Page 58 of A Brilliant Match
Dorothea was beginningto regret telling Miles she would go with him. His answering smile seemed altogether too smug for her liking. If he didn’t come to the point soon, she would order him to stop and would find her way back to Anne and Frank on foot. She turned to tell him so.
Miles indicated the avenue branching off ahead of them as he pulled into it. “I wanted to take you to an area where I might speak more candidly than where every member of thetonis gaping at the pair of us in speculation. This should be good enough, for the closest person is at least ten feet away.”
Dorothea looked around. Indeed, there was another couple walking about ten feet away, but they were headed down a separate avenue, and there was no one else anywhere in sight. That was when she began to grow nervous. Not from being alone with him, but fromhim. Why was he here? Was he going to break her heart again? She didn’t think so, but it did not do to let one’s heart hope.
Miles turned, and his knees touched hers. He put his arm along the back of the seat and allowed his gloved hand to rest near her back. She couldn’t breathe from the touch. He had always had that effect on her. She was powerless to move until he released her from his spell.
“Dorothea, I want to marry you.” His eyes searched hers, and she tried to draw breath before she grew faint.He was asking this of her now? It was impossible to answer him.
“I think I have wanted to marry you from the very first moment I met you, and not entirely for thewrongreasons. For although I needed your dowry, I have never met a woman I wanted to be with day after day, every day, for the rest of my life until I met you.”
She let out the scant breath she was holding and turned forward, gasping for more. A multitude of emotions swarmed within her. He was saying what she wanted to hear. But was she ready to give everything up for him? Was she ready to believe the truth of his declaration? Would he love her and be true to her always?
“Dorry, say something. Put me out of my misery,” Miles coaxed, lifting a hand and tilting her face so she met his regard. He traced his thumb over her lips until her breathlessness turned into a flame of warmth that shot through her.
He stopped suddenly. “Ah!But I am getting ahead of myself. I should have begun by saying that I am proposing to you now with honest intentions, for I do not need your dowry. Not a single farthing of it.” His eyes danced with joy. “I have received an unexpected inheritance that permits me to come to you on equal terms. I want to marry you for you, Dorothea. Only for you. Not your title, or your wealth, or anything else—just you.”
No amount of lifelong training in keeping her sentiments perfectly in check at all times could prepare Dorothea for the assault on her reason and her emotions. She laughed then, which turned into tears. She covered her eyes, but he took her hands and tucked her fingers into his.
“We can give the entirety of your portion away to the church if you would like and still live comfortably.” His doubt seemed to grow at her silence, because he coaxed again, “Only do say yes.”
She turned to him now, her knees touching his. A smile came to her lips, and although tears still sparkled on her eyelashes, glinting in the sun on its downward path to the horizon, she leaned forward a hairsbreadth.
He seemed to understand. Milesalwaysseemed to understand what it was she wanted. He leaned forward too—just enough so that their lips were almost touching… And then he waited. It didn’t require further thought.
“Yes,” she whispered.
Miles kissed her then. It was not the feathery kiss on her temple or the dry kiss she had always expected she’d be obliged to endure from her husband. This one was leashed passion, as though he had been waiting to do this very thing for ages and ages and had only held back until she gave him leave to do so.
If the feeling of his lips on her temple had destabilized her, the feel of his lips on her own tilted the earth from under her in a dizzying spin. She placed her hand on his chest to steady herself and he covered it with his own, grasping it, not for an instant losing his focus of sweeping her along in a tide of passion and promises of all that would be hers in marrying him.
The horses started forward suddenly, causing him to break away from their kiss. He spared them only a brief glance as he let the team feel his hands on the reins before bringing his full attention back to her. Sounds of voices advancing down a path that cut into theirs signaled an end to their whispered pledge.
He gave the tiniest smile, his eyes still on her. “Yes?” he asked softly, a little crack of vulnerability sounding in his voice.
Her lips were tender in the very best way from having been thoroughly kissed, and she smiled and nodded.
“Yes.”
Epilogue
Summer had come and gone, and with it a much-celebrated wedding in St. George’s Hanover Square with Anne Kensington, Lady Berkley, Lord Pembroke, and enough of thetonin attendance to receive a small paragraph in theGazette,marking it a distinguished affair. Dorothea hadn’t cared about any of that. She concerned herself only with her vow to love and cherish Miles Shaw and to hear him vow the same to her. That—and the kiss that sealed their union as man and wife. And then the kiss after that, and the one after that…
The leaves were beginning to fall and the smell of smoke from a farmer burning them in the distance mingled with the crisp air of autumn. That night they would be having their first white soup of the season for dinner, followed by every tasty dish of venison, pike, sweetmeats, right up until the syllabub she had planned for the guests that were set to arrive that day. Lady Isabelle would also be in attendance that evening, her new footman bringing her by carriage the short distance from the dower house and taking her back the same way.
Dorothea ran to the front door as soon as she heard the line of carriages arriving on the gravel path leading up to their house near Kington. She opened the door before any of the servants could come to it and stood waving and smiling. When the carriages stopped in front of the house, she ran down the stone steps and stood in readiness while the footman opened the door to the carriage that carried her family, while other servants went to remove the trunks from the second carriage.
Lady Poole climbed out first, and Dorothea went over to take her mother’s arm, reaching in to give her a little hug first. This was relatively new in their relationship, and she had initiated the affection on her husband’s encouragement. Her mother seemed to enjoy the embraces, which gave Dorothea the spirit to continue.
“It is a well-looking house,” her mother said, looking up to its roof and then turning to take in the gardens that were visible around it. “Just as you said it was.”
“I am so pleased with it, Mama. But I am even more pleased you are here.” Dorothea turned to greet Joanna and Tilly, who were now standing in front of the carriage. She hugged them both.
“I suppose I shall have to wait for us all to sit and haveteabefore I am allowed to see the stables or the bay mare you have boasted of,” Joanna said with an air of exasperation that—knowing her sister—was more true than she would let on.
“Go,” Dorothea said with a smile. “I am mistress here, and if I say you may miss tea and see the horses, then there is nothing stopping you.”
Miles rounded the corner at that moment and lifted a hand. He was in shirtsleeves, having expected the party to arrive later in the afternoon. He would put on a coat before he joined them in the drawing room, but she enjoyed the sight he presented and grinned at him appreciatively.
