Page 426 of From Rakes to Riches

His voice went intimately deeper, and she caught her breath.

“Then you know the next one will have an equally revealing neckline,” she warned him. “Madame Dupuy took liberties.”

“I’ll put up with it.”

“You will? Why? Are we attending the opera?” she asked with rising excitement.

“We’re attending the duke’s ball tonight.”

She knew she gaped at him, and he actually seemed to enjoy her reaction.

“We are?”

“We are.” He tilted his head. “Is this not what you wanted?”

“Yes, but…why did you change your mind?”

He looked embarrassed. “Because it was the right thing to do.”

That was the only reason?

She couldn’t expect declarations of undying love—not yet anyway. But a girl could hope.

Victoria hadseveral quiet minutes to spare before Anna returned to help her into her ball gown. She went to her desk, and to her surprise, she noticed that the household journal had been returned to her. Cautiously, she opened it to the last page, and found a man’s straight, heavy handwriting.

She gave a little sigh of pleasure and read:

I enjoyed our dance the other night. I’ll claim a waltz tonight.

She traced the words with her fingertip, and then opened their childhood journal to compare how his penmanship had changed. He had a bolder hand now, full of confidence. Hers had changed as well, becoming more precise, more careful, rather than hurried and exuberant. They could never go back to the children they were, but she considered this marriage a fresh beginning, and it finally seemed to be that for him as well.

He’d written to her! She put the household journal on the table near his room, hesitated, and then laid out the childhood journal as well. Maybe now he’d want to read and remember.

In her personal journal, she began to write about wanting to make him proud at the ball. With a frown, she sat back and looked at her words. She was so dependent on recording her every thought, as if something might disappear if she didn’t write it.

She couldn’t take a journal to the ball. She would make no lists of conversation topics, write down no one’s name.

Her palms began to perspire, and she wiped them on her dressing gown. She could do this. He needed her to be with him, not to be dependent on a book she couldn’t look at.

Very carefully, she opened the drawer and put the personal journal away. Anna soon arrived, and they were busy dressing her hair and stitching her into her gown, but Victoria found herself glancing often at the drawer, as if the journal called to her.

It was a book, not a crutch.

When she finally descended to the last staircase above the entrance hall, David and her mother were waiting below. He was dressed in black coat and tails, with white cravat and gloves. He was so very elegant, the Perfect Husband, who looked at her withadmiration, who’d compromised when he hadn’t wanted to. Was she really the Perfect Wife of her childhood imagination?

He stared up at her, and in his eyes she saw her future. And she could make it become everything she ever wanted, everything she ever dreamed. On her wedding day she had not dared to hope for so much. She had only thought to be content with a place to live, with the possibility of children.

But now she wanted all of it—she wanted his love. She would make sure he never doubted for the rest of his life that she loved him.

Slowly Victoria walked down each stair, reveling in his smoldering gaze. She felt as if she came out of a trance as she remembered they were not alone.

Her mother stared between them with a look of pride and wonder on her face that Victoria had not seen in a long time. She kissed her mother’s soft cheek, then noticed the earl down in the shadows at the far end of the corridor, watching. Victoria waved to him, and he nodded his head.

When she turned, David was looking at his father with an unreadable expression. Victoria quickly took his arm.

“Is the carriage ready?” she asked.

He nodded, and Smith opened the front door for them. She smiled at him, and the butler gave her the most serene, small smile in return.

---