Chapter Thirty-Nine
Andrew all but ran outside when he’d heard the carriages approaching.
It could’ve been anyone, but he’d hoped it was her.
Them, he should say. But all of his hope was for her.
Before they’d come, he’d been roaming about the house unpacking trunks and pulling sheets off of dusty furniture.
The Harrises’ crooked estate agent was long gone, and they were clearly rather lax in keeping up with their duties, given the fact that the house was in a beyond neglected state.
Andrew felt odd being here alone, like he was lingering somewhere he shouldn’t be.
This was Della’s property, and he didn’t know if Della wanted him here.
He didn’t know if Della wanted him at all.
He was here for an explanation, nothing else.
Preparing rooms for their arrival was just something to pass the time, he told himself.
It had only been several hours since his own arrival, and he heard the crunch of gravel as he explored the wide, open pantry in the over-large kitchen.
Kinloss was an overwhelming estate, and he’d scarcely learned to find his way around.
He took several wrong turns on the way to the front hall, ending up in one of the parlors.
He didn’t know why there were so many parlors.
When he reached the front door, he nearly tripped down the stone staircase. There were so many carriages, and Silas waved from his perch atop the first coach. Andrew couldn’t remember if he’d waved back.
Then Clara sprawled out of that very same carriage, and it was a true display of athleticism that she managed to land on her feet. Her smile was beaming, and she rushed to Andrew with the force she’d used to catapult herself out of the vehicle.
“I knew you didn’t need time,” Clara said, squeezing his arm as she walked by.
He opened his mouth to respond with an expression of his confusion, but she was already moving swiftly toward the house behind him. She pointed in the direction of the carriage from whence she’d come. He took that bit of direction for what it was—an order—and marched to the carriage’s open door.
“Della,” he’d whispered. It was all he’d been able to say. Through all of his traveling here, he’d planned out so much he wanted to tell her, and all of that conscious thought and eloquent speech abandoned him at the sight of her.
He reached for her, as he could do nothing but.
Her hand clasped his, and finally, she smiled.
He was completely shattered or melted or burned.
He felt as if he’d left the world of the living behind for weeks, and now he’d just become something new.
Something that was entirely hers, if she’d have him.
“Andrew.” Her voice barely reached his ears, but her hand squeezed his, and that was so much more than enough.
Della stood as far upright as she could in the dark confines of the carriage, and he hesitated to move.
He wasn’t sure how to proceed. He’d touched every inch of her skin, but he had no idea if she’d want him to touch her at all now.
Eventually, as she struggled to lower herself to the ground, his free hand rested at her waist. That damned hip.
She didn’t say it aloud, but he could tell she was thinking it.
It was such a gift to be able to look at her and know the line of her thoughts.
It was such a privilege to look at her at all.
Her right hand gripped his shoulder, her left still entwined with his.
She found her footing, and he reached into the carriage to find her walking stick.
Andrew had to extricate himself from her to do so, and it was more painful than that morning he’d woken up alone.
Then, she’d been long gone. Like smoke in the wind.
Now, she was right in front of him. Close enough to touch, and he didn’t know if he could.
He didn’t know if showing up here was a grave mistake.
“Andrew,” she whispered again as he passed her walking stick along, “I believe we need to talk.”
Those words were terror inducing on their own, but the downtrodden expression on her face confirmed that he was indeed in the midst of a horrible reality of his own making.
He’d come here for an explanation. One more chance, he’d told himself.
He’d give them one more chance before he left her alone forever.
It seemed she was eager to take that one chance and use it to break him.
“Of course.” He nodded, his hands behind his back. He didn’t trust those hands or his own ability to control them.
Around them, he eventually realized, the carriages had become hives of activity.
There were trunks everywhere, more than he’d ever seen in any one place.
The coachmen helped everyone disembark and unload.
Clara ran the entire length of the drive.
Mrs. Goldsmith waved Harry away from several of the trunks.
Andrew assumed those were her kitchen implements and she was trying to ensure their safety.
Harry began directing the coachmen, which was admirable as none of them, Andrew included, had any clue where to put anything.
Gwendoline stood in front of one of the large bay windows, staring up at the height of the turrets.
Her neck was bent back as far as it would go, and she seemed frozen in awe.
Andrew knew that feeling. He found comfort in it, actually. Freezing in the face of a chance at happiness had been easier. He’d forced himself to take action now, just this one last time, and now he was certain the fragments of his heart would be handed to him on an old, rusted silver platter.
They should talk, she’d said.
He wasn’t sure he was capable of that, of listening to her dismiss him and responding in a polite, respectable way.
“Should you not settle in first?” Andrew said. It was one last effort to postpone the inevitable. It wouldn’t make it easier, but he wouldn’t have to face it now, either. It was an opportunity to freeze once more. “You’ve only just arrived after such a long journey.”
He looked at her in earnest, now that she was in the vast sunlight.
Her hair was escaping its pins, and her gown was terribly wrinkled from all that time spent in such a confined space.
Her eyes were clear, though. There was none of the exhaustion he expected to see.
Rather, there seemed to be a sense of peace.
He thought she’d appear softened, as if almost asleep.
Instead, she was softened in just the opposite way—as if she’d just woken up.
“Oh, yes,” she agreed, looking down at her feet. She wore those riding boots again. The sight of them was so endearing that Andrew’s chest ached. “I suppose we should. Everyone is”—she looked around them at the flurry of motion—“rather excited to be here.”
“I see,” he chuckled. Despite the tension between them, the rest of the traveling party seemed to feel no such apprehension. Their thrill was palpable, even in the warm Scottish air that surrounded the estate. “Please, don’t let me stop you. Go and see your new home.”
At that, Della smiled. It was so overly bright, his eyes almost couldn’t stand it. His body warned him to turn away, to protect himself, as if he’d been staring right into a raging fire and waiting there for it to consume him.
“Would you . . .” Della took a deep breath in the middle of her sentence.
She looked down at her feet again for a moment, then met his eyes once more.
There was a certain vulnerability there he’d never seen.
Immediately, he understood that she’d never before let him see it. “Would you come with me?”
“Of course,” he answered reflectively. Of course he’d go with her.
Of course he’d stay for a while, or for all of his remaining days.
It was always his instinct when it came to her, to any question she had, to offer a certain, unrestrained affirmative.
Whatever she asked of him, it would always be yes.
Even if, at the end of the day, she asked him to leave.
Della turned away from him to begin her very first walk into Kinloss, into the home she now rightfully owned.
Without warning, her hand wandered over the sleeve of his coat, slipping her arm through his and resting her hand at the crook of his elbow. Her doe eyes looked up at him once more in uncertainty, as if she were asking for permission or anticipating a refusal of her touch.
Somehow, she still didn’t know his answer would always be yes.
He didn’t voice that, not yet. Now wasn’t the time.
With her fingers tucked into his left arm, his right hand covered hers.
He squeezed gently, just as she had a few long moments ago.
Her face softened. There was that newly awakened peace again.
He would do anything to keep that look on her face, to give her that tranquility forever.
Della leaned on him the entire way up the stone stairs, and some reckless part of Andrew hoped she wasn’t just in need of help, but she was also in want of him.