. He’d never given up hope, thought it quite possible, but it still took him by surprise.
“I only just discovered it myself,” Catriona went on. “But it would explain why I have been so on edge lately, so unlike myself. And I cannot keep down fish anymore, nor can I stand the smell of candles and—”
“You’re with child.”
She nodded at his dazed look, smiling. “I’m with child.”
“God, I didn’t think it possible to love you more.” He pulled her into his arms again.
“Does that mean that the more children I bear for you, the more your love will grow?”
“It seems rather likely.”
She giggled at that. “Then perhaps I should bear a few more after this one. Just to test your theory, of course.”
“I have no qualms with that.” He kissed her. “I love you, Catriona. More than I can ever express.”
“I love you too.” They stayed like that, her wrapped in his arms, all the way to Heaton Manor, and Joseph was tempted to forget about the dinner and ball and take her straight to Scotland, just to keep her to himself. But that could wait.
He could wait a lifetime for her because, he promised himself, they would have a lifetime together.
The End?