Page 78 of Forget Me Not

Julia took pity on him. She slipped her fingers up his neck and found his face in the dark. She stretched up on her toes and placed a simple kiss on his lips, no more than the length of a breath. “Volunteer to be the next one who seeks.” She opened the door, tossing back over her shoulder, “You can always search in this closet again,” and stepped out.

The other Gents were there not looking the least apologetic for their unwanted interference. Indeed, they seemed quite pleased with themselves.

Lucas crossed to the now-empty doorway. “What are the chances that if I do, I’ll find one of these clods in here instead of you?”

“I would say one-hundred-percent,” Aldric declared.

Lucas shook his head good-naturedly. “The lot of you are certainly adding an unexpected element of challenge to this game.”

“Promise we can play it again when the rest of us have wives to join in the fun and we’ll be more than willing to leave you be.” Digby gave him a pointed look.

“You hear that, Julia? All we have to do to gain a moment’s privacy is find the King here a Queen. Are you equal to a bit of matchmaking?”

“Yes,” Julia said saucily, “but that might require a bit too much sorcery.” She walked away, the air behind her filling with their uproarious laughter. Yes, this was a group she could not have been more thankful for.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Childhood Games Day had beenone of Lucas’s favorites. They’d spent it engaging in any number of ridiculous youthful entertainments. There’d been laughter and camaraderie. He’d flirted shamelessly with Julia and had been rewarded again and again with her absolutely joyful smile and that hint of a blush he thoroughly enjoyed bringing to her face. He’d resolved to regularly indulge in such diverting pastimes over the coming years. And to read to her at night. And to take advantage of cupboards whenever feasible. Holding her in his arms, kissing her... his heart still pounded when he thought about it.

He’d vowed after James’s death to live his life as fully as possible. More and more, he felt himself fulfilling that pledge. Adventures, good friends, a wife he was falling more in love with... a well-lived life indeed.

Julia had dozed shortly after dinner, exhausted. He’d all but forgotten she hadn’t been feeling well the day before. By the time he’d climbed the stairs that night, she’d been deeply asleep and he hadn’t had the heart to wake her.

Hope like he’d not yet felt surged at the promise of a lifetime spent chasing her around their house, flirting with her in the corners and shadows and mountaintops of their lives, laughing with their friends. They had taken the first steps toward building a beautiful life together, if only they could navigate the ones yet to come.

“I have a question,” he told Aldric the next morning when he joined his friend in the breakfast room. The General, like himself, was an early riser. “Was preventing me from quite thoroughly kissing my wife yesterday part of your secret plan to help me win her over? Because, if so, I have some complaints about your tactics.”

Aldric took a leisurely sip of his tea, not overly anxious to answer. It was a well-known approach of his. Lucas simply waited.

“We have heard for years about Julia, and every story involved the two of you getting into scrapes or undertaking larks. Your deepest connections to her have always been forged through smiles and laughter. There was none of that here when we arrived.”

That was truer than he wished it were. “Our connection was also forged in grief and loss.”

“Life will offer you ample moments in which you will experience that again,” Aldric said. “We mean to give you memories you can laugh about: a day of children’s games with a group of grown gentlemen, an interrupted bit of sparking, moments of harmless inanity between the lot of us.”

There’d been a decent amount of that thus far.

“Build on your mutual happiness,” Aldric said, “and you will have a strong enough foundation on which to endure the moments of pain.”

Lucas filled his plate from the sideboard. They chatted amiably about people they knew, adventures they’d had, ideas for future journeys. Lucas was grateful to these close-as-brothers friends of his.

“I suppose we have your father to thank for our invitations to Falstone Castle,” Lucas said. “I’ve lived within relatively short distance of Their Graces for eight years now and have not yet been invited to Falstone.”

“Father thinks it a connection worth strengthening,” Aldric said. “Younger sons can’t afford to alienate their sires.”

“It’ll be a lark.” Lucas returned to his seat. “With all of us in attendance, even you will enjoy yourself.”

“Even me? That sounds like something you ought to be saying to Grumpy Uncle.”

There was truth in that.

Julia stepped into the room, clad in a pale-pink, ruffle-edged mantle.

They stood, as was customary when a lady entered.

She held a hand up. “Please sit and keep eating. I have no intention of interrupting.”

“I would be happy to fetch you a plate, sweetheart.”

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